Here Fishy, Fishy, Fishy!

January 22, 2012

A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church in Boise, ID

Jan 22, 2012

Jonah 3:1-10

Mark 1:14-20

Our lectionary readings for this year will take us through Mark’s gospel. As you may be noticing, Mark is a man of few words.  Where you and I, or Luke and Matthew, would offer more details, Mark is content to let the story be spare.
Last week, we left Jesus in the wilderness after his baptism, being cared for by the angels.
And, immediately, after that, Jesus picks up the work of John the Baptizer, calling people to repent and believe in the Good News.

And I think that is not quite enough of a message to get me to repent. I think I would want to hear a little more. Repent of what? What is the Good News? ‘Repent and believe’ seems too vague.

But, when contrasted with Jonah’s message to Ninevah, it is a veritable treatise on Theology!
Remember what Jonah preached to Ninevah? “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”

Talk about a positive message that is designed to appeal to people!

As I was pondering the fact that both of these seemingly horrible tools of evangelism actually worked, it occurred to me to just say “40 days more and Boise shall be overthrown” and then just sit down.

Would have saved me a lot of time this week.
But I realized that while God was calling Jonah to deliver that message, it wasn’t what I was called to share this week. Bummer for you.

Let’s look more closely at the short passage from Jonah. It begins with a reminder that the Word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time. And, if you recall, the first time God told Jonah to go to Ninevah, Jonah chose not to. He got on the first boat he could find that was heading in the exact opposite direction. Big storm, Jonah abandons ship, and ends up in the belly of a fish, where he has a come to Jesus meeting before being spat out of the beast onto the beach.

And so the Word of the Lord comes to Jonah a second time. “Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you”.

And Jonah does.

He doesn’t like the Ninevites. He doesn’t want them to be saved. He doesn’t even want to be in the same room with them. You can almost hear the glee in his voice when he announces their destruction and doom.

“Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown! Ha! That’ll teach you horrible people! We’ll see how you feel when God’s judgment puts you in your place!”

Jonah delivers the message, gets out a lawn chair and maybe some popcorn, and sits down to wait for a ringside seat of the destruction.

But the people repent. The King repents. The cows repent, for pete’s sake.

This isn’t an isolated repentance of a few people. This is a repentance of all individuals, the government, and even creation.

And so God changed God’s mind. God showed mercy on Ninevah and didn’t destroy them.

I invite you to read the rest of Jonah’s story this week.  Let me just say that his front row seat to the destruction of his enemies doesn’t turn out quite the way he had hoped.  Despite his greatest hopes for their destruction, they are converted. His very success as an evangelist annoys the heck out of him.

There are many reminders for us in this text, of course.

God will choose to be merciful to whom God will choose to be merciful. We don’t get the final say in the people who are beyond the reach of God’s love.

I’ve shared this quote from Anne Lamott before, but it bears repeating:

“You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”

Our job, as it turns out, is not to judge. I know. Bummer, right?

Only God gets to do that, and even then, we can’t presume God will hate all the same people we do.

The other thing that struck me this time through the two stories we have this week is that it is better to respond to God the FIRST time the Word of the Lord comes to you.

Jonah didn’t do that. And he spent a fair amount of time in the digestive system of a whale.

But, according to Mark’s gospel, the Disciples fared better than Jonah.

They are minding their own business, literally, Simon and Andrew casting their nets in the sea, and James and John mending their nets, and Jesus calls them to follow him. The Word of the Lord comes to them a first time, walks past them and speaks to them. “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.”

And they do. The drop their nets. They leave their boats.

They don’t just accept Jesus Christ as their personal savior and go back to what they were doing. They abandon their ability to make a living. They leave their families. They walk away from everything they know and are called to much more than a moment of personal salvation. They are called to a life of discipleship, a life of itinerant preaching with some guy who walked down the beach and called to them.

So, where are you in these stories?

Are you like Jonah, sitting in the belly of a whale because you are resisting answering God’s call on your life?

Are you like Jonah, the second time the Word came from you, but still hoping for the destruction of the people you’ve determined are beyond God’s mercy?
Or are you sitting on the beach, working on your nets and wondering how to respond to the Word of the Lord as he calls you to join him?

The scenarios are all different. But the one thing they have in common is that the Word of the Lord comes to us all.

We can resist it.

We can choose our own interpretation of it.

We can follow it.

And just as the Word of the Lord came to Jonah and came to the first disciples, God’s Word is coming to you as well. That’s why we are here. Because we could be doing other things today, couldn’t we? We could be drinking coffee and working on the crossword puzzle. We could be skiing.

And maybe that’s on the agenda later today. But this morning, we’re here. Together. Because God is calling us to be this particular church family in this corner of God’s kingdom.

Somehow, the Word of the Lord called out to you and you responded enough to be here.

How is that call from God going to play out in your life as you leave here today?

The disciples  “immediately they left their nets and followed him”.

What does it mean to follow him?

I follow people on Twitter, but as this cartoon proves, Jesus isn’t talking about Twitter. We are to literally follow where he leads.

When the Word of the Lord walks past us and asks us to follow, we can’t just look up at him and say, “sure. Sounds great. Have a good day. See you on Sunday.”

If we choose to answer the call, our lives should grow to be different than they were before. This doesn’t mean we become perfect. We will still make mistakes. We will still hurt the people we love. We will still be human, in other words. But we should have a greater goal than our private concerns.

Following Jesus means we are going to journey down paths that might not be the ones we would choose. They will likely put you in to uncomfortable situations and challenging moments.

But, did you also notice in the stories we heard today that the call of the disciples, or the call of Jonah and the Ninevites, for that matter, weren’t so much about the people who were called as it was about the one doing the calling. The Ninevites were no candidates for God’s best followers. They were a wicked city of foreigners, for goodness sake.

And the disciples. What did Jesus know of their qualifications for ministry when he picked them? They were not-very-well-educated fishermen from galilee. Jesus hadn’t seen their Theology test scores. He didn’t know anything about their public speaking skills or ask if any of them could fix a computer.

He just called them.

It appears their best qualification for ministry happened to be that they answered when God walked by.

So, if you aren’t feeling particularly talented today, it’s okay. If you are certain that you don’t have what it takes to answer this call from Jesus, it’s okay.

Because God will give you what you need, but not before you need it. The disciples left behind their nets, their boats, the tools with which they surrounded themselves, and followed after Jesus. And God provided. As we listen to the stories in the coming weeks, pay attention to how this random band of people become the Disciples of the Lord.

And God is calling you, yes you, because there are still lots of fish in the sea who need to know about the God of mercy who loves us far beyond reason.

Here fishy, fishy, fishy.

Amen.

 

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Posted by marciglass

Assurance of Pardon

January 16, 2012

A few people requested I post the Assurance of Pardon I used yesterday at the Font. This is from Call to Worship, which is a great resource.

Since we were buried with Christ in these waters, we are raised to new life with him.
The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting!
I declare to you, in the name of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven.

This is the good news of the gospel, and it is for you and for all.
Whatever you have done, whatever you have failed to do,
whoever you are, whoever you wish you were but are not:
You are accepted, you are welcomed.
You are washed clean, you are raised up.
You are forgiven, you are set free.
In the love of Jesus Christ, you are loved forever.
In the waters of baptism we are set free to let go what is old and broken, to live a new life in the resurrection, and to follow together a joyful way, after Jesus Christ, our loving Savior.

Thanks be to God! The peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.

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Posted by marciglass

Can you hear me now?

