The Reverend Angela L. Ying

There once was a bear so filled with love that whenever he roamed the forest and came across another living thing, he would give it a hug.

Everywhere he wandered, the bear shared his love – hug by hug.

He even hugged creatures that bears have been known to eat.

This bear could meet the roundest little rabbit, and he would just stop, smile and give it a great big hug.
No creature was too big…
Too small…

Too smelly…

Or too scary to hug.
But what this bear love to hug most were trees.

The bear never met a tree he did not like.

Big trees…

Little trees…

Apple trees…

Pear trees…

Peach trees…

This bear hugged them all.
One day while the bear was trying to hug a beaver and a tree at the same time — he noticed a man with an axe walking into the forest.

The bear followed the man until he stopped at one of the tallest, oldest and most beautiful trees in the forest.

The man spent so much time looking at this magnificent tree that the bear thought the man must love trees, too.

But to the bear’s horror, the man started to chop the tree down…

For the first time in his life, the bear did not feel like hugging at all.

Then, just as the bear was about to sink his teeth into the man, the bear stopped.

The bear realized that no matter how angry he was, the bear simply could not eat the man.
It just was not in his nature.
The bear sighed…
And then he decided to do what he did best…

He gave the man a HUG!
The man was not used to getting real big bear hugs, so once the bear let go, the man dropped his axe and ran far, far away.

And do you know what the bear did next?
The bear smiled and gave the tree a great big hug.

The tree felt much better.
[from Big Bear Hug by Nicholas Oldland]

As you listened to the story, who are you more like?

The bear so filled with love…
The creatures and trees being hugged…

The tree, which has taking time to grow for years and yet finds it can still be vulnerable…
The man with the axe…
And what would happen if I told you:
Love is in YOUR nature.
Love is in YOUR nature.
Love is in YOUR nature.
Would you believe it?
Love is in OUR nature.
Do we trust it?

Knowing love is in your nature, would you act differently?

Knowing love is in your neighbor’s nature and in my nature, would you live differently?
I wonder if you and I actually do trust that love is in our nature, but we so easily forget.
When someone attempts to tell me that love is in my nature,

a part of me wants to believe it — and to believe it wholeheartedly. And that part of me grows and blossoms as I experience the embrace of God who is love.

And yet, a part of me… still wonders, still worries if the one sharing this about me really knows what they are talking about.

True?

And this part of me, I need God and my family, my friends and my faith community to help me in my unbelief. For this part of me can keep me stuck.

Stuck in my own destructive ways that become so familiar that they are comforting.

For left to my own means, out of my deep fears — without consciously knowing — I will get the axe out — forgetting the beauty, the immense beauty God holds in me, in you and in God’s creation.

Perhaps, we have become so far removed from the love that is in our nature — the love that God has breathed in each one of us. So much so that we come to see the beautiful old trees in our lives as things we are “entitled” to — Entitled to chop down.

True?

Looking at the world, it seems we often act more like the man proudly carrying a big, heavy axe into life than the bear so filled with love, don’t we?

We carry our heavy axe, we convince ourselves, as protection, not knowing what we are capable of destroying and swing at anything that gets in our way — cutting down anything that may be or become of use to us.

And if we do not cut it down, we might go behind the scenes, and try to get someone else who will go out and cut it down for us.

Is this really in our nature — or something we have gotten use to, something that is familiar though very destructive —- because we know what it is like to be vulnerable and to have to face being cut down and made into something we are not. And we are afraid.

BUT — To Love is in our nature.
Remember the stillpoint as we began a journey of Manna and Mercy: You are born in love, by love, for love.
Not to harm.

Not to kill.

Not to destroy.

But… To love.
This is what God wants.
This is what God hopes for us.
This is the God we keep running away from because we are not used to a real embrace that tells us who we are and whose we are. God’s Beloved.

So we run…

We run far, far away from God whose nature it is to LOVE.

Sure God can wipe us out.
Sure God can put God’s teeth in us.

But God weeps and sighs and knows it is not in God’s nature to do this.

So, God keeps loving.
And what do humans do?
Take a look at the scriptures.
Humans respond by acting like “BIG DEALS.” Humans not only think like Pharaoh, who thought he owned everything, humans start acting like they are Pharaoh with the military behind us.
Humans make a BIG DEAL. Which inadvertently means, we think there are others who can be seen as “small deals.” And thus, the disparity and inequality between Pharaoh with his big deals on top, and various big deals and ordinary citizens in the middle. And on the bottom of the pyramid, making up most people, are the slaves who lived under heavy oppression. A system divided by big deals and small deals, rich and poor, oppressors and oppressed.
“How do humans know if they were big deals?

They know by bossing other humans around, by piling up stuff, by dominating nature, and by reaching glorious heights… they knew by having more points than other humans in their scoring system. Humans gathered into groups, clans, tribes and nations. These collections of humans became extremely enthused about their group being better than other groups. Thus, humans invented oppression and war. Oppression involves setting up a system so one group can use another group for its own advantage. War involves killing humans in another group until they surrender.
God groaned. Planet Earth groaned. All living things groaned. The whole universe, its harmony disrupted by the egoism of the human species, wept.

You can bet God thought of snuffing out the humans. However, when considering the destruction of the human race, God wept and said, “I will not! Can a mother destroy her child, her delight, her joy?”

It is not in God’s nature not to love.

So, God in passionate love, decides that instead of terrorizing humans into submission, God will do what God does best — LOVE and begins “the long story – a story of friendship, passion, promise, disappointment, hope and self-giving love. A story of God mending the universe.” (from Manna and Mercy by Daniel Erlander).

Even when humans act and become oppressive Pharaohs.

Even when the oppressed are liberated and spend forty years in the wilderness and when they forget, they ask for a king to rule over them when God tells them Israel will become the very Pharaoh’s Egypt they left.

Even when the Assyrian Empire, the Babylonian Empire, the Persian Empire and much later the Roman Empire, in Jesus’ time came to be formed…

God weeps. God sighs. God loves.
And the amazing thing is this… that even as empire existed around him, Jesus taught, preached and lived LOVE.

In the days, weeks, and months ahead, will we remember we are born in love, by love, for love… to LOVE.
For that is God’s hope and in the words of the Apostle Paul to the Romans “as the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains” ready to give birth to something new — can we not make a big deal.

Rather, begin the long process to love and be so filled with love that, created in the image of God, we come to experience in our life long movement from empire to earth community — from our every day movement from big deals and small deals to loving as Jesus loves — we discover to our amazing surprise
…To love is in our nature!

How often in your life have your been asked to choose sides?

Pick a side, we are told.
Between one friend and another.
Between one child and another.
Between one team and another.
Between one race and another.
Between one country and another.
Pick a side, we are told.
Or you are not patriot.
Or you are not faithful.
Or you will not belong.
It is tempting for any church to work in absolutes.

For we in community need to be able to see and be comfortable with the grey and even with not knowing — to be able to embrace a both/and.

It is tempting for any congregation to work in either/or.

For we in the community need to be able to confess the complexity of not being able to see the whole picture, only a part, our part of the puzzle — to be able to embrace a both/and.

God made a man of faith, named Abraham the father of many nations.

God did not do it using instant gratification.

In fact, Abraham and Sarah got tired of the false starts and waiting for God.

And believe it or not, they really made a mess of things because they took other people and their lives into their own hands. And some have not recovered from their actions since.

No, God is not into immediate gratification for you and me and the community of faith — no matter how much God loves — even if we demand it.

Took God until Abraham was 100 years old to begin the process of birthing a father of many nations.

Took God until Sarah was barren and God had spoken with Hagar in the wilderness before the process of birthing was blessed.

The father of Judaism. The father of Christianity. The father of Islam.

You wonder how people of faith can think of working in absolutes and either/or — choosing sides as Jews, Christians and Muslims even with the same roots from the same tree and genealogy.

I am sure it saddens God to see God’s own people working against each other.

Remember our Bible stories from last week.

David and Goliath.

David the shepherd boy bringing food to his brothers only to find himself facing Goliath the towering giant of the Philistine army.

And with no armor and no bronze helmet, only a shepherd’s staff and five smooth stones, David confronts Goliath.

And yet, no sooner than David and the Hebrew community of faith have the chance to build community without fear when in the following chapter we hear that Saul of the Hebrew community is jealous.

Jealous.

Jealous of what?

Isn’t David on the exact same side of Saul?

That is what David thought. That is what we thought. Until we begin to see that King Saul is on King Saul’s side.

For if Saul were on the side of the community, there is no reason to be jealous of someone else in your own community. There is reason to rejoice and give God thanks.

But unfortunately, as the scriptures reveal, this does happen.

David saves the people from being oppressed and taken over by the Philistine army and Saul from his own community turns on David and seeks to kill David.

Bible story, yes.

The sad reality is that this happens every day by individuals who are more into themselves than being with God.

As David the shepherd discovers the hard way, it is not some outside enemy — but rather someone broken on the inside of the faith community who will cause havoc.

Yes, Saul is in pursuit of killing David because Saul cannot stand when the people in the community joyfully sing “Saul has faced thousands. And David has faced tens of thousands.”

When you can face thousands — rejoice!

When someone else in the community faces tens of thousands — rejoice!

But Saul cannot seem to do this.

Because it is all about him.

He cannot see beyond the past.

He wants to win. He needs to win. He wants to be the very person to face tens of thousands.
And because of this, Saul is blind — to what the community as a whole is able to do together.
Jesus who came from the lineage of Abraham and of David saw the Pharisees and scribes in the community experience the same thing when Jesus preached good news.
Whenever Jesus healed the poor, the lame, the sick and the blind — the church leaders — known as the Pharisees and scribes — looked on and became jealous of Jesus and wanted to kill him.

So much brokenness. So much fear.
And yet, in today’s scripture passages, God seems to shed light on another way.

One that does not come automatically or even by second nature.

One that must we learned and relearned over and over through love and forgiveness.

Saul is in hot pursuit of killing David.
Remember, someone who cannot see beyond themselves is not willing to see the whole picture.
Had Saul been given the chance, it is certain he would have killed David.

Strangely enough though, when David is given the chance to hurt and even kill Saul — David does not do it.

Some of those with David saw it as a chance — and yet, David did not do it.

Just cutting a corner of Saul’s cloak brought pain to David afterwards because — and this is key as we grow a church that helps people have a faith of doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with God as our mission —-

David says, “God forbid that I should do this thing to Saul — one of God’s anointed — to raise my hand against him — for he too is God’s.

How did David refrain from taking revenge on one who was going to kill him because of his fear and jealousy?
Perhaps, David, unlike Saul who embraced the ways of empire — David believed deeply in God’s earth community.
Earth Community — when the question is not — is God on our side (or even is God on MY side) — rather —

How can you and I be with God on God’s side?

To actually pray that we be with God on God’s side.

Which means we are looking to God and not ourselves on what that means to be with God.

Because let me share with you — sometimes we will not know. Sometimes we as people of faith, must live with the unknown for a time.

We may think we know one day and yet, tomorrow we find is another day that God can shed new light on us, once more.

Could this be the way David could resist the temptation, even with encouragement from his friends, to hurt Saul when Saul wanted to hurt David.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu writes as he reflects on the apartheid in South Africa. “There is no future without forgiveness.”

And he did not say it would be easy — only faithful.

