Storied Grace

A sermon preached for Proper 14
August 7, 2022

Our reading from Hebrews today comes from that famous faith chapter. You know the one. The chapter starts out, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” The writer then lists out what those heroes of the old testament did by faith. We heard today about Abraham–a man who left everything he knew because God promised to show him another country. A man who imperfectly clung to the promise of God that he would be the father of many nations, even though he and his wife Sarah had no children. 

Faith: the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Or as another translator put it, “Now faithfulness is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of unseen realities.” Evidence of unseen realities: not mirages, not phantoms, not figments of imagination, but realities that already exist in the mind of God. Unseen realities we are bold enough to grab and hold onto, even now. Unseen realities that shape how we live in this world.

Be like Abraham, Hebrews is telling us. Follow God from where you are now to a country that God will show you–follow God to an unseen reality–not desiring to go back to where you came from, but leaning forward to a future only God knows. 

What is that future? Hebrews is talking about heaven, life eternal with God. The writer says that these faithful heroes desired a better country, that is, a heavenly one, the city prepared for them. We are to desire that heavenly country, too. Our animating desire should be life eternal with God–a gift that comes to us from God by grace through faith in Christ Jesus. Faith is daring to believe that God is taking us there. Faith is holding onto God and keeping the destination in mind. Faith is believing the promise–that this world is not the end, but that there awaits a new place of redemption, of renewal, of rest, of resurrection. We keep looking to the horizon of heaven by faith. 

But that doesn’t get us off the hook in this world. I grew up singing a hymn, maybe you did, too. It says, “this world is not my home, I’m just a-passin’ through.” I think hymns like this one do us a disservice, because they set up heaven as an escape, and they can give us permission to get through this world as quickly as possible, without even looking around us. If that’s the case, we’ve missed something important. For while we keep one eye on the horizon of heaven, looking to the promise of life eternal, we keep another eye right here, trained on what’s going on at this present moment. 

That’s what Jesus is saying in today’s gospel. He says, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” Don’t be afraid, good people of God; keep your eye trained on that heavenly horizon. It is the Father’s good pleasure to have a place prepared for you–a place that has plenty of good room for you and all God’s children. But then immediately Jesus gives us instructions for the here and now: “Sell your possessions, and give alms.” In doing so, Jesus says that we will be making purses for ourselves that do not wear out, “an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” 

I like talking about heaven. I bet you do, too. But when we bring up what Jesus says today, it makes me uncomfortable. Because I got a little money in the bank. And I like nice things. 

Sell your possessions, and give alms. Now before we all go out and have a big yard sale, let’s pause. It’s okay to have some money in the bank. It’s okay to have some nice things. It’s not okay to be enslaved to those things and to make them more important than Jesus. It’s not okay to be enslaved to those things and make them more important than your neighbor. 

Jesus gives us this command for two reasons. First, he knows that our things, more than anything else, can distract us from that heavenly horizon. We get so preoccupied with what we have or what we don’t have, that we lose sight of a heavenly reward. We work so hard to build treasures here on earth, that we forget about heaven altogether. That’s what the parable of the rich fool was about last week–the one who built barns and bigger barns to hoard all of his stuff, and none of it went with him when he died. 

The second reason Jesus gives us this command is that when we give alms, when we care for the least of those around us, we are caring for Christ himself. In Matthew 25, the righteous ask Jesus, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry, or thirsty, or naked, or in prison?” What does Jesus say? As you do it to one of the least of my brothers and sisters in need, you have done it unto me. Jesus is reminding us, especially those of us with a little money in the bank, that our wealth comes with ethical obligations toward others. And if we are unwilling to fulfill those obligations, we don’t have our eyes on that heavenly horizon. 

Looking to the heavenly horizon is about a lot more than what’s coming after death. It’s also about how we live right now. How are we storing up treasure in heaven right now? Because I promise you, we are all storing treasure somewhere. We just have to make sure it’s going into the right account. With faith in those things hoped for and that unseen reality, let’s keep our eyes on Jesus, never wavering. Let’s watch out for Jesus to come on that heavenly horizon in the clouds of glory. And let’s watch for Jesus to show up on our doorstep in the form of a neighbor in need. If we do that, we will never be short on real treasure–the treasure that lasts for eternal life. 

A sermon preached on the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 11
July 17, 2022
Luke 10:38-42

We come today to a familiar passage of scripture. We read that Martha, who has a sister named Mary, welcomes Jesus into her home. That is to say, Martha is in charge. We know from the gospel of John that these are the sisters of Lazarus, whom Jesus raises from the dead. They are Jesus’s good friends, and they give this rabbi who normally does not have a place to lay his head, a bed for the night. They welcome him, and with him his company of disciples. 

These two sisters take very different approaches to Jesus’s visit. Mary, we read, sits and listens at Jesus’s feet. She takes the position of a disciple, learning from the master. Martha, on the other hand, gets to work getting things ready. Cooking. Setting the table. Getting the wine. All of the things that go into making a visit like this one a success. More than that, these things were demanded by society. In Jesus’s time, hospitality, welcoming others into your home, was not just a matter of being polite. It was a religious obligation. Martha is trying to fulfill what God expects. It is not an accident that in Greek, the words for “many tasks” are polle diakonia. Diakonia–we get deacon from that word. Service is an important, even religious, matter. 

Is it any wonder, then, that she gets frustrated with her sister? Her sister, who is supposed to answer to her, the matron of the house, is off listening to Jesus. Gabbing. Martha goes to Jesus. “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” Maybe you’ve felt like her before. Maybe there have been times when you’ve felt like everything depended on you and no one was around to help. And let’s be honest; these important things must get done. 

Jesus responds in a way that might make us uncomfortable, especially those of us occupied with those polle diakonia, those important, religious tasks of hospitality. “Martha, Martha,” he says, his voice full of compassion, “you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.” The better part. Those words must have stung Martha. 

