To Those Who Have, More will be Given and to those who Have not...

 

Isaiah 6:1-8, Matthew 25:14-30

            This passage from Matthew is the second of three which contain very hard sayings.  All three talk about a coming judgment time in which some are chosen, and others are rejected.  The passage before this talks about the young maidens who weren’t ready for the bridegroom who were then rejected.  Today’s passage seems to say that those who do not take risks, who do not use the money and talents which God has given them to further God’s kingdom, they will be kicked out.  The passage that follows this in Matthew is the very familiar passage that was preached on last week and it will continue to tell us ways in which if we are not prepared, if we do not risk what we have to the furtherance of God’s kingdom by giving to the less fortunate, visiting the sick and imprisoned, feeding the poor, clothing the naked, that we will not be accepted on that fateful judgement day.  Instead we will be “thrown into the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”  Matthew’s gospel says in so many ways that if the works we perform don’t measure up, we can say goodbye to God’s kindom, and hello to the fiery pits of hell.  Uncomfortable?  You bet.  These sayings of judgment are hard. 

            It’s not that it’s a totally unreasonable story.  To those to whom God has given much, much will be expected.  Those who have skills in building, organizing, healing, teaching; those who have resources such as time, money, energy: God will ask more from them than from those who have less skills or talents, money or time: those who are poor.  And we can live with this.  This shows compassion and understanding – how can those who have little be expected to give much?  But then we hear in this parable “from those who have little, even what they have will be taken away.”  And that is a lot harder to swallow.  The man with the one talent didn’t misuse the money.  He didn’t throw it away.  He didn’t spend it.  He held on to it and returned it in full to his master.  And yet it was taken from him and he was punished.  It feels completely unfair. 

            I will say, though, it seems to me that this story does give a generally accurate description of life here and now.  Another way of saying this might be, “Those who are most in need are the least likely to get what they need.”  Those who are most in need are the least likely to get what they need.

            For example, as we’ve been studying in our anti-racism group, people who have just been released from prison need most work and housing to turn their lives around.  But as you know, one of the questions in many states, on any job application or housing application is “have you ever been arrested for a crime?”  And if you have, chances are you will never see a decent job from the inside.  We understand this, we understand the fear of those doing the hiring.  But it is an example of the reality that those most in need are least likely to get what it is that they need. 

            We know that poor people looking for jobs struggle to find places to live, places to bathe – both of which, again, make it very difficult to get work.  Struggling to obtain food can be a full time job all in itself, and so they also lack the time and often the resources needed to even FIND the jobs.  Often they live far away from a center of town where work might be more available.  How do they get to where the jobs are without money to travel, places to type up applications, etc.?

           Closer to home, I have a very good friend who struggles with clinical depression.  There are times when she is so down that she cannot get out of bed.  It is during those hard times that she is least likely to get the support she needs from her friends.  When she is depressed, her friends sometimes have a hard time being around her because she brings everyone around her down too.  It is hard to want to support her when nothing they do seems to help, and when she is unable to return any energy herself.  It’s understandable.  But it adds to her depression as she feels useless and unwanted by those closest to her.  She is least able to get her needs met when she is most in need.

            Similarly, I cannot tell you how many times I have bought lunch for friends, had church people over for dinner, fed those who do not need me to do that.  But if a really poor person, someone who is really hungry, asks for food, how much harder is it to feed that person a really nice meal?

           Another example: we generally respect our friends and colleagues.  We respect their ability to do what is best for themselves.  They don’t actually NEED our respect, but they have it.  A street person, on the other hand, a person most in need of being treated with humanity, is least likely to receive common courtesy, let alone respect.  We often don’t even pay them the respect of acknowledging them with a hello or a smile.  Let alone answering their request for money, with a simple response of one kind of another.  When we do acknowledge them, we tend to fail to treat them as the full adult human beings they are.  We say we’d like to help, but we don’t trust them with OUR money.  They need our respect, need us to trust that they are capable of deciding what they need most to make it through each cold and lonely night.  They need our caring, but more often they get our judgement.  The poor also need the dignity that comes from being able to work and support themselves.  But while most people would be willing to hire a neighbor teenager to do some chores for us like mow the lawn, if a person who looks poor asks for work, we don’t trust them to do it!  In part I think we don’t trust them BECAUSE they are so needy.  Those who need are the least likely to get what they need.  “To those who have, more is given.  To those who have not, even what they have is taken away.”

            The examples go on and on.  The man in Matthew’s story with the one talent needed courage, he needed faith and reassurance.  He did not have these resources, and so he hid.  When the master returned, instead of being given what he needed, he was thrown out and whon he had reason to fear and mistrust the master.  Hard.  Especially if it means the unfairness of this world will just be increased in the next.

            But you know, I cannot accept this face-value reading of the master in Matthew’s story being God.  The God that I know in the New Testament especially is not greedy and angry with those who don’t make God richer.  The God I see in those around me and who was with us in Jesus is not a reverse Robin Hood who takes from the poor and gives to the rich.  The God I know does not go away without instructions and then return a long time later to punish those who did not read God’s mind about what they were being asked to do.

