O Lord, we pray, speak in this place, in the calming of our minds and the longing of our hearts, by the words of my lips and in the thoughts we form. Speak, O Lord, for your servants listen. Amen.
No one expected it - not one single person.
What we celebrate here today was totally outside of the frame of reference of every single disciple, and this even though Jesus had told them over and over again that it would happen, that he would be killed, and that on the third day he would be raised from the dead.
Yet not one of them believed it would happen. Not one of them took Jesus at his word.
On the day after the Sabbath - on Sunday morning - while it was still dark Mary Magdalene and some other woman went to the tomb of Jesus with special spices to finish the process of preparing his body for burial. Mary went out first - by herself - ahead of all of the others.
She went ahead of them - not because she was expecting a surprise, but because she wanted to be alone for a while in the graveyard. She went out alone because her best friend had been tortured and killed and because she wanted to grieve awhile before undergoing the ordeal of doing what needed to be done, before she touched the wounded lifeless body of Jesus and honoured him by treating his broken body with the dignity that the dead should receive.
When she got to the tomb, something was different than it had been when she had been late Friday afternoon. The huge boulder in front of the tomb had been rolled aside - exposing the entrance to the place where Jesus' body had been laid.
Mary is stunned by this, she was shocked - not because she suddenly figures out that it was true after all - not because she remembers that Jesus said that he would rise from the dead and at last believes it. No, she is shocked and stunned because she believes that someone has stolen the body.
And Mary turns and she runs and she tells Simon Peter and John the Son of Zebedee exactly that:
"They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him!" she tells them.
And they return to the tomb with her and they look in the empty tomb and then they go away - back to their own homes.
And when they go back, with the exception of John, none of them comprehend what they had seen - the strips of linen laying on the rock bench - and the burial cloth for his head, folded neatly and set apart from the rest of the linen, much in the fashion that a carpenter in those days communicated that a work was finished by placing a folded work cloth neatly on the piece.
The return home - still in mourning, for as John puts it in today's Gospel:
"as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead."
When they leave, Mary is again alone by the tomb - and she is weeping.
The body of the one she loved is gone. She cannot even do the little that she had come to do.
She stands there weeping - and, after a while she musters up her courage and she looks into the tomb. And when she does she sees two angels - two persons - dressed in white - seated on the ledge of the tomb where the body of Jesus was supposed to be.
And does she, who has heard the promises Jesus then believe those promises? Does she believe that Jesus has been raised from the dead?
She does not.
Rather, when they ask her why she is crying - she says to them: because "Someone has taken the body of my Lord and I don't know where they have put it!"
Then - still weeping - still in shock - still unbelieving - still not expecting or hoping for a single thing Mary turns around, and she sees Jesus standing there and she supposes he is the gardener.
Mary doesn't expect to see Jesus walking about - fully alive - and so she doesn't.
She doesn't see Jesus even when he talks to her, even when he says to her - as did the angels - "Woman - why are you weeping? Who are you looking for?"
Still thinking he is the gardener she asks him if he has moved the body. "Tell me," she says, "where you have laid him, and I will take him away."
It then that Jesus calls her by name, "Mary" - and it is then - suddenly - that her eyes clear - that her heart clears - and she realizes that Jesus is alive - and standing in front of her.
And she grabs hold of him and embraces him - and clings to him - until finally - Jesus tells her to let him go - and to go tell the others what she has seen - to tell them that he has risen just as he said he would.
And she does as Jesus has asked.
The scriptures record that they do not believe her - nor do they believe the other women who encounter the angels at first.
Indeed each of the first disciples has to go through a process of being convinced - of being convinced either by Jesus himself or by the overwhelming testimony of others who have seen him.
The reason I have laid so much stress upon Mary's disbelief this morning, and upon the disbelief of the other disciples - is because we are like them.
We hear the message that Jesus proclaimed. We witness the miracles that he performs in other people's lives. But when it comes to the hard times - the times of trial - the times of loss - the time of mourning, it can be oh so very hard to believe in what Jesus has said about being raised on the third day, so very hard to believe that not only was he raised - but that we too will be raised, that death does not in fact have the last word.
Why do you weep?
There are many ways to answer that question. Indeed there are many good reasons to weep.
But today - Easter Sunday - the empty tomb, the angels, the lilies, Mary's encounter with Jesus - the testimony of Peter - and indeed the existence of the church itself is a reminder to us that while there are many reasons to weep, there is also a great reason to rejoice.
Jesus was crucified - he died - and he was laid in the tomb, but that tomb could not hold him.
And because of him - it cannot hold any of those whom God loves.
Death is not the end of the story of Jesus. Nor is it the end of our stories.
Why do you weep?
Look around you - the signs of God's love are all about us in the midst of our world's troubles and turmoil.
Listen - listen for the voice of the one who called Mary by name in the garden is here to speak to us.
It is not over.
If were over - if Christ was not raised - the church would never have come into existence for the disciples would never have gone on in the face of the opposition they encountered to proclaim that God raised him from the dead on the third day and that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead.
They would never have passed to us their testimony, for they would have had nothing to testify about, for on that first day they did not believe despite all that Jesus had said and done before he died.
I thank for God today.
I thank God for Mary - and for Peter and for all the other disciples who did not believe.
I thank God for them because their faith tell me that there is hope for me when I weep; hope for me when I do not believe; hope for me when I face the cross and the tomb and feel despair rising up within me.
But most of all I thank God today for the living Christ - for Jesus of Nazareth - God's anointed one - for the one who was raised up on the third day and who - for me - and for you - has broken the power of sin and death.
Let us Pray...
Great God in heaven, hear our prayers of gratitude today! Hear our songs of joyful thanksgiving and praise! Despite our mortality, despite our disobedience, despite our lack of faith, you sent Jesus to die on a cross and be born to a new life. And because of that, everyday is a hope filled day, filled with that which makes for wonder, joy, and peace. Touch us now with your Easter love... Lord, hear our prayer....
O God of love and life eternal, as Jesus appeared and spoke to Mary and to the disciples - calling them by name, restoring their faith and giving them the reason that is above all other reasons to proclaim your saving power, so come unto us and make us witnesses to the resurrection. Indeed we pray that you might enliven your whole church and cause your light to shine through us upon the whole world. Lord, hear our prayer....
Eternal and everlasting Counsellor, Prince of Peace, Shepherd and Saviour of your people, we acclaim you and we praise you and we render you all honour and majesty. Pour out now, we pray, on us and upon all those we hold before you at this time, your healing and redeeming love..... Lord, hear our prayer...
We come before you O God with our praise, our thanksgiving, our prayers and our petition through Christ Jesus, our risen Lord, he who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, both now and forevermore. Amen!
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Sunday, March 24, 2013
Matthew 21:1-11; Isaiah 50:4-8; Psalm 31; Philippians 2:5-11; Luke 23:1-49
O Lord, we pray, speak in this place, in the calming of our minds and the longing of our hearts, by the words of my lips and in the thoughts we form. Speak, O Lord, for your servants listen. Amen.
When you look at the events from Palm Sunday to Good Friday it's almost like one of those "Good news and Bad news" jokes.
