You Are What You See

               "You are what you see."  This is a quote that I was told came originally from Thick Nhat Hanh but as I tried to clarify this online, it seems many people have said this, and with good reason.  Psychologists say that what we internalize through life, media or other parts of life can deeply affect who we are, what we believe, and how we function in this life time.  I read an article in Psychology Today that named the deep effects on a person's psyche of watching too much negative news.  Watching negative news can lessen our sense of joy, increase anxiety, and lead to deep depression. Similarly, there are numerous studies that show watching too much violent TV or engaging in violent video games encourages children and adults to act out that violence in their lives.  Considering how much time people spend watching violent TV or playing violent video games, is the increasing rage and violence in our country surprising?

           There is a common misperception that if you are feeling angry, you can dispel those feelings by acting out violence towards non-human targets (punching bags, pillows, shooting images through a video game).  In fact, the opposite has been found to be true.  Once you begin to act out violence towards ANYTHING, the possibility of becoming violent towards the living beings around you increases. That is a consistent finding.  Psychologists knew this 40 years ago (I remember learning it in my psychology classes in college) and studies continue to bear out this finding, yet people still claim they are "getting OUT their anger" through violence when instead their behaviors increase those feelings and violent tendencies. When we see, feel, hear or act out violence, even if it is aimed at inanimate or video objects, we increase the violence of our own beings and our own tendencies to harm others.

            This also manifests in what news we watch.  While we choose our news channels based on our beliefs, at the same time it becomes circular in that the stories we hear and see reinforce and tend to cement us into the beliefs we already had.  They make us who we are as much as we choose them because of who we are.

            Still, today I heard the phrase, "you are what you see" differently.  While I believe that what we see, what we engage with our eyes, our ears and our actions (such as playing violent video games) does change how we interact with the world, I also heard and understood this phrase at a deeper level.  We have choices about how we see the events around us.  We make decisions about how we interpret events.  As I have shared before, I knew someone who regularly said that every action of every person was a play for power.  I don't agree with her that this is true of everyone.  I do see that it is true of her own behaviors.  She projected onto the world her own internal reality.  She chose to see the world through the lens of others' playing for power and as a result, this "sight" of hers effected everything that she did as well and encouraged her choices to continue to be plays for power. 

    I am very close to a few people who have a condition that is a common part of ADHD called Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria.  Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria affects the way in which they see the world in that they experience perceived slights as rejection.  This may sound familiar to some of you who may experience this in your own lives as well.  Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria means that if someone forgot to invite you to something, or didn't look at you while they were speaking, or said something in a way that could have been perceived as a slight, even if that was never the intention, you assume you are being rejected, you assume you aren't liked and aren't valued.  While this is a common part of ADHD, there is still some choice in this.  There are activities that encourage those with this condition to consider other possibilities for the behavior they saw as rejection.  If these activities are practiced with regularity, they can change the way the person sees and interacts with the world.  

       Another example: Once a person starts seeing the world as divided into "good" and "bad" it is easy to see that mirrored in the world.  By "easy," I mean just that.  Considering why a person or group of people behave in a certain way takes effort, it takes work to refrain from casting certain people or groups of people as "bad guys."  It also usually means a person has to be more self-reflective and look at their contributions to the negative behaviors in the world, and that can be very painful.  But that effort, that work is deeply worthwhile as we strive to heal the world, bring peace to the world, create a better world, and become more whole people ourselves.

       What do we choose to engage in with our eyes, our ears, our time?  Do we choose to invite into our beings the violence that is so prevalent on TV or in video games, or even in the news?  Do we try to balance the negative news we hear with positive news, reminding ourselves that there still is good in humanity and in the world?  (Because that is the solution here: ignoring the news is not a good option.  Choosing to balance it out with positive stories is more effective as well as healthier.) But more, how do we choose to see the world?  And can we choose to see with eyes of grace, compassion and love?  If we make that choice, how will our behaviors, and our very souls be impacted and effected?  I believe this choice would change each of us, and in doing so, has the potential to change the world for the better.  

Was Blind But Now I See

Psalm 27

John 9:1-41

2/27/22

           How many of you would consider yourselves skeptical people?   I freely admit, I am a skeptical person, or rather, I’m a person who looks at things seriously before just blindly accepting them.  That doesn’t mean I’m not open to learning about some new or even old belief system that those around me think is important.  Growing up here in the Bay Area, I have known and still do know people who are into many different spiritual practices and as I’ve gotten to know these folk, I’ve taken the opportunity to learn about their beliefs and to try to understand why they believe what they do.  So, I’ve learned about Christian Scientist beliefs, I’ve learned about many of the new age beliefs such as Tarot cards, crystals, past lives, astrology and all sorts of stuff that those around me and perhaps some of you hold as dear, true and important.  I’ve listened to my friends’ experiences, but then I’ve also done reading, and studying, trying to understand.  I had a minor in religious studies in my undergraduate schooling because I wanted to know how these beliefs came to be, how they held up, how they measured up.  But more than that, I think some of the major questions that carried me through my learning about other faiths were: In the face of adversity what do these beliefs offer? In the face of suffering how deep do the beliefs go?  And most importantly, do these beliefs promote God’s love and life or do they, in the end, no matter how interesting or “true” a belief may seem on the surface, actually contribute to human suffering, to death, or to a pulling away from the God of life and love? 

          For example, I have an acquaintance who was very into Tarot cards and used them as a guide for daily life.  Generally, this didn’t seem to do too much harm.  But one day her dog became very ill.  Consulting the Tarot cards, the death card emerged.  Because she absolutely depended on the tarot cards to tell her “truth” she did nothing for the dog, assuming that it was set by fate that the dog would die.  Fortunately, her husband did not feel the same, took the dog to the vet and after a few weeks on antibiotics, the dog was fine - and continued to be fine for many years.  Her absolute unfailing belief in the tarot cards blinded her to her options, to choosing life, not only for herself, but also for her dog and for those around her who loved her dog. 

            Another example: I have a friend who believes absolutely in Karma and by “Karma” he means that people who are suffering are suffering because of something they have done: if not in this life, then in a past life.  Because he believes this, absolutely, he will not help those who are suffering, those who are poor, because he believes they must reap the consequences of their karma and if he helps them now, they will have to live through more pain in their next life.