There is a long history of interpreters wrestling with this text. Generally, you’ll find two interpretations. The first is something like: Mary represents the contemplative, prayer, study, things like that. Martha represents the active, doing things in the world, working. Mary, the contemplative, is better than the active. You should seek to be contemplative, and don’t worry about the active part of faith. A second interpretation is similar. Mary represents the contemplative and Martha represents the active. Some of us are one, while others are the other. It’s okay. Don’t try to be something you’re not. 

I think both of these are wrong. I think Jesus is speaking not to the form of our discipleship, but to our focus. I happen to believe that all of us are called to be like Mary, the contemplative, spending time in prayer at the feet of Jesus. I also believe we’re called to be like Martha, putting our prayers into action, doing the work of God to which we have been called. The question is not, are you a Martha or a Mary? The question is not, is Mary better than Martha? The question is, regardless of what you’re being called to at any given moment, are you focused on Jesus? For that’s the better part. It’s about our focus. 

Clearly, it’s easy to be like Martha and get away from that focus. It’s easy to get caught up in our tasks, our work, our service, diakonia, and forget why we’re doing what we’re doing. It becomes less about Jesus and more about ourselves. When that happens, watch out. 

But you can also be like Mary and lose focus. Growing up my church had prayer meeting every Monday night. I went every Monday night. And every Monday night I took a nap under the pew. 

The truth is, sometimes our faith calls us to be like Mary, sitting at the feet of Jesus, absorbing his teaching, listening intently. At other times, our faith calls us to be like Martha, getting to work, doing good service, taking part in that diakonia religious duty. We’re both-and people. Regardless of what we’re up to, our focus must be Jesus, Jesus, and Jesus. We don’t do anything for ourselves and our glory. We do everything for Jesus. 

But here’s the deal: We cannot be Martha until we’ve spent time being Mary. We cannot be Martha until we’ve spent time being Mary. We cannot serve until we have learned from the feet of Jesus. Our service means little unless we are connected to Jesus and learning from him. 

Let me be blunt and put it this way: You can work at the food bank all day every day, but unless you are praying, studying, learning from Jesus, and receiving strength weekly from this altar, your service is more about you than it is about God. 

Friends, we cannot neglect our spiritual health. We cannot neglect our relationship with Jesus. We cannot neglect that time learning at his feet. Or we will find that we do become worried and distracted by many things, and we lose focus on the one who is the way, the truth, and the life. 

Thankfully, we have the opportunity like Mary to come to the feet of Jesus. As the old hymn says, to “look full in his wonderful face.” We will be blessed so we can be a blessing. We will be fed so we can feed others. We will be loved, so that we might share that love with a broken world. Regardless of what we’re being called to do at any given moment, when our focus is on Jesus, we’re learning that “better part” that Mary knew about. And that will never be taken away from us. 

A sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 9
July 3, 2022

There are some people in this world who get what they want when they want it. They snap, and they have it. That’s a perk of the powerful. Everyone answers their phone calls; everyone wants them on their board of directors; everyone knows their name. These folks don’t have to put up with some of the stuff we normal folks put up with. They get the short lines, the direct access. They don’t have to do things they don’t want to do. 

Naaman in our Old Testament reading is like that. He’s the general in Aram, the bigwig. He’s a powerful man. He snaps, and he gets what he wants. But then something happens to him that is beyond his control. He gets leprosy. 

The uncontrollable happens to all of us, no matter who we are, no matter how powerful we are. And no, I’m not talking about the President of the United States falling off a bicycle here. Steve Jobs, an innovator who made a lot of money, dies from pancreatic cancer. Ronald Reagan, one of the most influential and powerful presidents of the modern era, suffers from Alzheimer’s disease. Stephen Hawking, endowed by God with such gifts for intelligence and discovery, gets ALS. The rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the Naamans of the world–the uncontrollable happens to them, just as it happens to us. That’s the cost of mortality. 

Naaman is distraught. But there is an enslaved girl working in his house, someone he had taken captive and tore from all she knew. This enslaved girl knew about uncontrollable things happening–she knew what that was like, the pain, the heartache, the helplessness. Unlike Naaman, powerlessness was her reality. She could snap all she wanted to, but no one was going to come running. And yet, some deep well of charity within her points her captor in the direction of healing: “If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”

So Naaman goes to Israel. After a dramatic episode with the king, the prophet Elisha gives him instructions: dip in the Jordan river seven times. That’s it. Simple enough. But Naaman gets angry. He’s not used to being treated like this. He has no desire to dip in the muddy and dirty and septic Jordan. He would rather go home, to Damascus, and enjoy the waters there. He wants the prophet to wave his hand, and with a dramatic gesture, to cure him. 

For Naaman, this backwater place he’s come to for healing is a long way from Damascus. It’s a long way from his comfort zone. He can’t snap and get what he wants here. He doesn’t get the best water here–no, he has to use the same water everyone else is using. No special treatment. But he finally relents. He dips seven times. And he is healed. 

You and I are called to the waters for healing, too. Each and every one of us, no matter our station in life, no matter the money in our bank accounts, no matter the power of our position–each and every one of us is born with that leprosy of Naaman’s. It is sin. It is hardwired into us, into our natures. That’s what we mean by original sin. 

But we are not left without a cure. Like that enslaved girl in today’s story, there are voices all around us, from Scripture, from our tradition, telling us of the hope of healing: “If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.” If only you knew about Jesus and his saving life, death, and resurrection, you can be cured of your curse of sin and death. 