January 15, 2012

A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church

Jan 15, 2012 for Baptism of the Lord

Gen 1:1-4

Mark 1:4-13

The Christian New Year didn’t begin on January 1. We began our liturgical New Year on the first Sunday of Advent, right after Thanksgiving. Our year begins in preparation for Jesus’ birth and Christ’s return. After Christmas, we moved to Epiphany and today, before we head into the Common Time of our calendar, we celebrate the Baptism of Jesus by John in the River Jordan.

We talked last week about how the gospels didn’t agree on the details of Jesus birth and early life, but they all agree that Jesus was baptized by John and they agree that his baptism inaugurated the beginning of his public ministry.

So, this morning, we’ll consider Jesus’ baptism and we’ll consider our own.

John the baptizer was preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin. And Mark tells us that everyone came. Which seems sort of odd to me. I imagine you could draw everyone to the opening of a nightclub if George Clooney were going to be there. But I have a hard time imagining everyone coming to repent of their sins.

But, there they were. And John had told the crowd, “I’m only baptizing you with water. Someone more powerful is coming after me and he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

But then that someone more powerful shows up, not to baptize, but to be baptized. And there is nothing in the text to suggest that he went to the First Class check in line either. It appears that Jesus showed up in the midst of everyone else from Judea. And after standing in the long line, he was baptized by John. The text doesn’t even suggest that John recognized Jesus when he saw him, as the person to whom he’d been referring.

Until the baptism.

Because after his baptism, the heavens were shredded apart and the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dive bombing pigeon.

And the voice. A voice from heaven says, “You are my Son, the beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

Yet another one of those moments I wish I had been there to see for myself. What did everyone else hear when the voice spoke? And did it scare the dickens out of them?

Some how, some way, the separation between earth and heaven collapses at the baptism of Jesus. Almost a reversal of the creation account in Genesis 1 when the earth and heavens were separated.

In the beginning, God.

The earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while the spirit of God swept over the face of the waters. Then God spoke. “Let there be light.” God speaks light, and with that light, we gain the ability to see the chaos that has been swirling across the face of the deep. God speaks and there was light. Light and Darkness are separated. God speaks and order appears, chaos abates.

God speaks creation in Genesis as the Spirit of God moves across the waters. And then, as Jesus comes out of the waters of baptism, God’s spirit again moves across the waters, and God speaks words of blessing. “You are my beloved. In you I am well pleased.”

One very radical notion we hold as Christians is that in baptism we are joined with Christ in his baptism. But how many of you (no need to raise your hands) hear those words, “You are my beloved. In you I am well pleased” and believe them?

Because you should.

But it is my experience, in the way we treat each other and in the way we treat ourselves, that we don’t. We have a hard time internalizing this message from God.

I wonder if part of the reason this is so hard for us is because we have a skewed notion of what our lives would look like if we were God’s beloved children in whom God was well pleased.

To be God’s beloved child ought to come with some impressive perks, right?
Free lattes at Starbucks
Discounts at the mall
First Class upgrades on flights

Okay, I’m kidding. Sort of.

But I think we look around at the average-ness of our lives as evidence that we aren’t God’s beloved children.

“If God really loved me, I wouldn’t be having these family problems.”

“If God really loved me, I’d be thinner”.

“If God really loved me, my mom wouldn’t have cancer.”

But did you notice what happened in the story we heard this morning?

Listen again:

And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.
He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan.

God’s beloved Son, with whom God was well pleased, IMMEDIATELY drove him out into the wilderness, to be tempted by Satan.

Don’t you think, just maybe, that this passage ought to, once and for all, let go of the notion that being loved by God means that life should be easy?

I know there are pastors out there who will tell you that if you are faithful to God, God will bless you with riches, health, and apparently anything you want.

Don’t believe me? Listen to these words from Joel Osteen:

“If you develop an image of victory, success, health, abundance, joy, peace, and happiness, nothing on earth will be able to hold those things from you” (p. 5 Joel Osteen, Your Best Life Now)

“You will often receive preferential treatment simply because your Father is the King of kings, and His glory and honor spill over onto you” (ibid, p. 40)

And since 40,000 people worship at his church each week, it seems that the message must be fairly attractive.

But it isn’t biblical.

And a voice came from heaven,

“You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.
He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan.

Yes, we are blessed by God. Yes, we are beloved children of God. Yes, it is right to cry out to God for healing, and for intercession.

But being blessed doesn’t mean you are going to get a new flat screen TV or that the problems of the world are going to pass you by.

Being blessed means that when you are in the wilderness being harassed by Satan, you should remember this—God has been there before.

Jesus of Nazareth knows exactly what it is like to be in those moments of pain, struggle, and heartache. Because he has lived it. He knows the high of seeing the heavens torn apart and hearing God’s voice call him beloved. He also knows the lows of wilderness struggle.

But if we stop trying to prove that we are blessed, that we are God’s beloved children, based on how much money we have or how healthy we are, then what does it mean to say we are God’s beloved children?

When God’s voice comes down from Heaven, proclaiming divine pleasure, what does that mean?

For me, it helps me to go back to the passage from Genesis. At creation, when God speaks and the world is created, God also pronounces that God’s creation is good.

We are a part of that good creation. And when God’s voice speaks again at Jesus’ baptism, God expresses divine pleasure in who Jesus was and how he lived his life.

So, to join with Jesus in his baptism, we also hear God speaking for us. Not to the exclusion of someone else. But God is speaking for us, individually and corporately, to live into our role as beloved children of God.

What would be the possibilities if we treated ourselves and treated everyone else as if our baptismal promises were true?

How would this congregation be different?

How would the world be different?
Baptisms often seem to be cute and innocent events. Sweet babies in their grandmother’s gown, adoring family all around. And that can be a part of baptism. But we should remember that baptisms are not tame events. At baptisms, God breaks into our world, shredding the barrier between heaven and earth. We come up out of the water as new people, reborn and claimed as Christ’s own for the world.

When God speaks, we should pay attention.

Listen to the words of the Psalm assigned for today:

        The voice of the LORD is over the waters;
the God of glory thunders,
the LORD, over mighty waters.
The voice of the LORD is powerful;
the voice of the LORD is full of majesty.

The LORD sits enthroned over the flood;
the LORD sits enthroned as king forever.
May the LORD give strength to his people!
May the LORD bless his people with peace!

For the past few years, on this day, we’ve done a renewal of Baptism. We don’t re-baptize people, because God’s work doesn’t need a re-do. But we do remember what happened at baptism. We listen, again, for God’s voice.

Today, I invite you again, or for the first time, to come forward as you are able and to take a drop of water from the font, so that you may remember your baptism. So you may remember the voice of God calling to you to live as a beloved child. If you are unable to come forward, ask your neighbors to bring one back for you.

This week, I invite you to take home your baptismal stone and remember your baptism. To consider that you are God’s beloved child in whom God is pleased. To look for the Spirit of God moving across the chaos of our lives. And to listen for where God is speaking today, creating all things new. Amen.

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Posted by marciglass

A Star to Follow

January 8, 2012

Matt 2:1-12

Isaiah 60:1-6

A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church, Boise, Idaho

Jan 8, 2012

Today we are celebrating Epiphany. This is an ancient Christian celebration, dating at least as far back as the 300’s.  And it is the day we celebrate the arrival of the magi, or the Eastern Wise men who came to visit Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. January 6 is the actual feast day of Epiphany, which is also, if you count it up, the 12th Day of Christmas.

This word comes to us almost directly from the Greek.

“Epi”, meaning ‘on’ or ‘upon’, and “phaneros”, which means ‘visible’, ‘apparent’ or ‘manifest’.