            Personality charts - whether they are determined by the stars or even by tests, can have the same unfortunate effects.   It is possible that they may help us gain understanding about ourselves or others.  Personally, I’m a big fan of the Enneagram which is a spiritually developed understanding of our personalities that can allow us to know ourselves more fully.  But I find that often the people who refer to these personality charts end up using them as a weapon, to box people in, to judge people, to decide who they are and what is best for them as well as themselves.  Another example, I met an acquaintance some years back who would not consider being my friend until she had my astrology chart done.  According to my astrology chart, I am a “popular” person who is shallow, into clothing and jewelry, and because of these shallow values, I can’t stay in a relationship of any kind long term.  My chart said some other interesting things as well, but these were the points which struck my new acquaintance.  It didn’t matter that I pointed out to her that I’d had the same best friend since child-hood as well as other long term close relationships or that all of my clothing was either hand-me-downs or gifts because I don’t have an eye for or even care very much about what things look like as long as they fit.  She had read my “chart” and decided that the stars had determined who I was – a person not fit to be her friend. 

         Another friend of mine chose when to get pregnant based on astrological charts, wanting certain specific personality traits for her children.  One of her children is a Taurus and though she is the least stubborn person in their family, my friend insists that she is the most stubborn because of when she was born.  She can’t see her daughter for who she really is, but instead allows these charts to tell her who her daughter is.  When we do this, we can fail to really see who is in front of us, and even the possibilities for ourselves about who we can be, and who we are called to be. 

         The truth is, there is danger in any belief system if it is adopted without constant question, without growth, without study, without vigilance against “magic” thinking and superstition.  Fundamentalist or legalistic thinking from any religion is dangerous.

          None of the major religions are exempt from the possibility of this kind of superstition either.  Christianity too, risks the danger of falling into that kind of magic thinking.  Prosperity theologians tells us, for example, that if we only do x,y,or z then God will bless us and our families.  This is a magic formula which will supposedly produce magic results.  In the Old Testament, especially perhaps, we are presented with many of these magic ways of thinking.  One of the early magic beliefs is reflected in today’s passage from John which shows an old but faithfully held belief at the time that any kind of disability in a person was proof that either that person or their parents were sinners.  This kind of magic thinking offered much - it offered stability, even offered comfort because it explained things and gave an impression of control in one’s life that otherwise would have been hard to claim.  All you had to do to ensure that you would not get sick, struggle with a terrible disability, produce children born blind or with another disability was to follow the laws to a tee, to be without sin yourself.  And since none of us is capable of perfection in our lives, when something did go wrong, it was easy to find the cause in our own behavior. This gave the illusion of absolute control in an uncontrollable world. Everything was “fair” in this world because anything bad that happened was a result of your own sin.

            But we now understand that sin is usually not the cause of disease, natural disasters, or disabilities.  Of course, there are exceptions: if a mother does not take care of herself nutritionally or in other ways when pregnant and this leads to a disability in the child, we could say our sin caused the disability.  But Jesus here quickly points out that disability is not always caused by sin, and it is not our place to make those judgment calls as regards other people.  Again, this kind of magic thinking, and this holding of unscrutinized beliefs, even in Christianity, can lead away from life, and instead to condemnation, to judgment, and to hurtful, life-harming actions.

          Generally speaking, then, I think that skepticism can be healthy - it can lead to truth, or steer a person away from magic thinking, from unfair judgments on others, from superstitions.

          However, as science also teaches us, things that are observed, are scrutinized, are watched, are also changed in the very act of being observed.  There is danger at times in being too skeptical, too questioning.  For the study itself changes the thing being studied.  When we question another’s experience, we can cheapen their experience.  We can reduce God-infused, meaningful life events down to facts, to cold hard “truth” that is empty of beauty, empty of purpose, empty of life.

          In today’s scripture lesson, this is what has happened.  A miracle had taken place - a blind man had found sight.  But instead of finding themselves touched by the joy, the beauty, the amazing gift of this new life, the truth present in the miracle that comes to each of us every morning we wake, every day we allow something new to change us at all, instead of this, the Pharisees needed facts.  Interestingly, it wasn’t the miracle happening that caused their skepticism.  It was the fact that Jesus performed the miracle that caused their discomfort and discontent.  Jesus was not legalistic, he did not adhere to the Old Testament rules surrounding what could and could not be done on the Sabbath, he did not fit into their image of what constituted a holy man, and because of their rules, and their ways of ordering and understanding the world, some of the Pharisees could not accept that Jesus was a man of God who could help another person to see.  So, they questioned, they grilled, they took some of the joy and life from the man who was given the gift of sight by insisting on questioning him again and again, finally criticizing him, discounting him, and rejecting him.  Ironically, in their search for “truth,” they lost the meaning of the event completely, they lost the joy of the new life, they lost the gift of wonder and awe, and instead found themselves mired not only in fighting with each other, but in blindness to the wondrous and beautiful presence of God around them.

          In the movie "Chocolat" those people who represent truth in the form of rules, those who stay in a way of life that is tranquil or correct, those who embrace cold hard fact, none the less are the very people who act without love.  They gossip, they pass on “truths” with a judgment that leads to the shunning of others.  They tell the “truth” through eyes that see anything that doesn’t fit into their rules as wrong and in need of correction.  They don’t welcome the stranger.  One of the men who represents this way of life beats his wife.  But then he dares still to call the wanderers who come into his town “animals” and he refuses to allow them into his place of business.  He eventually sets fire to their boats, destroying property and threatening lives.  In contrast, those in the movie who didn’t follow in the path that is expected, who didn’t follow the rules, welcomed in the woman who had been beaten, visited the strangers and gave them work.  They invited laughter, friendship, care.  They invited life.  That’s not to say that they were perfect or without sin.  But in the bigger scheme of things, it was the outcasts who invited life and love into the town, and it was the people who were following the rules who failed to act with love.  In the end, the outcast and rejected even welcome those who have persecuted them; they even offer to the one who would throw them out care and comfort.

          I have shared with you before the story of how the hymn “Amazing Grace” came to be written, but it is worthy of repeating, especially in light of today’s scripture.  John Newton was the captain of a slave ship when slavery was profitable and “popular” among the elite.  But after several years he went through a conversion experience.   After his experience he went to seminary to become a pastor and developed a more Christian understanding of slavery.  He came to see it for the evil it is and to condemn it and fight against it. 