After all “forgiveness, reconciliation and reparation are not the normal currency in political discourse where it is more normal to demand satisfaction to pay back in the same coin, to give as good as you get, for it is more common to have the ethos of “dog eat dog” in the jungle of the world of politics.”
And yet, we as a community of faith are not called to be “of the world.”

Not called as community to condone and follow empire.

Rather to be an earth community — which is not easy. And yet, with God, is possible.
To be an earth community where the question is not — is God on our side — rather — How can we be with God on God’s side.

Listen to the words of the apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans on being with God as a Christian.
Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve God. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to stranger.
The apostle continues: Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Live in peace with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are.

Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thoughts for what is good in the sight of all. If possible, live peaceably with all.

Could this be a way to authentic earth community as we dare to first change ourselves and our lives in seeking to be the change in the world?

This week two children at school got dressed up for Super Hero Day. One dressed as Hermione Granger with the great power of the wizard’s robe, wand, and her Gryffindor scarf. The other came fully dressed as Cat Girl, with a black dress, mask, cat ears and long tail.

The only thing was that when the two children arrived at school, the child, dressed as Hermione, suddenly went quiet.

I wondered what had happened to the power of the child’s joy.

And then I saw why.
Aware of everyone and everything around her — she realized at that moment that she with her mother had the wrong day and that Super Hero Day was tomorrow — the following day.
Today at school was “Inside Out Day” as looking around, many of the students were wearing their clothes inside-out.
What to do.

The child dressed in Cat Girl was happy to see her friend dressed as Hermione and still took no notice that no one else was dressed as a super hero. Cat Girl was happy swinging her tail.

Seeing the pain and struggle in the child dressed as Hermione’s face, the parent said that it was easy enough to take the robe and scarf off and to turn one’s clothes inside out to fit into the situation.

But for some reason, this child did not do this. She wanted time to think about the situation.
How could she and her mother have gotten the days wrong?

She needed time to grieve and ground herself.

As the two children walked towards the classroom, the child kindly asked her mother to ask and confirm with the teacher what day it really was.

“It is Inside-Out Day,” the teacher replied.

Looking at the child, the parent stood by her child dressed as Hermione — waiting to see what her child would choose to do.

During this time, the other child dressed in Cat Girl finally came to the realization that indeed it was not Super Hero Day, and that she had nothing else to change into.
The child dressed in Cat Girl stood at the doorway of the classroom while other stared. Cat Girl child looked at her friend dressed as Hermione.

“What are you going to do?”
And then, I watched and witnessed as the child, who could have very easily taken her robe and scarf off, and put away her wand and owl — instead…

Took hold of her friend, Cat Girl’s hand and courageously walked into their classroom with robe, scarf, wand and owl — together.

Thank you — I whispered looking up. Knowing how easily children can hurt other children, especially if they too have been hurt.

And as I was leaving the school, I heard the teacher say, “Today, we have two Super Heroes in our midst.”
They may have wanted to be Super Heroes by getting all dressed up that day. And yet, what the two children discovered, by the grace of God, was that to be a super hero — they, as we, first have to be there for each other.

As we move towards being an earth community daring to ask the question, “How can we be with God on God’s side” — we will see as the hymnist once shared:

“We are pilgrims on a journey, we are travelers on the road.

We are here to help each other go the mile and bear the load.

I will hold the Christ light for you in the shadow of your fear;

I will hold my hand out to you — speak the peace we long to hear.”

Thanks be to God!

Bread

You Knead it.

You Bake it.

You Toast it.

You Add to it.

Butter it up.

Watch it rise.

Bread

You can smell it from afar

You can leave it out and it hardens
Bread

When our ancestors Abraham and Sarah were barren in their old age hoping to give birth — let alone be ancestors to a multitude of nations — it was in offering Bread to three strangers — that Abraham and Sarah were told it would be so.
Bread of birth

When Jacob wanted to trick his elder brother, Esau out of his birthright and blessing, he fed him bread.
Bread of betrayal
When the Hebrew people fled to be free and had no time for the bread to rise, they took and received the unleavened bread of Passover.

Bread of freedom
When Moses brought his people out of the Pharaoh’s empire, crossing the Reed Sea — and instead of going the simplest route, took the way of the wilderness — God provided the people each day with manna.

Bread for the journey
Bread

When David was hungry, he and his people ate bread from the temple even on the Sabbath.

Bread of God that breaks from conventional ways.

When Jesus, in the beginning of his ministry, was praying and fasting in the wilderness for forty days and forty nights, Satan tempted him to use his power to turn the stones to bread.

One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

When Peter, James and John and the disciples looked out and saw that there were 5,000 people — they wanted to send the people home. But Jesus said, what do YOU have — bring to me what you have. The disciples brought forth what they had — five loaves and two fish. And it was enough for all — with baskets leftover.
Bread that makes miracles
When the disciples did not know how to pray, they asked Jesus “teach us how to pray.”
Give us this day our daily bread.
Bread

In the final hours when Jesus was at table, knowing he would be betrayed, denied, suffer and be crucified — Jesus took bread, blessed it, broke it and gave it to his people.
Take, eat, do this in remembrance of me.

Bread of life

On that first day of the week, at early dawn, when the women came to the tomb, they went to pay their respects to their bread of life.

Having phoned, and text messaged the other women they knew, Mary Magdalene, Joanna and Mary the mother of James had remembered to come with every spice they could think of to anoint the dead Jesus.

You get Jewish, Irish and Asian mothers together, and there is nothing they have forgotten.

Why, they will remind you of what you were to remind them about.

The women had remembered. The fact that they were prepared was an understatement.

Completely in control, is more like it.

Until —-

They found the Stone rolled away from the tomb.

And yet — in the gospel of Luke, the women did not freak out.

Why — they went right in.

Walked right on into the tomb, as if that was part of what they remembered as their plan.

But when they went in — they did not find the body.

Come on now! Stay with me — Here is where it gets a little bit complicated.

For death, is clean, clear, closed and nailed down.

Not so with Life and definitely not for the Bread of Life!

The women found the Stone rolled away and nobody. I mean NO body.

The women were perplexed.

Okay, terrified — when they do not see the body.

Who wouldn’t be?

Perplexed, puzzled, and pondering what to make of this. When Out of nowhere, two men in dazzling clothes – guess they wanted to make sure the women didn’t miss them – stood beside them.

“Why are you looking for the Living among the Dead?”

He is not here.

He has risen.

And then they said something that sounds like something my grandmother would have said,

“Remember.”

Remember.

Remember how Jesus told you and the other disciples when you were back in Galilee — in the south end.

Do you remember?

Will you remember?

Remember when Jesus told you that he had to be handed over to sinners, be crucified on the cross and in three days rise up.

Do you remember?

It is when the women remembered that everything changed.

No longer were their hands full of spices for burial, but open and empty with hope.

No longer were they the ones prepared, but the ones now out of control.

No longer were the women the ones without voice, but the first ones to bear witness to the risen Christ.

They remembered.

They remembered Jesus’ words. Remembered who they were and whose they were.

What happens when you remember Jesus’ words?

The women left the tomb.

They left the place where they came looking for death.

They went to their faith community.

They spoke.

They told of what they had seen and heard to the Eleven and to all the rest.

They kept telling the apostles, repeating, recalling, remembering.

You can hear them now!

“And then Mary went in, and Joanna after and you won’t believe what happened next?”

The women couldn’t stop telling all the people.

Kept telling everyone what they had seen and heard.

Because once God gives you voice, even a preacher knows this — you have to use that voice!

Remember. They remembered Jesus’ words.

A friend from seminary told me the story of when he and his granddaughter went out on a boat ride.

It was a beautiful day when the two of them went out together. Something they had planned and prepared for a long time.

It was when they got to the deepest end of the lake, where out of no where, heavy winds came upon them, and suddenly knocked the young girl completely out of the boat.

The grandfather tried to reach for her, but he just couldn’t. He did not have the strength.

Realizing he was too weak to pull her up by himself, he told her he was going to go get help.

By the time the grandfather got back on shore, hours had passed.

He and the others quickly went back to where the young girl had fallen out of the boat. But she was not there.

Then far out in the distance, they spotted her.

She was not moving. No longer moving her arms. They only saw her body floating.

Anxious and worried to get to his granddaughter, the grandfather pointed out to the others where he saw the girl’s body.

As the boat grew closer, they heard: “Grandpa! Grandpa! I remembered what you told me to do, to keep on keeping on — until you come back!”

At the empty tomb, when they thought all was dead and gone, they remembered Jesus words — and it made all the difference.

And yet, when they returned from the tomb to tell the Eleven disciples and the rest — the Eleven did not believe them.

When they had heard all that the women had said, it seemed to them an idle tale.

Thought the good news was nonsense. Thought the women were making it all up.

What the?!

Do you know what great lengths the women went through to come and tell all that they had seen and heard?

Do you know what courage it took for those women to speak of the crucified Christ now risen?

[I’m starting to sound like my mother]

The women who had been there with Jesus in Galilee, in Bethany, in Jerusalem, in the garden, at the cross, and at the burial.

These were women were not to be messed with.

And yet, the other disciples did not believe them.

How could this be?

You finally experience the risen Christ, and those close to you think you are making this all up! What gives.

You finally find the courage to speak and bear witness to the Christ you follow and have faith in and what Jesus has faith in, and they think it is nonsense?

What kind of Easter story is this?

I asked my husband John — why when the women came and told the disciples they did not believe.

He said, “Well, no one has ever been raised from the dead before, dear.”

Now here, I must confess, is where I am tempted to go back to my old self — discouraged, despairing and doubtful.

It is here where I contemplate looking for a date with death instead of new life.

Right here is where you too may let the others convince you that you do not know what you are talking about. That what you have to share is nonsense.

That you did not see or hear or experience what you did in the presence of God.

I have been there before. Have you?

If a turning point is remembering the Bread of Life — Remembering the words of Jesus.

Then another is remembering that we have something as people of faith worth sharing.

Something worth bearing witness to as an Easter community of faith.

For those stubborn, confident, keep to the purpose, faithful women — it didn’t matter if the others did not believe them at first.

They knew deep down in every part of their body that it was true. That the Bread of Life come down from heaven is Risen!

And yet, I can understand the apostles, who didn’t believe at first. Can you?

I know what it is like to be hurt and disappointed – to have my hopes dashed.

For the disciples, it had already been too much to bear.

I can see why they wanted to think it was nonsense.

After all, if Christ is alive:

You have to relive that you loved and loved deeply.

You have to face the fears that you have held on to for years.

You have to come face to face, as Harvey Cox writes, with the God who “restores not just a dead man, but a crucified man to life, which strikes a blow against morality, and an equally decisive blow against the unjust system that caused his wrongful death.”

For to remember and recognize Jesus, the Bread of Life, we, as the disciples, have to pay attention to what didn’t make any sense before in a whole different way.

To take ourselves less seriously and God more seriously — as when you thought you knew what was going on, but found you, too, could be surprised.

A woman was waiting at an airport one night,

With several long hours before her flight.

She hunted for a book in the airport store,

Bought a bag of cookies and found a place to sit down.

The woman was engrossed in her book, but happened to see,

That the man beside her, as bold as could be, grabbed a cookie or two from the bag in between them.
The woman tried to ignore this to avoid a scene and continued to read, munched cookies and watched the clock as the man next to her continued taking a cookie.
The woman was getting more irritated as the minutes ticked by thinking, “If I wasn’t so nice, I would blacken his eye!”