         Instead the God that I know is the God of love.  The God I meet in Jesus is one who gives and gives, especially to those who lack and are poor.  The God Jesus talks about never leaves, but is with us always, guiding, holding, comforting us along our paths.  And the God of the Gospels is selfless, even to the point of knowing that the cost for his love for us, the cost of his speaking up and stepping up will be his own death.  And even then that same God’s love does not stop but grows and grows to the point at which it overcomes even death and returns again and again with open arms still full of love, hope and grace.  The God we worship and trust is the God who invites us to become a part of creating God’s kindom of family here on earth – invites us, calls us, wants us to work with God to bring a heaven to earth.

        And this to me is where we come back to Matthew’s story.  Because in order to be a part of bringing heaven to earth, we do have to risk all that we have been “lent” by God.  And remember, that is everything we have – all that we have is God’s -entrusted to us for us to be good stewards over.  Like those in the story, we are lent the resources, the talents – all that we have – to use for the betterment of all God’s people.  And in order to be a piece of God’s kingdom, we have to trust God, depend on God, use what we have been lent to serve in gratitude the God who “gave” us everything!  God’s kingdom is here and now.  Do you see it? 

      Like the man offered the one talent, we limit our ability to be part of that kingdom.  I believe the master in Matthew’s story, then, is about how we sometimes envision God, how we try to make God a reflection of who we are, making God in our image, an image of a fearful, greedy, angry populace.  And when that is our image, we exclude ourselves from the life God offers by being fearful, not risking what we have been offered in order to help and serve and care for others.  We are fearful that in risking we will lose all, that in sharing there will not be enough for us.  We imprison ourselves when we choose not to see God’s light, God’s miracles, God’s beauteous renewing of creating each and every day.

            The slave with the two talents and the slave with the five talents saw and believed in a master who was loving and good.  They risked because they trusted.  And in return, they found the love they expected, they were met by a grateful, affirming, generous and loving master, and they shared in God’s kingdom.  The slave with the one talent didn’t just have less.  He chose to see and believe in a harsh master, a master who took what was not his.  As the slave with the one talent said, “I knew you were a harsh master, gathering where you did not plant, and reaping where you did not sow.”  The slave with the one talent put himself out of God’s kingdom by believing that he was out; stuck, helpless, and living under a cruel master.  He ran, out of his fear, into a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth which he created himself through his own beliefs.

         As loving and merciful as God is, this is a choice we make.  Do we choose to hide and protect what we have, believing in a God of wrath who is jealous, angry, greedy, and who just takes and takes from us?  Do we see a God whom we cannot possibly please, and therefore do we stop trying?  Do we see a God who leaves us powerless in a world of crooks and con artists?  Do we choose to live in our own hell of fear, distrust, emptiness and loss?

        Or do we see the God of love?  Do we see a God who has given us everything that we have?  Out of gratitude and joy do we then help to build the kingdom of God for ourselves and others here on earth?  Do we offer those in need the things that they need?  Giving more to those who have not, than to those who have?  In God’s kingdom, here and now, we can offer an unhoused person food or even a couple dollars without fear or loss.  From that place of trust and faith, we can risk inviting someone who needs work to come and trim our bushes or paint our garage.  We can stop and say a kind word to someone who is alone.  We can even take a few minutes to listen to someone’s story.  And through it all, we can choose to see God’s miracles working in those situations.  We see God’s love holding us and each other.  We can live day by day on God’s grace and witness to the living fact that God does provide and care for God’s children.  Out of our abundance, we can be part of creating abundance for others as well, taking what is in front of us and multiplying it.  We are invited and we can be God’s ling and loving kingdom on earth today.

           That’s not to say it’s easy.  From those who have, much is expected.  It will seem to take us more, perhaps, than those who “have not” to feel God’s kingdom around us.  We will need to give more fully in order to be part of God’s kingdom.  But it is there for us, waiting, calling, wanting.

            A young boy and his grandmother were walking along the sea shore when a huge wave appeared out of nowhere sweeping the child out to sea.  The horrified woman fell to her knees, raising her eyes to the heavens and begged God to return her beloved grandson.  And amazingly, another wave reared up and deposited the stunned child on the sand before her.  The grandmother looked the boy over carefully.  He was fine.  But still she stared up angrily toward the heavens.  “When we came,” she snapped indignantly, “he had a hat!”

            Which God do we see?  The God who saved  the child?  Or the God who did not rescue the boy’s hat?  Which world do we choose to be a part of?  A world in which everyone else is out to get us and we just have to hold on and take care of our own by burying what God has given us, keeping it away from the eyes and concerns of the world?  Or a world in which, when we share and give and love, God gives back ten-fold?  God invites us to be part of God’s new and glorious creation.  God wants us to be part of the kingdom here and now.  God hopes for us to trust, and love and live and be joyful.  God calls us to be God’s heaven on earth and to share it with others.

            We pray, God, that a little at a time, you would lead us to risk and enter the kindom which you have prepared for us and which is, by your great grace and love, all around us, all the time.  Amen.