The good news is that Jesus Christ reached the peak of his popularity this week, riding in a triumphal procession into the holy city of Jerusalem.
There was a big parade with lots of pomp and circumstance, everybody turned out, the disciples were very impressed, and the Pharisees and the Sadducees realized that they had underestimated this simple Galilean teacher.
Riding this crest of public approval Jesus went to the temple, the very centre of the Jewish faith, and began to teach and preach.
From Sunday to Thursday Jesus was unstoppable.
His enemies tried to trick him several times - but to no avail; each time he turned the tables on them and exposed their treachery.
No one even seriously complained when he overturned the tables of the moneychangers and let the sacrificial birds loose.
And of course, in this same period Jesus established the greatest new commandment, the one that says:
"Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another"
and He began a new ceremony with bread and wine which would later on, become the sacrament of Holy Communion.
So, what's the bad news?
On Thursday he was betrayed and arrested and on Friday he was hung him on a cross and killed.
Today the palms - tomorrow the passion - good news and bad news - but not a joke at all.
The grim truth is that the same people who shouted "Hosanna" on Sunday shouted "Crucify him," just five days later.
Everybody's hero became a bloody sacrifice, an object of scorn and hatred.
Is there anything we can learn from this?
Of course there is - and it has been customary in looking for that lesson to focus on the experience of the people around Jesus and from what they say and do come up with a message that goes like this:
"Don't be like those who cheered one day and jeered the next. Be faithful and see yourself as Jesus' loyal follower every day, every moment, of your life."
That is a good message - and that message lies underneath our prayers and our litanies today.
But, I would like to suggest, very briefly, that perhaps there is something we may learn from putting ourselves in Jesus' place rather than in the shoes of someone around him.
What was Christ's experience in the midst of all this up and down? This swirling whirlpool of events that progresses from Palm Sunday to Good Friday?
Perhaps it is easiest to get at this by asking the question: "What if Jesus had stayed in Galilee and retired an old rabbi full of wisdom and compassion?"
What indeed? The question helps reminds us of something we find easy to forget - namely it reminds us that Jesus CHOSE his path, that he CHOSE to leave the relative safety of Galilee and his rural ministry, and CHOSE to confront the powers of both politics and religion in their very centre; in Jerusalem.
The reminder is that all the uphill - downhill, good news - bad news, palms one day - passion the next, had nothing REALLY to do with what Jesus was about.
Jesus saw the purpose of his life in terms of proclaiming a new relationship with God, a relationship of intimate familial love, and no issue of popularity or acceptance could truly intervene in it.
Jesus came to Jerusalem neither excited or deceived by the applause of the crowds, nor downcast by the treachery, the desertion, the seemingly complete reversal of fortune he would endure.
As we have heard during the last few weeks of Lent - Jesus knew what would happen to him - he even knew, as we heard today in the story of Peter's denial, that his closest disciple and friend would claim to not know him when put to the test.
In both popular acclaim - and in denial and rejection - Jesus made it plain to everyone that he was not ruled by the feelings or events of the minute, but rather was walking step by step along a path which would lead him to the only source of true and lasting meaning for him and ultimately for us, that he was moving towards the fulfilment of God's will, for him and through him for the world.
It didn't matter if the path seemed to reach a peak from which there was no way to go but down. Jesus knew that his goal was not the top of the mountain, not popularity or power or applause.
Equally it did not matter that the path seemed to lead into, and end, in the valley of the shadow of death, although he would have willed for himself some other course if that course could still be true to the will of the Father, the will that he accepted as perfect.
No, regardless of appearances, regardless of the popularity that Jesus found, and regardless of the suffering that he knew he would undergo, Jesus chose to be true to his mission, he chose to be obedient; knowing, hoping, praying that in that, regardless of what might happen, he would be undergirded, surrounded, and encompassed by the presence, the mercy, and the love of God.
It is a lesson for all of us to remember.
If we depend upon the events of life to give us reward and satisfaction then we may never achieve them or we may have them snatched away in the very moment of tasting victory.
We may be at the peak of our lives, with money, health, security, friends, but - in those terms - there is nowhere to go but downhill in the weeks, months, and years ahead.
On the other hand, we - like Christ - have the opportunity to walk our own unique path of obedience toward God.
It is a path which may see us surrounded by enjoyment, possessions, and popularity, or it may lead us into loneliness, misunderstanding, and poverty.
But none of these things will finally give life its meaning.
Up hill or down, it is the destination which counts and no one's life can be more well spent than in seeking to find and do God's will.
Because, after all, the journey from Palm Sunday to Good Friday wasn't just a good news - bad news joke.
There was the final good news which redeemed it all and which reminds us that God can take any situation - no matter how bad it seems, and make it into good news for all of us.
Practically everyone has known the taste of Palm Sunday, the sweetness of success and popularity, and nearly all of us have tasted the bitterness of Good Friday, of failure and rejection.
What saves us from an endless round of ups and downs, what frees us from the tyranny of events over which we have no control is our commitment to press forward in obedience to God - it is trust in God's love to bring about Easter morning - knowing that the meaning of life is to be found in the knowledge and love of God - and in sharing that knowledge and love with those who accompany us on the way.
Praise be to God's name - and to the name of his Son, Christ Jesus, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Amen.
When you look at the events from Palm Sunday to Good Friday it's almost like one of those "Good news and Bad news" jokes.
The good news is that Jesus Christ reached the peak of his popularity this week, riding in a triumphal procession into the holy city of Jerusalem.
There was a big parade with lots of pomp and circumstance, everybody turned out, the disciples were very impressed, and the Pharisees and the Sadducees realized that they had underestimated this simple Galilean teacher.
Riding this crest of public approval Jesus went to the temple, the very centre of the Jewish faith, and began to teach and preach.
From Sunday to Thursday Jesus was unstoppable.
His enemies tried to trick him several times - but to no avail; each time he turned the tables on them and exposed their treachery.
No one even seriously complained when he overturned the tables of the moneychangers and let the sacrificial birds loose.
And of course, in this same period Jesus established the greatest new commandment, the one that says:
"Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another"
and He began a new ceremony with bread and wine which would later on, become the sacrament of Holy Communion.
So, what's the bad news?
On Thursday he was betrayed and arrested and on Friday he was hung him on a cross and killed.
Today the palms - tomorrow the passion - good news and bad news - but not a joke at all.
The grim truth is that the same people who shouted "Hosanna" on Sunday shouted "Crucify him," just five days later.
Everybody's hero became a bloody sacrifice, an object of scorn and hatred.
Is there anything we can learn from this?
Of course there is - and it has been customary in looking for that lesson to focus on the experience of the people around Jesus and from what they say and do come up with a message that goes like this:
"Don't be like those who cheered one day and jeered the next. Be faithful and see yourself as Jesus' loyal follower every day, every moment, of your life."
That is a good message - and that message lies underneath our prayers and our litanies today.
But, I would like to suggest, very briefly, that perhaps there is something we may learn from putting ourselves in Jesus' place rather than in the shoes of someone around him.
What was Christ's experience in the midst of all this up and down? This swirling whirlpool of events that progresses from Palm Sunday to Good Friday?
Perhaps it is easiest to get at this by asking the question: "What if Jesus had stayed in Galilee and retired an old rabbi full of wisdom and compassion?"
