Fiery Conversion

 on this Sunday (Pentecost 23) the opening hymn was 'Hark the Herald Angels Sing."

Yes, we did. This morning’s opening hymn was a Christmas Carol, as surprising as the words read from the prophet Malachi. Malachi, a prophet not read throughout the season of Advent or Christmas, provides the lyrics of the third verse of the hymn, Hark the Herald Angels Sing.

Hail the heaven-born Prince of Peace!/ Hail the Sun of Righteousness! Light and life to all he brings,/ risen with healing in his wings

 

After the initial surprise, how do you experience singing a Christmas carol outside of the Christmas season?

…

 

Christmas carols are the kind of music that is bold and powerful. It fills our spirits, our voices sing loud, there is joy and expectation. The music and lyrics carry the prophetic word, just as in the Book of Malachi, the text proclaims that evil is rooted out, those who revere the Lord’s name shall be healed, and that day is joyous. The theology of Christmas carols runs deep singing of incarnation, salvation, the cross, the kindom, and end times.

Like the prophecies of Malachi, carols balance the challenging reality of our lives together, coloured by evil, suffering, war, and so on, with the loving and healing presence of God in our midst.

 

On the last few Sundays of the church year, we read alarming and fiery scriptures, apocalyptic texts that warn of calamity upon calamity with exhortations to listeners to remain faithful. Malachi’s audience asks question after question from their lingering doubts of both the love God and justice of God. The peoples’ weariness shows as they repeatedly ask, “How have you loved us?” 

 

The people question God’s love and justice, for their lived experience – our experience- is a world shadowed by despair and heartache, where millions live a daily struggle for survival. Malachi points to a lived truth that there is no such thing as getting through life unscathed. The text’s focus draws people of faith to ponder the bare bones of the matter: to this truth how does one respond and where does one find refuge? We are told what we already sense and know: impermanence, inevitability, and unpredictability are intertwined in earthly life. The Gospel reminds us that we are unable to prepare for every eventuality. There is no amount of planning or worry that will save us. And when it all seems bleak and we are about to stop reading the text because it is depressing, the writer reassures the hearer of God’s presence.  Jesus’ comments about the Temple and its destruction preface his apocalyptic talk. Jesus is warming hearers to faith, a faith that is called away from fortifications, and whatever the large stones are in our time and place – to place trust not in the perishable but rather in the persistent presence of God, and the working of God’s love and justice.

 

Charles Wesley wrote Hark the Herald Angels Sing within the first year of his conversion. It was said by Albert Bailey that, “the inspiration of [Charles] newly-made contract with God was still fresh.” The point being that the hymn was filled with emotion and passion; it was an expression of faith that was experienced and embodied more than an intellectual exercise or pursuit.

Charles Wesley’s conversion is not what you might think. Charles and his brother John were raised as Christians. As students at Oxford University, they formed a student organization called the ‘Holy Club,’ a group that met for prayer, Bible study, and practiced pious discipline. They lived directed by good works not by faith. The brothers were ordained pastors and missionaries.  John described being Christian before his conversion as living a “fair summer religion.”

On Pentecost Sunday in 1738, Charles, influenced by Moravian friends who bore witness to salvation by grace through faith, had an experience of Pentecost.  He felt the conviction of the assurance of being a child of God, justified by faith. Charles expressed the experience of the Spirit as one who “chased away the darkness of my unbelief.” Three days later John was at a meeting house and heard a reading of Luther’s preface to the Book of Romans, describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ. John describes the conversion experience, “[I]felt my heart strangely warmed.”

The conversions were not what we generally expect. The brothers, Charles and John were not unbelievers or those deemed heathen, they were Christians – preaching and teaching pastors and missionaries. Conversion was not a change of faith, but rather a change in conviction – much like that of Martin Luther – a sudden experiential knowing of God’s grace.