Giving Hearts

 

2 Corinthians 8:1-15

Matthew 14:22-33

               Today’s passage from Corinthians is profound as it talks about a depth of giving that we can only imagine.  “While they were being tested by many problems, (their extra amount of happiness and) their extreme poverty resulted in a surplus of rich generosity…. They gave even more than they could afford and did it voluntarily.” We hear this kind of giving and generosity from Jesus as well.  He says that the widow who gave everything that she had out of her poverty gave so much more profoundly than the rich man who had given substantially more, but out of his abundance.  And we hear Paul refer to it here in terms of Jesus’ own life as well, “You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Although he was rich, he became poor for your sakes, so that you could become rich through his poverty.”  And I wonder if anyone who is hearing this sermon today can really relate to this level of giving, this kind of giving at all.  We here in this place give out of our abundance.  I give out of my abundance, and I know this.  Do we know what it is like to give out of our need?  Have any of you ever given out of a place of great need?  Have you ever been deeply generous in times of want, hunger, or true financial struggle?   And if you have, how did that feel?  What was that like?

               I’ve shared before that studies show that people are so much more generous in their poverty than we are in our comfortable lives and much more so than the rich are in their wealth.  Truthfully, there is an inverse proportion of giving to how much people have.  Greed is a disease that accompanies and intensifies with wealth.  This has been found in study after study.  The more we have, the more we believe we “need.”  We recognize it also in the joke about the poor man who begged God saying that he would happily give 10% of everything he was given if God would just allow him to have a little.  He immediately found a $10 and out of joy turned around and gave $1, his 10%.  He kept doing this and soon found that he was making more money.  When he made $100, he still joyfully gave $10 out of it.  When he made $1000, he gave $100 but it stopped feeling as “joyful” and felt instead more like a duty.  This was even more the case when he made $10,000.  But the time he made $100,000 he started to resent how much money he had to give back.  And when he made his first $1,000,000, the idea of giving $100,000 back was just too much.  So, he went to the priest and asked if there was any way he could get out of his deal with God.  The priest responded, “Well, I don’t think you can get out of your deal.  However, if you only want to give $1, I’m sure God would be more than happy to have you back to making only $10.”

But many of us who have worked with the poor have also experienced how true this is.  I want to share some stories that came out in my lectionary group meeting this week.  One of my group shared about her experience in Nicaragua.  She went down with a group and they ended up visiting a village that was not expecting them.  They came very late in the evening, but the village none the less came out from their tiny one or two room adobe and grass huts, someone killed the village’s only chicken which they cooked for my friend’s group.  The local pastor invited them all to stay in his tiny hut while he stayed on the floor of a neighbor’s home. They all came with an abundance of food, though the group learned that food was scarce here and that people were truly sharing out of their poverty rather than their abundance.  Still, they shared with great joy and celebration.  I had a similar experience in my time in Central America as well.  The giving and the generosity were astonishing.

               Even in this country I have seen and experienced that kind of generosity of our most poor.  Another pastor in our lectionary group shared that her church has been helping a homeless man – providing food, allowing him to be inside the building on the coldest and hottest days and nights, giving him a place out of the elements for a time.  She shared that one day while he was in the building, he found the pew envelopes that all of our churches have.  The man asked what they were for.  My friend shared that they were there so that people could give to the church: these were envelopes for people to donate money to the church.  My friend shared that the man lit up.  He said, “I want to give to the church, too!”  He dug through his pockets and found six cents. Six cents!!  That was all he had in the world.  But with pride and joy, and apparently even a few tears, he put the six cents into the pew envelope and handed it to my friend.  And she found that his giving of this to the church was worth more than the thousands that the richest member of the church gave because again, the unhoused man had given out of his poverty instead of out of his abundance.

               This is not just about giving money, though.  It is giving in all of its forms.  Our church has supported for several years now the Dougbe River Presbyterian School in Liberia.  This school was started by one of my lectionary group friends, Pastor Francis, as well as a member of his congregation, Isaac, who was from that community in Liberia.  They chose to build this school in a very remote region where the people are, again, extremely poor, and where education was not easily accessible.  But the people who began that school came with a few strong rules.  They approached the village and offered to build and support the school, but there were some trade-offs.  There were a few practices that would not be acceptable, ever, for Isaac or for the Presbyterian church supporting this school.  The practice of  female circumcision, and the marrying off of young girls – neither of these practices could continue if they were going to accept the help of the building and supporting of the school.  These were long-standing traditions, practices and rituals of importance in that community.  But it was made clear to the community that these practices had to stop if they wanted this school.  And they chose to do that.  Isaac, again, a member of their community, was able to frame and explain the necessity of these choices in such a way that the people understood the choice they were making and saw their decision as both a way for them to give back and to participate in the work of the Spirit.

               We experience this here now as well.  There are so many people who are choosing to work – especially our health care workers – despite the fact that they know they are putting their own lives at risk in doing so.  I saw a comment this last week that said “Another word for ‘essential’ is ‘expendable’” and what the author meant was that we have put some people in the category of “essential workers” and we are willing to risk their lives for the rest of us who are more privileged to be able to work from the comforts of our homes.  Sometimes there is no choice for those workers and they must do the work they are given to do.  But other times they are choosing to do the work out of love, out of care, and out of a commitment to serve one another.  They are giving out of their abundance of time, energy and love in support of the community.

               But what I find more interesting in all of this is the joy and the love with which people give.  Even more than this, what people discover to be the gift of giving.  The deep, spiritually transformational gift of giving out of poverty.

