8/30/20 - Bless to Me: Blessing the World - Matthew 28:16-20

Bless to Me: Blessing the World

Matthew 28:16-20

August 30, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the worship service in which this sermon was preached may be found here https://youtu.be/mhVS5dCY8PY

I had expected to share more about the ancient Celtic people and the distinctives of their spirituality than I have done so far, and today is the last Sunday of this series.  There are many volumes written on this subject, and probably many arguments about how much can be verified about people who lived so long ago.   This might be more my interest than yours, so let me just offer this one piece. It comes from Bridge House, an intentional Christian community  in Southern England which leans on this tradition.

On their website, they say “Celtic Christianity was a faith hammered out at the margins. The Celts lived on the margins of Britain, on the margins of Europe and on the margins of Christendom. They lived close to nature, close to the elements, close to God and close to homelessness, poverty and starvation. They were under constant threat, from invasion by Vikings and other Germanic tribes, from Anglo-Saxon, Norman and Roman imperialism, from all sorts of forces that were bigger and more powerful than they were. Nor was it just their land and their livelihoods that were threatened but their language, their culture, their institutions and their beliefs. It has been said that there are two kinds of people in history - those who do things to others and those who have things done to them. The Celts as a race indisputably belong to the second category. Their story is one of' oppression, suffering and progressive marginalization - the same way that was trodden by Jesus in his time on earth. But it is a story, too, of remarkable hope, imagination, wholeness and simplicity, qualities that we are beginning to discern our own need of in a society that for all its outward sophistication and success is perhaps just as threatened and suffers just as much.” [1]

“Celtic Christianity was a faith hammered out at the margins,” they say.  There are many who believe that Christians have followed Jesus the most faithfully at those places and times in history when we were not encumbered with earthly power, when we occupied more of the margins than the mainstream. That is certainly how we started.

We heard today the very end of Matthew’s gospel.  We might remember that Matthew’s story began with King Herod and his brutal massacre of babies. The story of Jesus is immersed in violence and injustice.  If the Empire had had its way, the story would have ended with Jesus’ crucifixion.  But that is not the ending we heard.  Instead we heard of a commissioning into a future saturated with the presence of God. 

It is an unlikely ending. Tom Long describes the scene as one of near-comic irony.   We have given these instructions the lofty title of “The Great Commission.”  We might expect to see row upon row of thousands of followers waiting for marching orders while a majestic choir belts out the Hallelujah Chorus.  Instead, when Jesus proclaims “all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me,”  he  “is on an unnamed mountain in backwater Galilee with a congregation of eleven, down from twelve the week before, and even some of them are doubtful and not exactly sure why they have come to worship this day.”[2] 

Let’s remember how they got to this point.  On Easter morning, two women went to the tomb and found it empty, except for an angel with a message for the male disciples. On their way to deliver that message, they encountered the risen Christ who repeated the message “Go tell my brothers to meet me in Galilee.”  Without seeing Jesus for themselves, the Eleven men acted upon the message delivered by the women and made their way to Galilee.  As a result, they come a place where they do see him.  They respond with worship in the midst of their own doubt.  It literally says “they worshipped and they doubted.” 

“They worshipped and they doubted.” Jesus sends the “whole mixed lot of worshippers and doubters out, sends them out without making any distinctions among them. . .”[3]  Matthew calls them the Eleven, without explanation, but we know that Judas is the one who is missing.  We know that this community has suffered loss and betrayal.  In spite of their brokenness, in spite of their doubts, they obeyed the instructions to go to Galilee and they will obey what he says now. 

To the disciples, Jesus says “Go . . .”  “This is the same voice that said to Abraham, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.’ . . . Long ago, God promised Abraham that all the nations of the earth would be blessed because of Abraham’s obedience.  Now, that promise is kept through Jesus, son of Abraham, son of God.” [4]

Unlike the other three gospels, Matthew does not mention Jesus’ physical body, his wounds or scars, or any special post-resurrection abilities.  Matthew’s emphasis is on Jesus’ words, on his teaching. [5]

There is a picture emerging that I find comforting and hopeful. The picture is of a small group of people who have experienced profound loss and betrayal and trauma. They are not at full strength.  They don’t get to see the risen Christ at first.  They have to trust enough in someone else’s testimony to get to the place where that happens.  And then, when they do, Jesus doesn’t walk through locked doors or prove that he is the Son of God. They worship and they doubt simultaneously, but they live their lives on his teaching.  I find that hopeful and comforting because it seems a lot closer to my own experiences with Jesus.

What is not nearly so comfortable is the realization that the small, minority, marginalized community is given the global mission of proclaiming obedience to Jesus and his teaching.  It is a mission that will be  carried out in a dangerous and resistant world. [6] 

They are sent to all nations, “which doesn’t mean ‘nation-states’ in the modern sense, but something more like foreigners, tribes of people who are not at all like you.”[7]  These are people with a proud ethnic identity that goes back to Abraham, but Jesus gives them and us a mission to everyone that transcends any allegiance to country or Empire.  I’ll speak plainly – anyone who works allows loyalty to country to be primary, anyone who chants “America First” has not understood the call for allegiance that Jesus demands.

The command is to disciple others. The ways of carrying it out are baptizing and teaching. The disciples have not been entrusted with teaching before. But now they are sent to teach the world what Jesus taught.  Things like “be reconciled to one another. Love your enemies. Welcome children.  Forgive.  Pray, fast and give alms but not in a way that calls attention to yourself. Rejoice with those who rejoice. Weep with those who weep. And above all, love God and love your neighbor.”

This is also our mission.  We have a lot in common with the Eleven who received it first.  If we feel small and inadequate, so did they.  If we feel ill-equipped to understand the culture and people we are called to love, so did they.  If we feel, hostility and opposition to God’s ways of love and justice, how much more did they. 

We are often overwhelmed by this call. It sometimes seems that so little of Jesus’ teaching has permeated the world in the last 2000 years.  What difference can we really make? 

I was in a Zoom call last week with Jeff Woods, who is the Interim General Secretary of our denomination. Jeff has served American Baptist Churches at the national level for many years.  Several of you have worked with him.  You know his compassion, his strength as a leader.  This Zoom call was a conversation about our responses to needs of this moment, most specifically to the challenges presented by white supremacy and by pandemic.  Jeff reminded us of the ways we have responded to racism in the past. As early as 1865, we expressed a concern for black education and founded Shaw University, Virginia Union and Morehouse College, three historical black colleges.  During World War II, our missionaries were a regular presence within the Japanese internment camps, ministering to the physical and spiritual needs of those confined there. You probably know that Dr. King was an American Baptist minister.  Jeff Woods reminded us that the MMBB, our pension board, sought him out because he was receiving death threats.  He enrolled in the benefit plan a few weeks before his murder, enabling his family to receive life insurance benefits.

We are a small denomination, made up mostly of small churches, but we have made a difference.  We are carrying out this mission.  We are blessing the world with the teachings of Jesus. In the last months, we have sent medical supplies to Hong Kong and China to slow the spread of coronavirus. Our missionaries in Lebanon are ministering to refugees from the war in Syria and now to those who survived the catastrophic explosion.  We have provided food and rent assistance, medical aid and child care across the United States. Many other Christians are making similar efforts. I mention our denomination just as one example of the ways we are connected to a larger world.   We are blessed to be a blessing. 

It seemed like an impossible mission that Jesus gave. It was.  It is.  Unless we attend to Jesus’ final words here, “Remember I am with you always, to the end of the age.”   We depend, we survive, we thrive, we bless others because of the mercy and strength of God.

“Behold I am with you” Jesus says.  It is an amazing statement which we can only appreciate in Greek.  Ego eimi means I AM.  This is the divine name.  The name of the God who appeared to Abraham and to Moses. The one who said I AM who I AM,  I will be who I will be. Jesus has said I am the Way, I am Truth, I am Life.

Meta humon – means with you. 

But here, Meta humon is sandwiched between ego and eimi.  In Jesus’ final proclamation he asserts the divine name, but “with you” placed inside it.  We are within the very life of God.[8]

“Remember I am with you always, to the end.”  We survive, we thrive, we bless others, with the teaching of Jesus, because of the mercy and strength of God within whom we move and live and have our being. Thanks be to God.

[1] https://www.bridge-house.org.uk/ethos/celtic-christian-spirituality

[2] Thomas G Long, in Feasting on the Word, Year A, Volume 3, David Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, general editors, (Louisville:  Westminster/John Knox Press, 2011) p. 47.

[3] Richard Swanson, Provoking the Gospel of Matthew:  A Storytellers’ Commentary, Year A  (Cleveland:  The Pilgrim Press, 2007) p. 136

[4] Thomas G. Long, Matthew:  The Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville:  Westminster/John Knox Press, 1997), p 326

[5] John Petty at https://www.progressiveinvolvement.com/progressive_involvement/2008/05/lectionary-bl-1.html

[6] Warren Carter,  Matthew and the Margins:  A Sociopolitical and Religious Reading, (Maryknoll, NY:  Obis Books, 2000) p. 549

[7] Tom Long, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Volume 3  p. 47

[8] John Petty at https://www.progressiveinvolvement.com/progressive_involvement/2008/05/lectionary-bl-1.html

8/23/20 - Bless to Me: Blessing in Adversity - Romans 5:1-5

Bless to Me: Blessing in Adversity

Romans 5:1-5

August 23, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

Photo by Dave Hoefler, Madison, WI

A recording of the worship service in which this sermon was preached may be found here https://youtu.be/pMvKCLqca2c

This week a Baptist pastor wrote about the stress of pandemic for church leaders.  He said that he had recently been in a Zoom meeting with 10 pastors from at least three denominations. As they shared their struggles, one pastor disclosed that he had been imagining taking his own life. Before the meeting was over, four of the ten pastors had shared their own thoughts of suicide.[1]  

That is a shocking story. It should probably have come with a trigger warning. Preaching about suffering is very tricky.  Everyone I know is struggling now.  Everyone you know is struggling now, whether you and I are aware of it or not.  Whatever else you hear today, please do not hear me saying that people are suffering because they lack faith or because they just need to pray more. Please don’t hear me saying they any of us should just tough it out.  I am confident that the pastors in that Zoom call have faith.  I am confident that they pray.  Forty percent of an admittedly small sample of pastors are suffering enough right now that they have thoughts of suicide.  That is not to be taken lightly.

Please hear me clearly.  I am not at that level of struggle.  A tricky thing about preaching about suffering is that I know my own burden is light. It sometimes feels disingenuous to attempt to speak in a meaningful way about something beyond my experience. 

I can only dare to try because of the witness of scripture and the testimony of saints gone ahead of me. One of the gifts of the Bible is access to the lives and experiences of God’s people from across generations and cultures.

The words we read from Romans are those of the apostle Paul.  More than once, he was beaten and put in prison because of his public proclamation of faith in Jesus.  He was shipwrecked three times and faced many other dangers.  Paul earned the right to speak about suffering.  He offers the testimony of someone who has been there.

And he writes to people short on hope. Jews and Jewish Christians had been expelled once from Rome.  Under the new emperor Nero, they had been allowed to return, but the empire was an increasingly  hostile and threatening place.  Eventually, it would execute Paul, the very person who was writing to them about suffering and endurance and character and hope. 

It is Paul’s testimony, but it is not based solely on his own suffering.  His testimony, his hope, is based on his faith in Jesus, Jesus the one who suffered and died to bring about reconciliation with God.  Paul says that we have access to grace through Jesus. The hope we have persists through our suffering because its foundation is Jesus’ solidarity, Jesus’ entering into our life in order to share our fear and longing and pain and weakness.

Paul says that this hope does not disappoint.  Which means this hope will not let us down. It will be fulfilled.  But it also means that living in hope is not something to be ashamed of. We can hold our heads up in the midst of pain; we can trust that tomorrow can be different from today, because the Spirit fills us with strong love.[2]

I want to be careful not to take Paul’s testimony and make it into a formula.  If this were a formula, it would be:                                                                   suffering + endurance + character = hope

If it were a formula, then we would tell everyone who is suffering to endure long enough to get character and then, tada, hope would magically appear. But this is not a formula.  This is Paul’s testimony about his experience.  Paul has earned the right to speak about suffering. But you and I do not have the right to take these words from Paul and use them to prod others into accepting their own suffering on Paul’s terms or our terms.  That is rarely helpful or loving.

What we can do is remember the grace to which we have access because of Jesus. What we can do is to interpret our own adversity in light of Paul’s testimony, to see what grace, what blessing, what hope might emerge if we try to apply his ideas about suffering and endurance and character, not as prescriptions for others, but as spiritual practices for ourselves. 

Barbara Brown Taylor’s book Learning to Walk in the Dark is all about embracing the unknown.  In it, she tells the story of James Bremner.  James grew up in a small Scottish village where there were no wild animals or known criminals.  But there were also no streetlights or porchlights. It got really dark. Every night after supper, it was James’ job to take the empty milk bottles down to the bottom of the driveway so that the milkman would get them the next morning.  The driveway was about 100 yards long, but from the house it disappeared into complete blackness almost at once.  James had to walk out into that darkness.  He couldn’t run because he might break the bottles.  But as soon as he set the bottles down, he would turn and race back up to safety.  The darkness never stopped terrifying him.  Every single night it took all the courage he had to do this simple chore.  As an adult he said that the bravery that drew out of him stayed with him for the rest of his life.  He writes, “Courage, which is no more than the management of fear, must be practiced.”[3] 

“Courage is no more than the management of fear.”  That makes it sound easy.  But have you ever tried practicing being afraid so that you could manage it? 

It seems to me that the kind of anxiety we all have right now, the fearfulness which pervades the airways and social media and our relationships and even gets into our dreams and nightmares, gives us the opportunity to practice courage. 

I don’t know about you, but if there is a choice between telling myself “I am afraid” and “I am practicing courage”, I’m going to find “practicing courage” the more helpful internal monologue.  I will endure longer and better if I understand that I am practicing courage.  Perhaps one blessing that may result from the current trouble will be a stronger bravery muscle for next time.

Paul says that endurance (or, as I’m calling it, “practicing courage”) leads to character.  That Greek word comes from a tool used for etching, making a mark or stamping an insignia. If we think about people who have endured suffering, we often see it on their faces or hear it in their voices.  The marks left on their lives may draw us to them. They often become sources of wisdom, perspective and inspiration.[4]

I think of a man in another church whose only child died as a young adult.  She lived and worked in another state.  During an ice storm, she was in a car accident. Her parents received a call informing them that she was in the ICU.  They drove hundreds of miles and arrived to the news that machines were keeping her alive. They made the heart-wrenching decision to disconnect the machines and release her.  That was years before I met them.  In my time, what was obvious was the way that experience had shaped their character. More than once, to someone struggling with a hard decision, especially a health care decision, I heard that father gently say “there are things worse than death.”  To affirm that death is not the worst thing; to trust that it does not have the last word—that is hope that comes from suffering and endurance.

Practicing courage does not mean a stiff upper lip and silence. Again, please don’t hear me suggesting that we should just tough things out or minimize our own distress.  Walter Brueggemann analyzed the testimony found in the Hebrew Bible, particularly of those in exile. He wrote that “Hope emerges among those who publicly articulate and process their grief over suffering.” [5]

“Hope emerges among those who publicly articulate and process their grief.”   Brueggemann indicates that the opposite is also true. Hope does not emerge when people keep silent.  Naming our distress, offering public lament is a way of enacting hope.   We name what is wrong and what we want to be different.  If we allow our circumstances to reduce us to silent suffering, if we cannot even articulate our pain, then we will likely give in to despair.  That is, ironically, what is hopeful about the story I started with. You and I know about those pastors thinking about suicide because they were able to process their grief over suffering. In a paradoxical way, that is hopeful.  Lament is valuable tool that can help us endure with courage.

A final story.  George Matheson was a pastor in the Scottish Highlands in the 1800’s.  He began to lose his sight as a teenager, but he went to university and earned a bachelor’s and a master’s degree by sitting near the window for the best light and using thick glasses. He was engaged to be married, but his fiancé ended the engagement when she realized he was going blind.  His oldest sister was a strong support for many years, taking dictation, and helping to write sermons.  She even helped to run the parish ministry in his first church.

Shortly after he was ordained, he experienced a crisis of faith.  He said, “I believed nothing, neither God nor immortality.”  He tendered his resignation, but his church would not let him go.  They told him to stay and preach as much about Christ as he could believe in.  So he stayed.  Gradually,  he was able to deal with his doubts and fears.  He wrote, “I have changed.  Without hypocrisy I preach all the old doctrines, but with deeper meaning.” [6]  He served that church for 18 years.

When he was 40, the sister, who had been such a support for him for decades, was to be married. Then, he experienced another crisis.  He said “I was alone . . . It was the night of my sister’s marriage, and the rest of the family were staying overnight in Glasgow.  Something happened to me, which was known only to myself and which caused me the most severe mental suffering.” 

We don’t know what caused his suffering.  Some speculate that it was remembered grief over the broken relationship with his former fiancée.  Others suggest that he wondered how he would manage life without his sister.  We don’t know the specifics. What we do know is the blessing that resulted. That night he wrote his most famous hymn “O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go”.   It reflects his own experience of the steadfast love of God.  And it has blessed generations of Christians in their own times of crisis.

Friends, this is a hard time.  We are all struggling, but we do not despair.  Let us practice courage and name our pain.  Let us lament and paradoxically rejoice in our suffering.  May we find the blessing in adversity or in spite of adversity because of the hope we know in Christ and the love poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

[1] https://baptistnews.com/article/too-many-pastors-are-falling-on-their-own-swords/?fbclid=IwAR31_kzj0Tr3ebCrOA9FTDPFzXLAfvUh0mtfckmZOubF2MuWubdatR_Wz0U#.X0BP_MhKiUn

[2] N. Thomas Wright, New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume X, (Nashville:  Abingdon Press, 2002), p. 517.

[3] Barbara Brown Taylor, Learning To Walk in the Dark, (New York:  HarperCollins, 2014), p. 36-37

[4] Wendy Corbin Reuschling in Connections: A Lectionary Commentary for Preaching and Worship, Year A, Volume 3 Joel Green, Thomas Long, Luke Powery, Cynthia Rigby, Carolyn Sharp Editors, ,  (Louisville:  Westminster/John Knox Press, 2020), p. 79.