 

Every pastor has a particular kind of situation that cuts them to the bone. For me it is when members, people I have taught, baptized, confirmed, and have relationship with – choose to be re-baptized in a church community that requires re-baptism for membership. It has happened a few times over my career. It happened this past Sunday. It always hurts. I feel in some way that I have failed, failed to communicate the gospel, the work of God through baptism, and the use of the affirmation of baptism as a liturgy of recommitment. I get angry when a shiny new package of faith – full of emotion and couched as salvation- tempts people into a conversion – that isn’t really conversion, but rather an experiential recommitment to Christ and to God who is already present and working in their lives. That which is shiny and new, in the long run isn’t going to chase away troubles or make living life easier. When the emotion of the experience wears off, when the community rallies around the person less, when the pressures of life surround, when God’s love and God’s justice seem once again overshadowed by the troubles of the world, what then? Where is one’s trust and faith when the ashes of life settle over emotion?

 

Malachi’s listeners continue to question, “how have you loved us?” They have lost faith in the persistent presence of God, and the working of God’s love and God’s justice. Jesus addresses listeners to put their trust in that which although intangible is steadfast and sure.

I get frustrated with a change of church based on emotional experience because I hear in the prophets and from Jesus a message of perseverance and steadfastness regardless of circumstances. I hear the necessity of persistence in faith, persistence in placing trust, which is aided by a persistence of practice, at all times, and especially in the times when our hearts aren’t in it, or our minds journey in doubt. I feel sadness and grief, that restless souls and troubled spirits are unable to wait for an experience of God’s love and God’s justice. I spend much time and energy crafting worship with purpose and intent. Worship designed in connecting head and heart, exploring complicated world views side-by-side with experience and emotions to embody theology deeply. The feeling of commitment, or renewed commitment, a fiery passionate embrace of an experience of God or an exhilarated emotion – won’t happen every week -but with persistence, faith and trust are planted and nourished so that we may be rooted deeply in the mystery of God.

 

I am currently playing in a Scrabble tournament called, “Everybody Loves a Baby.” While I am not all that comfortable around babies, I get it. Bonus words in the tournament include love and joy. Babies bring both emotions to the forefront, along with possibilities and hope amid whatever is going on in the world. In some ways the mention and/or presence of a baby is a conversion experience; our hearts and emotions are activated. We feel something. It is no wonder that God’s love and God’s justice appear in this form, in a baby. Deep theological concepts are diffused through the presence of a baby, the feeling – the emotion around a baby. I am reminded of this each year as I hear you sing the carols of Christmas. I hear your emotion, your longing and thanksgiving, joy, and power, presence – I hear a conversion of heart and a conviction of faith.  

 

Outside of Christmas and the emotions of that season, this morning has been a gift. We have heard the power of a carol and sung together. We have sung theology deep into our bones, in facing fiery apocalyptic texts and articulating the challenging reality of our lives together, coloured by evil, suffering, war, and so on, through a singing with herald voices, we have experienced the Sun, with light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings. In fiery text comes the loving and healing presence of God.

I Know that My Redeemer Lives

 

If you were to die this afternoon …

it is likely that by the end of the month, I, along with your family and friends would gather with your body or ashes in a cemetery. Standing on muddy ground in a wide-open space, huddled shoulder to shoulder as a cold persistent wind blows, our eyes brimming with tears, we would individually take a breath and sigh;

connected in that moment with faces turned toward the earth we find an insulated stillness…

My voice casts the Word, scripture, that hangs in the air as a blanket of comfort for the heart – I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.

When asked, “Where is this passage from?” who would guess the book of Job? I suspect many would guess it was from one of Paul’s letters. This blanket of comfort for the heart  - I know that my Redeemer lives- is ancient! Ancient as in the 7^th-4^th centuries BCE, that is 4-7 centuries before Jesus lived. The book draws on several genres and traditions of ancient Levantine peoples forming the book around far more ancient folktales that explore themes of undeserved suffering and final restoration. Job is a legendary figure of antiquity, from the remote ancestral period with the likes of Noah. With our ancient ancient ancestors we continue to turn our faces toward the earth, finding an insulated stillness and sacredness in the burying our dead; calm and comfort in the intonation: earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

 

The Book of Job is an ancient text that has layer after layer added and tweaked as humans try to account for suffering. We learn through the story that Job’s human understanding is limited, unable to classify suffering other than reduced to legal categories of guilt or innocence. While the book of Job ponders suffering, ‘why bad things happen to good people,’ questions where God is and why is God, if God is just, not addressing inexplicable human suffering  – it has been suggested that the principal theological issue is presented at the beginning of the book: Will mortals – human beings- be religious (will they fear God) if there are no rewards or punishments?