 One of our group shared a story of taking a very broken shoe of hers to a poor local cobbler when she lived in a tiny village for a few years.  She brought in her shoe and returned in a week to be told that the cobbler had not yet fixed it because he had been tending to a sick relative.  She returned in another week and found that it still was not fixed as the cobbler had had to catch up on other work.  When she came back the third week, the shoe was beautifully fixed.  But when she went to pay for it, the cobbler refused to take payment for it because it had taken him so long.  My friend insisted saying that he had done the work, she had not needed the shoe and she wanted to pay for the hard and beautiful work that had gone into fixing the shoe.   My friend shared that his response was one she will never forget.  He said to her, “Please do not rob me of my opportunity to give to you.” 

And this too matches what we heard from Paul today when he talked about the giving of the Macedonians: “They urgently begged us for the privilege of sharing in this service for the saints.” Paul names this giving by people as the action of God’s grace. And people who give out of their need experience it as such.  It does not feel like they are giving away something that is theirs, depriving themselves of something that they have earned and worked for.  Instead, giving out of need in this way is often experienced as a gift to the giver for two reasons.  First, they recognize that everything we have: our money, our talents, our time – is not ours.  These are resources entrusted to us for the service of all.  We are to be stewards of what is not ours, to share all of it with those who need it most.  But secondly, what people find in giving from that place of great need is that they experience that grace of God through the giving.  They experience trusting and having faith that their gifts will be used for the good of God’s people.  They experience being part of the movement of the Spirit, feeling that Spirit blow around them, through them and within them. 

And that brings us to the gospel reading for today.  When we hear this story, we generally think of the storm and the waves as the enemy out of which Jesus appears.  We usually think of God as being in contrast to the waves, in contrast to the storm.  But what I want to point out to you today is that, as I’ve said before, there is one word in Hebrew – Ruach, that means Spirit, breath and wind.  In today’s story we are told, “Meanwhile, the boat, fighting a strong wind, was being battered by the waves and was already far away from land”.  And so what I want to suggest to you is that perhaps the “kingdom of God” in this case is the storm.  C.S. Lewis in his Narnia stories illustrates the God character, Aslan, as a Lion.  And we are told throughout the series that Aslan is “not a tame lion”.  We want God to be tame, to be easy, to come to us in the stillness (as God does), and ONLY the stillness (which does NOT happen).  It is in the storms themselves that we often see God and are invited by God to step into faith, to step into generosity, and into being the people God calls us to be.  Jesus tells Peter to step out of the boat.  To “Come” onto the water, keeping his eyes on Jesus, despite the strong wind, despite the ways in which the Spirit moves, despite the poverty, or oppression or challenges that each of us must face.  Peter became afraid when he stopped keeping his eyes on Jesus, on the deep and true love of Christ.  That is when we become afraid as well.  Keep your eyes on that love, keep your faith deep and strong, and you will not sink when you step out of the boat, when you take the risk of trusting in the Spirit even when it is not “tame”.  As Augustine said it, “Pray as if everything depended on God.  Act as if everything depended on you.”  Acting is stepping out of the boat.  Acting is taking the risk to live the lives God calls you to live in the storm, because of the storm, for the sake of the Spirit that is the storm.

Step out into risking giving out of your poverty rather than out of your abundance.  Step out no matter that you have limitations and have areas of poverty and are afraid.  Step out of the security of the boat because it is in risking taking that step, giving out of that poverty, and trusting in God’s love for you that you will deepen, grow and become part of being, living, and loving through, within and with the Spirit of God.  Amen.

The Future: Good or Bad?

Isaiah 65: 17-25

Luke 21:5-19

Today we read two different passages talking about the future for the faithful.  What happened in the first passage from Isaiah?  The Isaiah passage describes a glorious future - creation of a new heaven and a new earth.

No more weeping.                               

No more infants dying after a few days.                                       

People living to be a hundred on a regular basis.

People living in the houses they build - (no foreclosures?)

People eating the fruit of their vineyards.

They will survive and enjoy their work.

Their children will do well.

Wolf and lamb will eat together - and the lion will eat straw now: no more stalking prey.

Serpent still cursed (eating dust) but no hurting or killing.

The Luke passage is also talking about the future but what does it say? 

The temple will not stand: those beautiful things built as an offering to God will be destroyed.

Wars, insurrections.

Nation rising against nation,

kingdom against kingdom,

earthquakes, famines, plagues

dreadful portents and great signs.

And before this...you will be arrested, persecuted,

handed over to synagogues and prisons, brought before kings and governors.

Betrayed even by parents, siblings, relatives and friends.

You will be hated.

But.... your soul will be saved.

Two very different versions of what the future looks like.  Why do you think these descriptions are so different?

They were written at different times to different groups of people and reflecting on different events. The passage from Isaiah was written to a group of people who were exiled and to whom Isaiah is declaring that once the injustices have been punished, once the pain they have reaped upon themselves is done, once Israel has repented, arrogance and hypocrisy confronted, and Israel has been cleansed and made new, THEN a new day will dawn, a day of life, a day of hope, a day in which the damaged relationship with God caused by the corruption of human hearts will be bridged by God God-self, made whole once again, made new, and made beautiful.  This is the promise of comfort after the fall, after all that we have done and failed to do, it is the promise of redemption, of grace, and new life, given to a displaced and suffering people.  God has not left them, they are still God’s people, and God will make everything right again.