So, an epiphany is more than just a “lightbulb” moment, or an “aha!” moment. An epiphany is something that is revealed to you. Something where light shines and makes something clear and manifest. The magi received the epiphany for all of us. They saw God made flesh and saw salvation for all people.

So, we have this text from Matthew about visitors from the East. Yet we don’t know much about them.

We don’t know their names.

We don’t know how many of them there were. We just know they brought 3 gifts.

The Greek text calls them “magi”, which referred to a caste of astrologers in Zoroastrianism, a religion in Persia. The word “magi” is where we get the word “magic”.

Their story is not related in any of the other gospels. Mark and John don’t talk at all about Jesus’ birth or childhood. Luke, in the texts we have heard the past few weeks, tells us about Bethlehem, the star, and the shepherds, but he makes no reference to the visitors from the East.

Only Matthew gives us this story.

And while Matthew and Luke as Gospels share some similarities, they are very different in their birth narratives. Matthew begins his with the genealogy of Jesus. He barely makes reference to the actual birth—no stable, no Roman census, no shepherds. In Matthew there is no reference to Nazareth as the home of Mary and Joseph. If you read further ahead in Matthew, the family will re-settle there, but only after fleeing to Egypt. The magi come to visit them at their home in Bethlehem, when Jesus is 2 years old or less.

Many of you know I like irreverent cards, and I’ve shared this before, but it is worth seeing again. My favorite magi image, from a Christmas card I received a few years ago. It shows 4 men on camels. Three of them are following the star in the sky. The fourth one is following Elvis and his caption reads, “I’m going to follow this star.”
Neither Matthew nor Luke, of course, make any reference to Elvis, but I think this is a question worth pondering.

Which star are we following?

For all we do not know about the magi, we do know they followed a star that led them to Jesus. Unlike the mage who followed Elvis, they didn’t just see this star and decide, “hey! That one looks interesting—let’s go this way!”

They prepared for the moment. They knew the sky. They studied the star charts. They listened for the Divine call in their lives. Because, let’s face it. There are plenty of pretty stars in the sky, but we don’t just follow them. There must have been more that called them on this journey.

What is it that caused them to lift their eyes and look up?

They pulled themselves away from their charts, their computer screens, or their Sudoku puzzles or whatever, and looked up, which is what Isaiah calls the people to do as well.

“Lift up your eyes and look around”, Isaiah tells the people. Isaiah gives a promise to people who have been defeated, exiled and forced to pay homage to other kings—he gives them a vision of kings coming to pay homage to them.
“Nations shall come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your dawn”.

But you have to have eyes to see it. Lift up your eyes and look around!

For people in Israel who grew up hearing Isaiah’s promises, people who were living under occupation themselves, the image of men from the east, offering gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the child Jesus must have given them great hope.
Arise! shine! for your light has come,
the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.

Perhaps that was the greatest gift the magi offered—hope. Their very presence reminded the people of long held promises and invited them to see the world in new ways.

Because surely the world looks different to you after you’ve stepped out on faith to follow a star and have discovered God at the end of the journey. Especially when the King of the Jews that Herod was so afraid of turns out to be a toddler.

The epiphany was only the beginning of the changes for the magi, for all of us. And not all of the changes are easy. The epiphany of a child born as king in Bethlehem turned the world upside down and shook the palace in Jerusalem. The world responds when God breaks into the world—and it isn’t always peaceful. I invite you to read ahead in Matthew this week and see how the powers of the world responded to the epiphany. Epiphany is about God coming to us in ways we would never have predicted on our own.

However the Magi knew that this star was different, that this child was a king, they followed the call and began the journey.

And journeys take time.

What if the magi had said, “the star looks interesting, but it isn’t a good time for me to leave. I’ve got deadlines coming up and the kids have soccer practice. And my camel’s in the shop. Plus fuel is so expensive right now.”

There are so many excuses we make when we don’t lift our heads and look up at the star.
A friend of mine shared this poem with me this week. The author is unknown.

When Will We Have Time?

If, as Herod
we fill our lives with things
-
and again with things -

If we consider ourselves so unimportant
that we must fill every moment
of our lives
with action -

When will we have time to make
the long slow journey across
the desert
as did the magi?
Or sit and watch the stars
as did the shepherds?
Or brood over the coming of the child
as did Mary?
For each one of us there is
a desert to travel
a star to discover
and a being within ourselves
to bring to life.
(Source: Michael Podesta)
So the choice is ours. Will we make time for the journey? Will we lift our heads and look up so we can discover our stars?

My trusty volunteers are going to pass some baskets down the rows now. I invite you to take one of the stars that are in the basket. Don’t over think this. Just grab a star. We’ll put the extras up front after, so if you need to spend more time on this project, you can trade your star out later.
Each star has a word on it. I invite you to consider how that word might speak to your life in this new year. Perhaps you could use it to lead your prayers this year. Perhaps you could tape your star to your refrigerator or bathroom mirror and when you see it, remember that you need to look up, look to God and follow the star that is guiding you.

(Since you are reading this sermon online, post a comment if you would like me to give you a word and I’ll pick one out of the star basket for you.)

I pray that this year you will discover the star that is there for you to discover, and will follow it and see where God is leading you. I’ll close with these verses from
John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress:

“And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year,
“Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.”He replied, “Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God. That shall be to you better than a light and safer than the known way.”

Blessings to us all on our journey. Lift up your eyes and look around. There is a star for you to follow.

Amen

5 Comments | Epiphany, Isaiah 60:1-6, Matthew 2:1-12 | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

Some Lady Holding a Baby

December 24, 2011

Christmas Eve Sermon 2011

Southminster Presbyterian Church, Boise, Idaho

Luke 2:1-20

Isaiah 9:2-7

Strange things happen at the holidays. I suppose strange things happen all year, but perhaps we notice them more at this time of year. With the grace of God, we get through them, hopefully with a sense of humor and maybe even new understanding. I’d like to share with you an encounter that one of my friends had this past week at a grocery store in Chicago:
Customer: “Do you have Christmas stamps?”

Clerk: “No. We just have Liberty Bell and some lady holding a baby.”

Customer: “Can I see them? That’s Mary holding Jesus. I’ll take those.”

At which point the Clerk says, “How did they get a picture of them?”

Customer looks back at my friend to keep from laughing, and so my friend chimes in with, “I bet it’s someone’s interpretation of what they may have looked like.”

Clerk: “Maybe. ‘Cause I don’t think anyone took pictures back then.”

(Thanks to Ashley-Anne Masters for sharing that true story!)

Yes, the story is jarring. Especially for me, who spends my days talking about Jesus professionally. I don’t presume that everyone shares my religious views, but it is always startling to me when people don’t even recognize Jesus, even if he is only on a postage stamp.

This is an image of the 2011 Christmas stamp in question, from a painting by Raphael called “Madonna of the Candelabra”.
And if you don’t recognize the halos around Mary and Jesus, you can imagine how someone might not know that was Jesus.

It is just some lady holding a baby.

If we look at the story of his birth as told by Luke, perhaps we ought to be surprised that anyone recognized him as the Messiah in this story.

Because he was just a baby.

And when you’re looking for a savior, I suspect you look for an adult.

Don’t you?

Because what’s a baby going to do for you?

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love babies. They are cute. I love to hold them while they sleep. The world is ever more peaceful while a baby sleeps.

But babies don’t lead armies. Babies don’t topple oppressive Roman governments. Babies can’t even pray for you, which is what they were expecting from their Messiah.

What’s a baby going to do for you?

Imagine Mary.
My youngest son’s birthday is just a few weeks after Christmas, so I remember being “heavy with child” and hearing the Christmas story. I remember thinking, “no way. Not going to Bethlehem. You go get registered, Joseph. I’m nesting.”