[5] Walter Brueggemann, Hope Within History, (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1987)  p. 84

[6] http://www.bullartistry.com.au/pdf_bestill/033BeStill.pdf

8/16/20 - Bless to Me: Seasonal Blessings - Ecclesiastes 3:1-8; Psalm 90

Bless to Me: Seasonal Blessings

Ecclesiastes3:1-8; Psalm 90

August 16, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the worship service in which this sermon was preached may be found here https://youtu.be/pySl7iGLlO0

Pastors often lead funerals for people they didn’t know. My first funeral at Emmanuel happened in September a few weeks after I arrived in August. I met Joe M in the hospital one afternoon and he died the next day. Sometimes a person leaves the church, but they don’t join another church, so the family calls me to request a funeral. Sometimes, I have only known the person in a very limited capacity, visiting them in a nursing home or hospital. I conduct the funeral regardless, but it feels different when it is for someone I actually got to know well.

In the last 10 years here, I’ve helped to lead 20 funerals for people at Emmanuel and 4 for members of Gethsemane Karen Church. Almost all of the Emmanuel funerals were for people I had come to know and love. When I asked you to share your memories of the last decade with me this week, several of you named the departed saints whom you still miss. One of the things that I have gained by sticking around for 10 years is a deeper appreciation for the great cloud of witnesses present in every church, the people whose talents and energies and personalities helped to shape the community into what it is today and in fact, whose presence is still actively felt. When you talk about Audrey or Pickett or Roy or Jennie, I know who you mean because my time overlapped with theirs. But you also mention people I never met, like Craig or David B or the Ralphs, and I am aware of their legacy as well.

We live our lives in moments and days, but we also live through seasons. Here in New York, we get four seasons every year. Some places in the world experience two primary seasons – a dry one and a wet one, in my childhood in Ghana, we called it the “rainy season”. I lived in Florida for a year. It was 85 degrees on Christmas Eve that year. I have lived in other places where there were no autumn leaves and no snow. I missed them both.

The writer of Ecclesiastes recognizes 28 common human experiences, some of which, like planting, plucking, gathering and throwing away, might be connected to the seasons of the year. There’s a verse in Genesis 1 that I have always loved. Describing the creation of the sun and moon and stars, God says “Let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and for years.” The Biblical writers understood that creation has a rhythm. They did not know that the earth turns on its axis and revolves at a tilt around the sun, but they knew that the patterns of light in the sky were connected to the seasons. They understood that humans are as connected to that daily and seasonal rhythm as the rest of creation.

We began worship with Psalm 90. In the New American Standard translation, verse 12 reads “Teach us to number our days that we may present to You a heart of wisdom.” One of my college English teachers had that verse in that translation at the top of her syllabus and I never forgot it. Of course, she was trying to impress us that numbering our days as students involved staying on track with assignments and tests and deadlines. But Ecclesiastes suggests that we number our days in many different ways. If only my college self had read to the end of Ecclesiastes. To that English professor, I might have pointed out chapter 12 where it says “be warned: the writing of many books is endless, and excessive devotion to books is wearying to the body.”

Biblical wisdom, it seems, is knowing what time it is, whether it is the right time for weeping or laughter, for dancing or mourning, for studying or something else. It is knowing how to receive of the days and the seasons allotted to us and to use them well.

Our reading ended before verses 11, which says “God has made everything suitable for its time; moreover God has put a sense of past and future into their minds.” We live our lives in seasons. We can remember winters of the past and anticipate that winter will come again, even when it is summer.

But beyond the seasons of the year, are the seasons of each life. The seasons which Ecclesiastes might describe as a time to seek, a time to lose, a time to keep, a time to throw away, a time for love and a time for hate.

The seasons of life include the stages of human development – like infancy, adolescence, and middle age. My 87-year-old uncle recently shared a meme that says “I don’t know how to act my age. I’ve never been this old before.” That is true for every one of us at every stage. Life continues to teach us, sometimes even more than we might choose to learn. We are helped to act our age by the rituals that come with marking milestones. The pandemic is disrupting some of that. Graduations, weddings, births, deaths, and retirement – the ways that we usually mark such occasions help us understand what time it is and transition into a new stage. They help us attend to the meaning of the occasion and act our age, or live within the season at hand. But this is not the time for gathering together and we are feeling that loss.

We also know something about how to act our age, how to know what time it is, because we live in community. We observe others. In relationship with older people, we anticipate what life may be like in our future. Younger people teach us how the world has changed and what it means to live in their now.

This week, I heard from several of you who shared memories. I was struck that newer people tended to share memories of their first encounters with Emmanuel. They mentioned what was for the rest of us probably a typical Sunday morning worship or another activity in which we had participated many times. It was a reminder that we each step into an ongoing stream of life at different times, and that our presence together shapes life for each other.

“Teach us to number our days that we may present a wise heart.” Numbering our days involves recognizing what time it is, caring about the moments and seasons of life to live all of them well.

Joan Chittister is a theologian, author and speaker. In her book There Is a Season, she tells this ancient story:

"Where shall I look for enlightenment?" the disciple asked.

"Here," the wise one said.

"When will it happen?" the disciple asked.

"It is happening right now," the wise one answered.

"Then why don't I experience it?"

"Because you don't look."

"What should I look for?"

"Nothing. Just look."

"Look at what?"

"At anything your eyes light on."

"But must I look in a special way?"

"No, the ordinary way will do."

"But don't I always look the ordinary way?"

"No, you don't."

"But why ever not?"

"Because to look, you must be here. And you are mostly somewhere else."

To look, you must be here. And you are mostly somewhere else. Biblical wisdom knows the value of being here and now. Celtic spirituality with its attention to the seasons was a way of saying “be here now.” Be here and enjoy the season of home-grown tomatoes now.

In pandemic, some of us are being forced to be here more and that may help us to look. Because we are looking, some of us are seeing basements that need to be de-cluttered and walls that want a fresh coat of paint. Because we are looking, some of us are seeing beauty in our neighborhoods. Because we are looking, some of us are appreciating the strengths of our family members and maybe becoming more aware of what we don’t like about ourselves.

“Teach us to number our days,” the psalmist says. “God has granted us a sense of past and future,” the teacher writes in Ecclesiastes. Numbering our days together, you and I have accumulated 3650 of them. Ten years of relationship as pastor and congregation. Knowing what time it is, sensing the importance of milestones, I invited you to share some memories of the last decade with me this week. Let me offer these back to all of us.

You remembered:

Hospitality – receiving a warm welcome at Emmanuel, you felt listened to and valued as an individual whose story was worth taking the time to know

Medieval Feasts, 100-mile potlucks and farmer’s markets

Youth in leadership on Maundy Thursday and the living Advent wreath last year

The boiler breaking down . . . the other boiler breaking down . . . . the first boiler breaking down again

Ken Graham’s 90th birthday gift to us of a projector and screen

Standing with Standing Rock and Black Lives Matter and against gun violence after the shootings at the Pulse Nightclub and Sandy Hook and Stoneman Douglas High School

Making Room for Grace in the form of a new nursery, library, choir room and bathrooms – I never saw so much excitement over bathrooms!

Emmanuel women and men in the Women’s March in Albany 2016

The gift of new matching chairs for the sanctuary

Mission trips to Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic

Baptisms with children watching from the very edge of the baptistery

Repeated requests to keep tissues on hand in the sanctuary

Retreats at Silver Bay and the farm in Berne and with Emmanuel Friedens

Trips to peace camp, to the border and Biennial Meetings

The beginning of Godly Play and Family Matters

Discussions about books like Just Mercy and The New Jim Crow

Little man stories – especially the time he moved his grandmother into the sanctuary

Stars over our heads in the sanctuary during Advent 2019 and angel wings another year

The Seven Last Words banners

Hosting the Karen and Kachin congregations, which included visits from missionaries Dan Buttry and Duane Binkley and bi-lingual worship services and after-school tutoring

Michael’s concerts and cabarets

The silent monk’s version of The Hallelujah Chorus

And walking in the pride parade and hearing people on the street say “thank you” to us and feeling SO proud to be a part of an inclusive, loving church

Your memories of course triggered many of my own. To share just one, I remembered my first Easter at Emmanuel. Because I was the new pastor on the block, I was asked to preach at the FOCUS Sunrise service. Early morning is never my best time. Somehow I messed up my alarm and thought it was an hour earlier than it actually was. When I realized the time, I went dashing out the door without my coat. You all know how cold Easter sunrise can be. I made it in time to preach. Then we all went back to Emmanuel for breakfast. But this was the year that the sausage cooking in the kitchen triggered the smoke detectors and we couldn’t get the fire alarm to quit sounding. My first Easter, so of course, the fire department showed up! I thought we were going to have those seizure-inducing lights strobing all through Easter morning worship. It was a close thing, but David M eventually climbed onto a very tall ladder and physically dismantled the smoke detector and people who arrived for worship at 10:00 never knew a thing.

That one memory encapsulates so much of our life together – I’ve shown up breathless more than once, we’ve dealt with unexpected challenges on many Sunday mornings and other days, and talented, creative people among us have helped us make it through with good humor.

The psalmist says, “Teach us to number our days, that we may be wise.” And “satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love” and “prosper the work of our hands.”

We live best in the here and now, but God has placed within us a sense of the past and future. Today I give thanks for the past 10 years with you and I anticipate God’s continued blessing on our next chapter. Bless to us, O God, these people and all our relationships and all the seasons we share. Amen.

8/9/20 - Bless to Me: Daily Blessings - Luke 12:23-31

Bless to Me: Daily Blessings

Luke 12:23-31

August 9, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be accessed here  https://youtu.be/O2tMwupAzBg

This week I read several sermons on our text. Sermons by other preachers within the past10 or 20 years.  A number of them started by talking about stress and anxiety. One from 2008 cited a study from the American Psychological Association suggesting that stress levels were close to an all-time high, with people worried about job loss, lower incomes, and how they were going to pay their bills and feed their families. You might remember the world-wide financial crisis of 2007-2008.  You might wonder, with me, if people are possibly more stressed and anxious now than we were then.

“Do not worry” Jesus said.  And then, as I saw this week, preachers start sermons by listing all the stuff there is to worry about. It is as if those three words “do not worry” trigger some Baptist Defiance Disorder so that where there was calm, suddenly fear and anxiety erupt. 

But it’s not only preachers. At Emmanuel’s Bible study on Wednesday, the conversation very quickly became about  people who truly do not have enough to eat, and how unhelpful Jesus’ words can seem in the face of harsh realities. Over the last few months, I have heard from many of you and from others.  You are concerned about friends who live with chronic pain, and about people in abusive relationships, especially those living in quarantine with them.  About those stuck in ICE detention and people in places that were disasters before pandemic, like Venezuela and Syria and refugees in the Mediterranean.  You worry about isolated older people and children with special needs and so many more. Some of these concerns were listed on Wednesday and pretty quickly, I was feeling anxious.  This passage was not going to easily support a sermon on daily blessings.  What had I been thinking? 

“Do not worry,” Jesus says and immediately we start to worry.  It’s a variation on what happens when an angel appears. You know that the first things angels say, at least in the Bible, is “do not be afraid.” And then immediately people get afraid. 

Most of us take Jesus seriously.  We try to follow his instructions.  But not worrying is really hard sometimes.  So we look for loopholes.  We tell ourselves, that maybe Jesus meant “don’t worry about yourself, but it’s OK to worry about others.” Or maybe this only applied to his first followers and everyone knows that life was simpler back then. 

But there aren’t really any loopholes.  Luke indicates that Jesus is speaking to his disciples here.  The men and women who left their homes and families, the ones who abandoned their jobs, to follow him.  They are supported mostly by a few wealthy women and sometimes by the hospitality of those who receive them in the towns around Galilee.  Jesus told them not to carry extra provisions, not even a change of tunic. At this point, they are on the road to Jerusalem where Jesus has already said he will be crucified.  It seems like they might have some legitimate concerns about the days ahead, but to them and to us, Jesus says “do not worry.” 

Preacher Barbara Brown Taylor says that it is a form of idolatry to give your fears and anxieties the power and authority to shape who you are and to drive your behavior.   Most of us have more time and space now in which to worry.  We have fewer places to go and people to meet.  That quietness combined with a worldwide pandemic is making a whole lot of people anxious and worried. It is real and being measured in all kinds of ways.

We can allow that anxiety and worry to shape us, but nothing good will to come from it. We will likely just make ourselves sick.  Or we can choose to use this time and space differently, to deepen awareness and gratitude. 

“Instead of worrying,” Jesus says, “look at the birds and the lilies.”   These are commandments, as strongly worded as his directions to love your enemy and not to judge. We recognize that those are hard things, but we still try to live them out. If we don’t already do so, perhaps we should try not worrying with the same degree of intention. 

Presbyterian minister and scholar Tom Long writes “The verbs look at the birds of the air and consider the lilies of the field, are, in Greek, very strong verbs.  They mean to suggest more than a casual glance; they invite us to study and to scrutinize the carefree world of nature.  Jesus commands us to look, really look at a world where God provides freely and lavishly, a world where anxiety plays no part, where worry is not a reality.  Jesus invites us to allow our imaginations to enter such a world, to compare this world with the world in which we must live out our lives.”[1]

We are not asked to stop worrying in order to become careless and happy-go-lucky, but in order to strive for the kingdom of God.  The kingdom of God is a new reality breaking in, a reality in which God’s will is done on earth as in heaven.  Justo Gonzalez says that since it is God’s will that even the ravens are fed and the lilies clothed, to strive for the kingdom, is among other things, to make certain that all are fed and all are clothed.[2]

“Consider the ravens. Look at the lilies”  Jesus says.  This is spiritual practice. It offers us a way out of worrying, path to reconnecting with God.  Biblical lilies are part of the genus allium.  They come up from bulbs in the spring.  Each tiny flower is symmetrical and comes together to form a globe.  There are over 1200 kinds of allium.  Some of them form globes which are a foot across, in reds and whites and purples and blues.  They are beautiful.  They inspire wonder.  What kind of God takes the time to create such beauty in such variety across the seasons? 

The ancient Celtic people offered loving attention to daily life, to the blessings of simple things found each moment.  It is a spiritual practice in which gratitude and wonder can replace worry.

As the poet Wendell Berry writes,

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief.

I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.[3]

We are not all poets.  But we can all choose wonder over worry.  We can choose prayer.  In her older book, Traveling Mercies, Annie Lamott wrote about a woman who said for her morning prayer “whatever”  and then in the evening she said, “oh well.”  

Annie said the two best prayers she knew were “Help me, help me, help me” and “thank you, thank you, thank you.”  Later she added the wow prayer, saying “Wow is the praise prayer. The prayer where we're finally speechless — which in my case is saying something. . . .  When I don't know what else to do I go outside, and I see the sky and the trees and a bird flies by, and my mouth drops open again with wonder at the just sheer beauty of creation. And I say, 'Wow.' ... You say it when you see the fjords for the first time at dawn, or you say it when you first see the new baby, and you say, 'Wow. This is great.' Wow is the prayer of wonder."[4]

Some of you are great at praying.  You don’t need any instruction.  But for those of us who might need help, especially right now when we are tempted to idolize worry, I suggest that we might use these three simple prayers – help, thanks, wow – as often as we can through the day. 

I am always helped to see blessings by the work of artists, poets and musicians.  So I share with you, the work of Carrie Newcomer. Perhaps this musical video can offer us a consideration of the lilies and the birds and so many other examples of the holy in the ordinary.

https://youtu.be/pxzO8DyY9e8

Augustine said “Our hearts are restless until they rest in you, O God.”  If we have restless worry about tomorrow, it might be a sign that we have not yet learned how to rest in God’s providence and care [5], just as we don’t always fully love our enemies -- to which we can say, several times a day, “help me, help me, help me.”  It is God’s good pleasure to give us the kingdom -- to which we can say “thank you, thank you, thank you, and wow”.  Amen. 

[1] Tom Long,  Matthew: Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 1997 ) pp.75-76.

[2] Justo Gonzalez, Luke in the Belief Commentary Series, (Louisville:  Westminster/John Knox Press, 2010), p. 161.

[3] https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/peace-wild-things-0/

[4] https://www.npr.org/2012/11/19/164814269/anne-lamott-distills-prayer-into-help-thanks-wow

[5] Tom Long,  Matthew: Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 1997 ) p. 76

7/26/20 - Tag Sale - Matthew 13:31-35, 44-52

July 26, 2020

Tag Sale

Matthew 13:31-35; 44-52

Guest Preacher: Rev. Lynn Carman Bodden

Emmanuel Baptist Church

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached is available here: https://youtu.be/NWeIDvPD0hE

7/19/20 - The Tie that Binds: Common Calling - Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

The Tie That Binds:  Common Calling

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

July 19, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be accessed here:  https://youtu.be/8A4V0JhAAyQ

For the last few years, I’ve been part of a clergy Bible study that meets on Tuesday mornings. Now we meet via Zoom.  Recently, one of the pastors talked about a church leadership retreat she attended many years ago.  There was a point in the retreat where each person was invited to share something about their sense of call.  People took turns around the circle.  One described his passion for working with children.  Another mentioned church finances and keeping the books.  Several talked about the vocal choir or the bell choir.   All of that was in line with what was expected.  What made this memorable was the next person who spoke.  She said, “Right now, I am being called to deep rest.”  It seemed that no one else in the room had considered that that might be a true calling.  Then, of course, some wished that they had thought of it first. 

There is always work to be done and it seems like churches usually need more hands than those that are raised.  We can’t really all be called to rest, can we?  Or can we? 

“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”   An easy yoke . . . a light burden . . . what Jesus seems to be offering sounds so good.  I wish I accepted this more.  I’m more familiar with the long list of tasks that churches set out to do.  I’m more acquainted with the earnest, faithful followers of Jesus who never feel that they’re doing enough or that they’re getting it right.   I am more familiar with the Jesus who says “take up your cross and follow me.” Or the one who talks about the narrow gate and the hard road that lead to life.  If we’re following that Jesus, we can’t really all be called to deep rest, can we?

We picked up reading in Matthew just after a preaching mission to major cities in Galilee.  And apparently, it had not gone well.  Jesus had gone to the cities to recruit learners, to engage people willing to hear how God was working in their midst.  But those cities rejected his message. Not necessarily every person in those cities, but the leaders of the cities rejected him.  The ones for whom the status quo was working, the insiders, those who were wise in their own eyes and self-sufficient. 

Jesus seems a little exasperated.  He mentions the children in the marketplace.  Flutes and dancing were associated with weddings, while wailing was an essential part of funerals. It is as if John the Baptist came and played funeral. He preached fire and brimstone and warned them about the imminence of death and destruction.  Some listened to him, but most thought he was too weird, surviving on locusts and honey, dressing like a wild man, and all that gloom and doom talk. They didn’t want to play funeral. 