That cleansing hope is not found where we expect it. Perhaps, like Naaman, we expect the clean and pristine waters of Damascus. Perhaps, like Naaman, we expect something big and theatrical, the waving of a hand, the muttering of words, the magicking away of sin. Instead, we are brought to a little font, a little bowl, a little water. Perhaps the blue waters of the Gulf would be our preference. Maybe we would rather be at Lake Hamilton or Greers Ferry. But salvation is not found there. Healing is not found in those waters. No, it is found in a little bowl, in a little font, a handful at a time: in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. 

It’s a long way from Damascus. This unassuming place is a long way from those waters we prefer, those places we pine for. But there’s salvation in these waters. There’s healing in these waters. In an instant, our souls are regenerated, transformed, made into a new creation. The curse of sin and death is obliterated. We are taken from a path of sin and put on a path of grace, forgiven and restored and adopted and marked as Christ’s own forever. And this promise is for anyone who desires to come to these waters. You don’t have to be a Naaman. You just have to be yourself as God created you. The water is there for us. 

Naaman went home after that. That was enough for him. But we keep coming back. We keep coming back to these waters, to this place of hope and healing. We come to this altar, and here, as we take bread and wine, we renew our baptisms, and our bonds to Christ and to one another are strengthened. And more healing gets in. The Holy Spirit keeps up the good work in us. And healing, full and complete salvation, it comes. Bit by bit, sip by sip. 

There’s still a lot we cannot control in this world. Powerful or not, rich or not, smart or not, savvy or not–the world throws its worst at us regardless. It’s out of our control, and the unexpected happens. Singer-songwriter Adele said it this way in a recent hit: “There ain’t no gold in this river that I’ve been washin’ my hands in forever.” She goes on, “I know there is hope in these waters but I can’t bring myself to swim when I am drowning in this silence.” If Adele would answer my phone call, I would tell her: Friend, you won’t find the hope you’re looking for in those waters. But I know where there are some hope-filled waters. That’s my message for us today, too. 

Yes, the waters in this world are out of our control. But the good news is, we don’t have to control them. Because when we come to these waters, when we come to this altar, when we come to our God, we approach the One who controls it all. We put our hope in God, now and forever. And God heals our souls. And nothing in this world or the next, no matter how bad or uncontrollable–nothing is able to take that hope and promise of God’s healing love away from us. 

A sermon for the Feast of St. Alban, Martyr (transferred)
June 26, 2022

This Sunday, we are celebrating our respective patron saints at both St. Peter’s and St. Alban’s. The Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul is June 29, and the Feast of St. Alban is June 22. We’re transferring both of them to this Sunday, the fourth Sunday in June. The purpose of celebrating our patron saints’ days is to give thanks for the life and witness of our patron saint, and to thank God for our community of faith here. We pray that God would empower us to follow the example of our patron, living more fully into Christ day by day as we are sanctified by the power of the Holy Spirit. And today is a good opportunity to be reminded of our saint’s story. 

St. Alban was a Roman soldier in present-day England. It wasn’t known as England back then. Scholars now put his in the year 209, during the persecutions of Emperor Septimus Severus. During those persecutions, a priest on the run came knocking on his door, seeking shelter. Alban let him in. And something happened. In talking with the priest, in seeing this humble priest’s life and witness, Alban was converted to Christianity. When the soldiers came to take the priest away, Alban put on the priest’s clothes and took his place. He went to the executioner and confessed, “I worship and adore the true and living God who created all things.” And he was killed with the sword, the first martyr of the British Isles. 

He is a saint, a holy one, someone whose life and witness show us clearly what it means to follow Jesus and lead a life of faith, hope, and love. One who has been caught up into heaven and brought into the nearer presence of Christ to pray for us. 

Not all saints are martyrs, like Alban. There are all kinds of saints. In addition to the martyrs, there are faithful prayer warriors; there are theologians and thinkers; there are deacons, priests, bishops, and a whole lot of lay folks; there are monks and nuns and ordinary people living in the world; there are young saints and old saints, rich saints and poor saints, pretty saints and ugly saints. Saints from every race and people and nation. Saints we know, and perhaps many more saints that are known only to God.  

Regardless of differences in life and death, to be a saint boils down to one simple thing. A saint is someone who has given in completely to the grace of God, has completely surrendered to the will of God for them in life and in death. One Persian poet, Hafez, described sainthood in this poem:

What is the difference
Between your experience of Existence
And that of a saint?

The saint knows
That the spiritual path
Is a sublime chess game with God

And that the Beloved
Has just made such a Fantastic Move

That the saint is now continually
Tripping over Joy
And bursting out in Laughter
And saying, “I Surrender!”

Whereas, my dear,
I am afraid you still think
You have a thousand serious moves.

“You still think you have a thousand serious moves.” Yes, that describes me. I’m not good at that surrendering thing. Sainthood is still far off. But the honest truth is, I want to be a saint. And I hope you do, too. I want my life to point fully to Christ, to confess fully in life and in death, whenever and however death comes, that Jesus is Lord–and nothing else, not even me, can compete with his lordship. I want my life and my death to show that I worship and adore the true and living God who created all things. And I believe that the Holy Spirit is still working on me, pushing me to greater sanctification, pushing me to be a saint. But becoming a saint isn’t easy stuff. It means surrendering, giving in to God’s grace and God’s will completely. It is joyously crying “I surrender,” “not my will but thy will be done.” 

We sing that little song about saints. We say, “And I want to be one, too.” I certainly hope we want to be a saint. But be careful what you pray! At the beginning, we should just know: If we’re serious about becoming a saint, the Spirit will get to work, purging away those things that stand in the way of our complete surrender to God. It might be painful. But the joys of heaven will be worth it all. Following Jesus will be worth it all. Knowing the love of God, deeply and fully and completely, will be worth it all. 

I know a living saint. Or I think she’s a living saint. Her name is Julia. She would probably be embarrassed, maybe indignant, if she knew I was saying this. But I think it’s true. It’s the fruit I can see in her life. And when I see her life, my spirit immediately knows that’s where I want to be, no matter the cost. But it comes at a cost. 