   He became a pastor to other sailors, teaching them about God’s love for all and God’s hatred of slavery or anything that oppresses and hurts God’s people.  His song “Amazing Grace” is autobiographical as he talks about the blindness that kept his focus on money and fame rather than on the love that God would have us share.  “I was blind, but now I see” is probably the most famous line in the song, in part because most of us have experiences of enlightenment at one point or another, in which the values we held, the lifestyles we’ve adopted, or the beliefs we have held onto so tightly break in the face of hard but deep truths.  These truths are sometimes beautiful, sometimes they are ugly.  But at some level, the very reaching of those truths can set us free to live differently, can set us free to see, really see God’s presence and life all around us.  In the case of John Newton, it forced a complete change in his life and he became an advocate for God’s justice for all people. 

So what is this truth we are called to face?  This truth we are called to see?  The truth is love; the truth is that we are called to be part of that love, the truth is that it changes us, all of us for the better.  The truth is God’s love was and is incarnate around us if we have eyes to see, ears to hear, and a mind open to receiving it. 

For one Faith and Film night we showed the movie "Spit Fire Grill."  For those of you who haven’t seen it, it is a wonderful and thought-provoking movie about redemption, and forgiveness, among other things.  In it the main character, Percy, comes to a small town looking for work after having just been released from prison.  While we don’t know the details of her experience until pretty close to the end of the movie, we do know that the conviction which landed her in prison was for manslaughter.  But while she is, by every standard, someone to be feared, someone to avoid, someone about whom we should have the greatest suspicion, she has an uncanny way of bringing new life, hope, and strength into the lives of those around her.  Her nemesis in the movie, though, Nahum, cannot see beyond his preconceived ideas of what this foreigner, this ex-con, this stranger must be like.  He cannot get past his skepticism, his cynicism, his fear for what she will bring to his family and his town.  As a result of his actions trying to prove her the villain he believes her to be, his life is lessened and eventually other life is lost as well.  He believed himself to be standing in truth while all around him were blind.  But his skepticism blinded him to beauty, it blinded him to love, it blinded him to opportunity, and in the end, it just plain blinded him to real truth.  His facts were correct - she was an ex-con, convicted of manslaughter and a foreigner to their town.  But the truth went deeper than those facts.  In the end he faced that truth, but not before a huge cost had been paid.

I think the pastor in "Chocolat" in his Easter homily sums it up very well.  He says this:

“I’m not sure what my homily should be.  Do I want to speak of the miracle of our Lord’s divine transformation?  Not really, no.  I don’t want to talk about his divinity.  I’d rather talk about his humanity.  I mean, how he lived his life here on earth: his kindness, his tolerance.  Listen, here’s what I think: I think we can’t go around measuring our goodness by what we don’t do, by what we deny ourselves, by what we resist and who we exclude.  I think we’ve got to measure goodness by what we embrace, what we create and who we include.”

            It’s not an easy journey to put aside our preconceived ideas of what people, what God, what you and I are like.  But when we can, when we can put aside magic formulas, boxes and judgments, when we can put aside our fear of the things that don’t fit neatly into our categories, we are free to be God’s people, a people of light, a people of sight, a people of hope, and a people of love.  Amen.

Choice

Ephesians 1:1-14

Mark 6:14-29

               Today in the narrative lectionary we begin a look at the book of Ephesians.  And for today what I want to say about this passage is simply that it is in many ways the elevator version of Christianity.  It talks about our being chosen first by God, our adoption, redemption, forgiveness, grace, mystery; the pleasure and plan of God for all to be gathered in, inheritance, the seal of the Holy Spirit.  But to be honest, as I looked over the passages for today, I felt much more called to focus on this very disturbing passage from Mark.  So, we will be discussing that today.  And what I want to look at in particular is this idea that Herod had, this belief that Herod had no choice but to behead John the Baptist. 

We know this story.  He imprisoned John the Baptist, and according to this story in Mark, it was because John had told him that he had acted unlawfully when he had married his son’s wife.  But at the same time as he had imprisoned him, it was also clear that he valued John the Baptist.  Herod was getting something from that relationship, it was freeing for him, it was teaching him, it was touching him.  He respected John.   

Then we come to the second part of the story.  His daughter, Herodius, dances for Herod and his guests.  Herod is so pleased that he says to her “ask me for anything and I will give it to you.”  Herodius asked her mother and her mother asked for John the Baptist’s head.  Now here is the interesting part.  The story says, “although the king was upset, because of his solemn pledge and his guests, he didn’t want to refuse her.  So he ordered a guard to bring John’s head. The guard went to the prison, cut off John’s head, brought his head on a plate, and gave it to the young woman, and she gave it to her mother.”

Herod believed that he had no choice.  He had no choice but to take a man’s life, an innocent life; a life, furthermore, that he greatly valued.  Now we can go into the specifics of why he felt this way.  We can talk about shame culture and the huge consequences he would have faced if he had done anything differently.  We can talk about what it means to have choice in this situation.  But regardless of whether you feel he did the right thing or the wrong thing for his place in that time and in that situation, the fact still remains that he had a choice to make and he made it, despite the things he told himself about lack of choice.

As I read this story, a Joan of Arcadia scene came to mind in which God asks Joan to play chess.  She joins the chess club at school and ends up beating the school chess champion though she really does not understand how to play the game.  Other disasters happen in which she is a part and finally she ends up in a chess game against God.  She still doesn’t really know how to play chess, but she sits down to begin.  She says,

“I don’t really know how to play chess.”

God responds, “Well, that’s fairly obvious.” 

“You know, God, for once I’m very glad to see you…  Because my life is completely unravelling.  I’m up to my eyeballs in the drama of the high school mating ritual and now, thanks to you, I’ve been mistaken as the high school chess champion.  How did this happen to me?”

“Which part?”

“How did I beat that kid at chess?”

“He was using logic.  You weren’t.  it’s impossible to guard against chaos.  It’s rare but it happens. Black’s move.”

“I don’t want to.” But even as she says this, she picks up her pawn and moves it.  “I don’t know how to play this game,” she says again.