And then Jesus came along.  He turned water into wine to make a wedding party last longer. He told hilarious stories and welcomed children and shared meals with all kinds of people.  Some of them followed him, but many of the leaders said that he was too accepting, too joyful and frivolous, not nearly serious enough.  They didn’t want to play wedding. 

It feels like people are never satisfied.  No matter what tack God takes to reach us, we will not enter the game.  We will not play.  Jesus is speaking to his own people, reflecting on struggles going on within Israel. 

This might require some stretching of your imagination, but see if you can envision people who are part of the same faith who cannot agree on what might be described as the basics. People of the same faith who disagree about heaven and hell, who get into fights about how and when to do the important rituals, like, say, baptism and communion. Within the same faith, there are those who hold up salvation of souls as the key command of God, while others vigorously defend seeking justice and loving mercy as God’s primary requirement.

I know it’s a stretch, but imagine if you can, people who are citizens of the same country who are at odds about which practices are best for the country’s well-being.  They argue about if and when and how to wash hands, about if and when and how to cover their faces.  Some are doing all they can to restore the nation’s former glory and others are plotting its downfall.

If you can imagine a society like that, then you have a sense of first century Palestine under Roman occupation.  There were a lot of movements or groups, some large and powerful, some on the fringes. Some seeking reform; some enacting resistance, some in violent rebellion.

In the midst of all that, I expect that people were weary.  They were tired and anxious and afraid, just waiting to see what tomorrow’s news would bring and how bad the next crisis would be.   To these people, Jesus says, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”

What a profound relief to receive that invitation.    Jesus thanks God for the weak and the poor and the spiritual babies who recognize this as good news, those who accept this call to join Jesus’ small group. In a landscape of varied political and religious and economic movements, they recognize the Wisdom of God found in Jesus. 

In Jesus’ call to rest, they hear echoes of long-ago.  They remember the Exodus, when Moses led their ancestors out from domination under Pharaoh. 

The next part of the invitation says “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me.”  In Jesus’ day, the yoke was a common farm implement.  Yokes are not something most of us use on a regular basis.

Preacher Barbara Brown Taylor is helpful to me here.  She describes the difference between single yokes and shared yokes.  A single yoke fits across a person’s shoulders with buckets hung from poles on each side.  Taylor says,  that with a single yoke, “. . .human beings can carry almost as much as donkeys.  They will tire easily and have to sit down to rest, and their shoulders will ache all the time . . . but still it is possible to move great loads from one place to another using a single creature under a single yoke.”[1]  

She says that a shared yoke works very differently.  A well matched pair of creatures can all work all day because one can rest a little while the other pulls.  “They can take turns bearing the brunt of the load; they can cover for each other without every laying down their burden because their yoke is a shared one.”  At the end of the day, they are tired, but not exhausted.

Taylor suggests that some of us are weary because we are trying to wear single yokes, trying to do all the things and carry all the weight alone, while Jesus is calling us to a shared yoke. 

To accept Jesus’ yoke is to join his movement for life and liberation.  To accept Jesus’ yoke is to resist the cruel and exploitative yoke of empire and to work alongside Jesus as God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven.

Some years ago, my family went to Mackinac Island in Michigan.  There are no cars there, but a lot of horses. Many of those horses pull carriages for tourists.  Pairs of horses, always the same pair, are connected to each other.  All day long, together, they transport people all over the island.  Someone told us where to find the off-duty horses, the ones that were on their own in the paddock after hours.  So we did, and what we saw was that the horses who had been yoked together all day, chose to stay together in their off time. The one that was always harnessed on the left stayed on the left, the one harnessed on the right stayed on the right, even without the harness.  And the two horses walked together, in matched step, in their off-hours just as they did when working.  The yoke has a power to create relationship, to establish strong connections even when the yoke is no longer physically present.

The tie that binds us is the yoked life with God, the call to a way of life intent on Shalom, the restful well-being and peace which God desires for all creation.  It is work, but work shared with Jesus and with each other.  We may get tired, but not exhausted, because we move with Jesus in Sabbath rhythm.

“Come to me,” Jesus says. 

“All you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens,

come to me. 

All you who are tired of

trying to figure it out all by yourself, come to me. 

All you who are worn out

from trying to keep life under your control. 

All you who think the world is growing scarier day by day. All you who are confused and scared, grieving and exhausted, lost and lonely, come to me.”[2]

Come to me, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light, and you will be find rest.  Amen.

[1] Barbara Brown Taylor, “The Open Yoke” in The Seeds of Heaven:  Sermons o the Gospel of Matthew (Louisville:  Westminster/John Knox Press, 2004), p. 21.

[2] This beautiful phrasing is the work of the Rev. Shannon J. Kershner  in her sermon, Burdens, http://fourthchurch.org/sermons/2014/070614.html

7/12/20 - The Tie that Binds: Forgiveness - Matthew 18:21-31; Ephesians 4:25-5:2

The Tie that Binds:  Forgiveness

Matthew 18:21-35, Ephesians 4:25-5:2

July 12, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be accessed here: 

https://youtu.be/Z5-vMBZ95n0

In his book, The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis paints a picture of hell as a huge, gray city.  The inhabitants of this city live only on its outermost edges.  There are rows and rows of empty houses in the middle. They are empty because everyone who used to live there quarreled with the neighbors, and then moved, and quarreled with the new neighbors and moved again.  It is so large that it takes hundreds of years to travel from one end of the city to the other. All because its citizens can never resolve any differences and forgive each other. All they want to do is get as far away from each other as possible.  

Our reading from the letter to the church at Ephesus describes a community that does not want to live on the outskirts of hell. Instead of quarreling and moving on, this community is encouraged to practice things like truth-telling, anger management, honest work, kindness and forgiveness. These are all important for healthy community life.  They all require a certain level of intentionality. None of them is always easy, but I believe the hardest one on that list might be forgiveness, but forgiveness may also have the most power to bind us together. 

Forgiveness is hard.  We don’t always want to be forgiven. We don’t like that we did whatever we did that needs to be forgiven.   And we don’t like having to admit we did it.  Sometimes, we would rather pretend that it didn’t happen, or if it did, it really wasn’t that big a deal, or if it was that big of a deal, then all the more reason not to talk about it.  Forgiveness is hard for the ones who need to ask for it.

Forgiveness is also hard for the ones in a position to grant it.  Sometimes we are still hurt or angry when we’re asked to forgive.  Sometimes we want revenge; we want the other person to suffer the same kind of injury we think they inflicted on us.  Sometimes we want to hold on to the fact that we were right and they were wrong, and if we forgive, it will feel like we let them get away with something.  Forgiveness is hard for the ones who need to give it.

After reading Ephesians, I started wondering about what Jesus said about forgiveness. What popped into my mind was that conversation he had with Peter.   Jesus had been talking about how to resolve conflict in the church.  Peter wanted to know how many times he was required to forgive.  He thought that the right answer was 7 times.  But Jesus said it was more like 77 times or maybe 70 x 7 which is 490 times, depending on how you translate the Greek. 

And then, according to Matthew, to illustrate his point, Jesus told this parable.

“ . . . the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he began the reckoning, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him; and, as he could not pay, his lord ordered him to be sold, together with his wife and children and all his possessions, and payment to be made. So the slave fell on his knees before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ And out of pity for him, the lord of that slave released him and forgave him the debt. But that same slave, as he went out, came upon one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and seizing him by the throat, he said, ‘Pay what you owe.’ Then his fellow slave fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ But he refused; then he went and threw him into prison until he would pay the debt. When his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their lord all that had taken place. Then his lord summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave, as I had mercy on you?’ And in anger his lord handed him over to be tortured until he would pay his entire debt. 

This is a strange and difficult parable.  It could be boiled down to this.  The king is going to sell a man and his family and everything he has because the man owes a gazillion dollars which he is never going to be able to repay. But out of pity, the king releases him from the debt and forgives it. Then that man encounter someone else who owes him a hundred dollars and he refuses to forgive.  Having just been forgiven a huge debt, he refuses to forgive a miniscule amount.  The king hears about that, changes his mind and orders him to be tortured until he can pay the debt. 

This parable is difficult because many traditional interpretations claim that the king stands for God.  This is not how Jesus’ original audience would have heard it.  This is an earthly king who wields violence, pressure and fear, which is not to be compared with God’s loving care.  One scholar asserts that to make the king as an image of God would be blasphemy in Jewish tradition.[1]

Another issue is that Jesus has just told Peter to forgive, more than once, more than seven times. But the king in this story forgives just once and then undoes his forgiveness.   That’s another clue that this king is not to be equated with God. 

What if this story is not about forgiveness at all, but about a lack of forgiveness?  What if this parable is about a system of power and domination that is the very antithesis of the gospel? From the beginning, we know that the king is very powerful.  He can destroy the life of the high level slave and his whole family in an instant.  Threatening to do so is part of wielding that power.  When the king forgives the debt, it is just the flip side of the same power.  It also demonstrates just who is in charge. 

This is a culture where shame and honor mean everything.  The high level slave who has been forgiven has lost face. He has been humiliated and he has to regain it, by re-asserting his authority over the next person he sees, a lower-level slave over whom he has power.   He demands immediate repayment of a small debt, refusing to show mercy.  This makes a mockery of the king, making it seem like the high level slave took advantage of him and got away with it.  Now the king is the one who has to defend his honor and establish his authority, so he hands him over to the jailers.[2]

Maybe Jesus is describing a system that wasn’t really about forgiving another person.  In that system, you would keep track of who committed each offense and who forgave and how many times, with the goal of maintaining your own position and status.  Maybe the point of this parable is to demonstrate how very different it is when you forgive someone with no motives other than reconciliation and restoration of relationship. Maybe that is what Jesus means when he tells Peter and the others to forgive from the heart.

Maybe the point is that Jesus’ followers are to create communities of mutual care, kindness and heartfelt forgiveness, places where no one is vying for position because all are welcome and loved, communities which offer a profound alternative to the domination system maintained by earthly authorities.

You will no doubt remember Amy Cooper. She’s the woman in Central Park who called the police when a when Christian Cooper, (who is no relation) asked her to leash her dog.  Instead of doing that, she called 911 and reported that a black man was threatening her life. She was attempting to wield the power that is racism.  Christian, on the other hand, simply filmed their interaction without escalating it.

Amy has been charged with filing a false police report, which carries a maximum penalty of a year in prison. She was publicly shamed, her dog was taken from her and she lost her job.  Christian thinks those consequences might be sufficient.  He said, “ . . she’s already paid a steep price . . . that’s not enough of a deterrent to others?  Bringing her more misery just seems like piling on. . . . if the DA feels the need to pursue charges, he can do that without me.” [3]

That story is just one specific incident of the racism in this country which needs to be addressed systemically.  That complex conversation is beyond the scope of this sermon.  What I’m noting is simply how Christian did was is encouraged in Ephesians 4 – Christian kept telling the truth to Amy, even when she didn’t want to listen.  He was surely angry, but did not lash out  in the moment and even now, is not taking the opportunity to pile on vengeance.  It looks a lot like forgiveness to me.

Forgiveness is a tie that binds.  Christian communities are sustained by people who are committed to a way of life as a forgiven and forgiving people.  This is may be the  most difficult and most important work we do. So let us be kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another from the heart as God in Christ has forgiven us. Amen.

[1] Luise Schottroff, The Parables of Jesus, trans  Linda M Maloney (Minneapolis:  Fortress Press, 2006), p. 201

[2] Bruce J. Malina and Richard L. Rohrbaugh, Social-Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), p. 96.

[3] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/nyregion/amy-cooper-central-park-false-report-charge.html

6/28/20 - The Tie that Binds: Loving Service - John 13:1-17, 34-35

The Tie that Binds:  Loving Service

John 13:1-17, 34-35

June 28, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

Photo Credit: Divinity School of Chung Chi College, Hong Kong; Sculpture by Hu Ke,  Photo by Lau Xiu Sang

The worship service in which this sermon was delivered may be viewed at this link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUh9BxwBR4A

“I give you a new commandment,” Jesus says, “that you love one another.”  These words are familiar to us.  It no longer sounds like a new commandment.  But they were familiar to his disciples too.  The instruction to love your neighbor as yourself was as old as the book of Leviticus. Jesus’ disciples already knew and followed it.

So why does Jesus say this is a new commandment?

Perhaps it is because of the new community which will form around it, the community of those who will believe Jesus’ teachings and continue to practice them after his death and resurrection. 

Perhaps it is because they have a new understanding of the God who gave this instruction.  It is the God who stoops to earth in form of an ordinary human being.  It is the God, who in Jesus, humbly serves his friends.

And perhaps what is new is the qualifier – “just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”  Loving others is not new, but maybe what Jesus is emphasizing is the idea of loving others in direct imitation of him.

“Love one another as I have loved you.”  Jesus says this after he has washed their feet. Washing feet was an act of hospitality.  It was a way of welcoming people after a dusty journey.  The host offered water, but the guests usually washed their own feet, or the host directed a servant to do it.  “When Jesus washes his disciples’ feet, he combines the roles of servant and host.  When Jesus wraps himself with the towel, he assumes the garb and position of the servant, but the act of hospitality is the prerogative of the host.” [1]

This confuses them.

A teacher could expect acts of service from his followers. If anyone was to be washing someone else’s feet, it should be the students, the disciples.  Jesus reverses that pattern.  It makes Peter uncomfortable because it upsets his notions about roles and what is proper.

This happens just before a long good-bye speech and prayer that Jesus offers.  That’s called the Farewell Discourse.  It takes the next 4 chapters.  But before Jesus starts talking, he acts.  He acts out his love for his closest followers, which is symbolic of God’s love for the whole world.  He acts it out in a way that they will remember because it breaks all their conventional assumptions about what is expected between a teacher and his students.

“Love one another as I have loved you,”  he says.  We notice that this love makes them uncomfortable, that it poses a challenge for them to accept. 

We notice that he washes the feet of his betrayer and he says this while Judas is still present.  The love that we are to imitate is inclusive of enemies and those who would harm us. 

In Washington DC, there is a medical clinic called Christ House which serves people experiencing homelessness.  In front of Christ House is a sculpture of Jesus called “The Servant Christ”.  The sculpture is a life-size figure of a barefoot man, wearing jeans and a workshirt with the sleeves rolled up.  He kneels on his left knee.  One hand holds a shallow basin while the other is raised to beckon anyone sitting on the nearby benches to have their feet washed.  His face is turned upwards.  The sculpture is situated where anyone can respond to it in whatever way they choose as they walk by on the sidewalk or enter the building. 

The artist who created it, Jimilu Mason, said, “Many have questioned me about placing this beautiful work in a place where it will surely be abused.  My response has been that there is very little they could do to him that hasn’t already been done.”[2]

“Love one another.” We notice that he says this before he has laid down his life for them.  After Jesus’ death and resurrection, they may come to understand this love as self-sacrificing.  But in this moment, the model of love seems to be one that gives life to others without requiring the giving up of one’s own life entirely.

We notice that Jesus puts on the towel and washes the disciples’ feet, but then when he is finished, he puts on his robe and returns to his previous position at the table.  Jesus is able to move easily from his role as servant to leader. The love he models does not require a permanent posture of self-abasement.[3]

This seems to me to be a tricky thing.  To be confident in love regardless of your role.  To be able to be equally loving as host and as servant. 

“Love one another as I have loved you.”  Loving others as Jesus loved us, means that first we have to receive love from Jesus.  We have to accept the love of God on God’s terms, which might make us uncomfortable.  It might be a challenge for us.  But learning to accept God’s love for us is probably the key to being able to give and receive love from others regardless of their status or ours.

“Love one another as I have loved you.”  This is not a general call to serve humankind.  This is a specific call to give as Jesus gives, to love as Jesus loves, to imitate Jesus in our loving and living.  The new community which forms around Jesus,  embodies and enacts his love, and in so doing, the community reveals Jesus’ identity to the world. [4]

That was what happened during early pandemics.  In the year 165, a devastating epidemic swept through the Roman Empire.  Some medical historians suspect this was the first appearance of small pox.  Whatever it was, it was lethal.  During the 15-year-duration of the epidemic, a quarter to a third of the population probably died of it.  At its height, mortality was so great that the emperor wrote of caravans of carts and wagons hauling out the dead.  

Then a century later, came another great plague called the Plague of Cyprian.  Again people died horribly and anyone who could flee, did so.  Without understanding germs, the people knew that the plague was contagious, so when symptoms first appeared, the victims were often thrown into the streets to die.  But Christians went into the streets to rescue them, providing elementary nursing, food and water to those too weak to cope for themselves.  There are some estimates that such care saved as much as two-thirds of the sick. [5]

Christians became known for caring for the sick while the non-Christians gave in to their fear and abandoned the ill and the dying.  Christians were also dying, but they trusted that in life or in death, they were in God’s hands. What went on during the epidemics was only an intensification of what went on every day among Christians.  Christians became so identified with this love that in the fourth century the emperor Julian challenged the imperial priesthood to compete with the Christian charities. In a letter to the high priest of Galatia, Julian urged the distribution of grain and wine to the poor, noting that “the impious Galileans [Christians], in addition to their own, support ours, [and] it is shameful that our poor should be wanting our aid.”  

This kind of selfless love repeated itself many times in history, during the Black Death of Martin Luther’s Time and the cholera epidemic in London in the 1850’s.  In those difficult times and many others, Jesus’ followers took seriously his commandment to love one another as I have loved you.”

This historical information comes from the work of social historian Rodney Stark who suggests that the courage and love and resilience of those earliest Christians led to exponential growth.  Non-Christians who were cared for and nursed to health tended to become Christians themselves.  The faith community enacted and embodied Jesus’ love and in doing so revealed Jesus’ identity to the world.  They kept this new commandment which, in John’s gospel, was one of the last instructions he gave.

After losing his job in 2010, Brandon Stanton moved to New York and began an ambitious project, to photograph 10,000 New Yorkers on the street. Armed with his camera, he began crisscrossing the city, covering thousands of miles on foot, all in an attempt to capture New Yorkers. Somewhere along the way he began to interview his subjects in addition to photographing them. He asked one of two questions, which seem to open the doors into people’s lives: “What is your greatest struggle?” or “Give me one piece of advice.”

This project turned into the blog known as “Humans of New York” which has 20 million followers.  One of those Humans of New York helped Brandon understand his project is really about the power of stories. Shirley was an older woman photographed with wisps of grey hair sticking out from a furry cap, with a little bit of mascara under her wrinkled eyes, and an umbrella in the background.