That is a weighty question. Would human beings choose to be religious, faithful, and fear God, if there were no rewards or punishments attached? Without threat of judgement or hell? Without golden crowns and a seat in heaven? Without reward for ‘doing what is right,’ ‘loving neighbour and enemy alike’? Amid persecution, suffering, and without answers to age old questions: Would -could- the human heart freely and willingly choose to love God?

 

Reading the book of Job for me, is like gathering at a graveside, in the moment when the gathered faces are turned to the earth and focused on the remains of a fellow human being – when there is a momentary pause for the mind and heart to be still; in the fleeting moment of facing our own eventual return to the earth, ancient ancient words are delivered in the extraordinary beauty of the poetry and mysteriously bring a sense of meaning. Commentaries comment on the elusiveness of divine speeches in Job, acknowledging that there is no answer to the questions Job poses that will satisfy the human intellect. Yet holy words in the form of poetry do. In the end, at the end, resolution to life’s questions are found in the depths of faithfulness before a mysterious God. English speakers have a phrase, “the patience of Job”, patience in the sense of endurance, persistence, and steadfastness – this is the depth of faithfulness.

 

In the Lutheran calendar that commemorates faithful witnesses through the ages, 19^th Century Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard is remembered on Nov. 11. Kierkegaard sounded like the prophets, decrying the complacency of the established church of his day demonstrated in its lean toward intellectualized faith and a bending to be accepted by the society. In his writings there is an exploration of faith that has depth and is in communion with the Absolute (his expression of God’s name and character). Kierkegaard’s theology is at home in the questions of Job, the ongoing cosmic conversation, the pontificating of Job’s friends, and the Word mysteriously winding through the poetry of the text. Kierkegaard reflects:

Truth is not something you can appropriate easily and quickly. You certainly cannot sleep or dream yourself to the truth. No, you must be tried, do battle, and suffer if you are to acquire the truth for yourself. It is a sheer illusion to think that in relation to the truth there is an abridgement, a short cut that dispenses with the necessity for struggling for it. 

In an Abstract, Benedict Egbuchunam distills a portion of Kierkegaard’s philosophy to this statement:

Suffering, which is a dying to immediacy, is an essential expression of the relationship to the Absolute.

Suffering, which is a dying to immediacy, is an essential expression of the relationship to the Absolute.

 

We live in a society that prizes immediacy. At our fingertips the internet has the answers to our questions. With a voice command, Siri or Alexa can turn out our lights or turn up the heat. Pinpointing our location, Google maps will give us step-by-step directions to where we want to go. When we have a craving, the supermarket has the food we want, whether in season or not. Doordash or other such service can deliver takeout or groceries to our door in no time. Streaming services allow us to watch what we want when we want. Work is about efficiency, a list of tasks completed in the shortest amount of time. We like results, quick fixes, and quarterly gains. It is preferred to buy new than take the time or energy to repair or repurpose.

Immediacy has and is shaping us. We use substances to mask pain. We go to great lengths to avoid conflict. As a society we apply band-aids to alleviate poverty rather than addressing the core problems. We opt out of uncomfortable situations and ghost those we find difficult. We assume we know, rather than listening. And when it comes to death there are options perceived to decrease suffering by speeding up the dying process.

And after death, there are less visitations or wakes, “too hard” people say. There are fewer funerals, “too sad” people say. There are less graveside services or scattering of ashes – because heaven forbid, we would take the time – to let go of the immediacy of taking care of things and just be still. To risk suffering a broken heart, to experience a fear of death, to have the ego suffer an acknowledgement of being human, fragile, hurt, and broken. Humans who for centuries have pondered the purpose of life, the cosmic actions and character of God, why suffering happens, have an insatiable hunger to understand, and we can not unless we let go of immediacy to stop and be still – and like our ancient ancient ancestors turn our gaze towards the earth and remember that we are dust and to dust we shall return. So many bypass the pause and miss finding in suffering the depths of faith and falling into the Absolute. Be still and know that I am God.