Julia is a learned woman, an important scholar, a faithful priest in this Church. She’s a loving mother and grandmother. She’s a dear professor. But none of that makes her a saint. Those things don’t hurt–but those things alone do not a saint make. No, what makes her a saint is that she has given in, as far as I can see, to the will and grace of God, completely surrendered. I heard a conversation about her once. Folks were talking about her and her influence on them. They talked about her scholarly work, her priest work, her work as a professor, her friendship and personality. But the true mark of sainthood was revealed after that. A man, a fellow professor and scholar of hers, said this: Mother Julia really knows Jesus. That’s a saint.  

“They were all of them saints of God and I mean, God helping, to be one, too.” Be careful what you pray. If you really want to be a saint, the Holy Spirit will make you one. And once you have surrendered completely to God’s grace and will, you’ll never look back, and you’ll never regret the cost. Bursting out in laughter and tripping over joy, you’ll give up on those thousand serious moves you once thought you had in this chess game with God. You will gladly cry, “I surrender! Checkmate!” And then you will really know Jesus.  

A sermon for the Second Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 7
June 19, 2022

There’s some part of us that likes to be scared. I’m not talking about the innocent Halloween type of scared. I’m talking about something darker, something buried deep down in secret places. The type of darkness that would drive people to flock to roadside shows to see people trapped in cages, dressed in tatters–the outcasts of society, the sick, the scary ones. Deep down, in some dark place, we like to be scared. 

There’s something reminiscent of that in the man from the gospel today. Jesus crosses the Sea of Galilee into Gentile country. Once there, he meets a man. Possessed by demons, this man would run naked through the city streets and lived in a graveyard. It’s not a stretch to imagine the social ridicule he would have faced. Kids daring one another, betting how close they could get to the man. “I dare you to go inside the graveyard where that man lives. I double dog dare you to go touch the fence of the graveyard. I’ll give you five dollars if you poke that man with this stick.” Perhaps parents would warn their children using this man as a sort of boogeyman. “You’d better eat your green beans or the graveyard man will eat you. Don’t run off or you might be taken by the graveyard man. You’d better be good or you’ll end up like him.” 

I can’t help but wonder how long it had been since anyone actually talked to him before Jesus today. How long since someone had looked him in the eye? 

You know the story. Jesus shows up and sees this graveyard man, running naked among the tombs. Jesus asks the demons their name. “Legion,” they answer. The name is no accident. A legion was a unit of about 5,000 Roman soldiers, and that the demons answer to that name is suggestive of the Empire’s demonic sway, of the evil powers and principalities of this world that rebel against God even now. Jesus casts Legion out into a herd of pigs and they drown themselves in the sea. 

The man is dressed, restored, renewed, and healed. The people of the town see him healed, dressed, talking with Jesus. They see a man liberated from the power of hell and sin. And they rejoice! Right? They celebrate and throw a party! Right? No. The gospel tells us, “And they were afraid.” And they ask Jesus to leave. 

And they were afraid. Not like before, when they would point at the man, ridicule him, ignore his suffering for a good laugh or just blame it all on his own choices. No, this is a different kind of fear. The fear of being found out. 

Now they see this man healed. Their scapegoat is gone. Their boogeyman is history. And maybe they were confronted with that dark place in themselves that had so often turned a blind eye, or worse, added to his suffering. Maybe they were confronted with their own need for healing. Maybe they were afraid that just as Jesus saw through the demoniac, he could see through them, too. They may not be running through the city naked and living in a graveyard, but they needed healing, too. They needed a messiah, too. Faced with the power of God to heal and save, they turn away, afraid. Go away, Jesus. 

There’s an old story about St. Augustine of Hippo. He prayed that God would reach down and pull him out of his sin and misery. He would pray earnestly, “Please, God, make me good, but not just yet.” Go away, Jesus. I can see that I need healing, just like this man. But not just yet. 

We live in a world that is not so different from the one in today’s gospel. The world needs the healing power of Jesus to lift us out of sin and death and into the life of God. But like today’s gospel reading, our world is one in which people shrink from the saving help of God. Too often, we ask Jesus to leave town, to circle back at a later time, to make us good–but not just yet. 

Our job as the Church in such a world is to keep bringing Jesus–to keep showing up with his promise of love, healing, redemption, and grace. And when Jesus and his way of radical and accepting love for all are pushed to the side and ignored, we keep bringing Jesus anyway. Because that is what our world needs more than ever before: a loving Savior who can heal us all and bring us all into the light. 

As for you and me, may we never ask Jesus to go away. For when Jesus shows up in our lives with his love and mercy and grace, we may be like those townspeople in today’s gospel, afraid of being found out. My message today is this: Let Jesus find us out. He already knows anyway. And what he wants more than anything else is for us to be transformed, changed to be more like him–day by day, to embody and show what it means to follow him and walk his way of love. May our prayer, today and everyday, be this: God, make me good. Change me to be more like you. And do it right now. 

A sermon for Trinity Sunday
June 12, 2022

Today is Trinity Sunday, a feast in the Church when we celebrate that we serve a triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Three persons but one being, one God. This is who God has told us he is. The Trinity is God’s self-revelation. We did not puzzle this out on our own; God revealed it. This is not our best guess at who God is; God revealed it. God has been revealed as Trinity: Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one God. That’s just who God is. 

Did you notice how each person of the Trinity is mentioned in our gospel lesson? Jesus, the Son, is speaking to his disciples. He says the Spirit will come to teach them all things. Jesus says that the Father has given everything into the Son’s hands. The Spirit will, in turn, give all of those things to the people of God. To us. 