What indeed? The question helps reminds us of something we find easy to forget - namely it reminds us that Jesus CHOSE his path, that he CHOSE to leave the relative safety of Galilee and his rural ministry, and CHOSE to confront the powers of both politics and religion in their very centre; in Jerusalem.
The reminder is that all the uphill - downhill, good news - bad news, palms one day - passion the next, had nothing REALLY to do with what Jesus was about.
Jesus saw the purpose of his life in terms of proclaiming a new relationship with God, a relationship of intimate familial love, and no issue of popularity or acceptance could truly intervene in it.
Jesus came to Jerusalem neither excited or deceived by the applause of the crowds, nor downcast by the treachery, the desertion, the seemingly complete reversal of fortune he would endure.
As we have heard during the last few weeks of Lent - Jesus knew what would happen to him - he even knew, as we heard today in the story of Peter's denial, that his closest disciple and friend would claim to not know him when put to the test.
In both popular acclaim - and in denial and rejection - Jesus made it plain to everyone that he was not ruled by the feelings or events of the minute, but rather was walking step by step along a path which would lead him to the only source of true and lasting meaning for him and ultimately for us, that he was moving towards the fulfilment of God's will, for him and through him for the world.
It didn't matter if the path seemed to reach a peak from which there was no way to go but down. Jesus knew that his goal was not the top of the mountain, not popularity or power or applause.
Equally it did not matter that the path seemed to lead into, and end, in the valley of the shadow of death, although he would have willed for himself some other course if that course could still be true to the will of the Father, the will that he accepted as perfect.
No, regardless of appearances, regardless of the popularity that Jesus found, and regardless of the suffering that he knew he would undergo, Jesus chose to be true to his mission, he chose to be obedient; knowing, hoping, praying that in that, regardless of what might happen, he would be undergirded, surrounded, and encompassed by the presence, the mercy, and the love of God.
It is a lesson for all of us to remember.
If we depend upon the events of life to give us reward and satisfaction then we may never achieve them or we may have them snatched away in the very moment of tasting victory.
We may be at the peak of our lives, with money, health, security, friends, but - in those terms - there is nowhere to go but downhill in the weeks, months, and years ahead.
On the other hand, we - like Christ - have the opportunity to walk our own unique path of obedience toward God.
It is a path which may see us surrounded by enjoyment, possessions, and popularity, or it may lead us into loneliness, misunderstanding, and poverty.
But none of these things will finally give life its meaning.
Up hill or down, it is the destination which counts and no one's life can be more well spent than in seeking to find and do God's will.
Because, after all, the journey from Palm Sunday to Good Friday wasn't just a good news - bad news joke.
There was the final good news which redeemed it all and which reminds us that God can take any situation - no matter how bad it seems, and make it into good news for all of us.
Practically everyone has known the taste of Palm Sunday, the sweetness of success and popularity, and nearly all of us have tasted the bitterness of Good Friday, of failure and rejection.
What saves us from an endless round of ups and downs, what frees us from the tyranny of events over which we have no control is our commitment to press forward in obedience to God - it is trust in God's love to bring about Easter morning - knowing that the meaning of life is to be found in the knowledge and love of God - and in sharing that knowledge and love with those who accompany us on the way.
Praise be to God's name - and to the name of his Son, Christ Jesus, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Amen.
Sunday, March 17, 2013
John 12:1-8
O Lord, we pray, speak in this place, in the calming of our minds and the longing of our hearts, by the words of my lips and in the thoughts we form. Speak, O Lord, for your servants listen. Amen.
A few years ago a Sunday School class in the church that a friend of mine was minister at decided to present to the congregation a banner for use in the sanctuary. It was to be an Easter banner - and therefore he expected it's predominate colour would be white.
For two reasons he expected that - the first reason was that white is the colour of Easter - and it has been the colour of Easter almost since the day that the Church began - and the second reason was that he had just prior to the decision of the class to make up a banner put on a workshop for the Sunday School teachers and Bible Study class on the church year - and carefully explained out the colours and major symbols of each season of the church year.
You know how it goes - Green for Epiphany and the Season of Pentecost with symbols of growth and transformation - Red for Pentecost Day and celebrations of ministry with symbols of fire and of doves descending - Purple for Advent and Lent with symbols of crowns and trumpets for the first, and of crosses and thorns and nails for the other - and of course for Easter - white with symbols like butterflies and empty crosses and sunrises.
That is the way the tradition has come down to us, and that is the way that he expected the Sunday School class to work - the right way - the traditional way - the way taught to each and every one of us by our ancestors.
Anyway - to make a long story short, he found out a couple of weeks before the presentation was scheduled that the new Easter banner was going to be purple, and he was very upset by it.
How, he fumed, will the people ever come to understand the symbolism of the church, how will they ever celebrate the richness of church traditions and learn from them what it is important to know, if we don't present them in the correct way?
He really fretted about it until he remembered another banner from another church - it was a baptismal and confirmation hanging presented by the ladies one sunny Pentecost Sunday.
On it there was a purple dove flying over a light blue background, that dove was so purple it could have been easily mistaken for a crow and from that dove there dripped several drops of blood.
It too was something that didn't seem right to my friend - like the purple Easter banner, but do you know something? Out of all the banners that were hung in that church, and there were twelve in all in the sanctuary the one with the purple dove was the one that people looked at the most.
I could not stop myself from wondering about the love of God when I looked at how Jesus bled for us, about how, when we are baptized, we are baptized into his death, as well as into his resurrection, about how the Spirit lets us fly like a bird, and how that lifting up for us, that soaring, came at a price to our Lord; a price that he willing paid because of the incredible love that he had for us.
My friend was ever so grateful to the children and their teachers for that banner just as he ended up being grateful for the purple Easter Banner, both of them were impressive, and both of them represented the labour, the love, and the devotion of some very special people.
I tell this story today for a simple reason.
I tell it to remind each of you how easy it is to allow our sense of what is right and what is wrong to get in the way of our seeing and doing what is good and beautiful and loving.
Like Judas in the gospel reading today. It is so easy for us to criticize an act of love and of dedication, because it doesn't fit with what we think is the proper thing to do.
Leave aside for a minute the part of the gospel reading that suggests that Judas criticized Mary's act of love in anointing Jesus' feet with an expensive ointment because he was a thief - and instead think of his criticism of Mary's act for its own value.
"Why", he states, "Wasn't this perfume sold for three hundred silver coins and the money given to the poor?"
Why indeed?
When you look at the story of Mary anointing the feet of Jesus with an enormously expensive perfume and then wiping his feet with her hair from the perspective of the needs of others it seems incredibly wasteful, almost sinful.
Surely the best thing Mary could have done, if she was a true follower of the man who claimed he came to give sight to the blind, to heal the lame, and to set at liberty the oppressed, would have been to honour Jesus by giving what she had to the poor in the very way Judas suggests.
So it might seem - yet Jesus does not see it this way - instead Jesus approves of her actions, telling Judas that he should leave Mary alone, and let her keep what she has done as a precious memory, a memory of how she has in fact prepared him for his day of burial.
"The poor, Jesus says, "You will always have with you; but you will not always have me."