“And yet you play the game.”

“Because I’m forced to!”

“Forced to!  Your friends make a suggestion which you follow up on and then you are surprised at the outcome!  It’s a causal universe.” He says as he moves his piece.   “Your move.”

“Wait a minute.  I’m being punished because I made a tiny little effort to fit in?”

“It’s not about punishment.  It’s that actions have consequences.  And to be in denial of that is to be disengaged from the laws of the universe which renders you powerless, and vulnerable to an inordinate amount of pain. Other than that, it’s no big deal. Move. ” Joan picks up a piece then puts it back down and reaches for another.

“Noooo,” God said.   “It’s a rule called touch move.  Once you’ve touched a piece you have to move that piece.”

“I’m not allowed to change my mind?  What kind of universe is that?”

“Oh, you can change your mind, but you still have to play that piece.  So you should think before you move.”

“Wait a minute.  This is a metaphor, right?”  She stares at the board for a few more minutes, mumbling under her breath and finally moves her piece.  “I took the bait so now I’m in the game.  How do I get out?”

“There are many ways to get out.  Surrender is one.  Losing is another.  Winning.  Cheating, which I don’t recommend.  But you have to do something.  You have to have a strategy.  You see, the number one rule of chess is this: whatever you do, don’t play the other person’s game.  Play your own.  Your move.”

-- 

Herod was playing the other person’s game.  Herod allowed the rules of a shame society to tell him that he had no choice but to have John the Baptist beheaded.  He played the other person’s game, and one man lost his life, and Herod lost his grounding.

I’m reminded of the movie “The Devil Wears Prada”.  The movie’s main character, Andi, starts as a person with goals and integrity.  She wants to be a journalist, and she has written about injustices such as poor work conditions.  She is in a committed relationship and values her time with her friends.  She enjoys her life, and has a cause or meaning, a purpose in her future.  Her values do not include shallow things like appearance, being thin, high fashion, owning expensive purses, clothing, things.  She puts work in its proper place as one aspect of who she is.  She is down-to-earth, centered, and knows where she is heading and what she wants.  When she first applies for the job as Assistant to the Director of Runway Magazine, she is appalled by the value system that surrounds her – the emphasis on accessories that make no real difference to one’s well-being, the insistence on being thin, on looking “right,” on dressing “right.”  But when she takes the job, she finds her values and her identity being slowly challenged, slowly and subtly being undermined and eroded.  She finds herself giving up more and more of her time with her friends and significant other in order to work.  She finds herself being pulled into the drama and the appeal of a fast-paced career with models and glamour and eventually into valuing the entire system of clothing and accessories and being thin and owning purses that cost thousands of dollars – all things she didn’t used to care about.  The choices she is faced with – to choose depth, meaning and relationships, or to choose appearance, glamour, fame and achievement are subtle choices, but she finds herself choosing for the latter again and again, and she finds herself saying to those who would challenge those choices, “well, I didn’t have a choice!” She chooses to do what her boss asks her to do, even when it means that she ends up deeply hurting a colleague who was becoming a friend.  And the entire time she is slipping she repeats that phrase, “I didn’t have a choice.”

What made her descent, her decline into a life that the movie, and I imagine many of us, would consider sinful so easy for her was that she didn’t realize she was playing by the rules of the other person.  Like Joan in the Joan of Arcadia episode, she kept saying to everyone, but especially herself, “I didn’t have a choice.” But that lie that she told herself, that she didn’t have a choice meant that she lost her friends, she lost her significant other, she lost her sense of self and her values.  As her boyfriend breaks up with her, she receives a phone call from her boss, and she says, “I’m sorry.  I have to answer this,” STILL not realizing she is making a choice.  As her boyfriend walks away he says to her, “You know, in case you were wondering?  The person whose calls you always take – that’s the relationship you’re in.”  Even after all of those losses she still didn’t realize the choices that she was making or that she had a choice to make, until her boss, Miranda, in the film pointed it out to her by comparing Andi’s choices with her own.  Andi could see that Miranda’s choices were hurtful, were harmful, were devastating.  But until Miranda pointed out that Andi had made the same choices, Andi couldn’t see. She could not see the choice she was making, or even THAT she was making a choice.

                In the movie, “You’ve Got Mail”  the main character’s book store has lost all kinds of business when a huge Barnes and Noble type store moves in across the street.  She tries everything to get her store to succeed, but it cannot compete against a Costco-like enterprise.  Finally she meets with her employees and says, “I’ve decided to close the store.”  Her dearest and longest employee responds, “closing the store is the brave thing to do!”  Meg Ryan’s character says, “What bull!”  To which Bertie responds, “It is!  You are envisioning a new future.  One you never expected and stepping into it boldly.”

               She did not have a choice about responding or not to the competition from across the street.  But she did have a choice about how she would respond.  And she made a choice that was her own game, her own step forward.  As sad as it made her, it also was a choice of hope.   

               As Dumbledore said in the Harry Potter series, “It is our choices that show who we are.  Not our abilities.”

I think about the stories I heard from a prisoner of seeing other prisoners saving food from their lunches and then calling the skunks. “Here, kitty, kitty!” they’d say and leave food for the skunks and other wildlife in the area.  They are in a situation over which they have very limited control, and certainly very few choices.  But this is a choice they can make: eat their food, or save it to share with the creatures around the prison.

Finally, I want to share with you one more movie story.  In the movie, Keeping the Faith, there is a wonderful conversation between a young priest and an older priest.  The young priest doubts his call into the priesthood after falling in love with a woman who is his friend.  Nothing happened between the two, but he found that the very fact of falling in love made him doubt a call that included celibacy.  He said to his older priest mentor, “If she had kissed me back, I would have given it all up.  She didn’t, but I keep thinking about what you said in the seminary that the life of a priest is hard and if you can see yourself doing anything else you should do that.”

The older priest responded, “Well that’s my recruitment speech which is good when you are starting out because it makes you feel like a marine!  But the truth is you can never tell yourself there is only one that you could be.  If you’re a priest or if you marry a woman, it is the same challenge.  You cannot make a real commitment unless you accept that it is a choice that you make again and again and again.  I’ve been a priest over 40 years, and I fall in love at least once every decade.”