Shirley said, “When my husband was dying, I asked: ‘Moe, how am I supposed to live without you?’ He told me: ‘Take the love you have for me and spread it around.’”[6]

Isn’t that just beautiful?  “Take the love you have for me and spread it around.”

How are the disciples supposed to live when Jesus is no longer with them in body? This is what Jesus commands the disciples to do: Take the love I’ve shown you and pour it out in the world. “Just as I have loved you…you also should love one another.”  Amen.

[1] Gail R. O’ Day, “John,” in New Interpreter's Bible, Vol. IX, (Nashville:  Abingdon Press, 1995), pp. 722-23

[2] Jann Cather Weaver, Roger Wedell, Kenneth Lawrence, Imaging the Word, Vol 1, (Cleveland:  United Church Press, 1994),  p. 168.

[3] Ian McFarland, in Connections: A Lectionary Commentary for Preaching and Worship, Year C, Volume 2 Joel Green, Thomas Long, Luke Powery, Cynthia Rigby, Editors, ,  (Louisville:  Westminster/John Knox Press, 2018), p. 153

[4] Gail R. O’Day, p. 727-728

[5] Excerpted from Rodney Stark, The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World’s Largest Religion (New York: HarperOne, 2011), 114-119.

[6] https://www.facebook.com/humansofnewyork/photos/a.102107073196735/431477093593063/?type=1&theater

6/21/20 - The Tie that Binds: Formation - Jeremiah 18:1-11; 2 Corinthians 4:5-12

The Tie That Binds: Formation

Jeremiah 18:1-11, 2 Corinthians 4:5-12

June 21, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

Image: Lidded jar of the sort used to store the Dead Sea Scrolls. From Qumran, Israel, 1st century CE, British Museum, London, Great Britain

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be accessed here. https://youtu.be/OxuDcBWJ9rI

On a Sunday a few years ago, I gave you clay. I gave everyone in the sanctuary some clay to play with, to form into any shape you wanted. I gave a few more instructions than that, but it was a pretty open exercise. I was not asking you to create a certain finished product. Most of you went along with it at the time, because you are great sports, but as soon as worship was over, you dropped your work into the trash. I know because I went around and rescued the clay from the garbage cans. Of all my attempts at creating engaging worship elements, that was one of the more stunning failures.

I wonder what happened. Some of you said you don’t like to work with your hands like that. Some of you said you don’t think you are artistic. I wonder if some of us are, in fact, fairly creative, but clay is just not a medium that we know how to work with. I wonder if any of us found the clay resistant. If it was hard to make it soft and pliable enough to work with, so we got frustrated.

Jeremiah compares God to a potter, working with clay. I wonder if God ever felt like that. The first time God is described as a potter in the Bible is at the beginning. In Genesis 2, God kneels on the ground, grabs a piece of moistened clay and from it fashions a human being. The Hebrew word translated as potter in Jeremiah 18 is the same word used in Genesis 2. And not long after that beginning, human beings start to assert their own ideas, their own will which is not always in keeping with God’s plans. By the time Jeremiah comes into the potter’s shop, God has been dealing with disobedient humans for a very long time. Jeremiah has too.

Jeremiah has been calling the people to repentance for their false worship and social injustice. They have not listened. In fact, a few verses after our reading, the leaders of Judah plot to kill Jeremiah. They don’t like his message and want to shut him up permanently.

The message that Jeremiah hears in the potter’s shop is harsh. It sounds like God is saying “I am the potter who made you and I can destroy you. I brought you into this world and I can take you out.”

It is strong language and we should note that the prophecies of Jeremiah are full of strong language. He repeatedly warns the people of impending doom and they pay no attention to him. His language gets more and more harsh in his attempts to get their attention.

It is also important to hear all of what he says. The Lord is sovereign over Judah, over all of creation, but also hoping not to exercise that power. Four times in these verses, God uses the word “If”. “If” the people will do X, then God will do Y. If the people will change their behavior, then God will change God’s plans. The Creator is responsive to the creature. There is give and take in the relationship.

If this was the only example of divine and human interaction in the Bible, then we might conclude that God is some kind of angry tyrant, a puppet-master who compels humans to do what God wants. But what we actually have in Scripture are stories of unexpected grace, of people receiving what they needed, instead of what they deserved. What we see in Scripture are the times when God’s change of mind was a decision not to punish. We might remember the time when people were in the wilderness and Moses was gone for too long, and they got anxious and built a golden calf to worship. God was going to destroy them, but Moses pleaded with God and God relented. Or we might remember when Jonah went to Ninevah with a message of coming destruction from God, only the people took the message to heart and changed their ways and God decided to spare them instead.

I read up a little bit on potters this week. I learned that they never waste clay. If something falls apart on the wheel, the clay goes into a bin called “reclaim” which is all the scraps and pieces that have failed somewhere in production. They’re kept together to be mixed back into usable clay.

Another potter said that clay is passive, but it has its own life and nature which can resist the potter. So the potter strives to open it up. Keeping it centered on the wheel is important to shape and reshape it. The outside of the vessel must conform to the inside. Sometimes the clay gets exhausted and must be set aside for awhile.

The relationship between potter and clay certainly seems an apt metaphor for the relationship between God and humans. If we understand potters, then we might recognize God not as bent on human destruction, but like a potter who is eager to coax something beautiful from resistant clay.

From the point of view of the clay, it might feel either like punishment or like growth. It seems significant that the metaphor holds as long as the clay continues to be malleable. In the next chapter of Jeremiah, the image is of clay that has been fired and shatters. One scholar suggests that is what happens when we harden. When our shape, our ideas, our faith, become fixed, we leave little room for God’s grace to reshape us.

Jeremiah was speaking to difficult people, his own people, in love. Some five hundred years later, Paul was also dealing with difficult people. The first church in Corinth was resisting his leadership. He had made mistakes. He wasn’t as flashy or as articulate as those who challenged his authority. Paul knew his Bible. I have to wonder if this passage from Jeremiah was in his mind when he mentioned clay jars. Maybe he wanted the Corinthians to remember that God could take them off the wheel and throw them into the reclaim bin. But he doesn’t go there.

Instead he recognizes his own weakness. He recognizes his own suffering and also the suffering of the Corinthians -- they are all afflicted, perplexed, persecuted and struck down. We humans are fragile and easily broken. In Paul’s analogy, we are more like inexpensive pottery that shatters than like malleable clay.

But Paul says, “we have this treasure in clay jars”. We have this treasure that is the Good News of Jesus. We have the extraordinary power of forgiveness and generosity and hospitality and justice through Jesus who dwells within us. And so Paul says,

“we are afflicted in every way

but not crushed;

perplexed but not driven to despair;

persecuted but not forsaken;

struck down but not destroyed”

We suffer, sometimes for the sake of the gospel, sometimes simply because that’s the nature of life, but God’s strength is often demonstrated in our weakness.

Archeologists have recovered clay jars from the first century. Perhaps this is what Paul had in mind – ordinary, functional, not valuable containers. They were considered fragile and disposable. But we might note that jars like this held the Dead Sea Scrolls, preserving that treasure for thousands of years, which kind of makes Paul’s point for him.

“We have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us.”

A few years ago, some of us had the privilege of being on retreat with Libby Little. Those of you joining us from beyond Albany may not know about Libby and her husband Tom Little. They were from upstate New York, but they spent 30 years living and working in Afghanistan, where they raised their three daughters. They stayed through the Soviet occupation. They hid in their basement during the Taliban rule of the 1990’s, all to provide eye care for the Afghan people. Tom was an optometrist. In 2010, he was returning from a mission to an outlying area with 9 other people when they were attacked and killed by the Taliban.

On that retreat, Libby talked about her life in Afghanistan. She talked about the loss of her husband and other hardships they had endured, but she did not dwell on that. What was perhaps most vivid in her presentation were her teapots. In Afghanistan, there is a highly skillful process of repairing broken pottery. Glue and metal staples are used to make containers watertight again. Her repaired teapots were fascinating.

There is a similar artistry in Japanese culture, called kintsugi. They use gold in the glue to mend the cracks in an object. They recognize that imperfection is credibility and scars are signs of improvement. So they highlight repairs and make them beautiful.

When the Russians left, Afghanistan slipped into a protracted civil war. Speaking about that time, Libby said, “One hundred rockets a day was a good day. We kept thinking it was going to get better, but it was a terrible time. It was a time when really the ground was levelled. We felt like we were able to come alongside Afghans and their suffering. Until then, we had no idea what suffering was.”

After Tom’s death she said, "We may never know what happened. We're not out for revenge or retaliation at all. We pray for whoever did this and keep working toward forgiveness."

Sometimes it is simple obedience. Sometimes it is fortitude in the midst of unjust suffering. Often it is a combination. But the tie that binds is our formation, our responsiveness to the God who shapes and reshapes us and forgives our sin and is made strong in our weakness.

“We have this treasure in clay jars,” Paul says, “so that the life of Jesus may be visible, so that the extraordinary power of God may shine from our hearts.” May it be so for you and for me. Amen.

6/14/20 - The Tie that Binds: Creation - Genesis 1; Psalm 8

The Tie That Binds: Creation

Genesis 1, Psalm 8

June 14, 2020

Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley

The worship service in which this sermon was delivered may be viewed at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwwIxgIqK4Q

This is the second week in our worship series called The Tie That Binds. Some of the ideas for this series came from an intergenerational conference held at a national retreat center where a whole lot of people were very much occupying the same places together for a whole week. I chose to lift up the idea of connections in this time when we cannot be together physically so that we might appreciate the other ties that bind us to God and to each other.

Last week we talked about the goodness of unity when members of households and members of nations can dwell together in peace. Today, we step back from our roles as family members, from our roles as citizens, to consider the bigger picture – what is our place in creation?

We began with reading from Genesis 1. We often hear familiar Bible passages as if they were written for us, which in a way they were, and in a context similar to ours, which they were not. The stories in the book of Genesis were particularly shaped in the time when the people of Judah were in exile. Living far from home, missing the places where they had worshipped God, they drew from a deep well of sacred memory. Most scholars believe that Genesis was written down after they returned to their homeland. The stories of beginnings – the creation of the world and the creation of a covenant people – were necessary to help them begin life together again. Genesis began to be a written book some 500 years before the time of Jesus. That means we are 2500 years from those who shaped these stories. For thousands of years before our time, millions of people read the same words we read now and wondered. They wondered at the power and order present in the world they observed. They marveled at beauty and diversity and abundance of color and shape and sounds. They shrank before the sheer might of wind and water and earthquakes and wild animals.

Imagine the expanse of history that separates us from those before us. Imagine that people told the stories of Genesis around campfires in the times when there was no light pollution to dim the stars, and when they believed the world was flat and if you travelled too far you would fall off, and before anyone understood anything about genetics or germs or gasoline. When I try to imagine times like that, I just can’t hold the thought in my head for very long. But for a moment, I have a sense of being small, of being not very significant in the grand scheme of things. And that’s not necessarily bad. It really is not all about me. It really is not all about you either.

But there’s also wisdom in the other direction. A professor who was also a clinical psychologist taught that the church gets it wrong when it starts with a confession of sin. Instead, he said that worship should begin with an affirmation of human dignity and honor and promise. “You should tell people that they’re almost angels before you tell them how flawed and hopeless they are,” he said. [1]

“A little lower than the angels” – that’s how Psalm 8 puts it. Genesis 1 asserts that humans are made in the image of God. Remember that first audience of this book, remember that they have survived the destruction of war, the loss of their loved ones to death, the humiliation of captivity. This opening chapter invites them to remember who they are, to accept their worth and dignity as human beings. [2]

On the sixth day of creation, we were made in the image of God, according to Genesis 1. But before our sense of self-importance gets too big, we might note that we are created on the same day as the other land animals. We don’t get our own special day -- a signal that we are part of a larger community. We are created after the birds and sea-life. In fact, the animals of the sea and the birds of the air are told to be fruitful and multiply first, before that instruction is given to humans. And before humans ever appear, six times it says “God saw that it was good.”

We are not the best thing in creation; we are not even the only good thing, But according to Genesis, only humans are made in God’s image. And only to humans does God give dominion.

This word dominion has been so abused, that we must pause here for a moment. In giving dominion, God confers responsibility on humans. God chooses not to be the only one who exercises creative power in the world. God shares that power with people. God entrusts the good and precious creation into the care of human beings.

In the very next chapter of Genesis, it says that Adam and Eve were put into the garden with instructions to till and to keep it. To till and to keep – to tend, nurture and protect.

Leviticus 25 and Psalm 24 proclaim that the earth is the Lord’s. God is the landlord of creation; humans are the tenants. We who bear God’s own image are to use the power entrusted to us to preserve and enhance the life of God’s delightful world. We are not to exploit or destroy it. It is not all about us.

Genesis 2 says that God formed the first human from the clay and when God breathed into his nostrils, the human became a living being. We are made from the earth and given responsibility for it. We are joined to God by our very breath.

This is a tie that binds. This is a connection to which we can attend even in the midst of sheltering in place during pandemic. It can begin with wonder, with noticing beauty and delight and goodness. I’ve heard that hiking is on the rise. Lots of people are taking to the woods and trails, even walking through our own neighborhoods, noticing with a new appreciation the daily changes that signal the arrival of spring. This connection to God and to the rest of creation also expresses itself as co-creating, exercising the gifts of shared power with God. This may be the particular vocation of farmers and scientists and engineers and artists, but tending the creation is everyone’s work. It means caring for other humans as friends, neighbors, family members, as teachers, therapists, nurses and doctors. It means loving this world that God so loves by preserving rainforests and fragile ecosystems and endangered species and watersheds.

It is as if someone has pushed a giant pause button. For weeks, humans slowed our activity, we quit travelling in our cars and planes, and turned off the machines in our factories. That giant pause has allowed us to see more clearly our interconnections with the created world. When humans paused, air pollution was dramatically reduced. People in parts of India could see the Himalayan mountains for the first time in decades. Animals started showing up in places where humans would normally be. Mountain goats wandered through a town in Wales, a puma was seen on the streets of Santiago, orcas have come closer to Vancouver because the industrial activity which usually keeps them away has quieted. In America’s National Parks, fox, deer, bears and bobcats have been seen in larger numbers at lower elevations closer to roads and areas usually occupied by human visitors.

If walking is gaining in popularity as a hobby, so is gardening, a very local way to nurture our connection to God and the earth. And humans are also tending to domestic animals with new care. In Spain, Ismael Fernandez was separated from his donkey Baldo for 2 months. Baldo was under the care of his sister while Ismael had to stay in his home in another city. When Ismael was finally able to travel, he was afraid Baldo wouldn’t remember him. The video of their reunion shows otherwise. It’s in Spanish, but I think you will understand it anyway.

https://tanksgoodnews.com/2020/05/22/man-and-donkey-reunited/?fbclid=IwAR125p4qQn-t2y3Zs_ADZLTOODhYUlEzE_kvpIxSNgIoeXL6MtYr1mn4iXA

After the video went viral, Ismael said, “I am not ashamed that you hear me crying [in the video] because it was a demonstration of unconditional love.” That kind of love is a tie that binds.

Rabbi Irving Greenberg is an Orthodox rabbi who seeks to promote greater understanding between Jews and Christians. One of the things we have in common, he says, is an overarching purpose in joining God in healing the world. In the grand scheme of things, our lifespan is short and our perspective is limited, but Rabbi Greenberg says

“we are to find our place in a world that was created eons before we came into being, by a Creator who existed eternities before this universe was shaped; a world whose idealized perfection may well be realized ages after we are gone from the scene. If humans can see the world even a little bit from this perspective, they will recognize their modest place; . . .They will be more able to find their proper role in the . . . world. They will act closer to the norms of love, justice, and dignity, which are the proper responses to the value of their fellow creatures.[3]

Beloved ones, we are created in the image of God, gifted by God with power and responsibility for the creation, formed from the dust of the earth, connected to God by God’s own breath/spirit. Made for communion with God, a little lower than the angels. Thanks be to God.

[1] As described by the Rev. John Buchanan in his sermon “Almost Angels” https://fourthchurch.org/sermons/2009/012509.html

[2] Kathleen M. O’Connor, Smyth & Helwys Bible Commentary: Genesis 1-25A, (Macon, GA: Smyth& Helwys Publishing, 2018) p. 43.

[3] Irving Greenberg For the Sake of Heaven and Earth: The New Encounter between Judaism and Christianity (Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society, 2004), pp. 49-50

6/7/20 - The Tie that Binds: Unity - Psalm 133; Romans 12:9-18

The Tie that Binds: Unity

Psalm 133, Romans 12:9:-18

Emmanuel Baptist Church

June 7, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be viewed here: https://youtu.be/e9tfv8mWNIk

How good and pleasant it is, when kindred live together in unity. How good and pleasant it is, when people live together in unity. About this time last year, my family was in Finland. Finland was part of Sweden for about 700 years and Swedish has an official status there. So all the signs are in both languages, much like Canada uses both English and French. When it was my turn to be served in a coffee shop, the barrista turned and addressed me in Swedish or Finnish, I’ll never know which, but as soon as American words came out of my mouth, he immediately switched to English. I watched as he easily conversed in whatever language was needed by the customer in front of him. How good and pleasant it is, when people live together in unity.

After Helsinki, we went to Berlin. It’s a place where there are still reminders of the wall and the river which once violently divided the city. It’s a place where people pray for world peace every Friday in a the shell of a church destroyed by bombs. It is a vibrant, lively unified city, dedicated to remembering its past so the future will be different. How good and pleasant it is when people live together in unity.

Psalm 133 is a pilgrimage psalm. It’s one of 15 psalms that might once have been in small songbook for use for people on their journey to Jerusalem. Verse 1 says “how good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity.” “Kindred” refers to family. Families travelled together to Jerusalem for religious or political festivals. Families were and are a crucial institution. In our families we learn may intimacy, love and growth. In our families, we may learn resentment, abuse, prejudice, and destructive behaviors. We know from experience that harmony is not automatic in families and so we can readily affirm – how good and pleasant it is when people live together in unity.

What we learn in our families, we will likely reproduce in other relationships. If what we learned is hurtful, it may take a good deal of work and practice to learn new, healthy behaviors. Psalm 133 starts at the level of family, but its main theme is the unity of the country. It refers to dew of Mt Hermon, which represents the people of Israel, flowing down on Mt. Zion, the center of Judah. It holds open the possibility of reuniting a country which has been divided into two.[1]

One image of unity is the oil that flows over the head of a high priest at his installation. It is not an image that we relate to very well, but we can appreciate that the oil poured on the top of his will flow down and consecrate his whole being.