The passage from Luke, was also written to a suffering people at a time of pain and persecution. But the strategy of Luke here, also wanting to offer comfort, is very different.  Luke has Jesus foreseeing their suffering and declaring that it is not meaningless.  Those Christians suffering persecution after Jesus’ death needed to know that their dedication and commitment to Christ in the face of pain, loss and even death was purposeful and powerful and important.  Their comfort then comes in a different form. Unlike Isaiah’s promise which is of a better life on earth for the faithful and their children, this is instead a promise that their current pain has deep and everlasting meaning, that God has not abandoned them but is with them to the end.  There is the promise of future relief here too, but it has more to do with the immortal soul and less to do with relief from the physical struggles of life.

While appearing to offer very different images of the future, both of these passages are seeking to offer the promise of God’s presence, God’s comfort, and new life.  Both passages are also offering a deep challenge....As commentator R. Alan Culpepper states “in every generation there are those whose religion is simply a form of escapism into the fantasy of futurism, every generation has also had its courageous and prophetic visionaries who devoted themselves completely to Jesus’ call to create community, oppose injustice, work for peace, and make a place for the excluded.  Every generation, therefore, is called back to the teachings of Jesus by the examples of those who have suffered persecution and hardship because they dared to strive to live

out Jesus’ call for a community that transcends social barriers, that cares for its least privileged, and that confronts abuses of power and wealth....(the Luke passage) calls for such a commitment in life that those who dare to embrace it will find themselves persecuted by authorities.”  We know this is true.  Who are the martyrs of our time?  Who are the people in our lifetimes who have really stood up to injustice, really made a stand for others to lead better, more full, more fair, equitable, humane lives?  Not all have been martyred, but many have.  Rosa Parks.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. 

Both of these passages are addressing the need to act for justice, despite all costs.  The entire book of Isaiah offers the challenge to the elite of Israel to stop using and abusing the less well off: to seek justice, knowing that if they don’t everything they have taken will be taken from them, and that if they do, if they repent, if they work for justice, then they will find new life far better than the one they are abusing others to get.  The challenge for those hearing the Luke passage is to walk firmly in the footsteps of Christ, again working to conquer injustice, working for a better world for all, knowing that the cost may be persecution, but that the gain is your very soul. 

Where are we in this?  As Culpepper said it, too many Christians come to church looking solely for the comfort - or as he said - the escape.  How many of you have heard people pray something along the lines of “as we come to this place, let us leave our troubles behind us, let us forget about our worries, let us be relieved of our burdens.”  I’ll own it, I’ve prayed similar things.  It’s present in some of our music, too.  There is a lovely song in our hymnals,  “you are my hiding place.”  But that very line is an example of this escape theology.  “You are my hiding place.”  Is God supposed to be a hiding place?  A place where we HIDE from the world and our problems?  Is our faith about escaping our difficulties?  Because we are called to exactly the opposite.  We are called to stand up to injustice - to be so much a part of making this world a better place for others that we risk persecution, even death.  Our faith if anything should throw us into danger, not pull us into a “safe” hiding place.

Instead of praying to be relieved of our burdens, we need to pray for strength, wisdom and courage to face them.  Instead of a hiding place, maybe we need to pray for places of peace where we can be renewed to face the battle of life again.  Instead of escaping into God, we need to ask God’s guidance for ways in which we can bring God’s kingdom to earth, making it a safe place for all people, making it a just place for all people, making it a good and Godly place for all people.

How do we do this?  By confronting whatever injustices and barriers come before us.  Sometimes this happens in large ways.  My study leave this year involved going to Alabama and learning more about the Civil Rights movement.  It was unbelievable to me how many people risked and lost their lives to stand up for African Americans to have the vote, to be allowed to sit anywhere on the bus, to be able to attend the same schools with the same quality of education that white children were given.  People who simply walked across a bridge who were beaten and killed.  People who simply stood near a school who had fire hoses and dogs set on them.  People who said, “no more” and stood up against injustice.  Again, during this season of voting, I think about the women who also stood up, demanding their right to vote.

As you know, Jack, for example, went down for many years to the US/Mexico border in AZ with a group of Christians who, despite differing political beliefs about immigration issues and laws none the less felt called as “neighbors” to help the large number of people - children, youth, adults of all ages, who die crossing the border because of dehydration.  They went to the border during the hottest weeks of the summer and simply set up a camp to provide water for those who otherwise would die in the heat.  They did nothing else.  They did not “aid” those trying to get into the country, nor did they turn them in.  But they saved lives by being present, being loving, providing water.  And while they were “persecuted” - harassed by the border patrol, threatened with arrest and worse, they stood in their faith and in their belief that we are called to love all people, to care for all people: in doing so they stood up for their faith. 

The ways in which we stand in our faith do not have to be so dramatic.  Serving food, providing shelter at the Winter’s Nights or Loaves and Fishes programs.  Recycling and composting so we are not contributing as much to the earth’s destruction.  Voting in ways that work to end homelessness and poverty in this country and others.  Being present at vigils, protests, assemblies: standing up for what we believe, but more, standing up for God’s people who do not have voices in the ways that we do....we are called to do that, to be part of that in every way that we can, with every opportunity that presents itself to us.

Is there comfort here?  Of course.  Both today’s passages were offering comfort though in different ways.  The Isaiah passage reminds us that God is by our side and that the other side to hard times is a life of renewal and refreshment - following the repentance and the work towards wholeness.  The Luke passage reminds us that when we do struggle for others, in the name of God, in the name of Jesus, in the name of love for neighbor and enemy alike, that we gain our very souls.  It is in this that our lives have meaning.  It is in this that we find real love.  It is in this that we meet God.  Amen.