I remember thinking, “she had to give birth where ever she could find space? Are you kidding me? They couldn’t find a room anywhere??”

My pregnant reaction to the Christmas Story might be reason 832 why God didn’t choose me to be the mother of our Lord and Savior.

In any case, Mary gives birth under circumstances that make me twitch. And, no matter how well the labor went, we know it was painful, and exhausting, and messy, and human.

And, so she’s found a quiet place, if not a hospital room, and she’s laid her baby in an animal’s feeding trough, and she’s resting. Pondering how human the Son of God is, perhaps.

And then the shepherds show up.
Just who every mother wants to have visit after her baby has been born, right? Strangers who live on the hillside?

And they find some lady holding a baby and they tell a strange story, an unbelievable story really, about a visitation by the heavenly host. But Mary, who has had her own visit from an angel, knows enough to believe them. But they keep talking about the arrival of the Messiah, the Savior, the Lord.

Regardless of what she’d been told by the angel, I wonder if Mary thought, “Who are they talking about? Can’t they see he’s just a baby? He can’t go out and save the world right now! He’s just a baby. He can’t feed himself. He can’t even lift his head. He may be the Messiah someday, but he’s just a baby tonight.”

And, of course, it is hard for us to hear this story of a baby laid in a manger without  knowing who he will grow up to be.

We know he will perform miracles.

We know he will heal people.

We know he will speak truth to power and seek justice for the oppressed.

We know he will defeat even death itself by dying on a cross.

But all of this is just a promise on Christmas Eve.
The angels announce the birth of a child.
The shepherds come to worship a baby.
And this 8 pound baby Jesus in his golden fleece diaper is worth our remembering. What does it mean that God would choose this vulnerability?

Listen to these verses from WB Yeats’ poem, “A Prayer for my Son”:

Though you can fashion everything
From nothing every day, and teach
The morning stars to sing,
You have lacked articulate speech
To tell Your simplest want, and known,
Wailing upon a woman’s knee,
All of that worst ignominy,
Of Flesh and bone.

What does it mean for us that God would choose to become human in this way?
God could have done it differently. Jesus could have just descended from the sky and announced the year of our Lord’s favor. The creator of the universe could have written the script any way they chose. And God chose to be born to a modest family with a royal pedigree in the midst of Roman occupation.

In his book, Christ: A Crisis in the Life of God, Jack Miles writes: “That God should have begun his human life as an infant is compelling…because although all men (People) are different, babies are all alike. Full participation in the human condition requires a beginning in the leveling anonymity of infancy.”(p 86)

This is an important reminder to us at this time of year. Because while we all start off this earthly journey as babies—all alike in our cute helplessness—we, as adults, are all very different. And our differences often lead to disagreements, fights, and discord. So, as you consider the baby Jesus in the manger, remember that the differences between us as adults are secondary.

Whether our mothers laid us in a manger or in a state-of-the-art crib, we all started our journey in a similar manner—helpless, defenseless, not in control of our economic or family situation, and in need of protection and care.
How can we seek that understanding of each other? How can we remember that commonality we all share?  How can we remember, in a new way, that we are all children of God, that we were all infants like God?
I invite you, as you celebrate the birth of a baby this night, to recognize God’s love for us in all of the babies you see. Whether it is some lady holding a baby on the postage stamp, or a painting by Picasso or Mary Cassatt or a Crow Indian woman with her child in a backboard or a woman in Mumbai

or a painting from Vietnam

any of these babies–all of these babies– remind us that God so loves the world that God chooses to be one of us. Let us seek to build a world where all of God’s children are recognized as signs of hope and signs of God’s love. As Isaiah reminds us:

    For a child has been born for us,
a son given to us;

This is the gift this night.
Thanks be to God.  Amen

Here is the link to the Puppet group’s presentation of Bethlehemian Rhapsody from worship on Christmas Eve.

Leave a Comment » | Isaiah 9:2-7, Luke 2:1-20 | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

Weeping with Joy

December 12, 2011

A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church, Boise, Idaho.

Dec 11, 2011

Luke 1:26-55

Psalm 126

I have struggled with these texts this week, even though I love them both. Mary’s Magnificat is one of my favorite passages in scripture. But I think both texts sound discordant when viewed through America’s preparation for Christmas.

I was talking with my hairstylist this past week and she told me that her family was opting out of Christmas this year. Last year, her son opened a present and said, “another shirt? Aren’t there any good presents here?” and that led her to stop and wonder why she was spending all of this money on things her kids didn’t want or need, why she was getting so stressed out making sure her presents were beautifully wrapped and matched her tree. Is this what Christmas was supposed to be about?

She decided “no”. So, this year, the family is going to take a trip and enjoy each other’s presence, rather than stress each other out by buying a lot of presents.

And even if she is right that being with family is more important than spending money on gifts, you and I might decide that even that isn’t the meaning of Christmas. Wasn’t there a baby born in a barn a few thousand years ago?

Where should this infant God be honored during this season?

There is a general worry that we have taken the “Christ out of Christmas” whenever we say “Happy Holidays” or when children’s school choirs sing “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” instead of “O Holy Night”.

But I don’t think these are God’s concerns. I think they are only ours.

As we look around at the holiday craziness, it is right to acknowledge that while Christmas has a very important meaning to us as Christians, Christmas has a different meaning to many non-religious people. And it is what it is. It’s okay. The removal of Christ’s birth from the consumer driven spectacle that is American Christmas may not be a bad thing, really.

So let us, as Christians, come together, as a worshipping family, to listen to the prophecies of Isaiah, to ponder the angels’ greetings in our hearts, and to prepare for the birth of a baby, but let’s not get distracted by the idea that Jesus is in any way diminished if people see things differently than we do. Our God is too awesome a God to be derailed by someone saying “happy holidays”.

But I wonder if our society at large is suffering from that sense of entitlement that my hairstylist’s son expressed when he didn’t like his gifts.

Rachel Evans, a Christian writer, said this about Christmas:
“I’m not sure when or why it happened, but in some circles, entitlement has been declared December’s Christian virtue. Suddenly it’s not enough that Americans spend millions of dollars each year marking the birth of Jesus. Now we’ve got to have a “Merry Christmas” banner in front of every parade and an inflatable manger scene outside of every courthouse… or else we’ll make a big stink about it in the name of Jesus.  Having opened the gift of the incarnation—of God with us—we’ve peered inside and shrieked, “This is not enough!  Where are the accessories? We want more!”

How did we get here?

This story didn’t begin at a Mall at Midnight after Thanksgiving where people fought each other for flat screened TV’s.

This story didn’t begin in the halls of power.

This story began when an angel of the Lord went to an unwed teenaged girl in the backwater town of Nazareth and announced good news of great joy for all people. “Mary, you have found favor with God!”

And, after she’d pondered this news in her heart, Mary said “let it be with me, according to your will.”

She didn’t ask the angel what was in it for her. She didn’t ask if she would get the TV rights to her story. She didn’t sell the pictures of the birth to People Magazine for $10 million dollars.

Instead, she went with haste to the Hill Country to stay with her cousin Elizabeth. Because the best place for a pregnant teenager to make sense of her situation is with a formerly barren cousin, who was pregnant late in life, with John the Baptist. And it seems that even in the womb, John was preparing the way for Jesus. Because when pregnant Mary walks in to the living room, he leaps in Elizabeth’s womb and she proclaims a blessing that mirrors what Mary had already heard from the angel.