The thing is, in every situation there are choices to be made. EVERY situation.  We choose how we see things, we choose how we act.  Sometimes we are making decisions between two terrible things.  Sometimes we are deciding between two wonderful things.  Sometimes it feels we don’t have a choice, but we still choose how we understand a situation, where we put our focus, whether we find gratitude or pain.  We choose whether we grow and learn, or whether we become bitter. And we choose whether we see God, whether we see the grace that is offered in every moment.  We choose whether or not to take the grace that is offered in each moment.  No matter how terrible a moment is, we still can choose to see the gift in having each breath we have to breathe.  In every single moment grace is offered.  But it is a choice we make whether we see it or not.  As Rick Warren said it, “I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore.   Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life.   No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on. And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for. You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems:   If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, which is my problem, my issues, my pain.' But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.”

Grace is offered to everyone in every moment.  But that doesn’t mean it is always easy to accept.  It also doesn’t mean that grace is always happy or even painless.  Sometimes the very breath we breathe is painful.  That grace, ruach, spirit, wind, breath that we are offered in each and every moment does not always come wrapped in a pretty package.  And sometimes that very breath itself is painful.   We know that sometimes wind becomes so strong it destroys things.  We know that sometimes the Spirit’s words to us are hard to take.  I think about at the end of Harry Potter, when the evil Voldemort was given a choice.  He could choose remorse, have his soul healed and live, or he could continue along his path of destruction that would lead to his ultimate destruction too.  He chose the latter because the pain of remorse was too much.  He chose to turn away from the Grace that was offered.  But that did not change the fact that it was being offered in that very moment.

In the story of Herod, we see that Herod’s inability to see his choices, to think beyond what he felt he had to do ended badly for John, and ultimately for Herod, too, who became obsessed with worrying that John’s ghost was haunting him.  He thought Jesus himself was John.  “But when Herod heard these rumors, he said, “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised to life.””.  But his inability to see did not mean that he did not have choice.  He could have pointed out to the girl that this request she made was really what her mother wanted and not what she, herself wanted.  He could have reasoned with her, talked to her.  After all, she was HIS daughter too.  But instead he felt bound by a blind, spur of the moment commitment he made.  And that feeling of being bound left him feeling impotent and blind to his choices.  He played her game, did not choose the grace of other options that were before him, and everyone suffered.

We have those same choices.  And my prayer is for us to see God’s grace, to choose God’s grace and to play the game the way God calls us to play it, for ourselves and for the world.  Amen.

Jesus Came For the Lost

 

John 12:20-33

Luke 18:31-19:10 

 

               Today we have three very packed stories back to back.  In the first, we hear Jesus’ final prediction about his death and resurrection, stating he will be rejected by the religious leadership, given over to human hands, and finally given to the political powers of the time who would kill him.  In the second section we hear about the healing of the blind man, and in the third we have the story of Zacchaeus.  And once again, while the stories are separate, are different, they are also related to one another and all center around the question of seeing, of blindness, and of the salvation that comes just from being open in our sight. 

               The religious authorities, as we know, were completely blind to the good that Jesus was bringing.  They feared him, they feared his sway over the people, they feared his radical ideas about inclusion and love of even those others despised.  They would reject him because he threatened the life that they were comfortable with, he threatened their way of doing things.  And because of all of this, they were blind.  The disciples, too, were blind.  Jesus talked to them again and again about what was going to happen and the fact that he would be killed.  But, as we are told throughout the gospels and here, once more, “But the Twelve understood none of these words. The meaning of this message was hidden from them and they didn’t grasp what he was saying.”  The people in the crowd were blind as Jesus passed through.  When the blind man was calling out for his help, the people in the crowd just kept trying to shush the blind man, failing to see that his care was Jesus’ concern, his well-being was Jesus’ well-being, and, indeed, theirs as well. 

               In the gospel reading from John we see a similar situation.  A voice from heaven calls down “I have glorified my name and I will do it again.”  And the people not only can’t see, they also don’t hear.  “it’s thunder.”  “An angel spoke to him.”  As Jesus said, the invitation to see, the invitation to hear, this is not for Jesus’ sake.  It is not for God’s sake.  It is for ours.  But seeing, hearing is difficult, especially if we don’t WANT to see or hear.  If we don’t like what is being said, seeing and hearing can just feel too hard. 

               In great irony and in great contrast to all of this we have the blind man, who, though he cannot see physically, understands who Jesus is and what he is capable of.  In his vision, then, and in his humility, he cries out to Jesus for help.  Jesus asks him what he wants done for him, and in this, too, the man has clear sight.  He wants to see.  He knows who Jesus is and he knows what he wants and needs.  In response to that sight, then, Jesus gives him what he asks for.

               Then we come to the story of Zacchaeus.  Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector, meaning he worked for the Roman system: an agent of the state, a Jew turned oppressor of his own people. People hated him, but probably would take his job if they could.  He had income, a job, was “rich”.   All tax collectors, by definition, at that time, were wealthy; they purchased the right to collect taxes and profit from what they charged above what people owed the empire. When some tax collectors asked John the Baptist, "Teacher, what should we do?" he said, "Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you" (3:12-13), which effectively put them out of business.  But somehow Zacchaeus had sight.  He knew that making a living wasn’t the same as making a life.  He had sight into that.  The story said he was of short stature.  It’s possible that this is literally true.  But some commentators suggest that the “short stature” was actually a metaphor, a way of saying that he was blocked from equal participation in the community because of his career. 

Either way, he was an outcast, he was not encouraged to have access to Jesus.  He was blocked, either because of his height or because of his career.  And yet, he, saw Jesus.  He climbed the tree to get sight, he made his own access to seeing Jesus.  Still, I’m certain he did not expect Jesus to call to him, did not expect Jesus to respond.  And then, here, is a very interesting part of the story.  The Common English Bible translates Zacchaeus’ words this way, ““Look, Lord, I give half of my possessions to the poor. And if I have cheated anyone, I repay them four times as much.”  Do you hear something different in this than you might have heard before?  This is not a future tense thing.  This is not a declaration about how he will change his behavior.  This is a statement about what he is doing now, what he HAS been doing.  In the face of this, those being confronted and asked to change their behavior are not the Zacchaeuses of the world.  It is those around him. 