With each cookie she took, he took one too.

When only one cookie was left, she wondered what the man would do.

With a smile on his face and a nervous laugh,

He took the last cookie and broke it in half.

The woman snatched it from him and thought, “This guy has some nerve, rude and ungrateful” – she did not remember the last time she had met anyone like this.
Then the woman heard her flight number being called – she sighed with relief.

She gathered all her belongings and headed for the gate.

She boarded the plane and got into her seat,

Then took her book out
And as the woman reached into her baggage, she gasped with surprise:

There was her bag of cookies inside!
If mine are here, she finally realized, then the others were his — and all that time he was trying to share.
To recognize the Bread of Life, the community of faith learns to live life with more questions than answers.

To recognize Christ is Risen, the community of faith empties our lives with the hope of God, rather than fills it up with our baggage.

To recognize Christ in our every day lives, we can hold in tension our faith and our doubt, our belief and our unbelief, our hope and our despair. The “That’s nonsense” and “Let’s check it out.”

No wonder the disciples thought the women were making it all up.

Think of what’s at stake if all that the women said is true?

For the gospel is not for those who have it all together — and who does?

The gospel is for those who have loved and lost

The gospel is for those take a chance and were let down

The gospel is for those who risk and experience disappointment

The gospel is for those who take a leap of faith and come up short on their own.

It is for those who have been on the outskirts, the fringe, who have been left behind.
It is for those who have seen death unjustly who can only hope that a just God will vindicate the victims and break down the walls of racism, oppression, violence, injustice and hate.

The gospel turns the listener into a disciple. It turns the outsider into an insider in the house of God.
As one author expresses, “If there is no resurrection, we might as well pack up and go home; there is truly no reason to be here.

But if there is a resurrection from the dead, if Christ is alive, then all heaven breaks loose.” And you and I are no longer safe. No longer safe from being loved — loved by God.

And that – that, my friends, is scary stuff.

I remember, one of the lowest times in my life. It was in a few years into my coming as founding pastor of Bethany.

We were starting to grow. We had survived an organist who played like a durge, a secretary who wanted to do pastoral calls instead of type the bulletin. We had just two children, no church school, and I never knew when a toilet would leak. I had no idea what I was doing here.

At the same time, I listened as the people in the congregation were saying it was time for the people and the pastor to lead.

Time for the leadership to be passed on to the people of Bethany themselves.

For as it was, the leadership was made up of people from our sponsoring church, the former church, and the conference.

Not one person on the Board, except me as pastor was invited from Bethany.

I shared this with the folks from the sponsoring church that financially supported us, but they adamantly disagreed.

Told me that the Bethany people were not ready for this. Told me it was too early — nonsense.

Torn about all this and wondering whether I needed to leave, so as to not offend the lovely people on the Board who had come to help Bethany, but also knowing full well that the very people of Bethany were willing and ready to grow a new church.

I kept all these things in my heart.

Perplexed and afraid, I had watched four other church starts in the conference all close within a year or so.

Perhaps, our number was up. Number five. Last one close the door and turn off the lights. End of story.

I went to the following board meeting, knowing full well it would be my last.

I had done everything I could possibly do, but had not been able to convince the leaders from the sponsoring church on Bethany’s current board to let the Bethany people lead.

I went to our meeting prepared for death.

I still remember the moderator opening the meeting, business as usual. My head was bowed down. It was not going to be pretty.

Then I watched — for by some miracle, the stone was rolled away — everyone in the room from the sponsoring church was asked to step aside and make room for new Bethany board members, ministry teams and me.

I couldn’t believe it!

God remembered to come back!

In no time, the Bethany women got the word out that we were free to lead and be leaders in our own church. Others couldn’t believe it.

Thought the women were making it all up.

And as for me, I ran into the empty sanctuary, looked in and wondered to my amazement, what had just happened.

From then on, the Bethany worship and music team said they would dare to sing acapella if we had to — and would recognize God in God’s time in our cross cultural music.

From then on, women got pregnant (don’t ask me how!) and faith formation for adult and children was born.

From then on, we saw and recognize Christ whenever the community of faith would break bread together.

From then on, people felt called to lead to fed families, welcome immigrants and refugees each week and be led in doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with our God.

Like Peter, I wondered, what had happened?

Kierkegaard said, “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.”

The women remembered.

You and I remembered.

But, just in case you and I forget to remember.

Just in case, you and I cannot remember or recognize Jesus.

The good news of the gospel is that Jesus meets us, even when we are not looking — on the way.

Even when we, as the two disciples, walking on the journey of life — our road to Emmaus — even when we do not remember and recognize Jesus at first in the stranger walking alongside us.

Even when our hearts are burning for a word from God, for healing and wholeness.

What does the Risen Christ who dares to come back have in store for you and for me?

It’s wide open.

Open space

Open garden

Open to free range chickens

Open worship

Open urban village

Open to all kinds and varieties of Bread!

Open to Life — New Life!

And as Bethany dares to remember and recognize God and one another — in the breaking of the bread — who knows what else will open up.

Will you remember? Will we remember?

The God who remembers.

The God who remembers … to come back!

Introduction: Today around the world Christians are celebrating Palm Sunday, An event that has been celebrated for many centuries. During this particular time, God-fearing people from different parts of the world were coming to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover.

This celebration was a commemoration of the mighty deeds of God, remembering when God rescued the children of Israel from slavery. Don’t that the Egyptians’ entire first born had to die in a single night in order for the children of Israel to be saved from the hands of the ruthless Egyptians.

So, it was tradition of the religious people of the day to meet every year in Jerusalem to offer sacrifice as they remember what God had done for them. They did this without knowing that one day Jesus would go there to replace the killing of animals and offer himself as a sacrificial lamb.

It was about five days before the feast of Passover celebration took place. And knowing his time was approaching to offer himself as a sacrifice, Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem from Bethany which was about two miles away from Jerusalem.

Our text this morning is heavily packed with very important points which I want to point out briefly. First, if you have noticed, the text starts with the word “after”. After telling the people about his own death in a parable, Jesus turned his face toward Jerusalem, on the way he send two of his disciples saying, 30 “Go to the village and ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied thee, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31If anyone ask you, ’why are you untying it? Tell him, ‘the Lord needs it.’”

I’ll bet you would agree with me that if something like this happened in America today, especially if it is done by a stranger as in the Scripture, the first thing a person would do is to call 911! The caller would describe that person perhaps with the ugliest words you can imagine. They would not fail to mention that the stranger is dangerous. They would make sure they told the emergency operator that the stranger was a thief and should be picked up immediately for the safety of everyone.

However, part of good news here is that when you are doing God’s work; God will always protect you and give you the right words to speak. When the two disciples went to get the colt, they found exactly what Jesus had told them, and they were asked the very question which Jesus expected them to be asked.

What does this mean to us as followers of Christ? What does it mean to our discipleship to be placed potentially in harm’s way as we follow Christ?

It means that when you are in or doing God’s business, God will always give you an answer to every question you will be asked. It means that when you become a follower of Christ, you are mandated to go out and do what the Lord requires of you. And if anybody asks you why, just say, “The Lord needs it to be done.” When the two disciples were asked why they were untying the colt, they just repeated what Jesus had told them.

It also means that God is sending you to go out and untie those who have been tied up in the world, so that God can make use of them.

Some of us have been labeled beasts of burden like that donkey. Some of us in this world, those of us who have been tied up, are waiting to be freed so that God may have use of us! This is a challenge for us in our privilege, because perhaps we as a society have become self-centered and individuals that have become our own god!

This week I was driving home when I noticed two of our neighbors’ kids getting into an unknown Limousine which was parked near the park by a Boys and Girls club, out of curiosity, I called on of the neighbor and asked if his daughter was being picked up, But he replied with a startle NO! I turned my car around and went back to see what was happening and before I parked he came out of his house without even shoes. When I asked the driving what he was doing opening the back door for those two little girl, he first replied rudely, When I told him I should have called police even without talking to him and I should actual do so, he changed his tone and started apologizing; saying that he was there to pick one the children and those two kids asked if they could see the inside of the limousine.

My aim was not to put this man into trouble but I was concern with the safety of those children. For I believe it is my responsibility to be concerned with safety of those who are vulnerable. In fact it is our responsibility to stand up for them, especially those who have been tied because of their color, race or gender orientation, God needs to use us all.

This reminds me of one of my favorite chorus that says, “You need to live a life that the Lord may use you, at anytime and anywhere.” However don’t lose focus, this is not all about you; it because our Lord, who is the king of glory needs it to be done.”

This gives rise to the term the “King.” Perhaps one the questions which people have wrestled with is this: If Jesus Christ was entering Jerusalem as King, why ride on a borrowed donkey? The answer is simply the Lord needs it done that way, for God’s purpose is not to cause chaos or unnecessary war. Jesus’ ways are not like our ways. There was no need to ride in on a stallion with swords drawn. Christ’s intentions are to seek peace and justice for all. His riding on donkey seems contrary to all the kings we have heard about in the Bible. The image we have of kings is that of someone riding a horse with a chariot, accompanied by well-trained and well equipped soldiers.

Compare this with our modern world. The president will have tight security all around him, including a presidential motorcade, and helicopters, who knows what other measures. Don’t mistake me; there is nothing wrong with that, for indeed we are living in a messy and cruel world. However, my point is that there is something unique in this image, for to seek of peace, the greatest of all kings—Jesus Christ, our humbled King, made a peaceful entry into Jerusalem riding on borrowed donkey.

Although Christ was known as the King of the Jews and the Son of God, and people could have expected him to enter Jerusalem as the one who has earthly power and authority. Jesus refused to do that, for God’s kingdom is not about power, it’s all about humility, humbleness and love. I believe this is one of the reasons why Jesus Christ refused to enter Jerusalem as an earthly King, riding on a horse and chariot!

Being God in human form, his main concern was to bring salvation to all people in a peaceful manner. Therefore, any Palm Sunday celebration that ignores the humbleness and humility of Jesus Christ will distort the real purpose of Christ coming on earth. Today as a church we are joining the rest of the world Palms Sunday, but I have question: Do you realized that those people were “celebrating” the promise of things which were about to happen? That in reality they were celebrating and ushering in the suffering and the death of Jesus Christ? Think about it. Jesus was going to Jerusalem not to be crowned as the King of the Jews but to die!

When I was reflecting on this passage, an image that came to my mind is that of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in his final speech on the eve of his assassination, (April 3rd, 1963 in Memphis Tennessee), and I suspect this is somehow he felt, when said, “I don’t know what will happen now; we’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life; Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountaintop. And I have looked over. And I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want to know tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land. And I am happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything; I do not fear any man. My eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!” 1

Those who are committed to doing God’s will do not concern themselves with being recognized as leaders or hero, and it is when we understand the value humbleness and humility that we will begin to notice the absence of justice and peace in our families and the whole community .

When Martin King said this, people did not understand what he was talking about. The same case applies to many of us today. Let us look at our current situation in America. For many, there are difficult days ahead. Many people have lost their jobs, and it is especially painful when a spouse has lost his or her job. These are difficult days. I know this for myself. Have you ever considered how painful it is, particularly for husbands, who in my culture are traditionally known as the heads of the family to not be able to work? Let me tell you this—those who have gone through this are like a scared chicken. You may be expecting that they are simply happy and enjoying every day. You may assume that everything is well with them. Just remember this, that some are in their own world, nursing their own pain because they are afraid, for they do not know what future hold for them and their families. Some may ask, “What’s wrong with you?” You’re frozen and you try to filter the next word that comes out of your mouth. By saying this I am speaking for men and husbands, for this is what I know best, but these difficult days include women and men, our sons and daughters, our relatives and friends.