My brothers and sisters-Christ how often do we miss the opportunity to show love to someone, how often do we pass up the chance to care for someone because we are either too busy doing, or insisting that others do the right thing, the proper thing, first - OR - because we are thinking instead, like Judas was, of our own desires?
Love that is measured out, whether it be in time, or in our own internal sense of our available energy, is not really love at all.
Love always gives its best - and it does so at the moment of opportunity,it does so now, today, with the people immediately around us, and not at some future date, when the people we do care for may, in fact be dead and gone.
Love is an immediate thing, an extravagant thing, like that love showed by Mary, it is not dealt out a bit at a time and only to those who seem to us to qualify for it.
How often do we stop ourselves or someone else, from showing love to another person because we believe that someone else, or some other cause, deserves our attention more?
How many families have difficulties simply because everyone is so busy trying to be fair and share everything equally that absolutely no one ever has the feeling that they are loved fully - that they are special and unique and truly cared for?
We as the church are called to love God, and to love each other, we are called in that love, to serve God, and to serve the world.
We cannot do this if we are so intent on helping everyone that we forget to love the person next to us fully and deeply with all that we have.
We cannot love God and our neighbour as we are meant to if we end up cheating those closest to us of the love that they need in the name of trying to be sure that someone else gets what they need as well, even if the person said do not help, and just pray.
In Deuteronomy 15:, verses 10 and 11, it is written: "Give generously to your brother, and do so without a grudging heart, then because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to. The poor you will always have among you, therefore I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers and sisters and towards the poor and needy in your land."
Marvellous words with a marvellous promise, the promise that when we are not grudging, that when we are in fact open handed, or extravagant towards our brothers and sisters that God will in turn bless us - and not just in some things, but in everything.
This is the passage of scripture and the promise that Jesus alludes to when he says to Judas: "The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me."
My dear brothers and sisters-in Christ everyone needs to be loved. Everyone needs to be treated as special.
This cannot happen if we are glued to our measuring sticks of who should be cared for and of who deserves just how much of our giving; nor can it happen, if we feel that we personally, are called to take care of everyone equally - because this too involves measuring and judging.
We can only love in the way we are called to love, in the way that Mary loved, if we throw away our rule books and our measuring sticks, and love each person as fully as we possibly can, trusting, as we do so, in the righteousness of Christ, the saving grace of Jesus, to make it all come out right at end.
As long as we cling to the idea that saving the world is all up to us, that salvation comes because of what we do or what others do, we will be worried about our actions and our resources and our abilities, and we will end up failing to do as much as we are in fact able to do.
But when we begin to forget these things, when we stop counting the costs and considering the consequences, and look only to the love that God has for us, and to the incredible record of his faithfulness, then we will be free to love as extravagantly, as completely, and as humbly as did Mary on that day.
Extravagant love like that of Mary, is the kind of love to which we are called to. Indeed it is the kind of love that Jesus himself showed us, when he, on the day after Mary anointed his feet and dried them with her hair, he rode into Jerusalem and gave himself up to death on a cross so that we, utterly undeserving that we are, might live forever with him and with the Father above. AMEN
A few years ago a Sunday School class in the church that a friend of mine was minister at decided to present to the congregation a banner for use in the sanctuary. It was to be an Easter banner - and therefore he expected it's predominate colour would be white.
For two reasons he expected that - the first reason was that white is the colour of Easter - and it has been the colour of Easter almost since the day that the Church began - and the second reason was that he had just prior to the decision of the class to make up a banner put on a workshop for the Sunday School teachers and Bible Study class on the church year - and carefully explained out the colours and major symbols of each season of the church year.
You know how it goes - Green for Epiphany and the Season of Pentecost with symbols of growth and transformation - Red for Pentecost Day and celebrations of ministry with symbols of fire and of doves descending - Purple for Advent and Lent with symbols of crowns and trumpets for the first, and of crosses and thorns and nails for the other - and of course for Easter - white with symbols like butterflies and empty crosses and sunrises.
That is the way the tradition has come down to us, and that is the way that he expected the Sunday School class to work - the right way - the traditional way - the way taught to each and every one of us by our ancestors.
Anyway - to make a long story short, he found out a couple of weeks before the presentation was scheduled that the new Easter banner was going to be purple, and he was very upset by it.
How, he fumed, will the people ever come to understand the symbolism of the church, how will they ever celebrate the richness of church traditions and learn from them what it is important to know, if we don't present them in the correct way?
He really fretted about it until he remembered another banner from another church - it was a baptismal and confirmation hanging presented by the ladies one sunny Pentecost Sunday.
On it there was a purple dove flying over a light blue background, that dove was so purple it could have been easily mistaken for a crow and from that dove there dripped several drops of blood.
It too was something that didn't seem right to my friend - like the purple Easter banner, but do you know something? Out of all the banners that were hung in that church, and there were twelve in all in the sanctuary the one with the purple dove was the one that people looked at the most.
I could not stop myself from wondering about the love of God when I looked at how Jesus bled for us, about how, when we are baptized, we are baptized into his death, as well as into his resurrection, about how the Spirit lets us fly like a bird, and how that lifting up for us, that soaring, came at a price to our Lord; a price that he willing paid because of the incredible love that he had for us.
My friend was ever so grateful to the children and their teachers for that banner just as he ended up being grateful for the purple Easter Banner, both of them were impressive, and both of them represented the labour, the love, and the devotion of some very special people.
I tell this story today for a simple reason.
I tell it to remind each of you how easy it is to allow our sense of what is right and what is wrong to get in the way of our seeing and doing what is good and beautiful and loving.
Like Judas in the gospel reading today. It is so easy for us to criticize an act of love and of dedication, because it doesn't fit with what we think is the proper thing to do.
Leave aside for a minute the part of the gospel reading that suggests that Judas criticized Mary's act of love in anointing Jesus' feet with an expensive ointment because he was a thief - and instead think of his criticism of Mary's act for its own value.
"Why", he states, "Wasn't this perfume sold for three hundred silver coins and the money given to the poor?"
Why indeed?
When you look at the story of Mary anointing the feet of Jesus with an enormously expensive perfume and then wiping his feet with her hair from the perspective of the needs of others it seems incredibly wasteful, almost sinful.
Surely the best thing Mary could have done, if she was a true follower of the man who claimed he came to give sight to the blind, to heal the lame, and to set at liberty the oppressed, would have been to honour Jesus by giving what she had to the poor in the very way Judas suggests.
So it might seem - yet Jesus does not see it this way - instead Jesus approves of her actions, telling Judas that he should leave Mary alone, and let her keep what she has done as a precious memory, a memory of how she has in fact prepared him for his day of burial.
"The poor, Jesus says, "You will always have with you; but you will not always have me."
My brothers and sisters-Christ how often do we miss the opportunity to show love to someone, how often do we pass up the chance to care for someone because we are either too busy doing, or insisting that others do the right thing, the proper thing, first - OR - because we are thinking instead, like Judas was, of our own desires?
Love that is measured out, whether it be in time, or in our own internal sense of our available energy, is not really love at all.
Love always gives its best - and it does so at the moment of opportunity,it does so now, today, with the people immediately around us, and not at some future date, when the people we do care for may, in fact be dead and gone.