As the Commentary Feasting on the Word said it, “If one takes seriously this reading of the text, …the issue is not Zacchaeus's conversion at all, but the unfair and harsh judgment of the observers, who see Zacchaeus as a sinner. In this light, then, Jesus' statement that Zacchaeus too is a "son of Abraham," that he is a good Jew, is a defense of Zacchaeus against those who judge him to be a sinner and therefore outside the faith. … Zacchaeus, … is outcast by reason of his occupation. Although he apparently has considerable wealth and, presumably, considerable power as chief tax collector, he too is treated as an outcast, a sinner, by the same religious leaders who condemn Jesus for healing a woman on the Sabbath and going home with a notorious tax collector.” – (Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary - Feasting on the Word – Year C, Volume 4: Season After Pentecost 2 (Propers 17-Reign of Christ).)

               Remember what we talked about last week: that Jesus actually talks more about money and possessions than anything else.  And here it is in a practical way.  This story shows us it is not enough to believe: a genuine encounter with the Christ we meet in scripture is life-changing.  It will change you.  It does change you.  Zacchaeus understands that.  Again, to quote from Feasting on the Word, “Luke's concern for the proper use of wealth is no mere indictment of rich people or an ascetic preference for poverty. It is a matter of distributive justice.  Before Jesus is born, his mother praises God for filling the hungry with good things and sending the rich away empty-handed (1:53). Jesus' blessing of the poor with the promise that they will be rich has a corresponding woe to those who are wealthy, because they have already received their consolation (6:24). The parables of the Rich Fool (12:13-21), the Dishonest Manager (16:1-13), and the Rich Man and Lazarus (16:19-31) all highlight the danger that personal wealth both easily becomes an idol and also can deprive others of what they need.  The story of the Sabbath banquet ends with Jesus' saying, "When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed" (14:12-14). God has designed wealth to be shared, something the ruler in 18:18-23 learned to his great sorrow. This is why Jesus says, "Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God" (18:25).

Again, Zacchaeus understands this.  And he is acting differently.  He is acting in a way that saves many people.  He is working for the empire, collecting taxes, in a way that does NOT harm the people.  But still they can’t see him accurately, they can’t see Jesus accurately, and so both Jesus and Zacchaeus are condemned by the people, by the legal experts, by the pharisees, because of their blindness.

               What helps us to see?  In today’s stories, people come to Jesus in different ways.  The blind man calls out to him.  Zacchaeus climbs a tree to see him and Jesus calls to him.  The ways in which people come to Christ differ: they are person dependent: they rely on God’s knowledge of each of us as the individuals we are.  But they all do have something in common.  On the part of those saved, what they have in common is humility.  In contrast to the religious experts and pharisees who think they got it all right, think they understand it all, think they have it all figured out, the blind man knows he needs help beyond himself.  And Zacchaeus, too, knows he needs to see Jesus: again that having a living and having a life are not the same things.

               Do we have this same humility?  Do we have trouble calling out to ask for what we need, what we want?  Do we even have trouble recognizing what it is that we truly need or want?  Do we have the humility to ask for help when it is there to be given? I think about Jesus asking the blind man what he wanted.  Jesus needed to know that the blind man could see what he needed in order for Jesus to be able to truly help him.  Can we see what we need?

               I found myself remembering the wonderful movie “Family Man”.  In this movie, Jack Campbell thinks he has it all.  He is the CEO of an exclusive company, he lives in a beautiful penthouse and is wealthy beyond imagining.  He is single but because he is good looking and wealthy, he can have any woman he wants and he does, on a regular basis.  When he goes out on Christmas Eve to pick up egg nog, though, he encounters a racist shopkeeper who will not honor a lottery ticket win because the person with the ticket is African American.  The African American man pulls out a gun and in anger tells the shop keeper to actually look at the ticket he’s rejecting before refusing to pay it.  Jack tries to step in to help and the African American man turns the gun on him, asking him if he wants to die.  Jack says “no”, offers to pay the man for the ticket, and helps everyone calm down and become centered.  As they leave the shop, Jack says to the black man, “What do you want to carry a gun around for anyway?  You’re just going to wind up doing something you’ll regret.  There must be programs out there and opportunities.”  The man responds, “You’re talking to the wrong person about regrets, Jack.” 

Jack goes on, “I’m not saying it wouldn’t take some hard work.  A lot of hard work, and maybe some medication…” But then the other man starts to laugh.  He says, “Wait a minute.  This is bananas.”  He turns his face to the sky and shouts, “This man thinks I need to be saved, yo!” 

Jack says, “Well, everybody needs something.” To which the man says, “And what do you need, Jack?”  Jack says, “Well, me?  I got everything I need!”  The man, laughing, says, “Wow, it must be great being you.”  And then he continues, “You know I’m going to really enjoy this.  You just remember that you did this, Jack.  You brought this on yourself.  Merry Christmas.”  And he walks away.

As the movie progresses, we learn that the African American man was actually an angel, and he gives Jack the gift of a “glimpse” – a sight into a life he might have had, had he made different choices.  The glimpse takes up most of the movie, but in the end, Jack realizes that what he thought he needed, what he thought he wanted, what he thought mattered to him, what he thought he valued, was not what would make him happy, whole, complete.  He came to see,  but not without a great deal of pain, struggle, and deep self-reflection.

               Jesus states that he came to save the lost.  But this is not a future tense saving.  This is a saving NOW: he saves the blind man from loss of sight.  He saves Zacchaeus and indeed many of the outcasts from their isolation, their condemnation, their exclusion.  He does this now.  And he lets his disciples know ahead of time so that they will understand that they are called to continue the work.  In the revised common lectionary for this week, we hear from the gospel of John that unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it can only be a single seed.  But if it dies, it bears much fruit…. Whoever serves me must follow me.”  It is in the growing of his community, in the spreading of the seed of truth, of love, that salvation comes to all of us.  But again, that is for NOW.  We are not called to wait to end suffering for people.  We are called to follow Jesus and end it now. 