“And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

I suspect Elizabeth’s message must have been very reassuring to Mary. Even if you say “sure” to the angel, I’m sure there’s still a piece of you that’s wondering if you’ve lost your mind. Elizabeth’s proclamation must have been comforting, because it matters to know that you are not alone—that someone else is standing there behind you. That while faith is a personal experience—remember that nobody else saw that angel—it is not a private experience. We find support for our personal faith journeys in community with others—even when they may have heard from a different angel.

And then Mary breaks out in song.
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”

This song is often referred to as the “magnificat”, which is the first word Mary says if you are reading the bible in Latin. And when I hear it, I realize the power of these words from a teenaged girl.

Her song is not a half hearted praise of “my soul thanks the Lord and I trust that he’ll get me through this mess and things will turn out okay.”

Her song is much bigger. It shows that she, correctly, connects the details of her life to God’s bigger plan for the world.

If God can use Mary in God’s plan for salvation for the world, then perhaps we need to reconsider everything we think we know. Mary’s magnificat takes on powerful significance.

If God can use a teenaged girl from a backwater town, then surely God will fill the hungry with good things and send the rich away hungry. Surely God will bring down the mighty and lift up the lowly.  Mary’s song becomes not a prophecy nor prediction, but a description of reality. She doesn’t even bother to use future tense. It doesn’t say “God will…” It says “God has…”

And perhaps you recognized Mary’s Magnificat in the Psalm we read this morning.
When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion,
we were like those who dream.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with shouts of joy;
then it was said among the nations,
“The LORD has done great things for them.”
The LORD has done great things for us,
and we rejoiced.

Mary connects her experience to the larger work of God in the world by hearkening back to the Psalms. And as these texts messed with my head this week, I was thankful for this Psalm. The drumbeat of Joy that works through this psalm called me to look for joy in the world.

Mary’s song, like the psalm, is also full of joy. But not fa la la la la, easy joy that denies the messy reality of her situation. Yes, she’s found favor with God. But she’s still a pregnant teenager.

I’m thankful that Mary went to see her cousin, Elizabeth. Not only did Elizabeth validate her experience with the angel, but I suspect she also helped her see the joy. Elizabeth had been barren for many years. In a culture where childbirth was the only way women had to succeed in the first century world, Elizabeth had been a failure. She had known heartache, loss, and that “yearning for” that everyone who faces infertility or other loss knows.

The text only tells us that Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah were “getting on in years”, which means she’d lived with this loss for a long time. Here was Elizabeth’s comment about her pregnancy. “This is what the Lord has done for me when he looked favorably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my people.”

Yes, Elizabeth knew joy, but it through the experience of her suffering that she recognized it.

And so I’m glad Mary went to Elizabeth. For a little perspective. To see that joy doesn’t spring up from the easy, unexamined life. Joy springs up through our brokenness and pain. I suspect Mary recognized Elizabeth in the psalm:
May those who sow in tears
reap with shouts of joy.

Mary’s joy seems to be a spontaneous outburst, one beyond her control.

Patrick Henry Reardon writes in his book Christ in the Psalms about this psalm and here is what he says: “The experience of salvation has a kind of dreamlike quality. Those who are saved must pinch themselves, as it were, to make sure it is really happening. God’s redemption of us from bondage and oppression is so marvelously incomprehensible; it is too good to be true ~ and the sheer joy of the thing encourages unbelief.” (p. 251)

Mary’s joy is like that. Something marvelously incomprehensible is going on. And her joy mirrors the psalmist’s and calls me to accept the joy that is too good to be true, to receive the situations of my life as gift and blessing, to seek salvation in the unlikely places.

So, on this 3rd Sunday in Advent, when the advertisers try to convince you that joy is people with shopping bags doing choreographed dance numbers in a department store, remember that joy looks different than that. Joy springs up from our tears.
Restore our fortunes, O LORD,
like the watercourses in the Negeb.
May those who sow in tears
reap with shouts of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
carrying their sheaves.

Let us go into the world, seeking that kind of joy.

Leave a Comment » | Advent, Joy, Luke 1:26-55, Psalm 126, Rachel Held Evans | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

Comfort

December 5, 2011

A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church

Dec 4, 2011

Mark 1:1-8

Isaiah 40:1-11

Prophets both attract and repel me in equal measure. I am confident that I would not want to invite John the Baptist over for dinner, for example. His decision to dress like the prophet Elijah, in a camel pelt that is hundreds of years out of style, while eating locusts and honey, are just the first reasons he wouldn’t be polite dinner company. He calls us to not be comfortable with where we are. He calls us to repent, to turn back, to the path God intends for us.  At least here he doesn’t call us a “brood of vipers” as he does in Matthew’s gospel.

But even if I am unlikely to put a John the Baptist display in my front yard as I prepare for Christmas, I can’t quite walk away from him either.

And neither could the crowds. People from the WHOLE Judean countryside and ALL of Jerusalem were going out to hear him speak and to receive that baptism of repentance. Because they needed, because we need, the message he preached.

Mark tells us that this is the beginning of the Good News. We don’t know if he doesn’t know of the birth narratives, or if he doesn’t care about them, but he begins the Good News with John the Baptizer.  At first glance, an oddly dressed prophet man in the wilderness telling us to repent and change our behavior doesn’t sound like Good News.

It sounds like work.

It sounds like discomfort.

It sounds hard.

And yet ALL of Jerusalem and the WHOLE Judean countryside left their comfortable lives in the city, or their work on the farm, and went out to the wilderness to listen to John.

And, here we are, 2,000 years later, doing the same thing.

Maybe we recognize that our lives of comfort are not bringing us any good news as we had hoped they would.

For some of us, perhaps the anxiety in our world has kept us from identifying with the word “comfort” for a while now. Job stress, family instability, disease, money worries, or other factors can make you forget what “comfort” is like.

For John’s audience, who were living under the occupation of Rome, comfort was also probably in short supply.

And so, as John calls people to repentance, he does so by quoting the Prophet Isaiah:
Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that she has served her term,
that her penalty is paid,
that she has received from the LORD’S hand
double for all her sins.

Isaiah wasn’t speaking about the Roman occupation, of course. He was speaking to a people in exile. In the 6th Century, BCE, Babylon invaded Judah, demolished Jerusalem, and carted many of her citizens off to exile in Babylon. Isaiah offered comfort to a people who were facing real political troubles, reminding us that it is appropriate to see the political troubles of our world and respond to them with our Faith.

John, like Isaiah, recognized the pain his people were living with under occupation, and gave them back Isaiah’s words, re-purposed for the problems of his day.
“Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight”.

That is one of the gifts of Scripture, to be able to reach across the years. A passage written by Isaiah as a response to a specific situation becomes the living word of God, hundreds of years later to 1st century Palestinians, and then combines with John’s preaching to again become the living word of God to us here in Boise in 2011, speaking specifically to our lives, our political realities, today.

Even though Mark doesn’t give us the entire Isaiah citation, the people would have heard the refrain of “comfort, oh comfort my people, says the Lord”.  Much like when Susan starts playing the doxology, you know to stand up. Or, when you hear the first line of a song and it then evokes for you the rest of the lyrics.

They heard John say, “Prepare the way of the Lord” and then their minds filled in with the rest of the song:
Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
Then the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together,
for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”

What is the comfort you need in this season of Advent? What is the comfort you need in this mad dash to Christmas?

When you look around at the world, where are the places where you see the need for the mountains to be brought down and the valleys to be lifted up?

What John recognized in Isaiah’s words is that the person of Jesus of Nazareth embodied Isaiah’s words and God’s promises in ways that nobody else ever could.
“Here is your God!”
See, the Lord GOD comes with might,
and his arm rules for him;
his reward is with him,
and his recompense before him.
He will feed his flock like a shepherd;
he will gather the lambs in his arms,
and carry them in his bosom,
and gently lead the mother sheep.