Pain and suffering can either destroy you or save you, depending on what you want to do with it. You can either give up and go down the path of darkness and live a more miserable life or keep your head up and keep on moving forward toward even when you cannot see and way out. You can believe that someone is coming to untie you, because Jesus Christ has need of you. This is redemption! Jesus who had all the power to change things around could not bear the pain of seeing God’s children going to hell instead of entering eternal glory. So there was a need for Jesus to go through what he went through in order to save us. And it is for this reason that I dare say that no matter what you going through, you are not alone! Though you may be tied in your own circumstances, our God is a God who suffers with us when we are suffering and rejoices with us when we are rejoicing! When I say this, I am aware that people would love to have a God who will physically fight for them; but God’s battle is not that of flesh and blood. Therefore, God will let people be who they what to be and do want they want to be. This is one of the human basics or so it is believed. Right?

This is my final point. I tend to believe that this is why the world is in such a mess today. So few of us want to hear any to do with praising of this God. Listen to this: (v39) “Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher order your disciples to be quiet!” Jesus replied, “If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out!” The Pharisees could not bear the pain of hearing the shout of truth. That Jesus is the savior. The Bible say the Word of God is cutting edge, God needs people who will shout to the world, proclaiming the mighty needs of God. God has need of people who without any fear will go out and cry out for justice, truth and peace. God needs people who will seek justice for all without self gain. God is looking for you to ride a borrowed but liberated donkey for the glory of God. God has need of it. Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ let us go out and praise Our God not only with words but also by walking and with those who are facing challenges in life. And if anybody question just say the Lord Needs to be done. Amen

This sermon was preached at Bethany United Church of Christ. This Sermon is Copyright ©2010 by Rev. Stephen Gituma Guantai. If you would like use any part of this sermon, Please contact Bethany United Church of Christ. All rights reserved

What do you do when something wonderful happens?

Celebrate.

Jump for joy.

Call a friend.

Smile quietly deep within.

Thank God.

All of the above.

And yet, isn’t it strange that as we get older, something else happens.

We stop and question — is it really possible?

Children often do not do this.

Something good happens to them and they pour it all out, take it all in, and go for it — not looking for some hidden, secret message that can be twisted into something completely different than intended.

And yet, we still ask:

When is the other shoe going to drop?

Did I do anything to deserve this?

Has God found me worthy?

With human beings — No, it is not possible.

But with God, all things are possible.

Is the other shoe going to drop? Perhaps — Perhaps not — but why wait when it may never ever happen?

Did I do something to deserve this and has God found me worthy? No.

You and I are in the company of sinners — we all fall short and we are at all the mercy and grace of God.

Which leaves the question: Could God do it again?

Would God do it again?

Would God make a way for all the people to connect as community, again?

God had done it before with Abraham and Sarah and their community — leaving the known for the unknown and giving birth when everything looked barren.

God had done it before with the Hebrew people who went from being a part of the empire and colluding with Pharaoh — to crying out for justice: “Let my people go” and wandering in the wilderness for forty years to learn new lessons.

In our scripture reading for today, the prophet Isaiah has faith God can and will do it again.

And yet, the people don’t seem to believe it.

Seems as if the people of faith had the same questions we have.

Do not remember the former things or consider things of old. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

God was telling the people: Hey! Don’t keep going over old history.

Be alert, be present. I, your God, am about to do something brand new.

Make a way for the people to connect as community.

Now the Hebrew people having been in Pharaoh’s empire too long — and being just as over stimulated as we are in this 21st century, hear Isaiah proclaim that God is about to do a new thing.

I wonder how the people will respond?

Will they have a response that is distant, detached, despairing — Oh — that’s nice. Good luck — as they go on their own way.

Or will they have a response that shows that Isaiah may know something and we need to listen up, because perhaps God will do a new thing.

Which will it be?

I remember when there were no more than two children when Beacon Avenue closed and Bethany opened our doors in December 2000.

Would God do a new thing at Bethany — we all wondered.

For nearly two years, I preached in this pulpit that we may not want children in the church. I mean —children are rambunctious, loud, active, out of control — most of the time.

I wanted to be sure this multiracial, multicultural, intergenerational, open and affirming community of faith was aware of the possibilities when you pray and ask for children?

Do you really want these “monsters and fairies” disturbing your quiet meditation?

Strangely enough, this Bethany community said “Yes! Bring them on!”

I am like, “Are you sure you know what you are asking God to make a way for in our community?”

We started by offering childcare for a whole year — when we had no children.

Some started to wonder.

We spoke about a growing church school and our vision and values for our children.

Some started to wonder.

We spoke of music and dancing, and connecting learning the Bible with doing justice.

Some started to wonder.

Some wanted to go back to being a part of empire instead of learn the new ways of being earth community.

Some would rather be and remain in bondage and be over fed, than in the wilderness backpacking it at church with juice and granola bars and “what is it” — manna from God.

Some after being in exile for so long had forgotten how to hope.

And so, when we hear the words of Isaiah telling us that God is going to do a new thing — it is natural, even human, that we as a people ask: Could God do it again?

Would God do it again?

After a year of offering childcare with no more than two children in the church — five women got pregnant. The beginning of God starting a church school here at Bethany and it has been fruitful since.

The beginning of God making a way for the people to connect as community, again.

And now, in 2010, on this very day where in scripture we hear the words of the prophet, Isaiah say God is about to do a new thing — God has given us a Director of Children and Youth Ministries.

It didn’t come easy.

We as a community of faith have gone through a long, prayerful and discerning process.

Sometimes, you may have felt in the wilderness.

Sometimes, you may have felt in exile.

Sometimes, you may have wanted to return to where you had come before you came to Bethany.

And yet, through it all, the words of the prophet Isaiah, call us to believe in the God making a way for us as people to connect as community, again and again.

When Mary from Bethany had waited faithfully for years to connect in the community and chose to pour the ointment on Jesus’ feet — which filled the entire house of God — some started to wonder.

Even Judas Iscariot said, “Why we could have used the money and given it to the poor?”

Some started to wonder.

And yet, just as God had brought an either/or people out of bondage and out of exile — Jesus was again calling his disciples and the community of faith from either/or to a both/and.

Why we could have used the money from the children and youth program for Bethany House?

Why we could have used the money for the tweens and teenagers for our Food Bank?

Why could have used the money for our infants and toddlers childcare for Hospitality?

And Jesus through God says: I am about to do a new thing. Do you not perceive it?

It’s not either/or — it is Both/And when it comes to Jesus and the poor. Both/And when it comes to Jesus and the least of these.

For as an intergenerational community of faith, if you and I are following Jesus and having faith is what Jesus has faith in — by our very nature, you and I are and will already be hanging out and being with the poor here at Bethany, which in Hebrew means “house of and for the poor.”

When we see it is Both/And not Either/Or, it becomes possible for us to see God making a way for people to connect as community, this Bethany United Church of Christ — again and again!

Knowing this, the question now is: Are we as a community ready for God to do a new thing?

Today is the third Sunday in the season of Lent. Which is the season of the church year that is 40 days before Easter. Lent has historically been a time to give something up as a way of showing our devotion to God. Like Chocolate, alcohol, or TV. Lent seems to be about sacrificing something for God. However, I think that Lent is not just about sacrificing but listening to God. The meaning behind this idea of sacrificing is that by giving up something (the TV, the sweets, whatever it might be), we will be more open to listening to God in our lives.

Let’s pray together: God, help us to open our hearts and minds to you during this time of worship. And may we listen closely to hear what you have to teach each of us. Amen.

Sermon:

Long before this Lent season started, millions of people in our nation have had to make big sacrifices. As you may know, we are facing the deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression. One recent statistic I found stated that 17.4% of Americans are out of work. Most surveys have a difficult time estimating how many people are actually out of work. Because the survey’s only capture those who are actively searching for employment.

Another survey indicated that 44% of families in the US have experienced either job loss or dramatic decrease in hours and salary. And this unemployment has become a chronic problem. Most have been unemployed for well over 6 months without finding a new job. Some of you may be in this situation yourself. If not, most likely you know someone who has been in this predicament.

A friend of mine, let’s call her Jill, finished a masters a few years ago. And like most new masters’ grads she avidly searched for a job to begin her new career. Jill got an interview with a competitive consulting firm in her field – and she was offered the job. Jill of course was thrilled, and accepted the position. She worked very hard, and felt like she had found her dream job. Well, you can only imagine what happened when the economy tanked. Jill was one of the newest hires in her firm and so therefore was laid off.

When someone loses their job, they usually don’t just lose their paycheck. This can impact their whole identity. The way they see themselves as fitting into the world, contributing to society. For Jill, this was true – she had not only lost a job, she’d lost a sense of purpose and identity.

Have you heard the term Calling? It’s a term used more often in ministry, referring to God calling a person to do something specific. “God called me to preach the good news!” But this term calling is not necessarily about ministry. Calling can refer to anyone’s purpose in life. How any of us might live in and serve the world around us.

Jill lost her dream job. Many Americans have lost theirs. But does this mean they lost their calling in life? And what about those of you who are in a job just to pay the bills. A practical solution, not a fulfillment of your life’s purpose. Have you missed your calling? How do we find our calling?

The text that I read today is known as the “Call of Jeremiah”. It is the moment when God tells Jeremiah what his life’s purpose will be. God says, “Jeremiah, I appointed you to be a prophet to the nations.” God makes it really clear that Jeremiah has a specific purpose in life. Wouldn’t it be nice if God just let us know exactly what we’re supposed to do with our lives. I bet there are a lot of folks out there who would appreciate this.

But we can’t forget what Jeremiah’s calling turns out to be. Jeremiah was one of the greatest prophets, during a really rough time Israel’s history. The book of Jeremiah is one of the longest books of prophecy, and also one of the darkest. Basically, Jeremiah was called by God to preach a message to the people of Israel. And, this was NOT a message of hope and good news. He was told to warn the people over and over that if they didn’t repent, God will destroy them and Jerusalem. You can imagine this was not a popular message. Over his lifetime, Jeremiah’s calling results in being taunted by his friends, being thrown in jail, and even being left to die in a pit. These were not happy times for Jeremiah.

So far it seems like the example of Jeremiah’s calling from God is more like a punishment from God. But if we look closely at this calling story, there are a few key messages of good news for us as well as for Jeremiah. These key messages are like a foundation for Jeremiah’s mission in life. And perhaps that same foundation can help guide us as we determine our calling. Even in the midst of the uncertainties we face today.

The first message God tells Jeremiah is that God has created him. “Even before I formed you in your mothers’ womb”…God lets Jeremiah know that he created him. For those of you who are familiar with Psalm 139, the same message is shared, “I knew you in the secret place, before you were knit together in your mother’s womb.” God created Jeremiah before he was born, and God also created each one of us. What does this mean? Well, Genesis tells us that God created us in the image of God. John Calvin says that there is a spark of God found in all of creation. No matter who we are, what we do, where we live, how much money we make – we are all created in God’s image. In order to find our calling (purpose in life), we must first know “Whose we are” (Douglas Steere). Whose are we? We were created by God, and we ultimately belong to God.