 

The good news for me this morning is that I am reminded that I am human, with a myriad of ancestors who asked and pondered the same questions. I find truth told through the stories of ancient ancestors who journeyed through immense suffering with endurance, persistence, and steadfastness. The good news in the book of Job is that in the same breath Job pleads to have his suffering recognized, he claims the promise of a redeemer who is long in coming. Hearing Job’s journey, suffering is not an end, it is an agent of change, that works deep in the bones awakening a depth of substance. Moving in the deep, there is cosmic Mystery, and in the stillness, the Absolute.

Stripped down – meaning no immediate reward or obvious benefit- Would - could – a human heart choose to love God? Ancestors like Job most assuredly say ‘yes.’ In the cemetery huddled with others turning our face to the earth, finding a moment of insulated stillness - the answer is yes, I know that my redeemer lives.

O Lord, support us all the day long of this troubled life, until the shadows lengthen and the evening comes and the busy world is hushed, the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then, in your mercy, grant us a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at the last, through Jesus Christ our Lord. (ELW prayer 421)

Reformation: Spirit Spiced

 

At the Lutheran Church of the Resurrection in Halifax, NS, October has been celebrated as Spirit-Spiced month. In autumn, coffee shops, bakeries, and even breweries, go all in on autumn flavours: pumpkin spice, carrot spice, apple pie spice. These spice combinations are warming and comforting, associated with positive feelings. The smells trigger sensory pleasure, joy, and memories with food that tastes like home. For Lutherans, Reformation Sunday tastes like home.

 

More specifically, Reformation Sunday is a day Lutheran’s make a return visit to the Spirit Spiced Shop. This shop is filled with a robust warmth and an abundance of fragrance. Everyone is welcome and spices are free. It is the one Sunday of the year where we intentionally and mindfully breathe in deeply, the full-bodied aromas of Reformation theology. There are five spices – five solae, as they are called in theological cookbooks. We enter the Spirit Spice Shop and find five autumn spices (cloves, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice). This cookbook – the sermon- mixes an autumn spice with a point of Reformation theology to expand our tastebuds and experience of the same.

 

Cloves – Cloves are paired with Sola scriptura. Scripture alone.

A clove is a flower bud from a bush in the evergreen family. It only takes a small quantity of this spice, whether used as a whole clove or ground, to add flavour. It can be processed into an essential oil. The essential oil is used to inhibit mold growth on some food. It is also used in the conservation of heritage wood.

Luther wrote the hymn God’s Word Is Our Great Heritage. God’s word, scripture, is the foundation of the Reformation. Luther’s questions for the Church of his time came from reading scripture. Scripture for Luther was like a flower bud: one verse, one question, led to another and another, budding understanding. It doesn’t take a lot of scripture to spice one’s understanding. We read and hear a pinch of ground cloves in worship – not the whole Bible at once. Small quantities are shared so that the Word can simmer within us. Too much at once and it is overwhelming. The essential oil, the essential Word, wears into us and ages with us, being passed from one generation to the next.  Scripture mulls within and inhibits mold, hopelessness, and failure of nerve. Scripture alone – is the essential. It is the fullest of flavour. Scripture flavours how we live our lives, who we are, and what we do in the world.   

 

Ginger  - Ginger is the flavour of Sola fide. Faith alone.

Ginger is the root of a flowering plant, in the genus of plant that includes cardamon and turmeric. It was domesticated in Asia and one of the 1^st spices to be transported from Asia to Europe in the spice trade. For centuries it has been a traditional medicine in China, India, and Japan. Ginger is used in rituals for healing, asking protection from spirits, and in the blessing of ships. Most interesting is that to grow ginger farmers need to protect the seed from disease. This is done by dipping it in cow dung, smoking before storage, or a hot water treatment.

The root of Reformation theology is faith alone. In our practice this root comes to us through the water treatment of baptism. Baptism is to protect the seed of faith. In the dipping, the Spirit is stirred within us and rooted deeply, so that as we journey through life, we stay grounded in God and community. The Spirit – ginger spiced- works through the baptized to bring healing and blessing to a broken world. Faith alone, a protected seed, given in baptism as a work of God, that is the spice of forgiveness and salvation earned by Christ in death and confirmed in resurrection.