So what, exactly, is Jesus promising that the Spirit will give to us? The Spirit gives us good things–the things that Jesus himself brought in his earthly ministry. The Spirit bestows grace, mercy, forgiveness, healing, hope, truth, peace, goodness, wisdom, blessing, beauty, power, courage, love, intimacy with God. Those are the good things we are promised–and the list doesn’t stop there! 

We need all of these good things now, don’t we? We need them, and our world needs them. There is a lot of pain around us and in our own lives. There is pain in our world. To face all of that alone is a fool’s errand. We just can’t do it by ourselves. We need help and power. We need grace and strength. We need faith and hope. We need the love of God. And all of that has been promised to us. Jesus tells us today that the Holy Spirit is pouring out those very things, even now, as gifts of God to the people of God.  

St. Paul knew something about pain and struggles in this life. He writes from personal experience today in our reading from Romans. He says, “we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” St. Paul is reminding us that we suffer in this world–as if we needed any reminder. We know pain and grief and sorrow. There’s no need to hide our eyes from it or try to ignore it. It’s there. But, St. Paul says, we are not left comfortless. God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Spirit, just as Jesus said, because we have been reconciled, reconnected to God through faith in Christ. Because God’s love, God’s very Spirit, has been poured out into our hearts, we can endure, holding fast to our hope. 

We hold fast to our hope. St. Paul says our hope does not disappoint us. One translator puts it this way: “Hope does not prove an embarrassment.” Hope in what? Hope in God. Hope in those good and needed things the Spirit is giving to us. Hope in God’s presence in our lives, even in the middle of our suffering. Hope that our suffering, our pain, the bad things in this world, do not win in the end. For we have been claimed by God. God’s love, God’s Spirit has been poured out into us. And because of that, we will be with God forever. And nothing can separate us from God’s love. That hope will not disappoint; you can count on it. 

The Trinity has a reputation for being difficult to understand, and sermons on Trinity Sunday are known for being difficult and heavy and intense. But here’s the long and short of the Trinity. God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God. Three persons but one Being. And that God is with us. That God invites us into friendship, into relationship, into intimacy. That God fills our hearts and gives us strength to face whatever this world throws our way. That God will not abandon us. And we can put our hope, our ultimate hope, in that God. For that God is faithful. That God loves us, now and forever.

A sermon for the Feast of Pentecost
June 5, 2022

Today is the Feast of Pentecost, the birthday of the Church. We call it our birthday because it is on this day that the Spirit of God, poured out, creates the Church, the Body of Christ. We are only the Church, the Body of Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit. It is not our good works that make us the Church; it is not who we are that makes us the Church; it is, rather, the Spirit and the grace of God poured out into us that makes us the Church, uniting us to one another, and to the Body of Christ throughout the world and throughout time. 

Today we read about how that Holy Spirit was poured out on the Church. The disciples have gathered in Jerusalem in obedience to Christ. He told them to wait in Jerusalem for the promised Spirit, and wait they did. For ten days. Praying. Fasting. Wondering. And then it happened. Acts tells us that the Spirit of God descends on them like fire, like a violent wind. It is the same violent wind that brooded upon the waters at the beginning of creation. And like then, the Spirit is making something new on this day: a new Body, infused with the Holy Spirit, empowered to bear witness to Christ and to tell of how he has saved us. The disciples begin to speak in other languages–the languages of those around them–so that they may share the Good News, the Gospel of Christ. Barriers that divide are broken down. Differences in language, nation, culture, class, race, gender–they cannot stop the liberating power of the Spirit.  

You and I, heirs of those first Christians, have the same promised Spirit. The Holy Spirit lives within us, empowering us to share the Good News, leading us to follow Christ in this world that needs to see him now more than ever. The Holy Spirit, in whom we live and move and have our being, makes us children of God, makes our hearts the throne of God, makes our bodies the Temple of God. 

In Romans today, St. Paul says we did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear. We did not receive a spirit that keeps us bound to sin and death. We did not receive a spirit that cannot liberate us from the evil around us. And take a look, there is evil around us. The false gods of this world seek to impose their will. We see the will of the false gods of this world when we see bombed out buildings and rows of headstones with the names of the fallen. We see the will of the false gods of this world when we see children hungry, seniors unable to afford food or medication. We see the will of the false gods of this world when we see people divided by race, by class, by gender, by who God made them to be. We see the will of the false gods of this world when we see hatred infesting hearts, innocents slaughtered in grocery stores, doctors’ offices, and schools. And we may be tempted to shrink back in fear–because what can we do? We may be tempted to shrink back in fear–because how can we escape, how can we not be bound to this cycle of abuse and violence? We may be tempted to shrink back in fear–because who are we against such terror? 

You and I? Who are we? We’re children of the Most High God. “We did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear,” St. Paul says. No, “we have received a spirit of adoption.” We have been made children of God Almighty, the Lord of Life and Love. So we can stand up, come what may. We do not need to be afraid, come what may. We can have courage, come what may. Because we know God hears us when we cry out to him: Abba! Father! 

We are not insulated from the bad things that happen in this world. In fact, St. Paul says we will suffer in this world, just as our Lord suffered in this world. Our world is fallen, and you and I are impacted by evil. But we are not enslaved to it. We are free–free from its power–because we know that evil does not get the last word. Sin does not get the last word. Satan himself does not get the last word. 

No, God gets the last word. God gets the victory. Glory awaits. And at the end we will see Christ standing victorious over all the violence, all the hatred, all the bigotry, all the pain, all the tears, all the hardship, all the evil, all the despair. We will see Christ wipe away every tear from our eyes. We will see Christ make a new heaven and a new earth, where there is neither pain nor grief, but life eternal. We will see Christ banish fear, and violence, and hatred, along with that old Serpent, forever. 