Even though Isaiah didn’t know who Jesus would be, Isaiah knew that God would send a shepherd for the flock, a leader for the people, and a savior to restore us.

And as John read Isaiah’s words, he, like the prophets before him, took his place in story, proclaiming that he was preparing the way for the one who was to come.

And so, today, we take our place in the story in this time of Advent waiting. What do we need to do to prepare the way for the coming of our Lord?

The text is clear. God calls for people to join in the work of preparing the way for Christ. The Good News takes work.  There are valleys to be lifted up and there are mountains to be brought low. We are both the people who need comfort and we are also the people who are called to provide comfort.

The human/divine relationship is mutual but not equal. God calls us to prepare the way, but it is, as John says, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals”.

We may not be worthy, but we still prepare the way. We are not called to be the heroes in the story.
And thank God for that.

Because, I don’t know about you, but I am not up to the task of being the savior. On a good day, I might be able to bring low a mountain of laundry, but not a mountain of injustice. I might be able to straighten out a few things, but I certainly am not up to the task of making a highway straight in the desert.

But our unworthiness to fasten the Lord’s tevas doesn’t keep us from doing our part. We wait. We prepare. We comfort.

Preparing the way. We’re all called to do it. But we don’t get to set this schedule or coordinate the details for this preparation. This isn’t our show to run. We don’t know what the outcome will be. And we don’t even know who all will walk down the road we are preparing.
We are called to prepare for God. On God’s timetable. For God’s glory to be revealed.

A part of the comfort we seek is in the preparation. This work we’re being called to is done so that the “glory of the Lord shall be revealed and ALL people shall see it TOGETHER”.
Isaiah is calling the people to work together for all people. But when the voice says, “cry out!”, the people have no better sense about what they are to do to prepare than we do. “What shall I cry?”, they ask.
Isaiah tells them to get up to a high mountain and lift up their voices with strength to proclaim.

“HERE IS YOUR GOD!”

That is what we are to point out to people. We are to boldly and with confidence stand on the mountaintops and show people where we have seen God. Isn’t that what John the Baptizer does?—pointing to where he sees God. John is the beginning of the Good News. He points to Jesus and reminds us to take comfort in Isaiah’s prophecies.

I’m thankful to hear that voice in Isaiah telling us to lift up our voices. And as we struggle together to figure out what it means to prepare the way for God, I hope that we’ll be able to go about it with love and great joy. I hope, like Isaiah, we can say to the cities of Judah (and Boise)—“Here is your God!”.

Because if comforting the people means pointing out to people when and where we see the Divine at work in our world—then we, too, are a part of the beginning of the Good News! Comfort, oh comfort, my people. Prepare the way!

Thanks be to God. Amen.

Leave a Comment » | Advent, Isaiah 40:1-11, Mark 1:1-8 | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

The Whole Flock

November 20, 2011

A sermon preached on Christ the King Sunday, Nov 20, 2011 at Southminster Presbyterian Church, Boise, Idaho.

Matt 25:31-46

Ezekiel 34:11-16

This morning is Christ the King Sunday. It is a day to pause at the end of the church calendar of “ordinary time”, before we head into the season of Advent next week.

And even though department stores have been playing Christmas songs since August, it is good for us to stop and take a breath, to remember that Christmas isn’t here quite yet, and to be present in the day we have been given.

During Advent, which begins next Sunday, we will prepare our hearts, our minds, and our lives, for both the birth of Jesus and for his return, at the end of days, however you see that.

So, before we enter Advent, it is right to take today to consider who this Jesus is. What does it mean that we call him a King?

What kind of King is he?
Let’s begin with the passage from Ezekiel. Before the text we heard this morning, God calls down judgment on the shepherds of God’s people. “You have not strengthened the weak, you have not healed the sick, you have not bound up the injured, you have not brought back the strayed, you have not sought the lost, but with force and harshness you have ruled them.”

So we start out with a reminder that the leaders, the kings of the people have not been good shepherds. And so God declares “I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will make them lie down, says the Lord GOD.”

We are left with a beautiful description of how God will provide, evoking the 23rd Psalm, with language of rest, of clean streams of water, enough food, beautiful pasture, safety from predators.  God doesn’t promise that everyone will have more than they need. But everyone will have what they need.

Nowhere in this passage is God referred to as a king, but God’s authority over his people is never in question. “I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them with justice.”

And God’s justice is not just aimed against the people who should have been leading. It is also directed at the flock. He tells them that he has given them pasture, but they have trampled over the excess. He has given them clean water and they have put their dirty feet in it.

God has judged the leaders who neglected the flock. And now God is judging the members of the flock who take advantage of the other sheep.

But God’s purpose in judging is not to punish the wrong doers. It is to restore the wrong doers. They aren’t living the lives they are called to live when they oppress their fellow members of the flock. God announces, “I will make with them a covenant of peace and banish wild animals from the land, so that they may live in the wild and sleep in the woods securely. I will make them and the region around my hill a blessing; and I will send down the showers in their season; they shall be showers of blessing.”
That is God’s purpose in executing justice. So that the entire flock can be showers of blessing.

Much as Ezekiel used imagery from the Psalms to write his prophecy, so too does Matthew use Ezekiel’s imagery in his gospel. Jesus, picking up where he left off last week with the parable of the talents, talks about the return of the Son of Man, who will judge, separating the flock just as Ezekiel described.

But as Matthew has the story, it tells us a few things about Jesus.

First,  this story tells us something about the nature of God’s judgment. While this text isn’t a parable in the same way the previous stories in this chapter are, there is a similarity in the punishment that is meted out to the people who do not live as God instructs. Remember last week how there was “weeping and gnashing of teeth” in the outer darkness for the worthless slave? The bridesmaids who let the oil run out in their lamps were told by Jesus “I don’t know you”.

The punishment in these parables is harsher than the reward.

But remember, these are stories Jesus is telling to instruct the ones he loves. He is presenting these stark comparisons because surely, surely, when we hear of the consequences of living our lives as if the rest of the flock don’t matter, we’ll change. Right?

Much like Ezekiel, the point of judgment is not just punish, it is to correct. God would take no pleasure in being the king who has to send people out to weep in the outer darkness. But God loves us enough to be that king. Because God cares that much about the entire flock.

Also, this story makes it clear that God is not some shepherd far away, watching the flocks through binoculars. In this story, God in Jesus is right there in the midst of us. So, yes, the shepherd imagery remains, but Jesus also identifies himself as one of the flock.

And not the part of the flock that has the money, the power, and the privilege. Jesus identifies himself with the people who were hungry and thirsty, the people who were sick and in prison, the people who were naked.

So our salvation will come, but it will be a surprise. “When did we see you hungry, and naked, and sick?” the unrighteous in the story ask Jesus. “We would have fed you, given you clothes, and nursed you to health!”

It means that the way we treat people can’t be because one of them might just be Jesus. It means Jesus wants us to treat everyone as if they are Jesus. Period. It means that our salvation is not a private event, just between me and Jesus. Our salvation is a part of how we live with the people around us.

And I know that this message is counter cultural.

A friend shared this quote this week from Father Ronald Rolheiser, who said that today we seem to prefer having

a King but not the kingdom,
a shepherd with no flock
to believe without belonging
a spiritual family with God as my father
as long as I’m the only child
“spirituality” without religion
faith without the faithful
Christ without His Church.

And it made me think of this text. Wouldn’t our lives be easier if we just had to take care of our own relationship with God? Can’t we just have our own personal shepherd?