Love is an immediate thing, an extravagant thing, like that love showed by Mary, it is not dealt out a bit at a time and only to those who seem to us to qualify for it.
How often do we stop ourselves or someone else, from showing love to another person because we believe that someone else, or some other cause, deserves our attention more?
How many families have difficulties simply because everyone is so busy trying to be fair and share everything equally that absolutely no one ever has the feeling that they are loved fully - that they are special and unique and truly cared for?
We as the church are called to love God, and to love each other, we are called in that love, to serve God, and to serve the world.
We cannot do this if we are so intent on helping everyone that we forget to love the person next to us fully and deeply with all that we have.
We cannot love God and our neighbour as we are meant to if we end up cheating those closest to us of the love that they need in the name of trying to be sure that someone else gets what they need as well, even if the person said do not help, and just pray.
In Deuteronomy 15:, verses 10 and 11, it is written: "Give generously to your brother, and do so without a grudging heart, then because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to. The poor you will always have among you, therefore I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers and sisters and towards the poor and needy in your land."
Marvellous words with a marvellous promise, the promise that when we are not grudging, that when we are in fact open handed, or extravagant towards our brothers and sisters that God will in turn bless us - and not just in some things, but in everything.
This is the passage of scripture and the promise that Jesus alludes to when he says to Judas: "The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me."
My dear brothers and sisters-in Christ everyone needs to be loved. Everyone needs to be treated as special.
This cannot happen if we are glued to our measuring sticks of who should be cared for and of who deserves just how much of our giving; nor can it happen, if we feel that we personally, are called to take care of everyone equally - because this too involves measuring and judging.
We can only love in the way we are called to love, in the way that Mary loved, if we throw away our rule books and our measuring sticks, and love each person as fully as we possibly can, trusting, as we do so, in the righteousness of Christ, the saving grace of Jesus, to make it all come out right at end.
As long as we cling to the idea that saving the world is all up to us, that salvation comes because of what we do or what others do, we will be worried about our actions and our resources and our abilities, and we will end up failing to do as much as we are in fact able to do.
But when we begin to forget these things, when we stop counting the costs and considering the consequences, and look only to the love that God has for us, and to the incredible record of his faithfulness, then we will be free to love as extravagantly, as completely, and as humbly as did Mary on that day.
Extravagant love like that of Mary, is the kind of love to which we are called to. Indeed it is the kind of love that Jesus himself showed us, when he, on the day after Mary anointed his feet and dried them with her hair, he rode into Jerusalem and gave himself up to death on a cross so that we, utterly undeserving that we are, might live forever with him and with the Father above. AMEN
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Joshua 5:9-12; II Corinthians 5:16-21, Psalm 32; Luke 15:1-3,11-32
O Lord, we pray, speak in this place, in the calming of our minds and the longing of our hearts, by the words of my lips and in the thoughts we form. Speak, O Lord, for your servants listen. Amen.
The Scribe and Pharisees criticized Jesus, because he ate with sinners. And so Jesus told them a story. The story of what a friend of mine calls the story of "the prodigal family".
That story is very familiar to those of us who have been attending church for a few years. Many of us have it heard it several times, read it several times, perhaps even taught it several times.
It is a very rich story - a story that can be told or examined from a great variety of views. A story that can be identified with from a variety of vantage points.
MANY LOOK AT IT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE YOUNGEST SON - the prodigal - the one who wasted his living in a foreign land and ended up going from bad to worse till - at last - he comes to his senses and flees homeward hoping against hope that there he can put his life together again - even if must be as a servant - for he knows that in his father's house even servants live better than does he.
John Newton - the writer of one of the Church's favourite hymns identified with the youngest son.
In the year 1779, after a tumultuous life as a sailor, a dissolute life, a bitter and angry life in which he mocked those who believed in God and tore down the faith of those who lived decently, he came to his senses and he gave his life to Christ, and he found in Him a welcome - a love - that till that time he had only dreamed of.
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see. T'was grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved, how precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed.
OTHERS OF US IDENTIFY WITH THE FATHER IN THE STORY - especially those of us who happen to be parents of children who have gone, or are going wrong.
Think of the father in today's gospel for a minute. Think of his pain. His youngest child - his youngest son has turned out badly.
He loves the child dearly - and what happens? The lad demands his inheritance, what he claims will be his when his father dies,and upon receiving it leaves home and is not heard from again.
We don't know why the father gave in to the demands of his youngest son for the money. Loving parents know that children are different. It is impossible to treat children exactly the same, because each child is unique. That makes child-rearing the most complex of all human tasks. Experts said that no man knows his true character until he has run out of gas, declared bankruptcy, and raised a teenager.
Perhaps the father gave in because he figured if he did not his son would only become more rebellious. Perhaps he gave in because he did not what else to do.
Whatever the reason - I think many of us here today can identify with the pain that the father must have felt; the pain - the second guessing - the constant worry - and the constant wondering...
- Will my boy make it?
- Will he survive?
- Will he become a decent man?
- Will he ever come home?
And so there are people who understand what happens at the end of story of the prodigal son. They understand why the father upon seeing in the distance his son returning home lifts his robes up around his thighs and runs down the road to meet him.
They understand - and they pray that such a seen might be enacted in their own lives. That they might be able to embrace their own child and say to him or her - welcome home.
BUT WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER SON IN THE STORY? What about the oldest brother? How many of us, I wonder, identify with him?
Let me do something for a second - let me take a poll - How many of you are the oldest child in your family? How many first-born do we have? Would you raise up your hands?
O.K., thank you. You may lower your hands.
Now, how many of you were the baby in your family? Would you raise your hand, please? Thank you.
Now, for those in the first group - the oldest children. How many of you felt like the baby of the family got away with things you never could have gotten away with? Would you raise your hand please?
I am a youngest child - the baby of a family - and for a long time when I read the story of the prodigal son I didn't really think about the oldest brother. However my mother died, and my father gone crazy and was even lock up in a mental home. My eldest sister also passed away.
I do think now about the older brother in the story of the prodigal family.
The older brother is like a lot of us. He gets up and goes to work every day and tries to be responsible. Indeed he feels he must be. It is expected of him. So you can understand why he would be upset with his baby brother.
First of all, that brat asked for his inheritance early, while father was still alive. That was selfish and an insult. It was exactly the same thing as wishing father was dead.
And then, it was just like that baby brother to squander it all. He never was a responsible person. He took it and went away and just wasted it. All that money that it had taken our family generations to accumulate. He just spent it all on sports cars and women and high living. It served him right that he wound up feeding somebody's pigs. He deserved it.
But now he comes home. And wouldn't you know it, Dad throws a party for him. He always could get away with murder around here. Nobody ever threw a party for me. Nobody ever appreciated that I stuck around and did what I was supposed to do. I didn't waste Dad's money. I worked hard in the fields every day. And do you think anybody ever butchered anything for me so I could have a party with my friends? No!
And who do you think will be the one to be responsible enough to take care of Dad when he grows old and feeble? Do you think it will be that brother of mine? No. It will be me. Because I am the responsible one around here.
Yes, Dad, little brother can come home - but don't throw a party! Make him grovel a little. He asked to be a servant. Let him do that for a while. He doesn't deserve to wear your fine suits.