And Love One Another...

It's all that easy, and all that hard!

Micah 6:8

John 13:31-35

Early on in my ministry I worked as an associate pastor in a church in which many AA and 12 step meetings were held.  One such meeting was a weekly Alateen group for teens whose lives have been affected by alcohol. One night a 14 year old girl was dropped off at the church for the Alateen meeting, only to discover that she was a day early for the meeting.  I found her standing in the door of the church looking lost, looking confused, looking scared.  I asked her if I could help her and she said she needed a ride home.  This girl lived with her single mother on the other side of the city, a good 40 minute drive away, and her mother had dropped her at the church on her way to work.  The girl had expected to get a ride home with another friend who attended the meeting, but since she had come on the wrong day she now had no way to get home.  I was scheduled to lead a session meeting that evening, so I went into the meeting and asked if any of the elders might be willing to forego the meeting that evening in order to give the girl a ride home. Can you guess what they said?

The response was unanimous: “That girl could be a car-thief.  That girl could be a con-artist.  “That girl could be carrying a gun or a knife and just waiting for a chance to stab somebody.”

I was floored.  They hadn’t even seen this 14 year old girl, but if they had, I knew it would not have helped her because as she had piercings and tattoos and she would have, for them, only confirmed their stereotypes and reinforced their fears.  I gently suggested that this might be an opportunity to help this girl have a new understanding of what it might mean to be part of a Christian community.  But I was greeted with the response, “God didn’t call us to be stupid.”  I asked if anyone would then be willing to pay for a cab for her.  No, they said, that would be putting the cab driver at risk, they couldn’t afford to pay the cab, what if it was a scam and she and/or the cab driver ran off with the money, or worse, spend it on alcohol.

I was surprised.  I was also very tempted to throw some scripture at them.  Wasn’t every parable and story about Jesus a story of loving to the point of risking his life until finally his very life was in fact taken away?  And weren’t we then called on time and again by scripture to go and do like-wise?  In fact, there is nothing in scripture, not one word, that supports playing it safe.  Where people are in need, when people ask for our help, we are called on to risk everything to love them.

Maybe when you heard this story, you, too, felt the indignation which I felt on that day.  Why wouldn’t these Christians, these elders in the church, help this young girl?  But what if I were to change the story a little?  What if, instead of a 14 year old girl, the person asking for help was a 14 year old boy?  Or a 17 year old boy?  What if, instead of a young person, it was a full grown adult male?  What if that adult male, threateningly or differently dressed were disheveled?  Dirty?  Drunk?  And yet, what Jesus calls us to do for a young, innocent looking girl, Jesus calls us to do for every person who comes to us in need.  And while at that juncture, I felt indignant and angry, the truth is that not very many of us, with exceptions such as Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa, Ghandi, and a few saintly people among our own acquaintances, live up to this commandment.  I don’t stop on the freeway when someone looks like they need help, because I am afraid.  I don’t offer homeless people beds in my home.  And it makes sense that I don’t.  It makes sense that we don’t.  For these activities are dangerous.  What the elders at my church said was true.  It is possible that they would have been putting their very lives at risk to care for this girl as when we care for anyone with the love of Christ.   Not only is this hard for us to do, it is hard for us to support others doing this.  I don’t want the people I love taking those chances or risks.

But when I look at scripture what I see is a path of love that lead Jesus to the cross.  And Jesus told us to follow him in that path of loving, even to the cross – literally, not figuratively.  Loving is not easy. While referring to his own love as that of a mother hen, Jesus refers to Herod as a fox.  And as we know, the fox will get the chicken, foxes do get chickens that come in front of the, and Jesus was killed.  If we too care about the world as a mother hen cares for her chicks, if we too would go out and meet the fox face to face to protect others, if we too would love to the point of putting ourselves in the path of a fox, we too risk death.  Loving is not easy.

      At another church where I served, the congregants were intimately involved with a program that served the homeless.  Through our work and through our time with the homeless people in our community, we developed a very close relationship with one homeless man in particular.  This man was very loving, very giving, very caring.  He began attending our church and when he did so, he offered to run our sound system, he helped with the gardening, and he was always on hand to help us in any way.  He was not unintelligent, but he was a severe alcoholic who could not seem to get through the disease to a place where he could give up drinking.  He would give it up for a week or two and then something would happen and he would be drinking again.  We saw him fight for his life against this disease and we saw him losing the battle.  Because we cared for him, as well as the other people on our church campus, we set boundaries and he was not allowed to be on campus while drinking or intoxicated, a boundary he both understood and respected.  Still, it did not help him in his fight against the disease.  At one point in our relationship with George, his drinking led him to fall and to hit his head very seriously on the street.  The police found him hours later and took him to the local hospital.  His injuries, especially to his brain, were very serious and he was admitted.  However, when the nurses and doctors at the hospital came to understand that he was a homeless, income-less, resource-less man, they gave up caring for him.  He remained at the hospital for quite a while, because he was unable to walk a straight line, he could not speak clearly and had very little control over his movements.  But in large part he was at the hospital for so long because they would not provide the care to get him to a place where they could discharge him.  The only time that George really received any attention – the only time he would be brought his meals even – was when one of us was there to insist on it.  This was a “Christian” hospital, and the doctors and nurses who were hired to work there were, we were told, people of faith.  But they did not see the contradiction in their faith when they served their charges according to their resources, rather than according to their needs. 