God did not stop creating Jeremiah when he was born. He continued to create and shape and bring life to Jeremiah throughout his entire life. And believe it or not, God is still creating us. Each of us is still learning and growing. Some of you may have thought you were finished growing up – but the truth is, you are never finished – God is always growing us into a new creation.

Or maybe you feel like you missed your calling in life – but I don’t believe that is possible. Our calling is not necessarily our job. It is also not a mark or goal that we either achieve or miss. Calling is much deeper and more organic than these. Our calling begins with an awareness of being created by God. And that God is continually creating us, molding us, shaping us, throughout our lives. And just like us, our calling is also a creative work in progress.

The second message of good news is that God tells Jeremiah that he KNOWS him. God says , “Even before I formed you in your mother’s womb, I knew you…” I knew you and I know you. Jerusalem was turning upside down with war and poverty and earthquakes, and violence. So how is being known by God such good news? The verb “to know” in Hebrew is not just about being aware of something, like I know its going to be sunny outside today or I know that we have the annual church meeting tonight . Knowing in Hebrew terms is to be deeply and intimately connected. Knowing is about being in close relationship. By knowing Jeremiah, God is saying that he is in a deeply connected relationship with him. And this is also true for us.

God knows us…everything – the good, the bad, and the ugly. But do we know us? Do we know ourselves? Perhaps if we knew ourselves better, then we might begin to understand our calling. This is not an easy task. Knowing ourselves is not just being able to rattle off resume like we might in a job interview. Knowing ourselves is an intimate knowing – an awareness of our weaknesses, struggles, the places we don’t want to accept as a part of ourselves.

Parker Palmer is a minister who has written a lot on this subject. He wrote a book called “Let your Life Speak”. In this book, he shares his search to understand his calling. Palmer spent his early adulthood struggling to become an academic professor instead of looking inside himself. Palmer says that once he was willing to look more honestly at himself, including his weaknesses, he found a more clear sense of his vocation in life. A calling involving writing, teaching, and lifelong learning.

Fredrick Buechner is another minister and writer, who said this “Calling is the place where your deep gladness meets the world’s deepest need.” (Repeat) According to him, we have to know what our deepest gladness is. What does this mean? Buechner’s idea of deepest gladness, it is a source of energy. When do you experience lots of energy, when are you in the zone? What are you doing? Is it when you are teaching or painting or fixing things or caring for someone? if you know the answer to this question, is there space for this source of energy in your life? How often do you use or access this energy? And finally, can you think of a need that this fills in the world? Our deepest gladness meets the world’s deepest need.

You remember my friend Jill, the one who lost her dream job. As you can imagine, she was pretty devastated by this. But, like many folks who’ve been laid off, Jill poured her energy into the job search process. So much so that she became an expert at it. And it turns out that Jill found a way to use her experience of unemployment to meet a need. She found a job working for the Employment Security Department. She now manages the stimulus money used to help others like herself. The energy of her experience (even though it was a challenging time) was eventually used to fill a deep need in the world.

The third message of good news is that God tells Jeremiah that he will always be with him. God says, “Do not be afraid”… “I am with you to deliver you”. When Jeremiah is going through hell on earth in Jerusalem, God is there. When Jeremiah is thrown into a pit, God is there. When Jeremiah is despised by his friends, God is there. And God promises never to leave him.This is true for us as well. Jesus told his disciples this same thing when preparing them for his death – he said “I will be with you always, until the very end of the age.” End of the age….that’s a long time. God has promised to be with us forever.

God has not promised us an easy situation, a successful career, or a clear pathway to whatever we have next in our journey. We live in uncertain times. The next decade is not going to be easy, with high unemployment rates, war, illness, and natural disasters. Your circumstances or my circumstances may at times feel almost as daunting as Jeremiah’s. But despite all of this, we trust in this foundation: God will be with us. God knows us inside and out. And God is definitely not finished with us yet! And that is Good News.

“The Lord is my light and my salvation – whom then, will I fear.”

Sometimes, just getting a glimpse of the LIGHT is enough.

Enough to get you through the Day.

As when you arise early in the morning — look out and catch a glimpse of the sun rising brightly over the mountains.

Sometimes, getting a glimpse of the LIGHT is enough.

Enough to get you through the Night.

I remember as a young girl, my two sisters and I, who all shared one bedroom, would insist that the light in the hallway be left on until all three of us had fallen asleep. Mom and Dad would leave our bedroom door ajar so that the light could shine through.

I wonder whether it was more because we wanted to be close to the light or afraid of being left in the dark.

Sometimes, getting a glimpse of the LIGHT is enough

Enough to give you courage to continue walking in faith — even when you are not quite sure of the next step.

As when you go for a hike on an unknown trail. The sign at the starting point tells you roughly how many miles the journey will be.

What it does not tell you is how many steps uphill you will take nor how many twists and turns and combinations of going uphill and downhill you will encounter.

It must have been something like that for David in Psalm 27, our scripture passage for this morning.

Notice that David is looking to the Light.

But it is not just any light.

David sees and believes in God as the Light.

We do not know when David wrote Psalm 27.Some believe that David wrote Psalm 27 in two parts.

He wrote the first part when life was good.

David sensed God answering his prayers, even when David had to face the giant Goliath and the Philistine army.

We hear it in David’s words of confidence and courage:

“The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?

Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not be afraid.”

David is called to keep the faith and not lose courage.

In having young David face Goliath, King Saul and others try to fit David into their image, their standard uniform, their way of doing things — instead of letting David be David, one created in the image of God.

David graciously puts on someone else’s tunic, another’s bronze helmet, another’s breastplate, and another’s sword to prepare to meet Goliath.

Fit for the journey? Hardly!

For you see, wearing things that fit someone else and not you, David found he could not even walk straight.

Thankfully, David took off the masks and the costumes and the army uniform the people had placed on him. And by faith – went as David,

— with a staff, five stones and a sling in his shepherd’s bag.

David is called to live by faith and not by fear.

This is not easy. For to live by faith and not by fear is a life long journey.

It is much easier to hide behind someone else’s shadow than to stand in the light, where we are vulnerable and capable of making mistakes.

It is more comfortable to wear what other people think you should — to wear and to look and to act as you think you should — than it is to look in the mirror and like what you see. To be bamboozled rather than be who God created you to be.

To live by faith and not in fear is to live with the risks and still go on. To trust that it is not all up to us – for God is faithful, working in and through God’s people, even if you do not know exactly where God is leading you.

When many saw the great, big, powerful Goliath – you fill in the blank for the Goliaths of the world – for there are many – the people were filled with great fear. They felt threatened, small and powerless.

What can we do? He is so big! So, the people could do nothing.

And yet, David, the shepherd boy, saw it differently.

David took one look at the great, big, powerful Goliath.

Now David probably scratched his head several times as he looked to God as his Light in prayer for wisdom and insight. And instead of letting his fear overcome him, David let God use his fear to humble him enough to see with a new perspective — with an open heart.

Yes, Goliath is big. No doubt about that. But if Goliath is so big, David thought to himself, “How can I miss!”

Live by faith and not by fear.

David may have written the second part of Psalm 27 when David was struggling and life was difficult. A very different situation than before.

In times of trouble, this same David thought God was hiding from him.

In the past, God had been good to him. Where was God now?

In living by faith and not fear — David must also learn to live by grace and not by greed.

“Hear, O God, my cry, be gracious to me and answer me.

Your face, God, do I seek — Do not hide your face from me.

Do not turn away from me who has been my help. Do not forsake me.”

Here, in the same Psalm, we see a David learning to live by grace as he chooses to stay with God.

For as we know, it is far easier to leave and walk away than it is to stay through thick and thin and be here for all of life’s trials and tribulations.

For David, who has faith in what God has faith in, — it is no different. Life still has its ups and downs.

In faith, it is not that clear cut — when you are faithful, all is good — and when you are faithless, all is difficult.

More often than not, it is actually when you are trying to be faithful following the ways of God — that trouble, real trouble in life may come.

Ever notice that it is when you have a daily exercise plan to stay in shape, that you can get sore muscles or find losing weight comes slowly.

Or when you are trying to get out the door, there is one more call or that is the moment the child chooses to have a meltdown.

Or when you finally have the spiritual disciplines to pray and be generous — there seem to come all kinds of distractions to keep you from your practice.

When we think that God has forgotten us, we must re-member the times when God did not forget or abandon us.

In the call of David in First Samuel,

The prophet Samuel watches as the people line up

Seeing all these nice people in line — the prophet thinks to himself

“Surely God’s anointed are now before God”

One after the other the people pass by

Not this one

Not that one

Neither has he been chosen.

I don’t think so.

Nope. Sorry.

When the line dwindles and no one is left, the prophet Samuel looks to God a bit anxious – and though living by faith says, perhaps, “Uh, now what do I do?”

Amidst the uncomfortable silence, someone reminds God of you.

Yes, you!

The one out in the field, in the garden, in the mud, dirt and soil, the one struggling, the one lost, the one talking to sheep! — and God says:

Send and Bring him or her here!

For God does not see as human beings see – they look on the outward appearance or on one’s stature – but God – God sees into the heart.

God moves us to live in grace and not in greed.

The last two verses of the Psalm has no beginning. In Hebrew it is “… (dot,dot,dot) —

I believe I will see the goodness of God in the land of the living.

This is not a mistake, as some people think.

It means that everyone that reads the psalm will put their own words in as to how they have found faith in what God has faith in.

Glimpses of the light to live by faith and not by fear. Glimpses of the light to live by grace and not by greed.

Sometimes this is all we are given in life.

There is a story of a pastor who began working at a church whose buildings were very run down and needed much work. Trust me, I can relate.

Then one winter night a severe rainstorm swept through the city causing a huge chunk of plaster to fall leaving a large hole in the sanctuary. What to do?

After cleaning up the mess, the pastor and people found in the closet a handsome lace tablecloth nearly 15 feet long. Though dated, it would do well in covering the gapping hole.

Days later, as the pastor was heading out of the church, he saw a woman standing in the cold at the bus stop. “The bus will not be here for another 40 minutes!” he said as he invited the older woman into the church to get warm.

As the woman was sitting in the church, she noticed the beautiful cloth that the pastor was adjusting across the hole. “How strange. Looks like the one I had years ago.”

She told the pastor that her husband had a cloth made especially for her. There could not be another like it. She went over and lifted up a corner and saw her initials monogrammed on it.

For the next few minutes, the woman shared that she was originally from Vienna, that she and her husband had opposed the Nazis and had decided to leave the country.

They were advised to go separately. Her husband had put her on a train for Switzerland. They planned that he would join her as soon as he could arrange to ship their household goods across the border.

She never saw him again. Later she heard that perhaps, he had died in a concentration camp. The pastor listened, tried to comfort her and urged her to take the cloth with her. She refused to take the lacecloth given to her by her husband and went away.

The following Sunday, after the church service as the pastor stood at the doorway greeting people, a gentle-faced older man from the community who had come to church looked rather puzzled. It is strange, he said in his soft accent.

Many years ago my wife – God rest her – and I owned such a cloth in our home in Vienna. The pastor could not believe it and started telling the man about the woman who had been in the church earlier. It was only time before the two were reunited —- only because of the Light in a hole in the wall – by the grace of God.