But for now, as we live in this world, we take heart. We have courage. We believe in the promises and power of God. Because the Spirit of God lives within us. The Spirit of God empowers us, and strengthens us, and gives us the boldness to face down evil when it comes our way. We are children of God. We are joint heirs with Christ. And God is on our side. 

So happy birthday, Church. All of that is certainly worth celebrating. 

A sermon for the Installation and Induction of the Rev. James Yazell as Rector of St. James’ Episcopal Church, Shreveport, La.

June 2, 2022

“We have come together today to welcome the Rev. James Yazell, who has been chosen to serve as Rector.” Your warden said those words earlier. Maybe they sounded funny to you. They probably should have. What has Fr. James been if not your rector these past years? 

There is an unusual air to this festive and joyous occasion. Normally this rite would be celebrated at the beginning of one’s time as rector, but due to circumstances we all know so well, we are gathered three years into Fr. James’ and Kelsey’s time among you to, as it were, officially say welcome. We have gathered to celebrate with much joy and gladness your ministry together, and to give thanks that Fr. James and Kelsey have been brought to this community of faith. 

Perhaps celebrating this occasion three years in is not such a bad idea. In my experience, I have observed that while the installation and induction of a new rector is a moment of joy, it can also carry some anxiety. The congregation is at the beginning of a new season, and they may not know the new rector well, if at all. There are “what-ifs” hanging in the air, “I wonders” floating about in our minds. What will this rector be like? Can we trust them? Will they help us heal? Will they hurt us more? But three years in, I trust you do not carry those anxieties, those “what-ifs”, those “I wonders.” (If you do, it’s time to let them go.) You know Fr. James and Kelsey, and they know you. You have come to trust one another. And God has been at work already, working through Fr. James, through Kelsey, and through each one of you, to bring about good things. Over the last three years, even during a most trying and difficult season, you all have grown in love and in friendship. And that’s what I want to focus on this evening: love and friendship. 

Tonight’s gospel comes from the Last Supper, just before Jesus is arrested and crucified. In his parting words, he tells his disciples and us to love one another as he has loved us, and he invites them and us into friendship with him. “I do not call you servants any longer,” Jesus says. “I have called you friends.” 

But what does it mean to be a friend? We tend to over-sentimentalize love and friendship in our society. We equate them with emotions, something fickle and fleeting, something we fall into and out of. But for Jesus, love and friendship are deeper. They are rooted in a real intimacy of being known. Love and friendship involve sacrifice, laying down our lives for the other, being willing to give all, to show up no matter the cost. 

The very word “friend” in English has roots that connect it to “love” and “free.” To be a friend, then, means to love freely, without coercion or condition, and to love in a way that is real and stable and even sacrificial. Jesus himself connects the two: he says he loves the disciples and he calls them friends. Thomas Aquinas, a medieval theologian, says charity, or love, is friendship, not only among us here, but also friendship of humankind with God, in response to the love that God has poured out for us already. God loves us freely and fully, and when we love God in return freely and as fully as we can in this life, we have friendship with God. Our other friendships in this life point to the desire for this deeper friendship with God, for this friendship with God is what we were made for. As St. Augustine of Hippo put it, “our hearts are restless until they rest in God.” Rest in God’s love; rest in God’s friendship. 

As with our friendships in this life, we must grow in our friendship with God. It takes time and work. While God loves us fully and freely from the start, we have to learn to love God more and more. With the help of the Holy Spirit, those things that seek to separate us from God are renounced and purged from our lives. And our intimacy with Christ grows. 

This is where your priest comes in. God has given you Fr. James as a friend, but not as just any old ordinary friend. He has been called among you, as one spiritual writer put it, to be a soul friend. Sure, he will share in those other friendship things–potlucks, barbeques, game nights, social occasions. But God has brought him here to be a spiritual friend to you, so that you all, together, may grow more and more, day by day, into friendship with Christ himself. 

I know from personal experience, and perhaps you do, too, that Fr. James is good at this soul friend business. In seminary, we walked to the School of Theology, along with Fr. Garrett of Holy Cross, regularly. I remember one such occasion. We were nearly to chapel, and I mentioned that I am not great at silent meditative prayer. “It’s just not for me,” I must have said.

I suppose there are any number of things Fr. James could have said. And I don’t remember his exact words. But he said something like, “Mark, that’s just an excuse–and you know it. You need to practice silent prayer more.” Ouch. But he was right. I was using the “I’m not good at it” excuse to justify a period of time when my prayer life had grown lax. But Fr. James redirected my attention. Through his own example of prayer and through his encouraging if blunt words, spoken with surgical precision, he turned me around again to see Christ reaching out for me, calling me to deeper friendship with him. That’s what a priest is meant to do. That’s what it means for your priest to be your soul friend. 

We need good soul friends now more than ever. The Church, now more than ever, needs priests like Fr. James who know how to be soul friends, how to direct the people in their charge through the changes and chances in this life and lead them to Jesus. 

Our world today, as ever, is opposed to the soul friend, because our world today, as ever, is opposed to our Lord and Savior. Just look around. The principalities and powers of this world are doing their very worst. The false gods of this world seek to exercise their dominion: The false gods of violence, power, war, politics, wealth, of all those -isms that are an ever present threat. These false gods give false  promises, enticing us to put our trust and hope in them. In the end, however, we see where those false promises lead: they lead to carnage in school classrooms and at a doctor’s office in Tulsa; to hungry children and seniors who cannot afford their medication; to homeless sleeping on the streets; to addiction and abuse; to rows and rows of white headstones marked with the names of the fallen; to hatred, hopelessness, and agony. 

The principalities and powers of the world promise everything but give nothing. They take their pound of flesh and push us headlong into the abyss of despair. They demand a sacrifice – us – to the god of death. 