Sound familiar?
It should - because that older brother is that responsible part in all of us who doesn't like it when somebody else gets something for nothing.
The older brother is that part of us that measures and weighs every deed for its value - every person for what they have earned or deserve - and has decided that by comparison we aren't getting the deal we deserve to get - or that someone else is getting more than the deserve.
It's important today that we understand whom Jesus told the story to that day long ago in Israel and why he told it.
The tax collectors and sinners with whom Jesus ate are not simply friendly people who have been misunderstood. Publicans were making a good living taking money from their own people for the sake of the occupying forces. Sinners were so designated because their behaviour had gotten them kicked out from the synagogue.
The Pharisees and other guardians of law and order could see the corrosive effect of not distinguishing between good and evil people.
Do the sayings: "birds of a feather flock together" or "evil companions make evil morals" sound at all familiar?
Think about it - doesn't forgiving look a lot like condoning?
To Jesus' listeners 2000 years ago, and perhaps to us today, the party is what is really offensive in the story.
Let the penitent return, there's nothing wrong with that. Both Judaism and Christianity allow for that. But let him return to bread and water, not fatted calf and fruit of the vineyard; to sackcloth and ashes, not to expensive suits and rings and merriment....
Those who to whom Jesus told the story of the prodigal family were responsible people. They followed the letter of the law. They did what they were supposed to do. And what did they see when they saw Jesus?
They saw a man whom they recognized as a holy man - a man whom many said was the Messiah, one whom some said was the Son of God, welcoming sinners and eating with them. Showing them the honour of his presence. Telling them that God loved them.
The Pharisees didn't like that one bit. Because those sinners hadn't toed the line. Yes, let them come in. But make them grovel a little.
The Pharisees, in all their super-responsibility were missing the party. They were not getting the message. They couldn't hear that God had enough love for them too.
Who are you in this story?
Are you the older son, jealous that somebody else is receiving God's love?
Are you the younger son, afraid to come home and ask for God's love?
Are you the Pharisee, so aware of what you have done and what others have failed to do that you can't enjoy the party? That you resent your God for being loving and forgiving?
The youngest Son learned an important lesson while starving in a foreign land. He learned about priorities. He learned that his father was a life giver.
That is something that we all need to learn. What our real priorities are in life. Where life is to be found - and how good that life really is.
In our lives here sometimes it seems that love is limited. That our parents, our wives or husbands, or our children, simply don't have enough love to go around. But that my friends is not so in the family of God.
In the story that Jesus tells to the scribes and pharisees who resented his eating with sinners, in the story he told to the oldest brother or daughter that lives inside our hearts he says:
"My child, you are always with me. You are very special to me. Indeed all that I have is yours - understand that - and rejoice with me that your younger brother - he who was as good as dead, is alive - he was lost - but now is found."
Hear the Good News. God's love is for you. Let your heart soften a little. Throw away the things that are blocking you from receiving the fullness of the love that God is aching to give you - and party a little.
Embrace your brother or your sister. Welcome them. Pray for them. Give thanks for them. The world will not end if you do. In fact it will become a better place for everyone. Amen.
The Scribe and Pharisees criticized Jesus, because he ate with sinners. And so Jesus told them a story. The story of what a friend of mine calls the story of "the prodigal family".
That story is very familiar to those of us who have been attending church for a few years. Many of us have it heard it several times, read it several times, perhaps even taught it several times.
It is a very rich story - a story that can be told or examined from a great variety of views. A story that can be identified with from a variety of vantage points.
MANY LOOK AT IT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE YOUNGEST SON - the prodigal - the one who wasted his living in a foreign land and ended up going from bad to worse till - at last - he comes to his senses and flees homeward hoping against hope that there he can put his life together again - even if must be as a servant - for he knows that in his father's house even servants live better than does he.
John Newton - the writer of one of the Church's favourite hymns identified with the youngest son.
In the year 1779, after a tumultuous life as a sailor, a dissolute life, a bitter and angry life in which he mocked those who believed in God and tore down the faith of those who lived decently, he came to his senses and he gave his life to Christ, and he found in Him a welcome - a love - that till that time he had only dreamed of.
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see. T'was grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved, how precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed.
OTHERS OF US IDENTIFY WITH THE FATHER IN THE STORY - especially those of us who happen to be parents of children who have gone, or are going wrong.
Think of the father in today's gospel for a minute. Think of his pain. His youngest child - his youngest son has turned out badly.
He loves the child dearly - and what happens? The lad demands his inheritance, what he claims will be his when his father dies,and upon receiving it leaves home and is not heard from again.
We don't know why the father gave in to the demands of his youngest son for the money. Loving parents know that children are different. It is impossible to treat children exactly the same, because each child is unique. That makes child-rearing the most complex of all human tasks. Experts said that no man knows his true character until he has run out of gas, declared bankruptcy, and raised a teenager.
Perhaps the father gave in because he figured if he did not his son would only become more rebellious. Perhaps he gave in because he did not what else to do.
Whatever the reason - I think many of us here today can identify with the pain that the father must have felt; the pain - the second guessing - the constant worry - and the constant wondering...
- Will my boy make it?
- Will he survive?
- Will he become a decent man?
- Will he ever come home?
And so there are people who understand what happens at the end of story of the prodigal son. They understand why the father upon seeing in the distance his son returning home lifts his robes up around his thighs and runs down the road to meet him.
They understand - and they pray that such a seen might be enacted in their own lives. That they might be able to embrace their own child and say to him or her - welcome home.
BUT WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER SON IN THE STORY? What about the oldest brother? How many of us, I wonder, identify with him?
Let me do something for a second - let me take a poll - How many of you are the oldest child in your family? How many first-born do we have? Would you raise up your hands?
O.K., thank you. You may lower your hands.
Now, how many of you were the baby in your family? Would you raise your hand, please? Thank you.
Now, for those in the first group - the oldest children. How many of you felt like the baby of the family got away with things you never could have gotten away with? Would you raise your hand please?
I am a youngest child - the baby of a family - and for a long time when I read the story of the prodigal son I didn't really think about the oldest brother. However my mother died, and my father gone crazy and was even lock up in a mental home. My eldest sister also passed away.
I do think now about the older brother in the story of the prodigal family.
The older brother is like a lot of us. He gets up and goes to work every day and tries to be responsible. Indeed he feels he must be. It is expected of him. So you can understand why he would be upset with his baby brother.
First of all, that brat asked for his inheritance early, while father was still alive. That was selfish and an insult. It was exactly the same thing as wishing father was dead.
And then, it was just like that baby brother to squander it all. He never was a responsible person. He took it and went away and just wasted it. All that money that it had taken our family generations to accumulate. He just spent it all on sports cars and women and high living. It served him right that he wound up feeding somebody's pigs. He deserved it.
But now he comes home. And wouldn't you know it, Dad throws a party for him. He always could get away with murder around here. Nobody ever threw a party for me. Nobody ever appreciated that I stuck around and did what I was supposed to do. I didn't waste Dad's money. I worked hard in the fields every day. And do you think anybody ever butchered anything for me so I could have a party with my friends? No!