The second image is of the dew from Mt. Hermon, the highest mountain in the land. The dew is the only precipitation in the dry season and it is sufficient to produce a harvest of grapes. It flows down, like the rain, on the just and the unjust, the deserving and the undeserving, a blessing to all.

I am struck that the two images of unity are oil and water. Oil and water, which we know, are not easily mixed. Oil and water molecules bond with their own kind, unless continuously forced into relationships. What a provocative suggestion about the nature of unity among humans.

I don’t have to tell you about oil and water. You have seen it for yourselves. You have seen it this week in city after city, including our own. In peaceful protests and less peaceful rebellion, in tear gas and pepper balls and riot gear, in looting and the imposition of curfews, in the voices of the oppressed demanding justice for all, reminding us all about the unity and equality upon which our country is supposedly founded. How good and pleasant it is when people live together in unity. We understand that most clearly when it is not happening.

When unity is absent, how do we find it again? In his book, Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer said “The first service that one owes to others in the fellowship consists in listening to them. . . . It is God’s love for us that not only gives us [God’s] Word but also lends us his ear. . . .
Many people are looking for an ear that will listen.”[2]

He wrote that in 1939, another time of great disunity in the world. So many people are still looking for an ear that will listen. There are so many voices speaking on top of each other. There are the voices of people of color who have been crying out for justice for hundreds of years. There are voices of white supremacists who are trying to change the narrative. And those representing law and order who may stand for justice, but may also have other agendas. And those of us who want to be good listeners will have to work hard to hear the truth.

Bonhoeffer continues “They do not find it among Christians because these Christians are talking when they should be listening. . . . [The one] who can no longer listen to his brother [or sister] will soon be no longer listening to God either. . . .
This is the beginning of the death of the spiritual life. . . . .
Christians have forgotten that the ministry of listening has been committed to them by [God] who is the great listener and whose work they should share. We should listen with the ears of God that we may speak the Word of God.[3]

I am learning again how hard it is to listen. I’m spending so much time on the phone and in Zoom meetings where I can’t read facial expressions and body language, where I have to rely on my ears more than ever. Bonhoeffer says that listening is a ministry, a service, entrusted to us by God.

“We should listen with the ears of God that we may speak the word of God.” The word of God is a word of strong love always. Throughout the Bible, the word of God is a word that brings good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind and lets the oppressed go free.

So, as we sort through the conflicting narratives, as we seek the truth which may restore unity, let us listen especially for the good news to the poor and for release of the captives. And let us listen for recovery of sight, aware that we, ourselves may be the ones who need that most. Let us be open to hearing a perspective different from our own, a point of view that might help us to understand a new reality, so that we may live together in unity.

This is a hard time for most of us, for many reasons. Many feel that our country is coming apart, that our oily and watery natures will never mix, never learn even to get along. But others are seeing signs of hope. And I’m choosing, when I can, to listen to them. One person who offers hope is the Rev. John Floberg.

Rev. Floberg is a supervising priest for 3 churches on the Standing Rock Sioux Nation where he has served for about 30 years. You will remember Standing Rock and the resistance there to the Dakota Access Pipeline. Sixty-seven Emmanuelites signed a statement in support of Standing Rock at that time.

This week, John Floberg wrote these words, “I am writing as the priest at Standing Rock during the NoDAPL stand-off of 2016 and 2017. I write because I feel a need to process once again the events of those days and what it taught me that is being repeated in this day - but on a different scale.

When the fires went out in the Camp it was stated that the fire is not out, it has been relit in many more places.

What had been very much an amazing show of solidarity as people and nations came with their flags to Standing Rock and thousands streamed into the Camps - is now this amazing show of solidarity ablaze in the country.

The NoDAPL movement is about oil - but much more about oil as a means of threatening a people and the callous disregard for those people by others in power. The NoDAPL movement is about Indigenous people and the solidarity that others provided to witness their Standing. People did not come to Standing Rock to get them on their feet - they came because they were standing up.

And now the injustice of some in Law Enforcement, a large piece of what was experienced at Standing Rock is being experienced throughout the cities of our country. But people are not all flocking to Minneapolis where George Floyd was murdered. People are, by and large, standing up in their own communities to cry for justice. This part of the NoDAPL Camp Fires has been kindled and the light is showing brightly all around this country.”[4]

What some of us are seeing as disunity, as conflict, as coming apart, John Floberg sees as unity, unity for the cause of justice, a unity that may yet lead to a change of heart and reconciliation.

How very good and pleasant it is when people live together in unity. Beloved ones, let our love be genuine, hate what is evil, hold fast to the good and as far as it depends on us, may be live peaceably with all. Amen.

[1] J. Clinton McCann, Jr. quoting Adele Berlin in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. IV, (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996), p. 1214.

[2] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together (New York: Harper and Row, 1954), p. 97

[3] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together, pp. 97-98

[4] John Floberg, his post in the Facebook group Clergy With Standing Rock, June 5, 2020

5/31/20 - Breath of God - John 20:19-23

Breath of God

John 20:19-23

Emmanuel Baptist Church

May 31, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be viewed here:

https://youtu.be/Uh6L-vW7nQ8

I looked back at old bulletins and discovered that I haven’t been with you on Pentecost for a few years. When I was with you, I tended to repeat one language lesson, but I have no idea what the guest preachers did, so just in case, here it is again.

Ruach is a Hebrew word. It means wind or spirit or breath. If you see a sentence like “the ruach lifted the kite” you could translate it “The wind lifted the kite” or “the spirit lifted the kite” or “the breath lifted the kite.” All of those translations are accurate.

Does anyone know the Greek word like this? . . . Yes, I heard it from over there. The Greek word is pneuma. And, just like ruach, it means wind, breath or spirit.

Only two of the Gospel writers describe the giving of the Holy Spirit. We usually read Acts 2, written by Luke. That’s the story we heard in the Godly Play video. In Luke’s version, the Holy Spirit is a very loud and windy wind. But in John’s telling, the Spirit is breath

In John’s gospel, only part of a day has elapsed between the resurrection and the imparting of the Spirit. It is Easter evening and the disciples are together behind locked doors when Jesus appears. He says “Peace to you.” It was a standard way to say hello and still is in Israel-Palestine. He says it twice, because the first time, they are still afraid. They haven’t recognized him yet. “Peace to you” from a stranger does not mean the same thing as “peace” from Jesus. When Jesus, the Risen One, says it, he enacts the peace. Jesus is their most trusted teacher. Jesus is the one who has literally been to hell and back. And so, when he says peace, everyone in the room lets go of their fear and breathes more easily.

One time, a church invited a well-known guest preacher, the Rev. Tom Long, to come for a special intergenerational worship service. They gathered around tables in the fellowship hall which were already set with the ingredients to make bread. Each group was supposed to prepare a loaf of bread and then while it baked in the kitchen, there were various exercises designed to get them talking about faith issues.

This was one of those things that looked better on the drawing board, than in reality. The kids played in the baking ingredients, and white clouds of flour coated everything. There were delays in the kitchen and the bread baked very slowly. People ran out of things to talk about. The children got bored and fussy. The planners had hoped for an event with excitement, innovation, peak learning, and moving worship. What happened was noise, exhaustion and people making the best of a difficult situation.

Dr. Long said, “In other words, despite the rosy plans, it was the real church worshipping down there in the church basement.” Finally, the service ended and he was able to pronounce the benediction. “The Peace of Christ be with you all,” he said, and just as he did, a child’s voice from somewhere in the room called out strong and true, “It already is.” [1]

“The Peace of Christ is already with us. A month ago, I remembered that story and I saved it for today. I thought this was going to be a sermon about the comfort and peace brought by the Spirit. I invited you to bring your signs of peace so that we could pass the peace of Christ and remind each other – the peace of Christ is already with us.

That is still true, but I hear it slightly different now. After the events of the last week, the last month, I could not preach a simple sermon on peace. The prophets Ezekiel and Jeremiah warned against those who say “peace, peace, when there is no peace”. So, I could not just act as though we are safe here in the Zoom space and pretend that nothing unpeaceful is happening. I had to go back to the text and look again.

After Jesus says “Peace be with you”, he says “receive the Holy Spirit” and he breathes on them. He breathes on them and it’s the same word as when God exhaled the breath of life into Adam and he become a living being. It’s the same word as in Ezekiel 37 where God’s breath/wind/spirit blows into the dry bones of Ezekiel’s vision so that they may live. And what I had hoped to say today was that the peace of Christ is already with us, it is as close as our breath.

But as soon as I say that, I think of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, who are no longer breathing. And I think of people of color who never breathe easily because the foot of oppression is on their necks. And I’m thinking of 100,000 Americans who have died from a virus that stole their breath, and of thousands more across the country who cannot inhale without a ventilator. And I cannot say “peace, peace” when there is no peace.

I go back to the text and look again. Jesus says “receive the Holy Breath, the Holy Wind, the Holy Spirit” and he breathes it onto them. It doesn’t seem like they have a choice. They aren’t socially distanced. They aren’t wearing masks. They cannot help but receive the Spirit and the power that comes with it.

They had locked themselves away in fear, with good reason. The world terrorizes those who work for justice; it crucifies Love incarnate. Within a few years, the disciples in that locked room will see their beloved Jerusalem in flames; before John’s gospel is written down, they will know the pain of religious factionalism, of persecution and violent separation from friends and family over their understanding of faith. So, if there is a peace that comes with the breath of the Spirit, it needs to be a strong, resilient peace.

Before Jesus breathes Spirit into them, he says “as the Father has sent me, so send I you.” Let that sink in. God sent Jesus to earth where he was accepted by many, but mostly rejected by the powerful, and where he ultimately endured a painful public death. And Jesus says, “as I was sent, so I send you.”

“The coming of Jesus is not just a nice presence; it is a mission.” Walter Brueggemann says, “. . . I do not know where you are sent. But I give you this word from Jesus; you are sent. And if you want the peace of Jesus, then you must accept the sending of Jesus. . . . Jesus is sending all of his disciples, all those baptized in his name, all who share his life, all to the same place, all to the neighbor whom God loves, all to the neighbor in need. . .. Before the sun sets on Pentecost,” Brueggemann says, “we must rethink this sending, and how we will go, and where. If, however, we do not go, we can forget about his offer of peace.” [2]

I have pretty much taken for granted the ability to breathe. I do it all the time without conscious thought. My breathing sustains me without my paying much attention to it. But today, I’m thinking about the Spirit/Breath/Wind of God and I’m wondering if I take that for granted too. How often is the Spirit moving in and around me and I haven’t bothered to notice? What a privilege it is to be able to breathe easily, to breath without fear and without a ventilator. With privilege comes responsibility. So, as long as I draw breath, how do I embody Spirit-infused love and justice? How do I love as Jesus loves?

Father Richard Rohr has said that If we do not transform our pain, we will most assuredly transmit it.[3] You and I have seen so much transmitted pain this week --the pain of grief, of justified rage, the rioting of the unheard. If we do not transform our pain, we will surely transmit it. Transformation is Spirit-work and forgiveness is its best tool.

Jesus breathes Spirit onto the disciples and sends them out into a hostile world, empowered with forgiveness. “Because without the work of the Spirit, without the power of forgiveness, the world will be devoured in anger, in violence and in vengeance.”[4]

Those are more of Brueggemann’s good words, “without the work of the Spirit, without the power of forgiveness, the world will be devoured in anger, in violence and in vengeance.” We know the truth of this. On this Pentecost Sunday especially, we feel the anger, the violence, the vengeance that threaten to devour us all. And so, we plead “Come Holy Spirit. Come with power to transform and heal and forgive. Come Holy Spirit. Come and grant us your peace.”

The peace of Christ be with you all.

Not an easy peace,

not an insignificant peace,

not a halfhearted peace,

but the peace of God in Christ Jesus be with you.

It already is.

[1] Thomas G. Long, Whispering the Lyrics: Sermons for Lent and Easter, (Lima, Ohio: CSS Publishing Company, 1995,) p. 93-94.

[2] Walter Brueggemann, “The Ultimate Gate-Crasher” in The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann, Vol 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2011), pp. 34-35.

[3] https://cac.org/transforming-our-pain-2016-02-26/?fbclid=IwAR3PWjYVD28-BlqOrwCeO8Y0hSWOMkxuBEmwZ25SZYfKWPGJKe759unT4o4

[4] Walter Brueggemann, “The Life-Giving Wind from Nazareth” in The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann, Vol 2 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2015), p. 160.

5/24/20 - Generation to Generation - Psalm 145

Generation to Generation

Psalm 145

Emmanuel Baptist Church

May 24, 2020; Rev. Jerrod H. Hugenot

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://youtu.be/FwQTotrecLA

In some Christian churches, I could ask this question: What is the chief end of man [humanity]? Many in the congregation reply: “To glorify God and enjoy God forever.”

How did they know this? Thanks to catechism.

While we Baptists might associate the word catechism more with Catholicism, a number of Protestant traditions use catechism as well, particularly in the Reformed traditions, especially Presbyterians and Lutherans. Catechism sets up a series of questions and answers for Christians to learn the vocabulary of faith and the beliefs central to Christianity. The question about “the chief end of humanity,” our identity and destiny, appears as Question #1 in some catechisms.

So, why is this brief handful of fourteen words considered so great, so central to what it means to be Christian? To give God due praise and glory means that no other shall receive your faithfulness and dedication. God alone receives our praise and glory, and our understanding of life cannot be without a sense of humility that we exist not for ourselves. Such a faith is unflinching in its theism (i.e. there is a God) and its willingness to say that we give our trust and allegiance to God alone.

In the midst of our lives, such talk may sound too lofty or worse, detached from the life we know. To say that humanity’s very reason for being, our reason for being is to praise God is even difficult. We typically struggle with questions of life, trying to sort out the puzzles and the pain of human existence however the plain-spoken words of this question and answer ought to cause some troubling in your soul. Such thinking calls our bluff and asks us to think about what we really mean when we say we are believers. Is this conversation this morning a “nice thought” meant as a Sunday morning listening yet lost in the shuffle of the other six days of the week, or does this question illumine the faith of Christianity, with its way of discipleship that asks very hard questions of us?

Answering with “to glorify God and enjoy God forever” is harder than just learning and repeating these words. To live it out means you commit to living out faith daily. Somehow, in the whirlwind of family and deadlines, in the midst of the headlines of the world and the headlines of your little corner of the world, such belief is a tall order. How does one learn such a way of life? And more to the point, can you risk life by living that way?

In the midst of the world, in the great times of trial, the praise of God can take place in every season of life, and it is indeed fitting for us to do so. Giving praise to God is in part a realization that our lives twist and turn, and often without much warning, yet we still recognize the goodness that God intends for the world, even when we cannot see much of it ourselves.

Christians believe that in the end, whether it is our own or that of this world, God shall have the last word. God shall make all things well. As Augustine said, restless hearts will find their rest in God. To give praise to God, even in the midst of your worst days, understands our lives so much differently, cast not to the winds, but in loving trust of the One who has made us.

Appropriately, the 145th Psalm raises up a long liturgy of praise. Of all the psalms, many of which call us to praise, this one begins with a self-description. Rather than perhaps “a psalm of David” common for many psalms, the superscription, or title, is simply tehillah, or in English: “Praise.” The psalmist just leaves it at that: “this one…it is praise.” To understand this psalm, you need not look any further than this one word: “praise.”

Down the centuries, a rabbinical tradition arose, stating, “Every [person] who repeats the Tehillah [praise] of David thrice a day may be sure [they are] a child of the world to come” (cited Mays, Psalms, Interpretation, 1994, p. 437). Reading this psalm, measuring its words with your heart and mind, is offered as a good word, one that guides you through this life, helping you know your identity against all the other claims of the world to tell you who you are. One could rail against rote (indeed, catechism is often criticized as rote faith), yet in the repetition, if you look closely, you shall find a rhythm worth taking up in your own life. In reading this psalm in times of sorrow, in times of joy, in the midst of disaster and when going to bed after a ho-hum day, this psalm keeps turning us back to our reason for being.

In the midst of this psalm, we find the same wisdom that prompted the later Christian observation that the chief end of humanity is to glorify God and enjoy God forever. The life we live ought to be a life of praise, yet not one that is trite or errs on the side of living faith as if it is “magic” (if I pray or live a certain way, I’ll get a free pass from the unpredictable part of human existence). This sort of praise is meant for those who have diplomas from the School of Hard Knocks. The psalms reflect ancient Israel’s own story, shaped as much by pathos as praise, as much about lament as hope. And in the midst of the collection, we are offered a psalm that points to the life we know as well as the life to come.

We have a holy calling to be involved in the education and upbringing of each child and youth in our congregations. After all, we did not learn the ways of faith alone. We too are the product of the investment and love of generations who have gone on before us. In turn, we share the faith, and hopefully take it very, very seriously as a key investment in what it means to be a congregation. Each of us is responsible for sharing faith and helping our children and youth know that life may be complex, life may even get deeply sorrowful, yet there is a world to come that is worth living and a great calling to live this life fully. This is not just the work of Sunday school teachers. This is not just the work of a Christian education board. This is not just the work of a pastor. It is the responsibility of each one of us to be invested in children, whether just learning to walk, or starting to bridge across the stages of life. You have the wonderful challenge of “being there” for our kids!

I remember very well the witness of grown-ups who made the faith come alive. Teaching a Sunday School class, helping train me to be an usher, welcoming my voice (going through puberty even) into the choir, asking good questions and acknowledging me in the room as the young kid, the moody teenager, the young adult (with the assurance of knowing all things despite knowing very little). I was blessed by those who remembered their faith was not just “theirs” to have, but to share and kindle anew a spark, a flame and a love of God made known through Jesus Christ.

We did not use catechism, so “to glorify God and enjoy God forever” did not get communicated by a standardized teaching. Yet it was there, so when I read what other Christians were taught, I could agree with the good word it imparted. I had seen it lived out in the lives of the church folk who helped raise me up in the faith. I could savor the words of “glorifying and enjoying God forever” as words of faith, not only passed down to me but kept by me as words that anchor me. And today, I share the faith with you through my preaching and through our connections together through the American Baptist tradition and our ministry together as fellow American Baptists in upstate New York.

Sometimes, people will pick up on the fact I do not sound like I’m from the Northeast. (This accent is not from the Bronx nor is it from Maine, so I do “sound funny” pretty much at the outset of talking aloud to folks out here.) The question gets asked, “How did somebody from Kansas get out here?” (I have a suspicion I would be believed if I casually said it was due to a tornado and some winged monkeys.)