And that starts with our own humility.  Our own ability to cry out,  “Have mercy on us!”  To remember that, on our own, we rarely see the grace of God.  But then we also have to remember that when we really see Jesus, we will be changed.  Jesus was in Jericho when all of these stories occurred.  He was in every way, tumbling down the walls of Jericho once again: breaking the barriers that put the tax collector on the outside, breaking the walls that said the blind man would always be stuck in his blindness, tearing down the beliefs that the religious experts and pharisees were the ones who understood while these outcasts didn’t; flipping that on its head so all would see it was the outcasts who got it, and those humble enough to learn from them.  Choosing to see Jesus, choosing to SEE, will not be easy, it will not be painless, and it will mean that we have to change, something that is not comfortable for any of us. 

Still, the gifts are amazing.  Zacchaeus walked away with incredible joy, a man maybe less rich in money, but filled with the elation of his faith and love of Christ.  The Gospels are about serious commitment to God, but also about joy.  Reminder that “Eucharist” means thanksgiving, the meal that we take is a meal of deep joy, deep connection, deep gratitude.  May we have that same ability to put aside our “sure knowing” and be open to actually seeing, hearing and meeting the risen Christ anew.  For in doing so, we will be “saved”, we will be found.  We will be healed.  And we will find joy.

Faith Vs Sight

2 Corinthians 5:1-21

Matthew 14:13-21

8/3/20

               As Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J. has said, we are not in fact physical beings on a spiritual journey.  Rather, “We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”  I think we can see this to be the case at times.  I remember when we first got the three kittens that are now my kids’ cats.  I remember watching them “try on” their bodies.  At least that was how it looked to me.  They were figuring them out: figuring out how to make them work, how to walk, how to balance, how to use their paws.  I remember moments when they would do something and it would startle them – as if they were saying, “oh, so this is what happens when I do this!”   We’ve seen this with our human babies too, but I think because cats develop and grow into adults so much more quickly, it was all the more obvious to me with the kittens.  I saw that they were beings wearing cat pajamas and trying to explore the limitations and gifts of those pajamas as they navigated this new world for them. 

               In many ways we hear this echoed in Paul’s words.  He talks about God’s house as the real house, the house where we want to be, ultimately.  He talks about our human residence as a tent that weighs us down, a place away from “home”.  These feelings too are familiar to many of us.  I have lived in other places besides the Bay Area in my life, but each time I was in these other places, I felt this strong pull, this strong yearning within me, “I just want to go home” I would say.  But the reality is that whenever I would then move back here, back “home”, those yearnings were ever only partly answered.  There is still a strong desire within me to “go home”, to “be home”.  A spiritual being seeking for a physical home in a physical world.

               What is “home” for you?  Have you ever felt those yearnings to go home or be home, and if so, what did you mean by it?  What are the feelings that you associate with “home”?  If you were here, I would ask you to tell me, but since we are apart, I’m going to have to guess what some of those feelings are.  When people tell me about their “homes” they talk about warm fires and food, good conversation and music.  But the two feelings that I hear most are unconditional love/acceptance and safety.  Home is the place where you feel safe.  Home is the place where you are loved and accepted as you are, where you can be fully and wholly yourself without fear of pain or rejection.

               I’m part of a clergy group here in the Bay Area that meets for an hour every other week.  Most of the other people in this group are people of color.  The African American man who leads the group asked us this last week when and where we felt safe.  To a tee all of the black or African American pastors and faith leaders in our group said that there was no place here where they felt safe.  No place where they felt free to be themselves without threat to their person.  Can you imagine what that feels like?  I can’t imagine what that feels like in terms of physical safety.  I usually feel safe in my house or car, for example.  But I do know what that feels like emotionally.  There have been times in my life where there is no place that I have felt safe emotionally. There have been times in my life where I felt I had to be “on guard” every hour of every day, not knowing where the next “hit” would come, where the next slam would hit, where the next demand on my time, energy and personhood would be exacted.  And again, in all of those moments, I found my soul crying out “I just want to go home!”  And I knew that what that meant for me was that I just wanted to find that place that felt safe, where I would be loved and accepted as I am, where I would no longer be the spiritual being on a painful, intense, long and difficult human journey; but where instead I would be seen in fullness for all of who I am, and loved not just in spite of it, but because of it. 

               I think that because of this deep-seated desire for safety and unconditional love that some people describe another human being as their “home”.  My home is where YOU are.  My home is where THEY are.  But, as Meg Ryan said in the movie French Kiss, “There is no home safe enough, there is no country nice enough, there’s no relationship secure enough.”  And no matter how romantic and wonderful it is when two people stay married and in love their entire lives, those of us who’ve been divorced can tell you that every relationship has conditions.  “Unconditional love” in romance isn’t real.  There are conditions.  And if your partner has met them for the entirety of their life, then you are one of the lucky ones to have found that.  For most of us, the conditions have been found and named and fall short in human beings.  And I would say that even for those who’ve been married their entire lives, there have been moments with your partners that have not felt good, that have not felt emotionally safe or loving.  That’s part of being human.  No one is perfect and when you get two imperfect people together, there will be disagreements and times of pain.

               So in the midst of that, where do we find “home”?  Where do we finally look for that place of unconditional love and safety?

               Many people look towards heaven for that.  This ties back once again to the idea of us as spiritual beings on a human journey.  The number of people who have said to me towards the end of their lives, “I just want to go home” is too many to count.  For them, “home” is that place after death: heaven, or rest, or a kind of Eden where there is no more pain, emotional, physical or spiritual; there is just love and safety. 

               But what I would challenge you with today is the idea that when we call the ones we love “home,” and when we talk about heaven as home, and when we see something beautiful in nature, or hear an amazing piece of music, or visit a country that touches us, or have those mountain-top experiences that feel like home – that all of these point to the same reality.  And that reality is that “home” is where God is.  This home isn’t created or limited by space or time, by life or death, by the people we are with or those we are missing.  And while Paul says, “we live by faith and not sight”, I would say that God’s presence is here for us to see as well as to have faith in, in every moment of every day.

               And that brings us to the gospel lesson for the day.  Jesus is trying to withdraw.  He is tired, he is wanting some space to himself.  But the people are following him, and despite his personal needs, we are told that “Jesus had compassion for them and healed those who were sick.”  Evening came and his disciples tried to get Jesus to send the people into the village and buy food for themselves.  Once again, I want to point out, God here, Jesus here, is not a good business person.  He could have sent them into the village to buy food for themselves, to “boost the economy” and to support local trade.  But he doesn’t.  He also does not “fix it” for everyone.  We tend to change this story in our heads into one of Jesus passing out the food which multiplies and multiplies in abundance.  That is how we tend to hear this story because that is how we’ve been taught to hear this story.  But that is not what happens.  Instead, Jesus says to his disciples, “There’s no need to send them away.  YOU give them something to eat.” 