“For the wages of sin is death,” so says St. Paul. But he doesn’t stop there. “But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” We are in this world as sheep among wolves. While the gods of this world seek to impose their will, the soul friend points us to another. They redirect our attention. They remind us that Jesus is standing right there, reaching out for us, desiring our friendship. 

The gods of this world demand a sacrifice; but Christ sacrifices himself for us. 

The gods of this world seek to take their pound of flesh; Christ says this is my body, this my blood, given for you. 

The gods of this world serve death; Christ says I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life–life here and now, life forevermore. And the Lord of Life gives us his love and friendship–freely. 

The job of your priest, your soul friend, is above all to point the way to Christ, even through the gloom and despair of this world. To show us the way to Christ. To show us that Christ is our only real and lasting hope, and he desires to be our friend. 

It is customary for sermons at installations and inductions to include a charge–marching orders for going forward. I hope it is not too presumptuous of me to follow that custom. First, I want to give a charge to you, the people of St. James. Let Fr. James be your priest. Let him be your soul friend, directing you to deeper friendship with Christ, for you were made for such friendship. Let Fr. James love you and challenge you when you need to be challenged. Let him say that direct and seering and purging word that may hurt for a moment, but its truth will turn your soul back to Christ. And when he falls (for he is human), don’t kick him while he’s down. No, forgive him and lift him up. Finally, love him and Kelsey. They are, rightly, laying down their lives for you. Lay down your lives for them, because that’s what love means. The vocation of priest and priest spouse can be isolating and difficult at times. Don’t forget that. And do not neglect to shower them with love and show them you appreciate them. They need it.

And now, to my friend, Fr. James. Love your people. Do not be like that hired hand who runs away at the sign of danger, and there are many signs of danger. But be a shepherd, pointing them ever to Christ, even in the midst of danger. Show them, by your life, what it means to fall deeper and deeper in love and friendship with God. And no, you are not worthy for God to come under your roof and to serve at God’s Altar. But God has called you to that very ministry, nonetheless. You will fall down sometimes. But get up, and in your rising, show what it means to return to the Father again. Proclaim the word and faithfully administer the sacraments, through which we receive grace upon grace; be an obedient servant of the people and the Lord; a pastor, priest, and teacher; a man of prayer; a healer and reconciler; a minister and channel of God’s abundance and blessing. 

There are many duties that come with being a rector. You have already been fulfilling these well. There are things that can consume our time and take us from those foundational elements of our calling. Don’t let them. In everything you do, do not forget your principal duties, the highest delights of our vocation. Before anything else, be a soul friend to these wonderful and holy people that God has put on your path. And keep falling in love with them and with Jesus. 

A sermon preached for the Seventh Sunday of Easter
May 29, 2022

In some places in the church, today, the seventh Sunday of Easter, is known as Ascension Sunday, so called because it is the Sunday following the Feast of the Ascension. Forty days after the Resurrection and ten days before Pentecost, Jesus ascends into heaven. He tells his disciples to wait for the promised Holy Spirit, and to teach and baptize all nations. Jesus promises he will come back at the end of the age, when eternity eclipses time. Our gospel reading today does not come from the Ascension, but from the Last Supper. Even so, the sentiment is the same. Jesus is praying to the Father, asking that the disciples (and us) will be strengthened to continue, even in his physical absence. 

Jesus’s prayer for the disciples and for the Church is that we would be one, united in him and with one another. It didn’t take long for us to get off track. For example, in Galatians, one of the earliest books in the New Testament, St. Paul is criticizing rival preachers, those who are carrying a different gospel. Already there are divisions among those who follow Jesus. In the Book of Acts, we see similar divisions as those early followers of Jesus wrestle with how Gentiles should be accepted into the community of faith. We see the same thing in first, second, and third John. In these brief letters, we see a church already fracturing, already falling apart because of internal divisions. 

The Church, the Body of Christ, is still fractured–indeed, fracturing at this present moment. How many churches are meeting now across this town? Churches divided by history, by theology, by any number of things? We Christians are quick to divide into tribes, into our own teams. We are quick to make the Church into something else. We make it into our group, made for people who think and smell and look and sing and pray and vote like us, instead of striving to be one, united Body of Christ across our many differences. 

The Body of Christ, the Church, is diverse. If you can’t be around Christians who look different or sing different or smell different or think different or vote different than you, I have some bad news about heaven. Christians are different. We are diverse. We have different gifts and different points of emphasis, but we are all called to be united in and through and by Christ. We are called to keep Christ at the center. No matter how different we may be; no matter how much we might disagree; we pray together, we sing together, and we follow Christ together. 

Our reading from Revelation takes us to the very end of the book, the very end of the Bible. And there we have this ancient prayer of the church: Maranatha. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. It’s a prayer for Christ’s return, for the second coming and the establishing of the Kingdom of God. But we don’t only mean the Last Day. We pray for Christ to show up at every moment, even now. Come, Lord Jesus, right here and right now. Come among our divisions, among our disagreements. Come when we are tempted to make the Church more about us and our differences than about you and our unity in you. Come, Lord Jesus, and heal our divisions, the way we have fractured ourselves into a million pieces. Come, Lord Jesus, and reconcile us, reconnect us, to your heart of love. Come quickly, Lord Jesus; come with your power, your grace, your peace, your joy, your love, your way, and help us to love and serve you first and best and most of all. Maranatha. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. 

I wrote this sermon before I left for vacation this past week. I wrote it before Uvalde, Texas. I wrote it before those events that can only be described as demonic: An 18-year old, bullied from day one in school, purchases weapons, easily, with the intent to inflict mass harm on innocents. After shooting his own grandmother, he walks into a classroom of fourth graders. He looks the teacher in the face, says “goodnight,” and shoots her point blank. He turns his attention to the fourth graders in the room, ten and eleven year olds. He repeats this in an adjoining classroom. In the end two teachers dead, nineteen students dead. I wrote this sermon before I heard the first-hand accounts of those students who survived by smearing the blood of their classmates on themselves and playing dead. Before I read accounts of children calling the police begging for help, parents outside begging for help, while the police waited one hour to take action. 