To answer that question is not about “jobs” or “opportunities.” I begin not with a roadmap or some GPS directions. I share that I am here thanks to first learning of the faith from a little Methodist church in a rural Kansas farming community. Later on, my family joined the local American Baptist church, especially for myself and my dad that day in 1984 through confession of faith, profession of Christ as Lord and going fully into the waters of baptism. How I wound up here today is a long journey that is still unfolding, still being discovered, somewhat on my own and somewhat on the way along with the gathered people called “Church.” Without a doubt, I can look back at that history thus far and say, “Praise be to God!” And I know I’m simply joining the rest of the choir, generations present, down the centuries of the past and with those who I hope will hear this sermon today and decide to join along this journey of faith!

Wherever we go in our lives, no matter how our lives play out in one time or another during the seasons of life, we are best known not as people with a list of successes or failures to our name. We are a people who know where we are going and what we should be doing in the times in between. We are a people called to a singular way of life, to praise God now and forevermore.

5/17/20 - Christ's Power - Our Power - Ephesians 1:15-23; Luke 24:44-53

Christ’s Power ~ Our Power

Ephesians 1:15-23, Luke 24:44-53

Emmanuel Baptist Church

May 17, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWBUzi6RvHI&t=2640s

Christ’s Power

Cassandra read the passage from Ephesians beautifully. In those 8 verses, she read 4 complex sentences. In the Greek, all of that is one long convoluted sentence. Paul is piling up phrases on top of each other to try to describe something almost incomprehensible. He speaks about resurrection which offers immeasurable hope and rich inheritance and great power. Great power -- that one is very hard to understand, as Naughty Racoon demonstrated.

At Christmas, we often talk about Jesus who abandoned his power as God to become human, to take on flesh and live with us. Here, what Paul is describing is the power of incarnation in the other direction. Jesus, the human one, has been raised to sovereignty, “far above all rule and authority and dominion, not only in this age, but in the age to come.” In Jesus of Nazareth, God came to earth, and now, in Jesus, a Human One resides in heaven. One scholar says “Humanity may have forfeited its magnificence, but in Jesus the Messiah, it is restored, renewed. . . we see Jesus, the one who reveals both God and our true humanity, the glorious destiny that fits our good creation. We see Jesus, the new humanity.”[1]

Barbara Brown Taylor makes it a bit easier for me to understand. She says, “What we share with [Jesus] – that fullness of his in which we take part – is the strenuous mystery of our mixed parentage. We are God’s own children, through our blood kinship with Christ. We are also the children of Adam and Eve, with a hereditary craving for forbidden fruit salad. Frisk us and you will find two passports on our persons – one says that we are citizen of heaven, the other insists we are taxpayers on earth.”

“What Paul asks us to believe,” she continues, “is that our two-ness has already been healed in our oneness in Christ – not that it will be healed, but that it already has been healed – even if we cannot feel it yet. . .”[2]

Paul prays that with the eyes of our hearts we will begin to see, to perceive, to grasp, the vast richness of our inheritance as God’s children and to live into that wholeness which has already occurred.

Waiting

My last Sunday with you in the Emmanuel sanctuary was on March 8. That was the last Sunday that many of us were there. On March 15, I was away and I’m told that about 20 of you were present sitting in chairs spaced apart. By March 22, we were worshipping via Zoom. Those major upheavals took place very quickly. As soon as we began to get our minds around one fact about the virus, there would be new information to incorporate.

The way that Luke tells the story of Easter, the upheaval is even faster. Jesus’ friends wake up on Easter Sunday in deep grief and fear. It is the third day since they witnessed the trauma and horror of resurrection. They are still coming to terms with that, when the women discover the empty tomb and are told by angels that Jesus has risen from the dead. Peter verifies the empty tomb but he and the other men think that the women’s story is ridiculous. Then two disciples walk to Emmaus and on the way, they encounter a stranger who turns out to be Jesus. They come all the way back to Jerusalem to inform the others, only to be told that the others already know and that Peter has also seen him. Then suddenly Jesus is among them. He eats a piece of fish, as if to demonstrate that he is not a ghost. He goes out and they follow him the two miles to Bethany. He blesses them and ascends into heaven.

How could they even begin to process those events? The day began with the worst kind of sorrow and ended with incomprehensible joy, but somehow Jesus is gone again. How did they experience that incredible roller coaster of emotions? How would they make sense of any of it?

Before leaving, Jesus tells them to stay here until they are clothed with power. Stay here means to stay in Jerusalem. They are from Galilee. They just went to Jerusalem for the holiday, but now Jesus says, “Stay here, where things are not so familiar, maybe not so comfortable. Stay here until . . .”

Jesus doesn’t tell them how long it will be. He doesn’t tell them how they will know when the power comes. Just “stay here until . . .” It turned out to be 50 days. Fifty days until the Holy Spirit came in power on Pentecost. But they did not know how long it would be – a week? A month? A year?

New York has been on Pause for about 56 days now. And we still don’t know how long we’ll have to stay here. I have a new appreciation for the Jesus’ wisdom and the disciple’s obedience. Waiting in place gave them time to process, time to incorporate the massive upheaval of Easter. They needed that time, the being together in the Temple, the season of waiting with ambiguity season because Pentecost was going to be another life-changing event.

Denise Levertov was a fascinating American poet of the last century who often wrote about faith. One of her poems about Jesus’ Ascension is called Suspended. She imagines trying to hold on to God’s garment. She writes

I had grasped God's garment in the void
but my hand slipped
on the rich silk of it.
The 'everlasting arms' my sister liked to remember
must have upheld my leaden weight
from falling, even so,
for though I claw at empty air and feel
nothing, no embrace,
I have not

plummeted.[3]

“I have not plummeted” she says. Those are words I am holding on right now. Things seem unstable and ambiguous. The upheaval of this time is huge but we have not plummeted. By God’s grace, we are facing the challenge, we are not despairing. Like the disciples, we are staying here, until . . .

Our Power

Jesus tells the disciple, “stay here until you are clothed with power.” Paul prays that we may know the power that raised Jesus from the dead.

Power is hard to talk about. For some of us is it a negative word. It makes us think of abuse or violence and we want no part of that. If we do construe it positively, many of us still tend to under-estimate the power of God in us at the best of times. And right now, we feel somewhat powerless, our strength diminished by fear of the virus and the political polarization that makes enemies out of those who need most to work together for the common good.

We just sang “Goodness is Stronger than Evil”. Those words were written by Archbishop Desmond Tutu shortly after the official end of apartheid in South Africa. At the time he was the chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which took upon itself the task of telling the truth about the atrocities of the past so that the country could heal. If you don’t know Desmond Tutu’s personal story, look him up on the internet this afternoon. The forces of racism and poverty and persecution waged against him for much of his life and yet, with the eyes of his heart he continually proclaimed “goodness is stronger than evil, love is stronger than hate.”

I read a remarkable sermon by one of Desmond Tutu’s colleagues this week. Peter Storey was a white South African, a Methodist minister in Johannesburg and Soweto during the decades of struggle against apartheid. The sermon I read was one he delivered to the South African Council of Churches in May 1981, just after Bishop Tutu had been arrested and his passport confiscated. In this sermon, Peter Storey spoke about the Jesus who was enthroned far above all government and authority. He called on his listeners to follow that Jesus and to bear witness to his truths. He told them that, as Jesus followers, they were a sign of hope in a divided land.

This was a very public gathering. There was no doubt that what he said would be known by the government. And yet, he clearly and deliberately described the injustice and abuse he saw. Listen to these words: “Our task is to continue to reveal these truths too for what they are. Call us unpatriotic if you will, but we want not part of a patriotism that hides that nations’ disease when that disease is hurting people, hounding people, and breaking people each day.” And later on, he said, “there are deeper and more subtle pressures that bring suspicion and division among us: a readiness to write someone off because his or her view of the struggle is different from my own; the quick labeling of people in destructive ways; a willingness to trade the eternal truth of the Gospel for some fashionable ideology of change.”[4]

Those words sound volatile. They still ring true in our context. Imagine the courage it took to speak them to the oppressors in his government, not just once, but over and over again. What strength he had, to remain clear to his convictions that Jesus is Lord. And what we know, from this vantage point, is that history was on his side. The struggle was long and terrible, but when he proclaimed that apartheid was doomed, he was right. That is the power of the gospel. That is the power that raised Christ from death to the right hand of God.

That same power is at work in us and around us, in so many ways. More than I can name, but here are a few.

The South End Children’s Café serves the children in Albany’s South End. In recent weeks, they have adapted their program to work in this time of social distancing. Every week, they are delivering groceries to provide 5 meals each for 500 children and their families. Last week, they put out the word that supplies were running low. They shared a list of needed items and asked people to make donations yesterday afternoon. The response was overwhelming. They needed a dedicated police officer to manage the line of cars waiting to drop off. One of my friends who volunteers there said, “I started crying when I saw the police officer directing traffic and the volume of food and supplies that were donated. It’s been pretty easy to get discouraged with everything we are seeing and reading, so this was much needed!” That is resurrection power.

Our church and so many others have creatively adapted. Few of us love streaming worship or Zoom gatherings, but we keep showing up, to be here for each other, to see the hope of our calling with the eyes of our hearts. We keep praying for our neighbors and loving our enemies through the power of Christ

I keep hearing from people who are looking to donate their stimulus checks in the best possible ways. I keep hearing that mostly from you. You want to give away money for groceries and medicine and shelter and electricity and all the things desperately needed by those who are especially struggling right now.

Beloved ones, that is compassion and generosity and hope. That is power. The power of Christ raised from the dead who fills all in all, whose fullness and power have spilled over into us. Thanks be to God.

[1] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible – Ephesians, (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2011), p. 61

[2] Barbara Brown Taylor “He Who Fills All in All” in Home By Another Way (Boston: Cowley Publications, 1997) p.139.

[3] https://www.journeywithjesus.net/poemsandprayers/630-denise-levertov-suspended

[4] Peter Storey With God in the Crucible: Preaching Costly Discipleship (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2002), p 46.

5/10/20 - Can I Get a Witness - Acts 7:55-60

Can I Get a Witness

Acts 7:55-60

Emmanuel Baptist Church

May 10, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-FfoTRaun8&t=1415s

Stephen is known as the first Christian martyr because he died for his faith, but in Greek, the word “martyr” actually means “witness.” It didn’t start out meaning someone who died for their faith (although getting killed for what you believe is pretty strong testimony). It just referred to someone who was willing to speak of what they knew to be true.

Some form of the word martyr occurs three times in Acts chapters 6-7. We heard the end of the story of Stephen. His story began when he was one of the leaders chosen to oversee food distribution. It seems that the early church had something like a food pantry. Some widows were being overlooked in the distribution, so the apostles asked for responsible leaders to take charge and make it right. One of the requirements they had was that the ones chosen had to be of good repute. The Greek for that is martyroumenous. A literal translation is “well-attested” or “well-witnessed.” Stephen’s good reputation is based on what other people have witnessed about him.[1]

So Stephen became a deacon, which means server. The church in Jerusalem was growing and Stephen became known not only for his food pantry skills, but for his wise and spirit-filled preaching. There was opposition to him which eventually took the form of false witnesses, mártys , which is found in verse 6:13. They lied about him, charging him with blasphemy which was serious enough to get the attention of the authorities.

What we didn’t read is a very long and pretty harsh sermon that Stephen delivered at his hearing. It seems that he was representing himself at trial. He did not make a good lawyer; he didn’t even address the charges against him. Instead he re-told the story of his people and reminded them of their long history of ignoring the prophets, including both Moses and Jesus. That’s when the mob turned on him and killed him. And we see that word mártys one more time in verse 58 where it says that the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul.

That word witness jumped out at me. In the last year I have joined two groups that called themselves witnesses -- the group that went to Homestead Florida to observe whatever they could about the conditions and treatment of asylum-seeking youth being detained there, and the group in Brownsville Texas who gathered to pay attention to what was happening on both sides of the US/Mexico border there.

What I learned from those experiences is that bearing witness has an effect on those of us who do the observing. In watching and listening and paying attention, we learn things which make a deep impression. We see faces and body language and hear words and tone of voice and what is happening becomes more personal and more important to us because we are there to bear witness and we can tell the story of what we know. Even when we could do nothing to change the situation, there was a power in simply watching.

I also learned that another power of bearing witness is that it can change the actions of those being observed. Witnesses at Homestead noticed that the staff were provided with baseball caps against the hot sun in Florida but that the teens were not. They pointed this out to the press. Within a few days, the witnesses observed that all the teens had been issued hats as well.

There were witnesses, observers at Stephen’s death. That’s how we know the story, right? Someone saw the expression of wonder on Stephen’s face when he described that he was looking into heaven. Some heard him committing his spirit to God and uttering other words very similar to those Jesus said on the cross “do not hold this sin against them.” Some witnesses were there to see and hear and record the story for future generations, like us.

I asked you this week about what you are bearing witness to. You are seeing that the virus is disproportionately affecting people of color and those in nursing homes, you see those in prisons and immigrant detention unprotected from it, you are noticing continuing racial violence, you mentioned the killing of Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia as just one example; you are bearing witness to political decisions like more stimulus money going to large businesses than small ones and proposed cuts to educational funding in the NY State budget and the continuing deportation flights which are now sending covid-positive people to Guatemala and Honduras; you recognize that in places you were already concerned about, the suffering is on-going and getting even less attention, places like the Northern Triangle and Venezuela and Yemen.

You are also bearing witness to wonder – the beauty of the return of spring flowers and birds, acts of kindness and creativity, communities rallying together to feed children and recognizing the self-sacrifice of those on the front lines in health-care and driving buses or cleaning subways. Some of us bore witness this week to one who is living her final days with the same strength and grace and humor with which she has lived the rest of her life.

It was intriguing to me that some of you described actions as a way that you are bearing witness. You said that you are giving money to food pantries and groups like Doctors Without Borders which are providing essential services. You are delivering food to people you know and supporting the CROP Walk.

In many different ways, we are bearing witness. To some of us, who are used to being actively engaged in the world, it feels like we are side-lined. Whatever we are doing, it doesn’t feel like enough. I want to encourage us to believe that bearing witness is a faithful act, an act that God may use in ways we cannot yet imagine.

On that day when Stephen was obedient all the way to death, there were witnesses. One of the witnesses was a young Saul of Tarsus. He saw what was happening and on that day, he approved. But later, he had his own encounter with the Risen Christ. Without him, we would not have one-third of the New Testament and the history of the church would be altogether different. Saul bore witness to someone giving his life for his convictions. Can you imagine that he ever forgot that? Saul became Paul who was known for his boldness in witnessing to Jesus. Undoubtedly, Stephen served as a model for Paul, who later wrote, “for me to live is Christ and to die is gain.”

Friends, I suggest that we do not know what will come of this time. What effect will it have on children? How is it forming young adults – those who expected to walk across a stage to receive a high school or college diploma this month? How is it shaping Emmanuel and other churches in becoming more flexible and intentional about defining the ministries that really matter?

When this pandemic first began, it stirred in many people memories of the AIDS outbreak in the 1980’s. The consuming fear of an unknown virus, the suffering and death, the pointing of fingers and casting blame, the ducking of responsibility by political leaders – all that sounded familiar.

During that terrible time, the Rev. Tom Long went to South Africa and met a young Johannesburg doctor whose specialty was AIDS. He worked in a dingy inner-city hospitality where the beds of AIDS patients spilled out of the wards and lined the corridors. The doctor said, “The numbers are growing at a fearful rate; in some areas, over half the population is infected and we don’t have enough to help them. We don’t have the medicine, the beds, the staff, the knowledge.”

Rev. Long asked “What keeps you going?”
The doctor spoke quietly, hesitantly, “My faith.” He looked out the window. He said, “I am holding on to the possibility of hope.”[2]

He was keenly aware of the suffering and death all around him, but he bore witness to the hope that God would act to create a redemption not already there in the present moment.

Beloved ones, keep bearing witness to all that is. Know that it is an act of faithfulness. Keep speaking of what you know to be true. Trusting in resurrection, keep holding on to the possibility of hope through Christ, our Risen Lord. Amen.

[1] J. Bradley Chance, Acts: Smyth and Helwys Bible Commentary, (Macon: Smyth and Helwys, 2007), p. 104

[2] Tom Long, “When Half Spent Was the Night: Preaching Hope in the New Millennium,” Journal for Preachers, Easter 1999, p. 19

5/3/20 - Breaking Bread - Luke 24:13-35

Breaking Bread

Luke 24:13-35

Emmanuel Baptist Church

May 3, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

Image: Kitchen Scene with Supper at Emmaus by Pieter Cornelisz va Rijck, 1605

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://youtu.be/5zXqiheG2Bc

Once, when I was serving a church in Indiana, I went on a weekend retreat about 40 minutes from where we lived. There were several other groups using the common dining hall. I had just put away my dishes and was walking back to join my group, when I found myself hugging a woman I hadn’t seen in 10 years.

Grace was a friend from seminary. We had lost touch after graduation. It was a complete shock and a wonderful surprise to run into her. I learned that she was also serving a church in Indiana. After that, we stayed connected. We lived about 90 minutes apart, but every couple of months, we would each drive halfway and meet at a restaurant, where we would talk about our work and our families. Then I moved to New York. Meeting halfway for lunch didn’t work anymore. But Grace had another idea. So in those first months that I was here, when I didn’t really know anyone, we would set a date, and I would call Grace at lunchtime. I would sit out on the front steps of Emmanuel with my lunch and my phone, and we would talk about our work and our families. And even though I couldn’t see her face, the sound of her voice reminded me of the way that she tilted her chin and the way she held her fork and the particular expression that she always had when she leaned in to say “Kathy, tell me how it is with your soul.”

So much happens around meals. The gospels record over 20 instances of Jesus at meals. He had a reputation as a lively dinner guest. His detractors called him a glutton and a drunkard. Over meals, he deepened friendships and made some enemies, he told stories and challenged assumptions.

The meal in today’s story comes at the end. The set-up for the meal is a journey. It is on the long walk to Emmaus that two of Jesus’ disciples encounter a stranger. He doesn’t seem to know anything about what is happening in the world. The disciples react like we might if someone showed up and got very close to us and asked why so many stores are closed and what’s with the face masks?

The disciples don’t recognize Jesus as he walks along with them. Luke says that their eyes keep them from recognizing him. They have a perception problem.

Maybe you have perception problems lately. I have quarantine brain. I’ve learned to read texts and e-mails at least twice because my eyes are not picking up all the words. I’ve learned to ask Jim to repeat himself because I don’t remember what he just said. There’s nothing really wrong with my ears or my eyes or my brain, but the situation we find ourselves in has altered some of my perceptions.