And who do you think will be the one to be responsible enough to take care of Dad when he grows old and feeble? Do you think it will be that brother of mine? No. It will be me. Because I am the responsible one around here.
Yes, Dad, little brother can come home - but don't throw a party! Make him grovel a little. He asked to be a servant. Let him do that for a while. He doesn't deserve to wear your fine suits.
Sound familiar?
It should - because that older brother is that responsible part in all of us who doesn't like it when somebody else gets something for nothing.
The older brother is that part of us that measures and weighs every deed for its value - every person for what they have earned or deserve - and has decided that by comparison we aren't getting the deal we deserve to get - or that someone else is getting more than the deserve.
It's important today that we understand whom Jesus told the story to that day long ago in Israel and why he told it.
The tax collectors and sinners with whom Jesus ate are not simply friendly people who have been misunderstood. Publicans were making a good living taking money from their own people for the sake of the occupying forces. Sinners were so designated because their behaviour had gotten them kicked out from the synagogue.
The Pharisees and other guardians of law and order could see the corrosive effect of not distinguishing between good and evil people.
Do the sayings: "birds of a feather flock together" or "evil companions make evil morals" sound at all familiar?
Think about it - doesn't forgiving look a lot like condoning?
To Jesus' listeners 2000 years ago, and perhaps to us today, the party is what is really offensive in the story.
Let the penitent return, there's nothing wrong with that. Both Judaism and Christianity allow for that. But let him return to bread and water, not fatted calf and fruit of the vineyard; to sackcloth and ashes, not to expensive suits and rings and merriment....
Those who to whom Jesus told the story of the prodigal family were responsible people. They followed the letter of the law. They did what they were supposed to do. And what did they see when they saw Jesus?
They saw a man whom they recognized as a holy man - a man whom many said was the Messiah, one whom some said was the Son of God, welcoming sinners and eating with them. Showing them the honour of his presence. Telling them that God loved them.
The Pharisees didn't like that one bit. Because those sinners hadn't toed the line. Yes, let them come in. But make them grovel a little.
The Pharisees, in all their super-responsibility were missing the party. They were not getting the message. They couldn't hear that God had enough love for them too.
Who are you in this story?
Are you the older son, jealous that somebody else is receiving God's love?
Are you the younger son, afraid to come home and ask for God's love?
Are you the Pharisee, so aware of what you have done and what others have failed to do that you can't enjoy the party? That you resent your God for being loving and forgiving?
The youngest Son learned an important lesson while starving in a foreign land. He learned about priorities. He learned that his father was a life giver.
That is something that we all need to learn. What our real priorities are in life. Where life is to be found - and how good that life really is.
In our lives here sometimes it seems that love is limited. That our parents, our wives or husbands, or our children, simply don't have enough love to go around. But that my friends is not so in the family of God.
In the story that Jesus tells to the scribes and pharisees who resented his eating with sinners, in the story he told to the oldest brother or daughter that lives inside our hearts he says:
"My child, you are always with me. You are very special to me. Indeed all that I have is yours - understand that - and rejoice with me that your younger brother - he who was as good as dead, is alive - he was lost - but now is found."
Hear the Good News. God's love is for you. Let your heart soften a little. Throw away the things that are blocking you from receiving the fullness of the love that God is aching to give you - and party a little.
Embrace your brother or your sister. Welcome them. Pray for them. Give thanks for them. The world will not end if you do. In fact it will become a better place for everyone. Amen.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
I Corinthians 10:1-13 and Luke 13:1-9
O Lord, we pray, speak in this place, in the calming of our minds and the longing of our hearts, by the words of my lips and in the thoughts we form. Speak, O Lord, for your servants listen. Amen.
It seems from today's Gospel reading that people haven't changed all that much over the two thousand years since the death and resurrection of Jesus.
People, then, as now, avidly discussed the latest news of death and destruction and tried to understand its significance.
We do not know precisely what tragedy some people told Jesus about on the day that our reading originally took place, all we know for sure is that several Galileans were killed in or near the temple by Pilate's soldiers as they prepared to offer their sacrifices to God.
Nor do we have a record of the tragedy involving the collapse of the tower in Siloam that killed eighteen people.
All we know for sure is that then, as now, tragedy struck and people died and still other people talked about it, and tried to make sense of it.
Whenever bad things happen, whenever senseless things happen, the human instinct is to try to make sense of it.
Why did my mother died?
Why was our son taken from us?
Why did God allow that mother of three children die of cancer?
Why did God allow the balloon in Egypt to blow up?
We all want to make sense of the senseless, we want to know why certain things occur, and that is often a good thing.
For example - when buildings collapse, like the tower in Siloam collapsed, investigations are done to find out why so that, just perhaps, such a tragedy will not occur again.
Generally speaking wanting to know why is not a bad thing, but sometimes the urge to figure out why leads us astray, it leads us into assigning blame and guilt to people that do not deserve it, or who at least do not deserve it any more or less than do we...
I recall a young man who was killed outside a pub some years ago. Samuel was the brother of a friend of mine. He was out with his girl friend for a quiet evening. He was minding his own business when he got assaulted by some sailors.
People, talking about the incident, were heard to say things like: "Well, if he hadn't gone to the bar district in Wanchai he wouldn't have been killed." and "People who drink deserve everything that happens to them."
Some people, in their quest to understand, reveal that they have all the compassion and sensitivity of a dead toad.
The implication was that Samuel somehow deserved what had happened to him - just as in today's reading, the implication is made by the people talking about the Galileans killed by Pilate that they somehow they deserved to die.
Why else would Jesus have replied, "Because those Galileans were killed in that way, do you think it proves that they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? And What about the eighteen people killed when the tower fell on them in Siloam? Do you suppose this proves that they were worse than all the other people living in Jerusalem. No indeed, and I tell you that if you do not turn from your sins, you will all die as they did."
There is a way to make sense of the senseless, but that way my friends is not to blame the victims by suggesting that somehow God brought about their death, or whatever other mishap has occurred to them as some kind of punishment.
By that standard no one should be alive today, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
Jesus suggests that we make sense of the senseless, not by condemning the victims of tragedy for their complicity in their own deaths - but by considering our own mortality, and our own sinfulness, and working to produce fruit befitting our salvation before we are called to account for our lives before his eternal throne.
The message of Jesus, like the prophets before him, is that all of us deserve to experience the wrath of God, but that God does not seek our deaths, or does he delight in our suffering, rather he calls us to live by his gracious law, and by the power of his Spirit and the wisdom of his living word, so that we might be able to stand before him at the end as one whose work in this life has been well and truly done.
As the parable of the unfruitful fig tree in verses 6-10 of today's reading tells us - God expects us to be fruitful for him, He expects us to produce that which is pleasing to him, lest we be cut down and perish like those we think have somehow deserved their deaths.
That same parable, my friends, tells us that God is in the business of giving us second, third, and indeed even fourth chances, chances to get it straight, and do that which is pleasing to him, but that, when all is said and done, there is a time of reckoning that we must all face.
That same parable also tells us that God actively labours over us to make us fruitful before making his final judgement.
We are not only given time to get things straight, we are also given the care and attention that a good gardener gives to his plants - the raking and the fertilizer and the nourishment that anything requires if it is to be fruitful.