And in light of these evil events, I must ask: Do we really want Jesus to come back?  For when Christ comes again, he will come to judge the living and the dead. He will judge hearts and nations. We will stand before him and we must give an account of our lives, as individuals and as a nation. Of things done and left undone. And I believe every American will have to stand before him and answer why we let shooting after shooting after shooting happen. Why we have let this issue become so polarized that we cannot even talk about it and compromise is impossible. 

Maranatha. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. But we better get our answers ready. For while this event in Texas is so sad, and heart wrenching, and despairing, and evil, and demonic, it is not shocking. Not after Sandy Hook. Not after the whole litany of school shootings. Not after Columbine on April 20, 1999. 

In 1999 I was finishing the second grade. My teacher, Mrs. Clyne, prepared us for something new: a Code Red. I know now this was all in response to Columbine, although I didn’t know that then. As a second grader, 8 years old, I was taught to hide. “Code Red, Code Red,” the intercom said. Mrs. Clyne locked the door to the hallway, which had a huge glass window in it. We turned out the lights as if no one was home. We hid in a closet. Since then we have changed our strategies. Second graders are now taught to be defensive, to throw books and barricade doors, to run if they can, to smear blood on themselves and play dead. 

This doesn’t happen elsewhere and it doesn’t have to happen here. I do not pretend to have the answers. I think we all need to be humble enough to admit that none of us has all the answers. I am not going to advocate for a solution or a policy. That is not my job from this pulpit. But it is my job to tell us that this is a moral outrage to God. To tell us that while God holds those poor children and teachers in his arms of mercy, he is fuming in anger at us. Because we as a nation have chosen to do nothing. For 23 years. And that’s a sin.

God fumed in anger when Pharaoh threw babies into the Nile; he fumes now. God fumed in anger when Canaanites sacrificed their children in fire to the false god Molech; he fumes now. God fumed in anger as Herod, desperate to find the baby Jesus, slaughtered the children of Bethlehem; he fumes now.   

When God fumes, judgment will come. The Scriptures testify that we will not be able to stand against it. For we, all, are guilty of the sin of doing nothing, of hardening our hearts on this issue, of turning away and ignoring the problem because it’s too difficult and divisive politically, all while our children are slaughtered on the altars of false gods. So on the Day of Judgment, it will be better for us if a millstone were tied around our necks and we were thrown into the sea. 

Before we pray Maranatha, come quickly, Lord Jesus, perhaps we need to pray, Kyrie Eleison, Lord have mercy. We need to pray for forgiveness, wisdom, courage. And for strength to do something, anything, even just a small something, at last. 

Today we have candles at the front of the nave. Candles represent the prayers within us, rising up to God and going out into the chaos of the world. In a moment, I will come down and light a candle. I invite you to come down and light one, as well. Light a candle with me, and pray with me. Pray for the dead and pray for their families. Pray for our nation and pray for ourselves. Pray for our schools and all of our children. Pray for mercy, forgiveness, wisdom, courage, and strength. And ask God for help, for grace to let our light shine in this world that needs the love and healing and reconciling power of God now more than ever. 

A sermon for the Sixth Sunday of Easter
May 22, 2022

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.” Jesus gives this promise in our reading from John. He is speaking to his disciples at the Last Supper, and he knows they will need his peace in the coming days. They will not need a cheap peace, the kind the world gives. Cheap peace is here today and gone tomorrow. Instead, they will need abiding peace, the peace of heaven. As St. Paul says, this is the peace of God that passes all understanding, and keeps our hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God. 

Jesus gives his disciples this promise of peace because he knows they will need it. In only a few hours time, he will be betrayed by one of the twelve, hauled off, tortured, and killed. Their hope will be lost as everything they thought they knew is turned upside down. Even after he is resurrected and ascends into heaven, the disciples will need this heavenly peace. They will need to know the peace of God as they are dragged before rulers, thrown into prison, persecuted, and eventually martyred for the cause of Christ. The peace that Christ gives them today will stand the test of all of that. It will last, for it is peace from heaven, peace from God, peace that is everlasting and abiding. 

This leads us to state the obvious: having the peace of God does not mean we will never know trouble. Jesus will still go to the cross, and his disciples will be troubled, indeed. The disciples will still be persecuted and killed for preaching in the name of Jesus. We must say, therefore, that the peace of God is not an absence of hardship and trouble, but rather the ability to persevere through hardship and trouble, confident in our Christian hope that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. This is what St. Paul means in Romans 8 when he writes, 

If God is for us, who is against us? Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:31b, 38-39

The peace of God does not exempt us from hardship and trouble. That’s just the world we live in. However, the peace of God does give us the strength and confidence to persevere, even in hardship and trouble. The peace of God helps us to hold onto our faith in God and in what Christ Jesus has done for us; to hold onto our hope in God’s power to save, even in the most troubling and difficult times; and to hold onto the love of God that has been shown to us in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. 

Like the disciples, we live in a time of trouble. Our hardships are not the same as theirs, but they are still real. We struggle with weakness and loss, with pain and suffering, with despair and shame, with sin and death. All of these things are impossible for us to carry alone. But Christ has come so we do not have to carry those things alone. As he carried his cross from Pilate’s headquarters to Golgotha, he carried all of those things, too. He carried our sin, suffering, shame, and guilt. He even carried our curse of death. The resurrection on the third day confirms that he defeated all of those things on our behalf. 

So what are we to do? We give thanks for all that he has done for us. We trust in our salvation because of his life, death, and resurrection. We live in the peace that he gives us: the peace that passes all understanding. And then, we persevere, following Jesus wherever he leads.