Are you open to receive the light — God as Light — as to have it change us!

As the words in Nelson Mandela’s inaugural speech after decades of horrendous apartheid in South Africa call us not only to the light, but to be as the light :

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure
It is our light, not our darkness that frightens us
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God
Your playing small doesn’t serve the world
There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t
feel insecure about you
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us
It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone of us —
And as we let the light shine, we unconsciously give other people
permission to do the same
As we are liberated from our own fears, our presence automatically
liberates others”

….For you see, sometimes in life, a glimpse of the light is all you get.

But by the grace of God — getting a glimpse of God as Your Light is enough to be changed forever.

God is my light and my salvation. Whom then shall I be afraid?

Fish

A word that brings up many images for us who live in Seattle and home of the infamous Pike Place Market, where one can go, see and experience flying fish!

Fish

Is it a noun or an active verb?

Is it fresh and alive or is it frozen — and needing some heat to even begin to thaw out.

Does it smell because it has been around without change?

Fish

Is it moving and shaking?

Is it part of a school of other fish?

Does it bring people together around a shared meal or out to eat others up?

Is there one fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish, black fish, blue fish, old fish, new fish!

Are its eyes open and clear or are the eyes dead and glazed over?

Fish

Is one willing to go deep or stay on shore?

Notice, in today’s scripture passage that follows Jesus’ ministry in Galilee — fish is on his heart and mind.

Having spent the beginning of his ministry in Galilee healing the sick and preaching in the synagogue — Jesus now goes out to the lake of Gennesaret, which is another name for the Sea of Galilee.

The people are pressing in on Jesus to hear the word of God.

To hear the Word of God.

They understand what really feeds them.

On the Sea of Galilee, in Jesus’ time, individuals and small groups relied upon each other to ensure that the fruits of the sea (the fish) were harvested.

Because the community was poor and not full of wealthy, privileged people — they could not afford to not produce.

There was no such thing as the privilege to only consume or choose to be a consumer.

The people saw themselves and their community as producers.

To ensure production, the fishers formed cooperatives with other groups to gain fishing contracts.

Though we sometimes think those who followed Jesus were successful fishers who were also boat-owners — it is more likely that the fishers rented the boats they used.

From the gospel, it is clear that Jesus’ first disciples were not wealthy people. They struggled to survive.

And yet, it was these every day working people — those oppressed and made poor by the empire that Jesus first preached his message of God’s love.That these were not the only ones who heard Jesus’ message is evident from the diversity of people that we see and hear eventually followed Jesus.

But the reality that the first to hear God’s good news are the poor — tells us first and foremost that God is God of the poor and oppressed.

Interviewing Archbishop Desmond Tutu for his book “God of the Oppressed,” Bill Moyers heard Tutu say that theology — which is the study and worship of “Theo” or God — “theology must always be linked with the liberation of the poor and oppressed” as Jesus proclaimed.

God is not neutral on this.

Tutu goes on “If you are neutral in situations of injustice — you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse — and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”

God is God of the poor and oppressed.

Second, God gets into our individual boat for the sake of the whole community.

God gets into our boat — our small boat. No cruise liner. No massive ship, no private yacht — our individual daily boat that somehow, by the grace of God, remains afloat and which carries both our failures and our hopes.

As my friends and colleagues in the black community on MLK,Jr. Day exclaimed to the crowd of people gathered, “We may all have come to this land on different ships — but be not mistaken — as human beings, we are all in the Same boat!” (Amen)

God gets in our life boat — and yet, not for the reason we think.

Not for our own petty individual complaint, codependency and competition.

No! God gets in our life boat for the whole community of faith.

For what God creates in the intimate and personal is also universal. The individual heart interconnected with the universal soul — with heartache and humor, hope and healing.

Peter and the other fishers were going about their daily lives when Jesus enters their empty boat. You and I going about our every day lives and finding Jesus in our boat — no force or striving, conniving or manipulating.

It is living faithfully in our own daily lives that Jesus enters in.

First and foremost, God is God of the poor and oppressed.

Second, God gets into our individual boat for the sake of the whole community.

Third, God through Jesus moves us from shore to knee deep water to see if we are ready to go deep.

As parents learn and teach, before their children can run, they need to learn how to walk and before they can walk, they need to crawl and before they can even crawl, the children need to put out and move from one side to the other.

Today, if you have not caught on this week, it is Super Bowl Sunday.

As a faithful Minnesota woman, born and bred in the small town south of the Twin Cities, a Purple People Eater (aka: a Minnesota Vikings’ fan) at heart — I have watched and witnessed with my father, which is why I know the game, and my two sisters — the failure and loss of four Super Bowls — and only a few weeks ago, again giving away, through five turnovers, the NFC Championships to the Saints.

First time New Orleans Saints are in the Super Bowl against the experienced Indianapolis Colts.

And yet, if the Saints are going to face the Colts who plan on trampling over them — they will need to start from the shore and move to knee deep before going deep into the end zone.

The team will start at the shore or line of scrimmage or 20 yard line. They cannot go deep immediately. They could, but probably not too helpful as there is always the possibility of a fumble, interception or loss of yardage, let alone loss of a down.

As the gospel instructs, the team of Saints will need to focus on putting out a little way — in this case, 10 yards.

Ten yards — that’s it — just ten yards towards a first down.

A mere, but very important ten yards — then ten more yards and ten more yards after that, until the team finds itself putting out into the deep of one’s own end zone.

Now, if one is focused on success and being successful rather than faithfully playing the game, chances are one will come up with nothing.

You throw the ball up in the air — and there is no one open or prepared for the catch.

And yet, though I may be wrong, if a team works together — where each person on the team understands his strengths and weaknesses, failures and hopes — and is open to letting each play their part, chances are each person on the team can move from shore or the line of scrimmage to knee deep and eventually into the deep — the deep end zone — where there will indeed be a wide receiver with open arms to help get the catch.

On a team, as a ministry team here at Bethany, when there are days where there is no catch, we will need to be big enough, and yes, humble enough, to change our original game plan to follow God’s plan.

For as followers, you and I do not get to make the call. Someone who sees the bigger picture, vision and goal for us — does this.

Very few things in life require no every day practice and no daily routine to practice in our lives. The community of faith and learning to be faithful are no different.

If the Super Bowl analogy does not work for you, what about one with our children?

At night, our family has a daily routine. If at school, it is the three R’s: Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. At home, it is the 5 B’s: Bath, Brush teeth, Bedtime story, Blessings and Be in Bed Asleep.

As parents, we find that if there are not stepping stones for the children, no daily practice and routine — our children do not know what is expected of them and what the consequences are and will be, if they choose not to follow.

Back to our scripture passage, notice as I mentioned earlier that Jesus does not go immediately into the deep, which would be over the fishers’ heads, where they could drown or where Jesus could lose them without daily practice.

Jesus gives Simon Peter the instructions, as the gospel tells us, “to put out a little way from the shore” — which means Jesus has the self assurance to give the fishers and the whole community and himself some Healthy Space.

Breathing Space, Open Space, Just Enough Space, Sacred Space.

Each of us knows that only a person of faith who is self aware and self assured of God’s love has the capacity to give another human being — healthy space. Someone who is self-indulgent, self-hating or who has no self cannot, nor dares not, give another space — but sadly crowds out the very thing she needs — space.

Mystic and writer, Simon Weil, writes, “All sins are attempts to fill voids… Grace fills empty spaces, but it can only enter where there is a void to receive it — and it is grace itself which makes this void.”

In my own faith journey to be closer to God, I realize that Jesus wants to get into my life boat and can get in only when my boat and life are empty — empty and open for God.

God is God of the poor and oppressed.

God gets into our individual boat for the sake of the whole community.

God through Jesus moves us from shore to knee deep water to see if we are ready to go deep.

Fourth, God is amazing enough to go deep and to seek out people who will follow God, not themselves.

Even though some will stay safely on shore and some will remain in the shallow waters, God is willing to go deep with God’s people.

In the gospel and good news, Jesus tells the fishers, as Jesus tells us, to put out into the deep water and let down our lives as we have never done before.

For Simon Peter and his fisher partners, James and John — this meant letting down their fishing nets — the very nets that have caught nothing all night long.

Strangely enough, Jesus does not ask them to put out their “successful” nets — what has worked for them in the past.

No! Jesus asks them to put out their faithful nets. Jesus knows being faithful costs.

Jesus lives out the liberating difference between being faithful and being successful.

For Jesus is not interested. Jesus could care less in the “successful” nets.

For Simon Peter and the fishers —Jesus is commanding them to put out into the deep their night-time fishing nets in the daytime — what many and most would consider the completely wrong nets!

The crazy and astonishing thing is — Simon Peter and the other fishers do what Jesus commands.

“Teacher, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet — if You say so, I will let down the nets.”

How incredible that they not only followed — they did not complain and provide Jesus with a long list or litany of all the ways this would not work for them.

They actually follow Jesus and what Jesus has faith in!

It is only by faith and being faithful and not success and being successful that when the fishers had done what Jesus asked — after an entire night of disappointment in catching absolutely nothing — they caught, scripture records, “they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break.”

The first disciples needed to ask others for help. They could not do it on their own even if they wanted.

They saw their boats begin to sink, not because they were faithless or without doubts — but because they were being FAITHFUL.

By now, if success and being successful is our goal, we would be jumping up for joy — claiming we did it on our own. Our American society has taught us this.

Not so — for those who are about faith and being faithful to God. We see Peter fall down at Jesus’ knees and confess.

You get the biggest catch of the day and it moves you to confession.

Now, that’s the good news of the gospel!

When Isaiah received his call from God, it first led him to despair and yes, to confession. Only later, did our prophet Isaiah say, “Here I am, send me.”

“Go away from me,” Simon Peter says to Jesus as a human being capable of sin. And yet, Jesus does not go anywhere. Jesus remains.

Jesus never leaves us even when we choose to leave. And get this: Jesus not only remains in Peter’s boat — Jesus gives them compassion and a challenge.

The words of compassion: “Do not be afraid.” The same words told to Jesus’ own mother before his birth.

And the words of challenge: “From now on, you will be catching People!”

A much bigger vision for a much bigger God who amazing enough will go deep and seek out people who will follow!

So, what do you think?

Will Bethany’s community of faith let God be God as God of the poor and oppressed?

Will this community of faith let God be God who gets into our individual boats for the sake of the whole community?

Will Bethany let God be God who through Jesus moves us from shore to knee deep water to see if we are ready to go deep?

And will Bethany let God be God who is amazing enough to go deep and seek people who will follow God, not themselves.

I do not know about you — but while you figure it out — I plan on going fishing with God as my life and faith depend on it!

Care to follow this day?

I Corinthians 12: 4 – 20

Well, it’s nice to be back in this role, at least for one Sunday! Thank you, Angela, for the invitation to preach and participate in worship leadership today.

Every now and then I hear someone say something like, “Gosh, wouldn’t it be great if we could be like the early church, recapture that original magic . . . When people were totally united, when faith burned bright, when the church was overflowing with spirit and love!”

Sometimes I respond to such comments by saying, “Well, good news, we aren’t as far from the early church as you might think. Read the New Testament.” When you do read the letters of and to the early church, like Paul’s letter to the congregation in Corinth, you discover that it wasn’t quite as hunky-dory or ideal as we imagine.