       This is NOT how Jesus acted.  And it is not what Jesus calls us to do.  Despite the reaction of those around him, including his disciples, Jesus found time to be present with “the least of these” every time.  He gave of his healing, of his energy, of his attention, even to those who didn’t somehow “rank” or “deserve” it. 

This Sunday I’m inviting you to join me in a benediction and charge which was written by Bruce Reyes-Chow that ends with the phrase; “Care for one another and love one another.  It is all that easy and it is all that hard.”  Mostly, I think, loving one another as Christ loves us is hard.  We are called to see one another as we really are.  We are called to be good news to the poor and liberation to the oppressed.  We are called to be willing to lay down our lives for one another, even as Jesus laid down his life for us.

So where is the good news in this for us?  Well first, we aren't called to fix the world, but only to do what God puts in front of us.  I found this quote from the Talmud this week that I just love, "Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief.  Do justice, now.  Love mercy, now.  Walk humbly, now.  You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it."  Amy Grant puts it this way, "As you daily recreate me, help me always keep in mind, that I only have to do what I can find."  The burden of fixing the world is not on any one of us.  We already have a savior.  Our call is simply to do what needs to be done that is in front of us each moment.

Also, the good news is that loving is itself the greatest most fulfilling experience we can be given by God.  It’s not easy, just as loving any real person with all their quirks and foibles and challenges is not always easy.  But it is rewarding to care about others, to see them grow, to be part of changing and helping lives.  Not only is the gift of loving its own reward.  When we are able to love like this, I believe we are given the ability to see God.  We see God’s face in those we love, we experience God’s grace through the act of loving.  We experience God’s resurrection in seeing lives change and grow. We grow in our ability to love and we become more wholly ourselves and wholly God’s people. 

It is not easy to be a Christian.  We are required to love with our whole beings, with our total selves.  But loving and the ability to love ever more fully and deeply is its own reward and promise.  Amen.

Sunday's Sermon - "And love one another; it is all that easy and it is all that hard."