Why do we have to deal with the rest of the flock?

And how do we treat the flock?

Not just the part of the flock that is in this room, but the part of the flock that is downtown at the homeless shelter and the part of the flock that is across the world, starving in Somalia?

So, this week, before the Christmas race begins full force, before we reach Advent, I invite you to spend some time thinking about how Jesus is King in your life. How is he the shepherd? And, more than that, how do you get along with the rest of the flock? What does it mean to be a part of a bigger kingdom than just having our personal relationship to the king?

They shall know that I, the LORD their God, am with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are my people, says the Lord GOD.  You are my sheep, the sheep of my pasture and I am your God, says the Lord GOD.

Remember this promise from Ezekiel. God seeks our restoration. God seeks the health of the whole flock. May our lives and our actions also seek the same. Amen.

Leave a Comment » | Christopher Columbus, shepherds, snakes on a plain, Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

Unburied Treasure

November 13, 2011

A sermon preached Nov 13, 2011 at Southminster Presbyterian Church, Boise, Idaho.

Matthew 25:14-30

I shared this story with the people who gathered Tuesday night for Committees, and their first reaction was that this parable prompted an “Occupy Jerusalem” tendency in them.

Much like the people who have been camping outside Wall Street to protest policies that benefit the Wall Street corporations at the expense of the “little guy”, this parable, at first glance, sounds like Wall Street would love it.

“For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away”. Doesn’t that sound like something we should be protesting against?!! It is enough to make me weep and gnash my teeth.

But before we can really dig into this parable, we need to clear up what the word “talent” means here. It is a Greek word and was a unit of measurement in many middle eastern cultures. One talent was not just one coin. A Talent was what a laborer would earn in 16.5 years. So in ancient terms or in today’s terms, we’re talking about a lot of money. It might have been more helpful had the translators said, “A man, before going on a journey, summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave two and a half million dollars. To another, he gave one million dollars. And to a third he gave five hundred thousand dollars.”

Does that change the story for you at all?

It sure changes it for me.

To start with, it gives me a different appreciation of the Master. Anyone can leave people with $10 or $20 to invest. And while it would be nice to get it back, if you lose $10, you still might have some other options. But this master didn’t hand out $1, 5, and 10. He gave out, conservatively, 4 million dollars.

That’s quite a gift. Staggering, really. It is quite a responsibility. If the investments don’t work out, the master is the one who has lost. His relationship with these servants must be unique. You wouldn’t just hand $4 million dollars over to servants if you didn’t know them well enough to know if they were going to leave town with your money. He clearly trusted these servants with something of great value.

Putting this parable in modern economic terms also gives me a different appreciation of the servants who receive the gifts. If I were entrusted with $1 million to invest, I’d be humbled by the trust that had been placed in me. It would probably make me reconsider my relationship to the master and my appraisal of my own abilities—“I didn’t know he thought I was capable of this. Wow. I wonder what else I might be capable of?”

What could you do if someone placed that kind of trust in you? Could you live into bigger dreams for yourself?

Two of the servants seemed to do just that. They took the talents they’d been given and they immediately went out and invested them. When he returned, they had doubled his investment in them.

I confess that it has been hard for me to read this text while the stock market keeps falling. Because, I’ve been wondering, how do you DOUBLE an investment without doing something very RISKY? I don’t think you can.
What did they invest in? The Damascus Stock Exchange? Camel stock futures? Olive oil? Credit Default Swaps? Housing developments on the Dead Sea coast?

Whatever it was, these servants took risks to double their investment.
We have seen these risks playing out rather badly lately. And so when we see the third servant, the one who buried his talent in the ground, we likely have some compassion for him. He may not have taken any risks, but he didn’t lose the money. Right? How many times have you heard people say, “I wish I hadn’t invested my money but had put it under my bed!“

I think the parable I’d like to see is the one where the man leaves his servants with the money, goes on his trip, and while he’s gone, the economy goes down the tube. How would he have responded to the servants who had gone out there and made those risky investments had the investments not made money? What if they had taken the gifts they’d been given, gone out on a limb to do something new, and then failed?

Perhaps we can see the answer in the parable we already have. Did you notice the response from the third servant when the man came back?

“Master, I knew you were a harsh man—reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you did not scatter seed. So I was afraid and I went and hid your talent in the ground.”

What?

Who’s he talking about? The same “harsh man” who just left him with $500,000?

The other servants didn’t say anything like that. And his responses to the first two servants—“well done good and trustworthy slave. You have been trustworthy in a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master.”—those responses don’t seem to support the third servant’s claim.

But, for whatever reason, two of the servants seem to have a good relationship with the master, and one of them does not. The first two servants were comfortable enough in their relationship with the master to respond to his gift, to respond to the task he gave them, with confidence.

Despite the risks. And, I suspect that had they lost everything when the Jerusalem Stock Market crashed, I think his answer to them might have been the same. “Well done good and trustworthy slave. Enter into the joy of your master.”

Because, of course, this parable isn’t about money. It is about these other staggering gifts we’ve been given. These talents, as it were. Interestingly, because of the usage of this word in this parable, the Greek word talent is carried over almost intact to mean “a natural aptitude or skill”. There may be other examples, but this is the only one I know of where the figurative use of a term by Jesus becomes a new word with new meaning. The word talent moves from a staggering amount of money to become a description of the gifts we’ve been given.

Let’s rephrase the parable again, in non-economic terms.

“For it is as if God summoned God’s servants and entrusted his belongings to them. To one he gave the gift of hospitality. To another, he gave the gift of evangelism, and to a third, he gave the bread of life and the cup of salvation. The one who received the talent of hospitality went out and invested the gift by being welcoming and providing safe space for those she met along the way. The one who received the gift of evangelism went and invested the gift by sharing the good news of the Gospel and invited many others to join him. The third servant took the gift of bread and wine and buried them in a hole.
“When God returned, the first servant shared stories of how she had overcome her fear of being rejected and how, as a result, the gift of hospitality had made a difference in the lives of the people with whom she had shared it. The second servant shared stories of how God’s confidence in him had allowed him to overcome his fear of public speaking and how the gift of evangelism had allowed him to share the good news of the gospel with others, that they might also know the love and grace of God. To both of these servants, God said, “well done good and trustworthy servants. Enter into the joy of your master.”
“The third servant came to God and said, “I didn’t know you well enough to overcome my fear, so I buried the gifts you’d given me and put them in a hole so nothing would happen to them. They’re a little dirty, but here they are.”
“You wicked and lazy slave,” God replied, “I’d given you gifts of life to share—what good were they going to do in a hole in the ground? If you weren’t going to invest them in other people, you could have at least passed them on to someone who would have.
“For to all those who have, more will be given and they will have an abundance. But from those who have nothing, who have buried their gifts in the ground, even what they have will be taken away.” (Thanks to Anna Carter Florence in Lectionary Homiletics for this rephrase of the parable.)

Friends, the good news is that God has given us all gifts beyond measure. I may not know what your talents are, but I hope you have a sense of them. And I hope you notice the talents in others. Often we don’t recognize how our talents can be invested until others suggest things to us. And I pray that you are cultivating and sharing your gifts for the betterment of the Kingdom of God.

Because, for you to not share your talents is the equivalent of burying them in the dirt.

And we all have reasons when we dig those holes. We’re busy. We’re afraid of failure or rejection. We don’t think our talents are worth sharing. We think other people are more talented. We don’t think it matters—to others or to God.

But this week, I invite you to lay down your shovel. I invite you to consider that your talents do matter—to this community and to God. Where would we be if people hadn’t shared their money and talents with this community?