In fact, in this letter, I Corinthians, from which our epistle lessons come during this Epiphany season, we find Paul writing to a conflicted congregation, one engaged in some pretty intense power struggles. Some in that congregation felt that they were the spiritually “enlightened,” while others in their view were the spiritually benighted. The benighted were “in the dark,” lacking at least as the enlightened saw it, the true light.

So in his two letters to the congregation at Corinth, a lively seaport town and bustling trade crossroads of the ancient world, Paul sought to address such issues.

One of the ways Paul does so is with his wonderful image of the church as the Body of Christ. He writes, “Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” (I Cor. 12: 27) By speaking of the church in this way Paul affirmed two truths that are sometimes in tension: diversity and unity.

Diversity: we aren’t all the same. Just as the body has many different parts, each with its place and function, so the church is made up of different people with different gifts. There is diversity. It’s important, necessary. As Paul puts it, “If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be?” But also important is unity. “There are many members,” said Paul, “but one body.”

I arrived at the very first congregation I served as a minister, over thirty years ago now, to find it deeply divided. At the first meeting I attended as a pastor I walked in to find that one faction in the congregation, a quite conservative group, were demanding that the congregation immediately withdraw from the denomination.

Not sure what else to do I suggested a kind of moratorium, a cooling off period, during which we study Scripture together. I had some vague recollection from seminary New Testament classes that I Corinthians was all about a squabbling congregation, so I said, “Let’s study I Corinthians.” We did that, in small groups, for ten weeks. Well, God is good, and it turned out to be pretty much what the doctor ordered.

One of the things that Paul does in I Corinthians and in our reading for today is what some contemporary writers and thinkers call “managing polarities.” The idea of polarity management is simple but profound. Polarities are opposites, opposites which don’t function well independently. Like “unity and “diversity.” Turns out we need both. And we need to keep the two in a lively tension. Sometimes we think of such polarities as problems to be solved, rather than polarities to be managed. So the unity people push for a unity that morphs into uniformity. Or the diversity advocates push for a diversity that devolves into fragmentation.

Long before the “discovery” of polarity management in our own time, Paul and indeed much of the Bible were onto it. One of the things I most love about Scripture is that it does live with great polarities and hold competing truths in tension.

For example, faith and works. Paul says, “By grace we are saved through faith.” We can’t earn our salvation; it’s God’s gracious gift. There’s an important truth there. But James answers (remember our tour in James last fall?), “Faith without works is dead.” If our faith isn’t expressed in action and behavior, forget it. Important truth there too. The thing is, Scripture holds the tension between the two, refusing to treat this as a problem to be solved. Rather it is a polarity, a tension, to be managed.

So I want to reflect on three polarities that need to be managed in our personal lives as well as in our life as a congregation. The first is one I’ve already mentioned: the polarity of unity and diversity. It’s the one Paul engages with his description of the church as a body, the Body of Christ. “There are many members,” writes Paul, “but one Body.” And a little earlier in today’s reading, “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” Everyone is gifted by God, not just some. All the various gifts and parts are important: diversity. Yet these varied gifts are given, “for the common good.” Unity.

Some years ago I served on the Cancer Care team at a large hospital. That team was made up of a mind-boggling array of specialists. There were oncologists, psychiatric nurses, social workers, nutritionists, oncology nurses, administrators, and several of us chaplains. We met once a week to pool our different insights and perspectives with regard to twenty or so patients. We were quite aware of our diversity, of our different perspectives and takes on things. But every now and then, one member of the team, a psychiatric nurse, would ask, “How are we doing as a group?” Then she added a line that has stayed with me. She said, “The group has a life too.”

She meant our group, the Cancer Care Team. She was asking us to take off our specialist hats for a moment and be aware of ourselves as a group, our life together. “The group has a life too.” Her implied question, as we dashed in late, focused on our own agendas or rushed out early was, “Are we contributing to, playing our part, taking care of the life of a group, the whole beyond the parts?”

She really helped me to better understand Paul’s idea of the Body of Christ. “The group has a life too.” Sometimes in the church we are so aware of our particular needs or concerns, or those of a part of the congregation with which we identify, that we forget that “The group has a life too” and each of us have a responsibility for it’s health and strength.

I have experienced the same truth or tension in the family, where we are both, individuals and a group. When kids are adolescents, in the wonderful and awkward in-between years, they become aware of their uniqueness, even their special-ness. They begin to discover the particular self or person they are. And that’s great. But it’s not the whole story. In those years I would occasionally say to my kids, “Yes, you and your plans are very important and you are part of a family.” It’s not an either/ or; it’s a both/ and. Sometimes that’s a real gift, and at other times a huge challenge.

So, in the church today: diversity and unity. “There are many members, yet one body.” We are called to be mindful of and true to both. We are called not to lose the tension between the two.

Okay, here’s the second polarity to manage that I want to mention. I’m thinking of it, at least today, as the tension between compassion and courage.

“Compassion” means that we feel the pain of another. I think it’s quite remarkable and admirable that since January 12 more than half of U.S. citizens have made a donation toward relief for Haiti. We see the pain and are moved by compassion to respond. Here at Bethany, not only do we respond to such situations as that in Haiti or last fall in the Philippines and Samoa, but we have responded compassionately to the plight of immigrants and undocumented workers, providing housing and other forms of support for the stranger and sojourner in our midst.

But compassion too needs to be held in balance and tension with other truths. Most of us, by now, are familiar with the language and concept of co-dependence. It’s not always good or helpful to take care of people in trouble. Sometimes care, however well intended, allows people not to come to grips with their own situation or problems for themselves. It takes great courage to tolerate some pain in the interests of growth.

One of the most powerful stories I ever heard that expressed this truth was told by Harold Wilke, a remarkable United Church of Christ minister who led the church in ministry with  and to those with disabilities. Wilke himself had been borne without arms. On one side, he had a very short appendage with a couple of fingers, on the other shoulder nothing at two fingers.

As a boy, Harold struggled to learn to dress himself. One day a neighbor lady was visiting as young Harold sat on the living room floor and tried to get his shirt on. It was tough. Finally, the neighbor, unable to tolerate the pain, hissed at Harold’s mother, “Helen, why don’t you help him.” Harold’s mother, tears streaming down her face as she looked on said, “Can’t you see that I am?” Had she always dressed her son, he would never have learned how. To not fix it for her son took tremendous courage.

In the church it’s difficult for us when someone is in pain or is unhappy to not wish to or try to fix it. Sometimes we are right to respond to alleviate pain. But not always.

A friend of mine who works as a consultant to organizations and churches on personnel issues has sometimes made this observation: “In the name of compassion to one, we are sometimes cruel to many.”

What she means is that sometimes we can be so concerned to fix one person’s problem or pain or to take care of one person’s needs, that we don’t see that in doing so we are really sacrificing the good or welfare of the larger group, team or congregation. She had observed the way that many times a church carried an employee who wasn’t doing their job, believing that in doing so they were being compassionate. But they were, in effect, asking other members of the staff to do that person’s job for them–in the name of compassion to one, being unkind to many. It takes a lot of courage to face such a situation honestly.

Compassion is a virtue, but it needs to be held in tension with others qualities, like courage and honesty.

A third polarity to be managed is the polarity of leadership and community, or maybe leadership and team or partnership. This too is a polarity to be managed and not a problem to be solved.

A couple weeks ago a group from a local Seattle congregation asked me to meet with them to talk about leadership. That congregation is in the midst of a pastoral search process and they are trying to come to grips with what seems to be an on-going debate in their congregations over what they are about and what they want and need in a new minister.

Some in the congregation argue, “We need a strong leader. We need someone who will take the reins, who will give clear direction.”

Others in that congregation find that worrisome. They respond, “No, we need someone who works as part of a team, who values collegiality, who supports others.”

So this small group asked me, “Which is it . . . Strong leader or Shared ministry and partnership?” You know what I said, don’t you? I said its not an either/ or, it’s a both/ and. To set it up as they had, “strong leader or working collegially as part of a team,” seemed to me a false dichotomy. It’s not one or the other. Strong leaders build teams and empower others in their growth and leadership. It’s a both/ and; a polarity to be managed.

In the book From Good to Great by Jim Collins, Collins speaks of what he calls “the tyranny of the Or,” and “the genius of the And.” He uses the example of the auto industry. For years American car manufacturers clung to the tyranny of the Or. They said, you can have high quality or low cost, but not both. But along came the Japanese car manufacturers who understood the genius of And. They said, we can and must do both, high quality and low cost. Well, we all know the outcome on that one!

So with leadership and partnership or leadership and community. It’s not an either/ or; it really is a both/and. Healthy organizations are congregations value leadership and partnership.

My observation working with many congregations today is that the struggling, unhealthy ones have often lost the tension. If some conservative churches tip the balance in favor of leaders who are too dominant; often more moderate or progressive churches err in the other direction.

For example, last year while teaching in Canada, I noticed how often churches were so apprehensive about leaders or leadership, and so enamored of the language of partnership, consensus and community that they had turned their ministers into mere staff people, employees, hired help. They were not to be leaders. But the churches were suffering for it. Often there was no real or effective leadership or sense of direction.

Working there with churches in Canada I found myself saying, “You guys are playing bunch-ball.” What I meant by that was that their congregations often looked like 6-year-olds playing soccer. You know how that looks right? Everyone runs to the ball, no one plays their position. The result: sore shins and little progress in moving the ball.

They were so enamored of values like partnership and community that they thought everyone in the congregation needed to be in on every decision. The result was “bunch-ball” and stuckness. I suggested that it might be better in the church, as in soccer, to learn to play one’s position and to trust others, including leaders, to play theirs. Hold them accountable, but let them do their job.

There is, again, a polarity to be managed, a polarity of leadership and partnership, or leadership and community. Both are important. When one trumps the other, problems result.

Diversity and unity; compassion and courage; leadership and community–none are problems to be solved. All are polarities to be managed.

In the next chapter of I Corinthians, I Corinthians 13, Paul speaks, famously of “love.” Toward the end of that beautiful chapter, Paul writes, “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we shall see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.”

We live here and now and we see, but not clearly; we know, but not fully. Our knowledge is partial, our sight is limited. Only God sees perfectly, only God knows completely.

So we live prayerfully and in community, bringing our partial truth and insight into conversation and healthy tension with the truth and insights of others. This side of the Promised Land, this side of the fullness of God’s Kingdom, we are called to manage and live with polarities, balancing passion and humility.

Passion and humility: say there’s another one!

Sunday, January 17, 2010
Reverend Angela Ying

Fear

A four letter word that can stop us in being who we are called to be, God’s beloved.

Fear

A four letter word that keeps us from acting in faith as we choose to remain numb and silent.

Fear

A four letter word that allows people not to see themselves and others for who they truly are.

Fear—of which people lived and still live.

And yet, God is the God who seeks to liberate all people from our fears.

When Abraham was afraid to go to a new place, God gave Abraham courage to face the unknown and to follow God to an unknown place.

When Moses was afraid to speak and confront the Pharaoh and his empire to let his people go, God gave Moses the voice to lead.

When the people in the wilderness after their Exodus from empire were afraid they would have no food, God sent down manna and quail every day from the heavens and reminded them to distribute and share the food with one another, which meant no hoarding and thus, taking only what each person needed.

When Elijah the prophet was afraid and hid in a cave to get away from King Ahab and Queen Jezebel—having kings and queens against you is not a safe place to be—God send a messenger to tell the prophet to get up and eat for there was still much work Elijah and God had to do with God’s people.