               The disciples did not want to do that.  They did not want to share.  “We have nothing here except five loaves of bread and two fish.”  So, Jesus prays over the food and then, giving it back to the disciples, asks them to give it to the crowd, which they do.  We don’t know what happened.  We don’t know if the food did in fact multiply – the story does NOT tell us that.  What we know is that once people started sharing what they had, which began with a small group but grew out into the crowds, that there was more than enough for everyone.  And THAT is where we see God, and that is heaven, and that is the safe and loving place that we call home – it is all around us at all times.  But we do not see it because we do not truly believe in it, we do not act on it, we do not live it. 

               I'm reminded of the stone soup story from our childhood.  A man comes to town and, though he is very hungry, no one will help him, no one will feed him.  They feel they don't have enough to share, they don't have enough to give.  So he takes out his pot, gets some water from the local stream and begins to cook it with just a stone inside.  People are curious and come out.  He says to them, "I am making a wonderful, magical, amazing soup!  I will share it, but it surely could use a carrot."  One of the villagers thinks, "well, I have a carrot I could add" and he returns with carrots to throw into the soup.  Then the stranger says, "Hm.  It surely tastes good now, but it could use a potato or two," and one of the villagers remembers that she has some potatoes to throw in.  This continues until the stew is an amazing soup of everyone's ingredients which the stranger is then able to share with all.  They didn't think there was enough.  But together, there was more than enough for all.

               There is always more.  There is always enough, if we could choose to trust in it and share it.  Did you know there was a study out recently that was looking at how people use money?  No surprise, the more money you have, the less you share it.  What was so interesting though is that the poorest of the poor really were the first to share what little food they had.  Greed is a spiritual illness that grows along with how much people have.  The more a person has, the more they are afraid of losing it and less likely they are to share it.  We see this through our country, we see this not just as individuals but as groups, too.  We forget how to see God’s kingdom.  We forget to be “home” for one another.  The bottom line, we forget how much we have been given and how much we have to share.  This does not just apply to money, either.

               I remember a time when my youngest child was just a baby of about 6 months old, my son was 2 and my eldest daughter was 5.  I would not have been winning any parenting awards on that day, and at one point I even considered shipping off at least one of my lovely three children to someone who I knew would be much better capable of managing what I came to think of as my own personal monkey cage.  I had come to expect help on Fridays, but this particular Friday I was completely on my own all day.  The kids had been in rare form; all demanding things in temper tantrum format all afternoon.  By 7:00 I was a stressed-out mess.  With Youngest in her bouncy chair, and Eldest in the shower, I was trying to get Middle dressed for bed.  But when I tried to put his pajama top over his head I was greeted with yet another temper tantrum.  He would not tell me what he wanted, but instead ripped the shirt off and started to scream at the top of his lungs.  At that moment, Eldest called me to help her wash her hair and Youngest decided this was the perfect moment to put in her two cents as well and she started crying like there was no tomorrow.  I explained to Middle that if he was going to fight me I couldn’t help him, I left him in his room, went and picked up Youngest who continued to scream, took her into the bathroom with me to help Eldest with her hair with my one free hand that wasn’t holding Youngest, and I tried to take a deep breath.  When Middle came running into the bathroom after me, it was all I could do to not snap his head off with a “What is it now?” But instead of crying, or screaming, my two year old boy walked up to me, wrapped his arms around my legs and with a look of deep compassion said very simply, “I’m sorry I was fighting with you, Mama.”  In that moment I saw him again - my little, caring, sweet boy who needed my attention, who needed my love.  Yes, I could give it.  I had reserves that I didn’t even know I had, just for him, just for then.

               A friend of mine told me the story this week of his sister-in-law who is a doctor-of-all-trades whose primary job it is to fill in when other doctors can’t go in.  She’s basically on-call all the time at a particular hospital, for wherever she is needed and in whatever capacity.  Well, her husband died recently.  The day of the memorial service, she not only hosted the service, but hosted the party afterwards at her house.  Before everyone had even left, she received a call that one of the doctors who was supposed to give a lecture that day to a class of medical students just hadn’t shown.  The lecture was supposed to have started already and while the person calling understood she had just lost her husband and that the service was that day, she just didn’t know who else to call.  My friend’s sister-in-law thought for a minute and then realized she, too, had “more than enough”.  She chose to do the class because she had it to give.  That energy, that choice to share what we have whether it is resources, time, energy or money – that is where the kingdom of God, that is where “home”, that is where God, God-self is to be found.

               It’s not that faith isn’t important.  It is faith that tells us that there is enough for everyone.  It is faith that tells us to share and to give.  It is faith that hopes, trusts and believes that if we give what we have, there will still be enough for us.      

               We are, right now, in a time of increasing need.  While some people’s rents have been “put off”, they will have to pay them eventually and many simply won’t be able to.  The increase in numbers of homeless is growing exponentially.  The number of those who don’t have health care during this terrible time is growing.  The lines at the soup kitchens, the food pantries, the need-based agencies is growing exponentially.  This is a time when we need those loaves and fishes to go a long way.  But God gave us the ability to make that happen as God has given us the ability to share what we have, and not from our abundance, but from our recognition that these people are our brothers and sisters, our community, our family, who are in need.  The choice to believe that Jesus alone turned the bread and fish into a feast is a choice to abdicate our responsibility here.  We are not off the hook.  It was to his disciples that he said, “give them something to eat” and in this story from today it is the disciples’ own food that they are being asked to share.  Can God take that and make something amazing out of it?  Of course.  But it must start with our choice to share, to give, and to trust that there will be enough for us all.    

               “We walk by faith and not by sight”  Paul tells us.  But that faith becomes sight, and the world becomes “home” when we choose to follow in Jesus’ footsteps and to love fully, remembering that we are spiritual beings on this human journey together, called to live that out as the people of God that we were made to be.  Amen.