We wouldn’t have this building, or a choir, or Sunday school teachers, or the flower beds weeded, or bulletins typed, or any of this.

Where would our community be without churches and individuals to support the homeless shelters, to provide thanksgiving dinners for children, to provide gifts so that children have present to open at Christmas, to offer assistance to refugees who are trying to resettle, to provide free medical and dental care to those who can’t otherwise afford it? It would be a sad world, indeed. A world full of buried talents.

I suspect God looks at talents differently than we do. They aren’t commodities with a limited supply and demand. They aren’t worth anything by themselves. They are gifts. Gifts that are only of value when shared with others. And gifts that only grow and expand once they are shared.

“For to all those who have, more will be given and they will have an abundance.”

May it be so. Amen.

2 Comments | Matthew 25:14-30, Talents | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

Stories We Tell

November 6, 2011

A sermon preached November 6, 2011 at Southminster Presbyterian Church in Boise, Idaho.

Joshua 24:1-25

In our text this morning, Joshua tells the people their story as God sees it.

Long ago your ancestors—Terah and his sons Abraham and Nahor—lived beyond the Euphrates and served other gods. Then I took your father Abraham from beyond the River and led him through all the land of Canaan and made his offspring many.
Then I sent Moses and Aaron, and I plagued Egypt with what I did in its midst; and afterwards I brought you out.

The narrative goes on from the experiences of the Patriarchs and the Exodus and then includes a reminder of the Wilderness and the entrance into the Promised Land. And in this telling of the events, let’s notice what God didn’t say.

God did not say, “I called your ancestors from beyond the Euphrates because I could tell that you, someday in the future, would be more deserving of my blessing than other people.”
God did not say, “You made it out of slavery because you were super fabulous “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps” types.”

God did not say, “It was your own ingenuity and great ideas that delivered you.”
It is clear, in both God’s telling of the story, and in the people’s reiteration of it later in the chapter, that God is the actor in the story. It was God who brought Abraham from beyond the Euphrates and who made him to be a blessing. It was God who blessed the 12 tribes of Jacob’s sons. It was God who parted the waters and who cleared away the earlier inhabitants of the Promised Land.

Joshua asks the people to choose, this day, whom they will serve.

The people answer Joshua:

“Far be it from us that we should forsake the LORD to serve other gods; for it is the LORD our God who brought us and our ancestors up from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and who did those great signs in our sight.”

Their answer is clearly the “right” answer for them to have given Joshua. But he doesn’t accept it at face value. “You cannot serve the LORD, for he is a holy God,” he tells the people.

 

“Well”, they say. “We know that we have sometimes forgotten that God is leading us. We know that, in the past, we have served other gods and exalted ourselves, but we promise, promise, promise, that this time we will have no other gods but God.”

And, here we are, thousands of years later, and still being asked this question. “Choose this day whom you will serve”.

 

What I appreciate about the question from Joshua is that he asks us to choose “this day” whom we will serve. And we, on this day, consider that question in light of all of the days before us. From the time God brought our ancestor Abraham from beyond the Euphrates to the time God brought our ancestors to Boise.  From the time God called Southminster Presbyterian Church to be built on the southern edge of Boise in 1956. From the time God called these new people to join our family this day.

 

There have been a lot of “this days” in our past, bringing us each here from our different journeys to be family, to be God’s people here in this neighborhood on this day.
The stories we tell about ourselves and about our history are important. If you want to know how someone sees the world, ask them to tell you about their past.

For me, it probably shouldn’t have been a big surprise when I became a pastor, because the narrative of my life starts like this. “My earliest memory is of my parents telling me that I was adopted as an infant because they prayed for a baby and God gave me to them.”

So, I have tangible proof in my life experience that God was actively working on my behalf before I was even born, preparing the family for me that could help turn the loss of adoption into the gift of family.

 

What are the stories you tell about your own life? What are the stories you tell about this community of faith? Is God the major player in our life stories? Or do we recast ourselves as the leading actor?

And sometimes we choose to only tell what we think are the “good” stories. We tell about how our grandparents invented post it notes, or played drums in Glen Miller’s band, but we neglect to mention how a gambling addiction led to financial ruin.

But the stakes are too high for us to only tell the pretty stories.

 

The letters that people include in Christmas cards are good illustrations of this. While it is appropriate to focus on your blessings and to share the gifts of the past year, many people send out Christmas letters that tell the story of the year as if it had been lived by a perfect family that we all know doesn’t really exist.

 

And those letters are okay. But they aren’t the ones you remember. And they don’t connect people as well because you don’t look at their story and see room to enter into it. They don’t help us look at the brokenness in our own lives and realize that if God is at work in that person’s broken story, then surely God is at work in mine.

But we have some friends in New Mexico who send out an honest Christmas letter. While they do share their blessings and write about the good things that happened that year, George is also likely to write about the son who flunked out of college because he forgot to go to class. He’ll tell you about the smells, sounds, and body changes that go along with having adolescent boys in the house. He’ll tell about car crashes and mistakes.

And, while I confess that our own family Christmas letter is not quite as brutally honest as George’s, I recognize that his is the more Biblical one.

Remember how God tells the story of the Hebrew people? Remember how they tell it themselves?  It is human. It is flawed. It is messy. It is full of things they would just as soon forget. Slavery, exile, being lost, and making bad choices.

And these are the stories we need to share with each other. The stories of our pain, our brokenness, our mistakes.

Because if you look at the world around us, where people spend millions of dollars a year on plastic surgery to deny the very human processes that are going on in their lives, if you look at the world around us where rates of depression are higher than ever and where substance abuse rates continue to rise, we can see that telling only perfect stories isn’t working.

If you look around the television dial, you will find plenty of stories of not perfect people, I’m told. From the Kardashian family to the Real Housewives of wherever.

But the problem in these stories is that the stories they tell don’t say anything about where God is moving in the midst of their imperfect lives. Their stories present a narrative that suggests that had Joshua asked them to choose this day whom they would serve, their answers would have been “we serve ourselves and our endorsement deals.”

Yes, we are appalled that a celebrity marriage that reportedly earned the couple millions of dollars in endorsements came to an end after 72 days, as happened this week. But the truly sad piece of the story that is missing is that they seem to be trusting that more endorsements, more reality TV is what will heal them.

What we know, from the stories of scripture, and the stories of our lives, is that it is only the grace of God that can turn the broken and messy, true stories of our lives into beauty, into salvation, and into grace filled moments of wonder.

That’s why we tell the stories that include our brokenness. Not because it will get us endorsements with People Magazine. But because it is how we share where God is moving in our lives.

Remember how the people answered Joshua when he asked them who they would serve?

Then the people answered, “it is the LORD our God who brought us and our ancestors up from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and who did those great signs in our sight. He protected us along all the way that we went, and among all the peoples through whom we passed. Therefore we also will serve the LORD, for he is our God.”

In a few minutes, we will be welcoming new members and baptizing people who are new to the Faith. We will be dedicating the pledges of our Tithes and Offerings to support the budget for 2012.

I invite all of us to remember the stories of our own faith journey as we welcome these new members. How did we end up in this place? Who were the people who led you on the journey?

And as we dedicate our pledges, I invite you to consider how God might be calling you to serve God with your time, your talent, and your money. How have other people shared their gifts in your life and is there a way that your tithing and pledging can be a way to answer Joshua’s question?

Friends, let us choose, this day, to serve and love the Lord who has provided for us in the past, who is leading us today, and who is preparing a future for us that is better than the story we could invent for ourselves. Amen

Leave a Comment » | Joshua 24 | Permalink
Posted by marciglass

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