The disciples were in the midst of sorrow and bewilderment and fear. The tomb was empty. Just that morning the women had told them that Jesus was alive. They were perplexed by this news. Whatever it might mean, it was a let-down. It didn’t fit with what they had believed about Jesus the Messiah. Their sorrow and disappointment is summed up in three words – we had hoped. “We had hoped Jesus was the one to redeem Israel,” they say. Its in the past tense. They are no longer hoping. Their sorrow and disappointment cloud their perceptions and they do not recognize Jesus. He is a stranger who seems completely outside their lives.

But then he tells a story. The kind of story that can happen at a meal or on a journey. A long family story, the kind that might begin “when your great-grandmother was just a little girl . . .”

Jesus tells a long, long story, a story that begins with Moses and ends with the events of the last few days. He tells their story back to them. Their family story, their faith story. But he reframes it so that it becomes bigger and deeper and richer. “When Jesus tells the story . . .he grounds it in memory, in tradition, in history, in Scripture. He helps the travelers comprehend their place in a narrative that long precedes them, a narrative big enough to hold their disappointment without being defeated by it. When Jesus tells the story, the death of the Messiah finds its place in a sweeping, cosmic arc of redemption, hope, and divine love that spans the centuries. When Jesus tells the story, the hearts of his listeners burn.”[1]

By the time he is done with that story, their journey is over. The stranger is going on, but they ask him to stay with them. The one thing they get right all day is extending hospitality. What if the disciples had not greeted the stranger on the road? What if they had not listened to his stories? What if they had let him go on his way? They might have missed this sacred encounter.

A Dutch artist known for his large kitchen scenes entitled this drawing, “Kitchen Scene with Supper at Emmaus”.[2] It shows a busy kitchen in a wealthy household in the 17th century. The title of the drawing with the word Emmaus is the only clue that we should look very carefully. The people in this kitchen are intent on many tasks. The disciples also undoubtedly had things to do at the end of their trip. But something prompted them to ask Jesus to stay. Holy moments, encounters with God can be elusive. Sometimes they can be happening in the room where we are without our notice. Have you found it yet? The Emmaus part of this picture?

For those on the phones, let me describe the picture. There are about 10 people in the main part of the kitchen which is quite large. There are three hunting dogs and a mother dog with pups which a girl is playing with. One woman is peeling carrots. Another is tending a fire. I can see a dead rabbit and a goose waiting to be skinned and plucked. There are also live chickens. A man with an ax is leaving; his companion seems to be chatting with a woman instead of coming with him. The scene is busy and I imagine noisy. But at the very back of the picture there are a couple of steps leading up to a smaller room and in that room, we can see three people sitting around a table, apparently oblivious to the bustle of the kitchen. The suggestion of this picture is that God comes to us in the midst of the ordinary, that perhaps “every meal has the potential of being an event in which hospitality and table fellowship can become sacred occasions.”[3]

Jesus takes the bread, the regular bread that is part of their meal. He blesses and breaks it and gives it, as he had done when he fed 5,000 people, and probably at the supper table in the home of Mary and Martha and Lazarus, and when they celebrated the Passover. Suddenly, they recognize him in the breaking of the bread and everything falls into place because of that long story he told on the road.

Extending hospitality to a stranger, they recognize Jesus in the breaking of the bread and realize that God was with them all along. This forms the pattern of early Christian worship: two or more gather together, they tell stories that recall Jesus’ presence, reflect on scripture and break bread together. [4] What has evolved into our church communion celebrations began when believers gathered in homes on the first day of the week to enjoy an ordinary meal together. Rachel Held Evans says, “They remembered Jesus with food, stories, laughter, tears, debate, discussion and cleanup. . . . According to church historians, the focus of these early communion services was not on Jesus’ death, but rather on Jesus’ friendship, his presence made palpable among his followers by the tastes, sounds and smells he loved.” [5]

The story of Emmaus reminds us that God meets us in the guise of the stranger, at the most unlikely moments. And God meets us in the most ordinary moments. God meets us in the text we receive from a lonely friend, in the patience we struggle to find when stir-crazy children and adults are in the same house all day long, and also in the silence of an empty apartment. God might meet you in the neighbor who waves when you walk your dog or the person who rings up your groceries behind a plastic shield. God can meet us in a phone call lunch with a friend and in a breakfast worship gathering shared across Zoom.

God meets us at the most unlikely moments and in the most ordinary moments. If your ordinary moments are also your most unlikely moments right now, then hear the good news: your story, with all of its moments, is part of a bigger, deeper, richer story of divine love and hope and redemption, and God is meeting you there. Thanks be to God.

[1] Debi Thomas in her essay But We Had Hoped at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2616-but-we-had-hoped

[2] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pieter_Cornelisz._van_Rijck_-_Kitchen_Scene_with_the_Supper_at_Emmaus_-_WGA19497.jpg

[3] Alan Culpepper, The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. IX, (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), pp 480.

[4]Sharon H. Ringe, Luke: The Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1995), p.287.

[5] Rachel Held Evans, Searching For Sunday: Loving, Leaving and Finding the Church, (Nashville: Nelson Books, 2015) pp. 125

4/26/20 - Reflections on John 10:1-11

Reflections on John 10:1-11

Emmanuel Baptist Church

April 26, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

Photo credit: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apse_interior_and_triumphal_arch_-_Sant%27Apollinare_in_Classe_-_Ravenna_2016.jpg © José Luiz Bernardes Ribeiro / CC BY-SA 4.0

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://youtu.be/12sBoIDKpJU

The Sheep

From their earliest days, the people of Israel were nomadic herders. The tasks and patterns of tending animals shaped their lives on a daily and seasonal basis. Sheep were a primary life source, providing a staple food supply and raw materials for clothing and shelter. In the Bible sheep often become a metaphor for people. There are many comparisons made between people and sheep, but an important one is the sense that, for all their faults, sheep were highly valued.

Shepherding is still a way of life in many places, with its own wisdom and tools and language. For example, Arabic has an array of unique words to categorize sheep by age and fertility and the season in which they were born and by color, including “white sheep, black sheep, black sheep with white spots, white sheep with black face and neck, brown-faced with white nose sheep, brown-and-white-spotted-faced sheep, grey headed sheep.”[1]

Sheep are a prey animal with very few natural defenses. They stick together to protect each other. When one runs from perceived danger, they all run. When separated from their flock, they can become stressed. Once a sheep knows it is lost, it will often hide under a bush or rock and begin quivering and bleating. The shepherd must locate it quickly before a predator does. When found, it may be too traumatized to walk and must be carried back to the flock.[2] Sheep are communal beings. We are keenly aware just now of how much humans also need to share a common life, and how stressful separation is.

We are often told how dumb sheep are. I have certainly witnessed humans acting very dumb this week. Maybe you have too. It is worth noting that sheep have the ability to remember faces, not only faces of other sheep, but all faces, for years and years. And as Jesus said, they know the voice of their shepherd.

During some riots in Palestine in the 1930’s, a village near Haifa was punished by having its sheep and cattle sequestered by the government. Individuals were allowed to redeem their possessions at a fixed price. Among them was an orphan shepherd boy whose six or eight sheep and goats were all he had in the world. Somehow he obtained the money for their redemption. He went to the big enclosure where the animals were penned, offering his money to the British sergeant in charge. The man told him he was welcome to that number of animals, but ridiculed the idea that he could possibly pick out his “little flock” from among the hundreds which had been confiscated. The little shepherd just gave his call on his shepherd’s pipe and “his own” separated from the rest of the animals and trotted out after him.[3]

The Shepherd

If you go into almost any Christian church today, you will find a cross or a crucifix. The cross has become a universal symbol for our faith, but it wasn’t always that way. For hundreds of years, Christians embraced the symbols of the Good Shepherd, the fish and the vine. These are images found in the art in the Roman catacombs in the first four centuries after Jesus. The image of the Good Shepherd suggested the recovery of the lost sheep, the tender care and protection, the green pastures and still waters, the self-sacrifice: in word and image, the whole picture of a Savior.[4]

Art from the oldest existing church buildings, dating from the fourth and fifth centuries echoes that from the catacombs. In those times, Christians focused not on the cross and not on the empty tomb, but on Jesus very much alive in the world. They believed that in his death and resurrection, Jesus had re-opened paradise. Paradise was not limited to a heavenly realm, but it was first and foremost this world, permeated and blessed by the Spirit of God. It was on the earth – in the craggy landscapes, the orchards, the clear night skies and the teeming waters of the Mediterranean.[5]

One Anglican scholar says that the religion of these first Christians was the religion of the Good Shepherd. “The kindness, the courage, the grace, the love, the beauty of the Good Shepherd was to them the Prayer Book and Creeds and Canons, all in one. They looked on that figure, and it conveyed to them all that they wanted.”

Psalm 23 is beloved and familiar, a frequent reading at funerals when it conveys comfort, peace and tranquility. However, it’s primary intent is to convey life and vitality. The images of green pastures and still waters and right paths are about food and drink and safety. “God restoreth my soul” is a beautifully poetic way of saying “God keeps me alive.”

In John’s gospel, Jesus says that the shepherd calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. He goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. In many places, flocks of sheep are driven from behind, but in Palestine, even today, the shepherd leads from the front. And some sheep always stay near the shepherd and are his special favorites. He calls them by names like “Split Ear, Short Tail, Bright Eye, Angel, Lazy and Black Spot”[6]

The shepherd leads the sheep to graze in green pastures which are farther and farther away as the season progresses. Alone in the open spaces, they might face any number of threats, including thieves, wild animals, sudden blinding dust storms, water shortages and loose rocks. The sheep are entirely dependent on the shepherd for guidance and protection. The rod is not a walking stick, but a weapon to protect from enemies. It was also held horizontally at the entrance to the sheepfold, just high enough for each sheep to pass under it one at a time, allowing the shepherd to count the sheep, because every single one matters.

According to Walter Brueggemann, “the term shepherd is political in the Bible. It means king, sovereign, lord, authority, the one who directs, the one to whom I am answerable.”[7] To declare “The Lord is my shepherd” is to declare absolute loyalty to God and the intention to live under God’s reign.

Ezekiel was one of the prophets who bore witness to the failure of earthly kings. Because those king-shepherds tended to themselves instead of the sheep, and because the flock was being plundered by human enemies, God took on the role. In Ezekiel 34, God says, “I will feed them with good pasture, and upon the mountain heights of Israel shall be their pasture; there they shall lie down in good grazing land, and on fat pasture they shall feed on the mountains of Israel. I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will make them lie down, says the Lord God. I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the crippled, and I will strengthen the weak, and the fat and the strong I will watch over; I will feed them in justice.”

When Jesus says “I AM the Good Shepherd” he identifies with this God of ancient Israel, a source of deep security in a dangerous world.

As we share some silence together, I invite you to reflect on these ideas.

The sheep know the shepherd’s voice. What other voices are clamoring for your attention? How do you practice listening for the voice of God? How do you recognize it when you hear it?

Or you might think about Jesus’s death and resurrection as a re-opening of Paradise on earth. How do you appreciate and care for and live purposefully in this world which is permeated and blessed by the Spirit of God?

Let us center ourselves, allowing all that has been shared so far to be part of our thoughts, but seeking what God would have us attend to. We will simply be still together for a few minutes.

The Gate

Jesus says “I AM the Good Shepherd.” In late summer and early fall, the shepherd leads the sheep farther from home each day to find good grazing. Eventually, they must spend the night in the open country. In the evening, the sheep are led into an round, roughly built enclosure with no roof or door. Once the sheep are safely inside, the only vulnerable spot is the opening which is just wide enough for the shepherd’s body.

The shepherd will sleep across entrance, putting his body between the sheep and any danger. Jesus is the good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep.

Jesus also says, “I AM the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.” Anna Carter Florence, Professor of Preaching and Worship at Columbia Seminary, describes it this way:

We go out and we come in even when we are saved. The gate marks a place to rest and a place to graze. The rhythm of in and out is necessary to life because the green pastures are outside the gate; a sheep that flat out refuses to go out will die. Likewise, a sheep that flat-out refuses to go in, when the call comes, may soon be lost in the night. So the gate is part of life and key to life, but not because it keeps us out or in. It simply marks the boundary between what we are to do in each space. The secret of saving the life of a sheep is to know when it is time to go out and when it is time to come back in. The point is to listen to the voice of the shepherd—the voice you recognize above all others—and follow that call.[8]

We cannot live our lives in the sheepfold. It may be safe there, but we need the pasture, the still waters, the green grass that lies beyond. To move in and out through the I AM gate means to live a life that is abundant in freedom and sustenance.

The shepherd calls us by name, tends, protects, and has gone ahead of us. May we together, continue to lean into the day when the Shepherd’s voice is the only voice we hear and the Good Shepherd is the only one we follow into life abundant.

[1] Bruce Malina and Richard Rohrbaugh, Social Science Commentary on the Gospel of John, (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 1998) p.182

[2]Kenneth E. Bailey, The Good Shepherd: A Thousand-Year Journey from Psalm 23 to the New Testament, (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2014), p. 45

[3] Bailey p. 42, quoting Eric F.F. Bishop Jesus of Palestine (London: Lutterworht, 1955), pp 297-298.

[4] Bailey, p.21

[5] Rita Nakashima Brock, Rebecca Ann Parker, Saving Paradise: How Christianity Traded Love of This World for Crucifixion and Empire, (Boston: Beacon Press, 2008), p. xv

[6] Bailey, p. 217

[7]Walter Bruegggemann, “Trusting in the Water-Food-Oil Supply” in The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann, Vol 1, (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2011), p. 112

[8] Anna Carter Florence, Preaching the Lesson John 10:1-10, Lectionary Homiletics, April 13, 2008, p. 15

4/19/20 - Trusting Resurrection - John 20:19-29

Trusting Resurrection

John 20:19-29

Emmanuel Baptist Church

April 19, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://youtu.be/SGmd93Lusu0.

Ask people about the disciple named Thomas and they will likely say, “Oh, you mean Doubting Thomas? ” Even though the word doubt doesn’t appear anywhere in the story when you read it in the Greek.

Thomas gets dubbed The Doubter as if that title distinguishes him from the rest of Jesus’ followers, as if what he does is different from any of the others. Remember back to last week. As John tells the story, Mary Magdalene saw the empty tomb first. Then she fetched Peter and the mysteriously unnamed Beloved Disciple. When the Beloved Disciple went inside the tomb and saw the graveclothes, he believed. One scholar suggests that Lazarus might be the Beloved Disciple, because Lazarus knows something about God interrupting the death and burial process. But Peter doesn’t believe then and neither does May. Mary only comes to believe when Jesus calls her by name and she recognizes him for herself.

Then, Mary goes and reports to the others that Jesus is alive, that she has seen him and touched him and talked with him. But that same night, they are hiding in a locked room. They are afraid. I suppose they could be afraid because they believe the resurrection. That is a life-altering reality with its own kind of fear.

But, I think the implication is that they are fearful because they don’t yet believe resurrection. That only changes after they see Jesus for themselves. It seems that hearing the Beloved Disciple’s experience and Mary’s experience was not compelling for them. They only valued their own experience.

Thomas missed all this. He wasn’t at the empty tomb. He wasn’t with the others on that evening when Jesus appeared. And so, he is the one who gets called The Doubter, but none of them believed without first-hand experiences.

Eugene Peterson is a pastor and author, now retired. You might know him as the creator of the Message Bible. He says, “It is not easy to convey a sense of wonder, let alone resurrection wonder, to another. It’s the very nature of wonder to catch us off guard, to circumvent expectations and assumptions. Wonder can’t be packaged, and it can’t be worked up. It requires some sense of being there and some sense of engagement.[1]

None of us here received first-hand experiences of Jesus’ resurrection. So how did we come to believe? In Peterson’s terms, how did we get the sense of being there and being engaged?

Most us came to believe in Jesus when we were children. Before we learned to question, before we formed critical thinking skills, before we became skeptics, this belief and trust was formed. Many of us also went through a time later when that belief had to be re-examined and re-formed.

Often, the faith that developed from that re-examination process was different from what came earlier, but the later form was built on the earlier form, which began when we were very young, perhaps when wonder and trust came more easily.

Now that is not true for all of us. Some of us became Christians, that is we put our trust in Jesus, as adults. I am always fascinated by hearing those stories. For me, people who come to faith in adulthood really are those that Jesus describes then he says ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”

When Thomas finally does see Jesus, Jesus invites him to see his wounded hands, to touch his side. And Jesus says to him “Do not be unbelieving but believing.” In many translations, it reads “do not doubt, but believe,” but as I said earlier, the word ‘doubt’ is not there in Greek.

In contemporary English, the word “believe” has come to mean something that we regard as true in an intellectual sense, but Jesus is asking more than that of Thomas.

In medieval English, to believe meant to prize, treasure or hold dear and it came from the same root as the word for love. To believe meant to give your heart.[2]

We might also translate Jesus’ words as “do not be faithless, but faith-full”. Jesus is asking Thomas for his confidence, his loyalty, his heart.

An Ohio grandfather was driving through Pennsylvania Dutch Country with his 7-year-old grandson. When they passed an Amish horse and buggy, the grandson was curious.

“Why do they use horses instead of cars?” he asked.

His grandfather explained that the Amish don’t believe in automobiles.

After a few minutes, the boy said, “But can’t they see them?”

Of course Amish people can see cars. They believe that cars exist, but they trust horses, they put their confidence in horses.

Diana Butler Bass says, “the point isn’t that you believe in the resurrection. Any fool can believe in a resurrection from the dead. The point is that you trust in the resurrection. And that’s much, much harder to do.”

What Jesus asks of Thomas, and of us, is not that we weigh the evidence and make an intellectual choice to believe. Jesus is asking that we actively place our trust in the Risen One.

I think about some time in the future when we will be told that it is safe to leave our homes, to go out and about in the world. When that word comes, we may believe it or not. We will know how much we trust it when we are willing to take off our masks, when we have the confidence to let another person get closer than 6 feet, when we are comfortable going into a restaurant or a movie theater. When we take concrete actions based on what we believe -- that is faith.

Fleming Rutledge is an Episcopal priest. In one of her Easter sermons, she wondered why so few people are usually in church on the Sunday after Easter as compared with Easter Day. She said, “As I thought about this, it occurred to me that the reason people don’t come back on the Sunday after Easter is that they don’t really believe that anything unusual has taken place. Something nice, maybe; something cheerful and uplifting; but not an honest-to-God resurrection from the dead.”[3]

Well, today is the Sunday after Easter and we are here. So perhaps we do believe that something unusual took place. Maybe we do trust in the resurrection.