Luke 13:31-35, John 13:31-35
May 10, 2015, Mother’s Day

After God created Adam and Eve, one of the first things God said to them was “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” Adam replied.
“Don’t eat the forbidden fruit.”
“Forbidden fruit?  Really?  Where is it?”
“It’s over there,” God said, wondering why God hadn’t stopped after making the elephants.
A few minutes later God saw the kids having an apple break and God was angry.  “Didn’t I tell you not to eat that fruit?”  the first parent asked.
“Uh huh,” Adam replied.
“Then why did you?”
“I don’t know,” Adam answered.
God’s punishment was that Adam and Eve should have children of their own…
---
It is not easy to love even our own kids all the time, and as we know, not every parent does it well.  Mother’s day can be a really hard day for a lot of people as they reflect on their childhoods.  It can also be a hard day for a lot of women who wanted babies but couldn’t have them, or who lost them, or who raised kids but struggled to be good moms.  Far too many children suffer abuse, neglect or simply an absence of love at the hands of their parents.  While we cannot condone this behavior from any parent, I think there are moments in every parent’s experience when they have a slight understanding of what might lead to the tragedies of abuse.  Even the best parents suffer disobedience and rejection at one time or another at the hands of their children.  When we tell our children “no” to something they really want, it is not uncommon for a child to strike out.  Even toddlers push parents away with angry tears.  For parents of many teenagers the words, “I hate you” are not unfamiliar.  Jesus described this experience well when he said in the Luke passage, “How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings and you were not willing!”  And yet Jesus continued to act loving.  Good parents continue to care and love their kids even when they are rejected, even when their children disobey.  It is not easy, but it is part of parenting.
Parenting is hard for another reason.  A good parent will risk anything to protect their child.  When we love, we want to protect them just as Jesus wanted to gather the children of Israel to himself as a hen with her brood, protecting them from the foxes in that society.  And this protection is impossible.  We cannot protect our children from every bad thing.  There are horrible things out there; kids shooting other kids, pedophiles, murderers, kidnappers.  More universally, all children get their hearts broken, get sick and suffer disappointments.  Even though sometimes these trials help kids to grow and be strong, every time my child hurts, a part of me dies.  We lose parts of ourselves daily in the process of loving as a parent.  It is hard to love in this way, and as I said before, not every parent is capable of this kind of love for their children.
In today's passage from Luke, Jesus describes God’s love for us as the love of a mother hen gathering her chicks in to herself.  In the John passage, Jesus refers to his followers as little children and then proceeds to ask them to love one another as he loved them.  Jesus asks us to love one another with God’s love.  The closest we can come to understanding the depth of this love is to compare it with the kind of love we have as parents for our children.  Even a parent’s love falls short of what God asks, but it is the closest we have in human understanding for the kind of love God asks, and expects us to return to God by loving one another.  But this is hard.  It is hard to love our own children well, and it becomes increasingly challenging when we apply this to others, to strangers, to enemies.  But it is something we are called on to do as Christians.  It is also something we promise to do every time we baptize someone.  We promise to help raise the child, or adult, in the way of Christ, a promise we can only keep by loving with the depth of love of a good parent.  Even beyond the bounds of our membership and baptism, we are called to “love our neighbors” with the same love Jesus had for us; the deep love that we are closest to experiencing when we love our children.  And in this way, because of those promises, every one of us is a parent, a mother, to everyone else in this room.
I worked for a while as an associate pastor in a church in which many AA meetings were held.  One such meeting was a weekly AA group for teens.  One evening during a session meeting at the church, a teenage girl, about 13 years old, interrupted the meeting, asking for help.  I went outside to talk with her and she told me that she had thought the teen AA meeting was held that evening when in fact it was scheduled for the following night.  She lived about 20 miles away and had no way to get home.  When I returned to the session meeting I asked if any of the members would be willing to forego the rest of the session meeting to take her home.  The response was that no one knew the girl.  She had admitted in the very act of looking for the AA meeting that she was an alcoholic.  What other problems did she have?  She could be a thief.  She could be desperate.  She could be lying.  She could be a murderer.  It wasn’t safe to take that kind of risk.  I asked if anyone would then be willing to pay for a cab for her.  No, they said, that would be putting the cab driver at risk, they couldn’t afford to pay the cab, what if it was a scam and she and/or the cab driver ran off with the money, or worse, spent it on alcohol.
I was surprised.  I was also very tempted to throw some scripture at them.  Wasn’t every parable and story about Jesus a story of loving to the point of risking his life until finally his very life was in fact taken away?  And weren’t we then called on time and again by scripture to go and do like-wise?  In fact, there is nothing in scripture, not one word, that supports playing it safe.  Where people are in need, where people ask for our help, we are called on to risk everything to love them.
Maybe when you heard this story, you, too, felt the indignation which I felt on that day.  Why wouldn’t these Christians, these elders, help this young girl?  But what if I were to change the story?  What if I were to tell you that she was dressed all in leather with dark make-up on her face and a spiky dog-collar-like band around her neck and wrists?  What if, instead of a 13 year old girl, the person asking for help was a 13 year old boy?  What if, instead of a young person, it was a young adult?  What if that adult male, threateningly or differently dressed were disheveled?  Dirty?  Drunk?  And yet, what Jesus calls us to do for a young, innocent looking girl, Jesus calls us to do for every person who comes to us in need.  And while at that juncture, I felt indignant and angry, the truth is that not very many of us, with exceptions such as Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa, Ghandi, and a few saintly people among our own acquaintances, live up to this commandment.  I don’t stop on the freeway when someone looks like they need help, because I am afraid.  I don’t offer homeless people beds in my house.  And it makes sense that I don’t.  It makes sense that we don’t.  For these activities are dangerous.  What the elders at my church said was true.  It is possible that they would have been putting their very lives at risk to care for this girl as when we care for anyone with the love of Christ.   Not only is this hard for us to do, it is hard for us to support others doing this.  I don’t want the people I love taking those chances or risks.
But when I look at scripture what I see is a path of love that lead Jesus to the cross.  And Jesus told us to follow him in that path of loving, even to the cross – literally, not figuratively.  Loving is not easy.  While referring to his own love as that of a mother hen, Jesus refers to Herod in this passage as a fox.  And as we know, the fox will get the chicken, foxes do get chickens that come in front of the, and Jesus was killed.  If we too care about the world as a mother hen cares for her chicks, if we too would go out and meet the fox face to face to protect others, if we too would love to the point of putting ourselves in the path of a fox, we too risk death.  Loving is not easy.
Every Sunday you participate in a benediction and charge which ends with the phrase; “Care for one another and love one another.  It is all that easy and it is all that hard.”  Mostly, I think, loving one another as Christ loves us, loving one another as a parent loves, is hard.  We are called to see one another as we really are.  We are called to be good news to the poor and liberation to the oppressed.  We are called to lay down our lives for one another, even as Jesus laid down his life for us.
So where is the good news in this?  The good news is that loving is itself the greatest most fulfilling experience we can be given by God.  Loving as a parent loves a child is a deep love like nothing else one can experience.  Loving my kids is truly the greatest gift I have been given.  There is a woman I know who has been unable to conceive.  Every mother’s day she avoids church because hearing about how wonderful mothers are reminds her of her own inability to become a mother.  Her story is not unique.  And she would not experience such despair and loss were it not the case that the deep love one experiences in being a parent is its own reward.  I tell you this not to say that we shouldn’t celebrate the gift of motherhood because we should.  We do need, however, to celebrate that gift in a way that is still loving for individuals who find mother’s day a challenging holiday.  And while I do not want to diminish her loss or the loss o others in her situation, I think that in spite of that loss we are still all called to love one another to the depth of a parent loving a child.  And I believe that in every case where we learn to truly love to the depths of our being, the loving itself is more fulfilling and rewarding gift than we can imagine.  Even when that love is not returned, real love is a gift to the lover.
Not only is the gift of loving its own reward.  Also, when we are able to love like this, I believe we are given the ability to see God.  We see God’s face in those we love, we experience God’s grace through the act of loving.  We experience God’s resurrection.  Every time I die a little in loving my children and experiencing their pain, I am born again stronger, with a greater ability to love my kids, with a greater ability to love others.
It is not easy to be a Christian.  We are required to love with our whole beings, with our total selves.  But loving and the ability to love ever more fully and deeply is its own reward and promise.