When the people were in exile after King David, the shepherd boy had lead them to unity as an united kingdom of Judah and Israel, died, and the Assyrians and Babylonians took over—God gave this community, now a remnant, a faith and a purpose to sing and pray even in exile, even in what was for them a foreign land.

When Mary was afraid of what giving birth to God’s Son might do, God gave her the wisdom and perseverance to still say “Yes” to God amidst her fears.

And when the disciples of Jesus were afraid and behind closed doors having witnessed the crucified Christ—God gave them the power of the Holy Spirit to speak in their native languages and to rejoice in the good news and their diversity.

When the destruction came this week in Haiti, it was unimaginable.

But for the people of Haiti, the effects wrought by Tuesday, January 12th catastrophic earthquake at 7.0 magnitude were all too real.

As one Washington Post journalist described, “the children, cradled in their parents arms with bandages that swathed away their bloodied heads—few having the energy to cry.”

Tens of thousands of people are dead. 50,000 to 100,000 people estimated dead by the Washington Post with this being the largest earthquake ever recorded in this poorest of countries in the area—centered ten miles west of Haiti’s capital of Port—au—Prince.

Former President of Haiti, Jean Bertrand Aristide, who gave his Haitian people voice, living in exile in Africa since he was ousted five years ago said in love of Haiti and the people, he wants “to return to his quake—devastated country and is prepared to leave immediately.”

The United States Department says 45,000 Americans live in Haiti—we are not only our brother and sister’s keeper, in Haiti, they are us and we are them.

So much so that when the people in Haiti were devastated by the massive earthquake in a poor country—there was:

A Taiwanese search and rescue team

A Chinese search and rescue team

A German rescue team

A French civil security rescue team

A Spanish firefighter rescue team

A British

A Mexican

A African rescue team and more of the international community.

Amid rubble and ruin, our duty and faith to our international brothers and sisters of Haiti remains whether we are afraid or not.

When Jesus claim up out of the water, the Spirit of God came like a dove and a voice said, “You are my Beloved.”

As I shared with you last Sunday, you are God’s beloved. We are God’s Beloved.

For you see, as Archbishop Desmond Tutu who had lived through the atrocities of a South African apartheid and headed the Truth and Reconciliation Commission eloquently shares in his book No Future Without Forgiveness:

“Our God is preeminently the God of grace. What we are, what we have, even our salvation, all is gift, all is grace, not to be achieved but to be received as a gift freely given.

God does not give up on anyone, for God loved us from all eternity, God loves us now and God will always love us, all of us good and bad, forever and ever.

God’s love will not let us go. For God’s love for us, all of us, good and bad, is unchanging, is unchangeable.

There is nothing I can do to make God love me more, for God loves me perfectly already. And wonderfully, there is nothing I can do to make God love me less.”

And just as Jesus discovered after his baptism that in being Beloved, one has and needs to us the capacity and responsibility to love all people back.

The same Spirit of God who blesses Jesus sends him to the wilderness, connecting Jesus to the people of the Exodus and their faith in God’s liberation from their individual and collective bondage.

The same Spirit of God who blesses and sends Jesus to the wilderness, anoints Jesus to bring good news to the poor.

For Jesus knew that the spiritual health and well—being of a community of faith is how we respond to:

The least

The last

The lost

The poor

For if you and I have missed the point that bears repeating—God, the very God we worship, the One for whom we gather every Sunday to sing praise—the God who hears our prayers and calls us and our children to not only live a life of prayer but to be a prayer—is God, the God of the oppressed.

God is God of the oppressed.

Which is why Jesus and his disciples are sent out into the world to not only bring good news to the poor, reminding each of us of our roots and our name—Beth—any from the Hebrew “house of God of and for the poor” but also to find relief for those captive, recovery of sight to those made blind and to let the oppressed go free!

This is an incredible task this Spirit of God dares to give us, as a community, as we seek to be faithful.

And as we seek to be faithful, people will be amazed—not at us, mind you, but at God.

That God would work through a house of God of and for the poor called Beth—any on the south end of Seattle.

That God would pray that we not close our eyes, our hearts and our checkbooks, when it comes to giving relief to our international brothers and sisters in Haiti.

That God would smile in the ability of the human community to move, by faith, from Bloody Sunday to becoming as a our brother, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, a man of God called, the Beloved Community.

I do not know about you, but I do not come and worship God week after week in this house of God of and for the poor called Beth—any because I have nothing better to do.

I have plenty to do. You have plenty to do.

And there is still plenty more for us to still do.

I come because the Spirit of God has given me this one life to bring good news to the poor and I cannot do it without being community—in a Beloved Community.

I cannot be who I am supposed to be as God’s beloved—without God.

I cannot be who God wants me to be as God’s beloved—without Community—a community aware of becoming a part of the wider international Beloved Community.

For in this Martin Luther King County, the only one in our great nation, where our King County logo has changed because of the people—from an imperial crown to the human face and image of Martin Luther King, Jr., a man of deep faith in God—willing to die for an interracial democracy, so blacks and all of us brown people could have vote and voice and could eat, study, pray and work with their white brothers and sisters across the globe—we as a Bethany community need to keep working in faith so that our diversity and our differences of this amazing nation and all of God’s nations have hope, soul and strength.

And where your zip code is simply an address and not a lifetime determinate—or a prediction of whether our nation’s children get an education, health care or whether they are rich or poor.

For to not only be Beloved in God’s eyes, but to become God’s Beloved Community is to be a nation at peace with itself—a people, who know what peace is and what it requires.

As our brother in faith, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr knew:

“True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.” Justice for all—justice as the prophet Amos said that will roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever—flowing stream—justice which Martin knew came from the same God, the same prophets and the same Scriptures who professed Jesus Christ.

“Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.”

And yet, be for warned in our task in becoming God’s Beloved Community, some will say as they said of Jesus, “Isn’t he the carpenter, Joseph’s son?” What can he do?

Some will say: Aren’t they just Beth—any—the house of God of and for the poor on the south end of town? What can they do?

Martin Luther King, Jr. at the early age of seven, the same age of my own daughter, was confronted and met with prejudice and racism.

Congressman John Lewis, who I went to hear speak on Wednesday because my soul needed to be in community, shared the importance of being a diverse community to stop prejudice and racism.

When he was seven and growing up in rural Alabama in the town called Troy, he asked his parents, “Why are our black and brown children not able to be with the white children in church, in school, on the bus, anywhere?”

His parents said, “Don’t get involved, don’t get in the way and don’t get in trouble.”

When he asked, ”Why is there segregation? Why is there racism?”

His parents said, “Don’t get involved, don’t get in the way and don’t get in trouble.”

So, John Lewis was a teenager at the age of 15, he and his parents heard the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. speak in the church.

And now, for fifty years, as a civil and human rights leader, John Lewis says he continues to get involved, get in the way and get in trouble, because of his pastor, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and hope of the Beloved community.

People lived and still live in fear.

And yet, prophets then and now inspire us to be liberated from our fears, so that with God we as a community dare to move from Bloody Sunday to becoming God’s Beloved Community.

People and prophets who give us courage to walk out of our own and the world’s darkness and into the light.

Only a few years ago, even in my lifetime, black men, women and children were brutally attacked, beaten and hosed down by the Alabama police, and young black men were killed by the KKK when they went to check out why there was a burning of an African American church killing little black Sunday school girls.

Through the Jesus and God he believed in, Martin Luther King, Jr. had the

Message of Love

Work of Human Rights

Method of Nonviolence and Forgiveness

And the Goal of the Beloved Community

That is my prayer this morning. That we hear the good news, bring the good news to the poor, respond to the cries of the people in Haiti, and in asking why, and having our children ask why—will, with the help of community, get involved, get in the way and get in trouble, for the love of God.

For you see, as Gandhi shares, “Prayer is not an old woman’s idle amusement. Properly understood and applied, prayer is the most potent instrument of action.

The Spirit of God is upon us to bring good news to the poor.

What better message to bring us out of our own fear into faithful action and compassion.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Following the sermon and a moment of silence, this Bethany community of faith listened to the following reading from the words of Mahatma Gandhi, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Audre Lorde and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, all people of faith and collect funds to send to Partners in Health who have been working directly with the people of Haiti for over twenty years.

Readings from the words of Mahatma Gandhi

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.

An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.

I am prepared to die, but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill.

Readings from the words of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

I have the audacity to believe that people everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality, and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self—centered people have torn down, other—centered people can build up.

An individual has not started living until he or she can rise above the narrow confines of his or her individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.

The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.

True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.

Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.

A man who won’t die for something is not fit to live.

Readings from the words of Mahatma Gandhi

Prayer is not asking. It is a longing of the soul. It is daily admission of one’s weakness. It is better in prayer to have a heart without words than words without heart.

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

Let everyone try and find that as a result of daily prayer, one add something new to one’s life, something with which nothing can be compared.

Readings from the words of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The ultimate measure of human beings is not where they stand in moments of comfort and convenience, but where they stand at times of challenge and controversy.

Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Readings from the words of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr

There is so much frustration in the world because we have relied on gods rather than God. We have genuflected before the god of science only to find that it has given us the atomic bomb. We have worshipped the god of pleasure only to discover that thrills play out and sensations are short—lived. We have bowed before the god of money only to learn that there are such things as love and friendship that money cannot buy and that in a world of possible depressions, stock market crashes, and bad business investments, money is a rather uncertain deity. These transitory gods are not able to save or bring happiness to the human heart. Only God is able. It is faith in God that we must rediscover.”

Congregation sings first two verses of “We Shall Overcome”

We shall overcome—today

We’ll walk hand in hand—today

Readings from the words of Audre Lorde

When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak.

I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised and misunderstood.

I remember how being young and black and gay and lonely felt. A lot of it was fine, feeling I had the truth and the light and the key, but a lot of it was purely hell.

When I dare to be powerful – to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.

Without community, there is no liberation.

Readings from the words of Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Our God is preeminently the God of grace. What we are, what we have, even our salvation, all is gift, all is grace, not to be achieved but to be received as a gift freely given. God does not give up on anyone, for God loved us from all eternity, God loves us now and God will always love us, all of us good an bad, forever and ever. God’s love will not let us go. For God’s love for us, all of us, good and bad, is unchanging, is unchangeable. There is nothing I can do to make God love me more, for God loves me perfectly already. And wonderfully, there is nothing I can do to make God love me less.

Congregation Sings “We Shall Overcome” verses 3 and 4

We are not afraid—today

Our God will see us through—today

Readings from the Words of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s final speech the day before he was assassinated on April 4, 1968

We have been forced to a point where we’re going to have to grapple with the problems that people have been trying to grapple with through history, but the demands didn’t force them to do it.

Survival demands that we grapple with them. People, for years now, have been talking about war and peace. But no longer can we talk about it. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world, it is nonviolence or nonexistence.

That is where we are today. And also in the human rights revolution, if something isn’t done, and in a hurry, to bring peoples of the world out of their long years of poverty, their long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed.

…Let us rise up today with a greater readiness. Let us stand with a greater determination. And let us move on in these powerful days, these days of challenge.

… I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life; longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And God’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know that we as a people will get to the promised land.

I am happy today; I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any one. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

Congregation sings “We Shall Overcome” verses 5 and 6

The truth shall set us free—today

We will live in peace—some day