I’m coming to a new respect for Jesus’ first followers, those who were faithful, those who put their confidence in resurrection. They had a before and after experience. Before Jesus, life was ordinary, normal, even good. They were fishermen or they studied with John the Baptist or they were women of means. That was before. And then there was after. After learning from Jesus, after his crucifixion and resurrection. After – life could be different. But it didn’t have to be. They could have pretended that nothing unusual had happened. They could have retreated in fear, gone back to being normal, but they didn’t.

A number of people are talking now about our before and after. Before pandemic, before lockdown and after.

Sonya Renee Taylor is a poet and activist who focuses on issues like racial justice, police brutality and mental health. In the last week or so, she said this, “We will not go back to normal. Normal never was. Our pre-corona existence was not normal other than we normalized greed, inequity, exhaustion, depletion, extraction, disconnection, rage, hoarding, hate and lack. We should not long to return, my friends. We are being given the opportunity to stitch a new garment.”

Some people love that statement. Some find it depressing. I happen to agree with a lot of it. I found myself wondering if others agreed. I wondered if those who wanted to stitch a new garment, to live in different ways after pandemic would find each other and find ways to do so. I thought about how hard that might be, because I expect a whole lot of people will just want life to go back to normal, to what it was before. Even if it means greed, exhaustion, extraction, hoarding and hatred, a lot of people will choose that, I think, because change is fearful and hard. And with so many other people choosing to go back to normal, how hard will it be for a few to live as if something else, something new is possible?

That is what Jesus’ first followers did. They lived into something new, something radically unheard of. There weren’t many of them. And there was enormous pressure to go back to the ordinary before. There still is. They did not just believe the resurrection. They trusted it, trusted it enough to be changed by it, to live differently afterwards. They gave their hearts to Jesus. They committed themselves to the Risen One.

May it be so, for you and for me. Amen.

[1] Eugene Peterson, Living the Resurrection: The Risen Christ in Everyday Life (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2006), p.13

[2] Diana Butler Bass, Christianity After Religion: The End of the Church and the Birth of a New Spiritual Awakening (New York: HarperCollins, 2012). p. 117

[3] Fleming Rutledge, The Undoing of Death: Sermons for Holy Week and Easter (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing, 2002) p.300

4/12/20 - Small Easter - John 20:1-18

Small Easter

John 20:1-18

Emmanuel Baptist Church

April 12, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

A recording of the Easter service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_DxdqGMWxI

I hope you can see the ever-flowing stream of justice behind me. You remember it from the sanctuary, right? On the first two Sundays in Lent, we started adding to it. If we had kept on, it would have been so full, it would have cascaded down the wall. It would have flowed out beyond where the lectern usually stands. We were just getting started when we had to stop, because of disease, because of death and the fear of death.

Disease, death and the fear of death is occupying a lot of energy these days. There are no sports, no arts and entertainment, no in-person events of any kind to be covered by journalists, and so every day we get reports on what work death has done over-night. What are the latest safety recommendations? Who has been newly diagnosed with covid-19? Who has died? How many have died?

In one of those reports a week ago, I learned that three medical residents in New York City have died. Most of you know that our daughter is a medical resident. You might think this news makes me more concerned for her. It doesn’t actually make me more fearful. But it brings the grief very close. I can easily imagine young people, bright, compassionate, committed young adults who have worked hard and delayed gratification to get through college and then med school. Their families have supported them and missed them on holidays when they had to work or study. They reached the milestone of graduation a year or two ago. And what celebrations they had. Now as residents, they were finally getting to do what they’d been trained for, what they had wanted to do for so long. They were just getting started . . . and now their lives are over. Their families lives are shattered. The grief -- I imagine it sharp and cutting like a knife. And simultaneously heavy and dull and suffocating. Their parents must be inconsolable.

That sharp pain, that suffocating weight of sorrow, that inconsolability -- all that could also describe Mary Magdalene as she arrives at the tomb. Mary is in the cemetery to be as close as possible to the now lifeless body of Jesus. She is there to see if her memories of him are more vivid there. She is there to weep and curse and be angry. She is there to grieve.

Only she can’t really do that, because the grave has been desecrated. They have taken Jesus’ body and she doesn’t know where. Two angels speak to her. It doesn’t seem to register that they are angels. And then gardener asks who she is looking for. She repeats the story that she has been telling everyone—why isn’t anyone getting it? –If he knows where Jesus is, would he please, please just tell her.

Then the gardener says her name “Mary”. That’s all it takes. We remember what Jesus said before: “[The shepherd] calls his own sheep by name … they know his voice.” It is not the gardener. It is Jesus. Mary turns and says “Rabbouni” which means teacher.

Mr. Wiechern was my high school physics teacher. He took us out into the long hallways to play with Slinkys while he explained how light was like a wave. He got up on his hands and knees on a lab table to knock over a bottle with his nose. Then he asked for volunteers to try. The boys had a much harder time than the girls, which provided the perfect opportunity to explain the concept of center of gravity. Mr. Wiechern is one of a handful of teachers to whom I wrote a note of appreciation years after I left high school.

There’s a scene near the end of the movie Dead Poet’s Society where devoted students stand on their desks in protest of the firing of their beloved teacher played by Robin Williams. I am fortunate that I can name several teachers for whom I would stand on my desk. I hope that you have a list like that too. At its best, the relationship between teacher and student is one of discovery and trust and even intimacy. There’s a viral photo of a teacher who heard that a student was getting very frustrated trying to learn math at home. So he took a big white board and stood outside her house and worked the problems with her. Last week, one of my friends posted a picture of his 8-year-old daughter. She’s wearing headphones and connected to a her teacher via Zoom. She has the biggest smile on her face. Her father said it was the happiest he had seen her in days.

When Mary recognizes Jesus, she says Rabbouni. It is a an emphatic form of rabbi, which also means teacher. Rabbouni means “my teacher” or “master teacher” or “beloved teacher”. It conveys great respect and deep affection.

“Rabbouni,” she breathes, with so much caught up in that one word. Jesus is her beloved teacher, the one who taught her so much, the one who changed her life.

She doesn’t even entertain the notion that resurrection is a possibility until he calls her name. It only becomes real when it is close and personal. And then, she goes to hug him – wouldn’t you? Aren’t there people you haven’t been able to see in weeks now? People you want to hug for a good long time whenever you finally get to? The grief is gone and Mary is ecstatic, but within moments she is told she has to let him go.

“Do not cling to me,” Jesus says. How much would that hurt? There’s a clip going around of a doctor dressed in surgical scrubs. His young son is running towards him and the man hollers for him to stop, as the man himself is backing away. It seems that the father is keeping his son at a safe distance. But you can see the confusion and hurt on the son’s face and then on the father’s face too. I bet Mary looked like that. I wonder if Jesus did too.

“Do not cling to me,” Jesus says. Mary can touch him. They don’t have to be physically isolated, but she can’t hold on. She can’t try to contain or confine or control Jesus.[1]

Jesus has something yet left to teach her – which is that things are not the same. There were probably some things she was in the middle of, something like our ever-flowing stream, that got set aside, put on hold when Jesus died, but now Jesus is alive and she wants to pick up where they left off. Except they can’t. Resurrection has changed everything. Life will not go on as it was before.

The Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor says that Jesus “was not on his way back to her and the others. He was on his way to God , and he was taking the whole world with him. . . The thing we cannot do,” she says, “is to hold onto him. Instead, we must let him take us where he is going . . . into the white hot presence of God, who is not behind us but ahead of us, every step of the way.”[2]

That sounds really big. It sounds like the kind of thing a preacher might say on a big Easter Sunday, but Easter feels kind of small this year. None of us gathered for Easter sunrise in Capital Park. No one got up super early to put the coffee on and cook for the Easter breakfast. We’re not in the sanctuary, which would be beautiful with white banners and Easter lilies. There’s no glorious live music to compensate for weaknesses in the preaching.

It feels like a small Easter, but here’s the thing: the first Easter wasn’t big either. Maybe it was for Jesus. Maybe for Mary. But for most people. It wasn’t headline news. It was a small story that trickled out gradually.

Two people encounter each other. They exchange two words—“Mary” and “Rabbouni”. It’s a small, short story. But it packs a wallop.

It is a story about desolation and ecstasy wrapped up immeasurably close to one another. It is learning from the best Teacher that resurrection is not about things being the way we want them to be. It’s not about getting back to normal. That would make for a very small Easter indeed.[3] It is about the deep truth that what looks like the worst thing doesn’t have the last word. Death and the fear of death cannot . . . do not . . . will not have the last word.

If Easter feels small to you this year, you are not alone. But take courage, the first Easter was even smaller, and it was enough to change the world. Enough to change the world, for Christ is risen, Christ is risen indeed.

[1] Gail O’Day in Frances Taylor Gench, Encounters with Jesus: Studies in the Gospel of John (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2007) p.132

[2] Barbara Brown Taylor, “The Unnatural Truth” in Home By Another Way (Boston: Cowley Publications, 1997) p.111

[3] I’m grateful to Joanna Harader and her musings about a Small Easter which coincided with mine this week – only hers began in 2012. https://spaciousfaith.com/2016/03/21/small-easter/

4/9/20 - Jesus in Gethsemane and Other Reflections - Matthew 26:36-44

Jesus in Gethsemane and Other Reflections

Matthew 26:36-44

Emmanuel Baptist Church

April 9, 2020; Rev. Kathy Donley

These reflections were offered across a Maundy Thursday service. Interspersed with them were congregational hymns, instrumental music, choir anthems, and spoken prayers. A recording of that worship service may be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16t5U6wvuJc&feature=youtu.be

Jesus in Gethsemane

Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem. Weeks earlier, he had decided to leave relative safety of his home in Galilee and go to Jerusalem for the Passover. His disciples had pleaded with him not to go, but his mind was made up. It was necessary, a part of his mission to continue proclaiming the reign of God despite the pressure of friends and adversaries, to continue to speak his truth, even speaking truth to power in the form of political and religious authorities.

Things have escalated quickly this week. From his carefully staged entrance to the city, to turning over the tables in the temple, to the daily confrontations which are intended to entrap Jesus into blasphemy or treason, the stress has mounted. He set his face toward Jerusalem, knowing that it was dangerous. But had he held out hope that somehow, he would be delivered, that it would not cost him his life? Even now, he wonders, is it possible that this cup will pass? Could it be that laying down his precious life will not be required?

He has shared the holiday meal with his closest friends, the people with whom he has shared so much over the last years. This very night, he has washed their feet. This very night, suspicion and competition have again crept into their ranks, as some wondered who would betray him and some pledged their undying loyalty.

This is perhaps the loneliest, saddest, most poignant moment of all – as Judas was leading a mob through the night with torches and spears and swords to arrest him, Jesus and his friends walked to a garden called Gethsemane. Peter, James and John went further into the garden. And then the most remarkable, most human thing began to happen. Jesus became agitated and grieved. It is a powerfully intimate moment of self-disclosure. Jesus honors his closest friends by sharing his truest feelings. “I am deeply grieved, even to death. “Remain here and stay awake with me.” “Don’t leave me now. I need you. . .. I need you to be here for me and with me.” This is a man baring his soul, a man who is about to be tortured and killed and knows it. This is a human being doing what human beings do in moments like that, reaching out to other human beings, to dear ones and friends. “Be there. Stay with me.”[1]

His friends are not there for him and he continues to pour out his heart to God. He pleads “Help me . . . save me . . . rescue me” over and over until he summons the spiritual strength to say “Not my will, but yours be done.” Even now, in the midst of the most dire circumstances, Jesus trusts God.

In Jesus, God took on human form, becoming like us in all ways. We see that so clearly in his grief in the garden. Jesus became as we are so that we might become like he is. The desperation, the fervency of his prayer is common to human beings across time and geography and culture. For the next few minutes, let us consider together some examples of prayers offered in places of devastation or desperation or hard decision. After each short reflection, there will be response in the form of instrumental or vocal music or spoken prayer.

Christmas Eve in Aleppo

Syria has been at war now for 9 years. I can no longer think of Syria apart from the images of vulnerable children. As the first part of Matthew’s gospel says, “A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.”

In December 2016, there was a temporary ceasefire in Aleppo. On Christmas Eve, Christians all over the city returned to church for the first time in 5 years. The congregation of St. Elias gathered in a ruined cathedral with the roof gone from bombings and open to the sky and the snow. They created a nativity scene from materials they scavenged in the rubble. Those who built it said, “We are using whatever debris we can find to symbolize the triumph of life over death.”[2] They did not choose the cross or the empty tomb, but the manger.

Perhaps they did so because “When the fullness of time came, the time for the Word to be incarnated, God did not choose Rome or Athens for Christ to be born at; He chose occupied Bethlehem. He chose to be one of those oppressed; He chose to be one of those terrorized. When the fullness of time came, God so loved this world with all its ugliness and did not shy away from it. God chose to encounter this world with all its might and terror. He chose to challenge Herod with the face of an innocent child. God did not leave this world to its misery and pain but embraced it with both hands and pulled it to his heart.” [3]

Tijuana

On one of my last days in Tijuana, we walked a dusty road alongside a wall of assorted pieces of cast-off lumber intermittently secured with padlocks. Slowly, I realized that people lived within these structures. These were their front gates, locked because everyone was off at work in maquiladoras, foreign factories in Tijuana, Mexico. They might make $5 per day for a 12-hour shift on an assembly line where they have to ask permission to use the bathroom. In this neighborhood, as in another one-third of Tijuana, there is no water or sewer system. It costs $10 per week to have water delivered via truck. In more wealthy Tijuana neighborhoods, it costs $10 per month. The poor pay four times as much for the same service. This neighborhood runs alongside the freeway which means car exhaust and traffic noise, but also easier access to transportation. Workers who live in other areas may face a 2-hour daily commute plus more hours spent waiting for the bus. The cost of being poor is extracted in money and time.

I began to notice personal touches – a splash of color here, a salvaged front door there. At one entrance was a hard-to-read, hand-lettered sign in Spanish. My companion at that moment was Nasteho, a 22-year-old, Somali-American Muslim woman who speaks and reads Spanish. I asked her what the sign said. On her first attempt, she translated the sign as “I am always here, at the end of the world.”

My heavy heart sank further in recognition of the despair that might lead someone to post such a message on their door. Nasteho found this Spanish different from Spanish she had encountered elsewhere. Unsure that her translation was accurate, she consulted a third member of group, Luz, a Colombian theologian whose first language is Spanish. Luz translated the sign “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.”

Then I recognized the words of Jesus, the One who moved into the human neighborhood, the One whose words have been passed from generation to generation, in hundreds of languages, to provide comfort and hope. In this Tijuana neighborhood, they were passed from a Mexican factory worker to a Somali-American Muslim, to a Colombian pastor, and then to me, a white American Christian who has never endured poverty and is illiterate in Spanish. They brought tears to my eyes and a lift to my heart. Here, I saw desperation and suffering and injustice and trauma, but also resilience and hope and generosity and faith, even until the end of the world.

New York City

The cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City is one of the largest Gothic cathedrals in the world. At 121 years old now, it was standing during the 1918 influenza pandemic. Imagine all the people who have passed through its doors, those who have been nurtured in faith -- baptized or married or buried here. Numerous funerals have been held in this place, including those of Eleanor Roosevelt, James Baldwin, Duke Ellington and Jim Henson.

This cathedral has chairs, not pews. Earlier this week, the chairs were stacked and the transformation began. This Holy Week the church is becoming a coronavirus hospital. Nine climate controlled medical tents capable of holding at least 200 patients have been set up inside. The Rev. Clifton Daniel, dean of the cathedral said, “In the history and tradition of the church and following the example of Jesus, cathedrals have long served as places of refuge and healing in times of plague and community crisis. So, this is not outside the experience of being a cathedral, it is just new to us.”

Two hours upriver from the City, we are all too aware of the devastation being wrought there. And so, we join our prayers to those who have prayed in this situation through the ages -- please pray aloud with me, these words from the Book of Common Prayer.

Keep watch, dear Lord,

with those who work, or watch, or weep this night,

and give your angels charge over those who sleep.

Tend the sick, Lord Christ;

give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering,

pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love's sake. Amen.

Bonhoeffer in Prison

Two days after Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany, a lecturer at Berlin University named Dietrich Bonhoeffer, took to the radio and denounced the Nazi the leadership principle that was merely a synonym for dictatorship. Bonhoeffer’s broadcast was cut off before he could finish. Shortly after that, he moved to London to serve a German congregation there. Then in 1939, he went to New York City at the invitation of Union Seminary. The plan was for him to stay, to safely sit out the war. Other Germans theologians did so. Karl Barth stayed in Switzerland, Paul Tillich in Chicago.

As soon as Bonhoeffer stepped off the ship and onto the harbor at New York City, he knew he did not belong there. Despite strong pressures from his friends to stay in the United States. He wrote to Reinhold Niebuhr: “I have come to the conclusion that I made a mistake in coming to America. I must live through this difficult period in our national history with the people of Germany. I will have no right to participate in the reconstruction of Christian life in Germany after the war if I do not share the trials of this time with my people ... Christians in Germany will have to face the terrible alternative of either willing the defeat of their nation in order that Christian civilization may survive or willing the victory of their nation and thereby destroying civilization. I know which of these alternatives I must choose but I cannot make that choice from security.”

In Germany, he ran an underground seminary for the confessing church and became part of the resistance. He was arrested and held in military prison for a year and a half, then transferred to Buchenwald and finally to Flossenburg concentration camp. Under orders from Hitler, he was executed there on April 9, 1945, 75 years ago today, just two weeks before US soldiers liberated the camp. He was led away from the final church service he conducted there. His last words were “This is the end – for me, the beginning of life.”

Earlier in prison, he wrote “God lets himself be pushed out of the world on to the cross. He is weak and powerless in the world, and that is precisely the way, the only way, in which he is with us and helps us. . .. Christ helps us, not by virtue of his omnipotence, but by virtue of his weakness and suffering.” [4]

[1] The Rev. John Buchanan, in his sermon “Disappointed” https://www.fourthchurch.org/sermons/2008/030208.html

[2] http://www.naharnet.com/stories/en/222629

[3] Rev. Dr. Mitri Raheb, in his Christmas Eve sermon 2016 at Christmas Lutheran Church, Bethlehem, Palestine, https://www.mitriraheb.org/en/article/1484299023

[4] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, Eberhard Bethge, ed. (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1953), pp. 360-361