I can not tell you why some people die at certain times and others do not. I can not make sense of the senseless in this fashion. But I can and do tell you what Jesus had to say about our making judgements about those who have died, and judgements about God's intention in allowing those deaths to occur as they did.
I can tell you that all of us are in need of the gracious forgiveness of God, that all of us deserve to die as much as anyone else deserves to die, to die without hope of redemption, without hope of seeing the face of God smiling at us, and the hand of God giving us the eternal crown of victory and life evermore in his kingdom.
And I can tell you that it is not God's purpose or intention that this should happen to us - but rather, through the labour of his Son - Jesus - he works to make us all that we should be in this life, and that he gives us every chance we need.
God gives us time to repent on one hand, and what we need to become productive for him on the other.
Jesus calls us to make sense of the senseless by giving our own lives meaning before we are called home to God.
Do our lives count for anything?
Are we fruitful for God?
Do we make a difference?
Or are our branches bare,
and our limbs naked?
There is an old story told about little Johnny:
Johnny was going home one day past his grandfather's house with a couple of his friends. As they passed the house they spied the old gentleman out on his sun porch in his rocking chair with a big black book on his lap reading rather intently.
"What's your grandfather doing", asked one of Johnny's friends.
"Oh - grandpa - he's getting ready for the finals", Johnny replied.
Our Lord and Saviour is patient with us my friends. He cultivates us and tends to us, even when we ignore him, even when we fail to trust him, even when we produce nothing for him.
But not forever can we put off the day when we are called home for the final exams - home to account for what we have done and what we have not done.
The question is not whether or not other people's death make sense, whether or not they have deserved their deaths at the time and in the manner that they came to them, but whether or not our lives make sense, whether or not they are fruitful for God and we are ready to meet our maker. May His name be praise day by day. Amen!
It seems from today's Gospel reading that people haven't changed all that much over the two thousand years since the death and resurrection of Jesus.
People, then, as now, avidly discussed the latest news of death and destruction and tried to understand its significance.
We do not know precisely what tragedy some people told Jesus about on the day that our reading originally took place, all we know for sure is that several Galileans were killed in or near the temple by Pilate's soldiers as they prepared to offer their sacrifices to God.
Nor do we have a record of the tragedy involving the collapse of the tower in Siloam that killed eighteen people.
All we know for sure is that then, as now, tragedy struck and people died and still other people talked about it, and tried to make sense of it.
Whenever bad things happen, whenever senseless things happen, the human instinct is to try to make sense of it.
Why did my mother died?
Why was our son taken from us?
Why did God allow that mother of three children die of cancer?
Why did God allow the balloon in Egypt to blow up?
We all want to make sense of the senseless, we want to know why certain things occur, and that is often a good thing.
For example - when buildings collapse, like the tower in Siloam collapsed, investigations are done to find out why so that, just perhaps, such a tragedy will not occur again.
Generally speaking wanting to know why is not a bad thing, but sometimes the urge to figure out why leads us astray, it leads us into assigning blame and guilt to people that do not deserve it, or who at least do not deserve it any more or less than do we...
I recall a young man who was killed outside a pub some years ago. Samuel was the brother of a friend of mine. He was out with his girl friend for a quiet evening. He was minding his own business when he got assaulted by some sailors.
People, talking about the incident, were heard to say things like: "Well, if he hadn't gone to the bar district in Wanchai he wouldn't have been killed." and "People who drink deserve everything that happens to them."
Some people, in their quest to understand, reveal that they have all the compassion and sensitivity of a dead toad.
The implication was that Samuel somehow deserved what had happened to him - just as in today's reading, the implication is made by the people talking about the Galileans killed by Pilate that they somehow they deserved to die.
Why else would Jesus have replied, "Because those Galileans were killed in that way, do you think it proves that they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? And What about the eighteen people killed when the tower fell on them in Siloam? Do you suppose this proves that they were worse than all the other people living in Jerusalem. No indeed, and I tell you that if you do not turn from your sins, you will all die as they did."
There is a way to make sense of the senseless, but that way my friends is not to blame the victims by suggesting that somehow God brought about their death, or whatever other mishap has occurred to them as some kind of punishment.
By that standard no one should be alive today, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
Jesus suggests that we make sense of the senseless, not by condemning the victims of tragedy for their complicity in their own deaths - but by considering our own mortality, and our own sinfulness, and working to produce fruit befitting our salvation before we are called to account for our lives before his eternal throne.
The message of Jesus, like the prophets before him, is that all of us deserve to experience the wrath of God, but that God does not seek our deaths, or does he delight in our suffering, rather he calls us to live by his gracious law, and by the power of his Spirit and the wisdom of his living word, so that we might be able to stand before him at the end as one whose work in this life has been well and truly done.
As the parable of the unfruitful fig tree in verses 6-10 of today's reading tells us - God expects us to be fruitful for him, He expects us to produce that which is pleasing to him, lest we be cut down and perish like those we think have somehow deserved their deaths.
That same parable, my friends, tells us that God is in the business of giving us second, third, and indeed even fourth chances, chances to get it straight, and do that which is pleasing to him, but that, when all is said and done, there is a time of reckoning that we must all face.
That same parable also tells us that God actively labours over us to make us fruitful before making his final judgement.
We are not only given time to get things straight, we are also given the care and attention that a good gardener gives to his plants - the raking and the fertilizer and the nourishment that anything requires if it is to be fruitful.
I can not tell you why some people die at certain times and others do not. I can not make sense of the senseless in this fashion. But I can and do tell you what Jesus had to say about our making judgements about those who have died, and judgements about God's intention in allowing those deaths to occur as they did.
I can tell you that all of us are in need of the gracious forgiveness of God, that all of us deserve to die as much as anyone else deserves to die, to die without hope of redemption, without hope of seeing the face of God smiling at us, and the hand of God giving us the eternal crown of victory and life evermore in his kingdom.
And I can tell you that it is not God's purpose or intention that this should happen to us - but rather, through the labour of his Son - Jesus - he works to make us all that we should be in this life, and that he gives us every chance we need.
God gives us time to repent on one hand, and what we need to become productive for him on the other.
Jesus calls us to make sense of the senseless by giving our own lives meaning before we are called home to God.
Do our lives count for anything?
Are we fruitful for God?
Do we make a difference?
Or are our branches bare,
and our limbs naked?
There is an old story told about little Johnny:
Johnny was going home one day past his grandfather's house with a couple of his friends. As they passed the house they spied the old gentleman out on his sun porch in his rocking chair with a big black book on his lap reading rather intently.
"What's your grandfather doing", asked one of Johnny's friends.
"Oh - grandpa - he's getting ready for the finals", Johnny replied.
Our Lord and Saviour is patient with us my friends. He cultivates us and tends to us, even when we ignore him, even when we fail to trust him, even when we produce nothing for him.
But not forever can we put off the day when we are called home for the final exams - home to account for what we have done and what we have not done.
The question is not whether or not other people's death make sense, whether or not they have deserved their deaths at the time and in the manner that they came to them, but whether or not our lives make sense, whether or not they are fruitful for God and we are ready to meet our maker. May His name be praise day by day. Amen!
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