 

Cinnamon  - Cinnamon is Sola gratia. Grace alone.

Cinnamon is an evergreen tree that produces berries and has thick bark. The spice is the ground bark.  A few species of the evergreen are grown for commercial use, with ‘Ceylon Cinnamon’ being considered the ‘true cinnamon. Most of the international cinnamon is derived from four other species. The concept of ‘true cinnamon’ has us ponder grace alone. Grace alone, is not the theology that stews in some churches, and it is not the theology heard by those who have left the church or heard by those who have decided never to cross the threshold of the church. “True cinnamon,’ true grace is the good news that there is absolutely nothing required and nothing one can do to achieve salvation; it is already done with no merit given for works. Ephesians 2: 8 says, For by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this is not your own doing it is a gift from God –

Cinnamon is a super Spirit spice for it traverses boundaries being embraced across cultures and used in a diversity of culinary dishes. Grace – embodied by God in Jesus on a cross – ground bark. Grace is God pouring God’s self out to flavour the world, across cultures to diverse peoples, spice! The spice of forgiveness. The spice of love and shalom. The spice of life, life everlasting! Grace that comes in the waters of baptism. Grace that comes in the culinary meal of the church, communion. Cinnamon, grace is the spice of life.

 

Nutmeg – Nutmeg embodies Sola Christus. Christ alone.

Nutmeg is ground from a seed that grows on a deciduous tree. The nutmeg seed is like a nutshell of the gospel of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Nutmeg seeds are dried gradually in the sun for 15-30 weeks – agonizing, as was the journey of Jesus on the cross. Drying nutmeg shrinks to a kernel-size inside a hard-seed-coating. Jesus is laid in a sealed tomb. Eventually the hard-seed-coating when shaken, rattles.  There is an earthquake, and the door of the tomb is opened. The shell is broken off and the kernel -the nutmeg- appears. Risen, Jesus appears to the disciples.

Reformation theology points out that Christ is the only mediator between a person and God. The outer hard-seed-coating is not meant to be a Saint or a priest as an intermediary for people to get to Christ. Believe it or not, miraculously the hard-seed-coating is also a spice, a different spice called mace. Reformation theology believes in a priesthood of all believers where believers are immersed in the holy – nutmeg and mace- holy in their everyday lives and vocations.  Saint, priest, pastor, believer are all redeemed, all equal in Christ.

 

Allspice – Allspice incarnates Sola deo gloria. Glory to God alone.

Allspice is ground from a dried unripe berry, of an evergreen shrub native to Jamaica, Mexico, and Central America. Colonizers called it allspice because of its flavour notes of cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. It is handled carefully so it does not loss essential oils in the drying process. It is sometimes grown as a canopy to shade coffee plants.

The most interesting thing about allspice is that in Jamaica it is not by peoples’ works that the plant survives. Attempts to grow the seed have failed. Allspice is spread by birds eating the seeds and this is essential because there is something in their digestive track that gets the seeds to germinate. This astonishing brilliance in creation is glory to God alone. Allspice, although tasting like many is one. God is one. We are called as the body of Christ to be one. With all our spice, we offer all praise and glory to God.

 

Reformation is Spirit spiced. Spirit spice is the aroma that dwells in us and wafts from us into the world. The Spirit working through us flavours our communities. In a world where bland, tasteless, watered-down, insipid, flat, uninspired, flavourless, unpalatable, unsavory, unseasoned, unrefined, and artificial are all too common, Spirit spice mixes in that which is needed for healing and wholeness; for justice and peace; for warmth and comfort.

 

Sola scriptura, sola fide, sola gratia, sola Christus, and sola deo gloria.

Scripture alone. Faith alone. Grace alone. Christ alone. Glory to God alone.

Cloves. Ginger. Cinnamon. Nutmeg. Allspice.

 

Breathe deeply, sisters, brothers, and siblings. Breathe deeply

So that you are filled with the aroma of God. Warm and comforted, share that spice. Be Spirit-spice.

Kindom Filled Spoons

 

It is that time of year when lectionary readings double-down on exploring God’s kindom. This is the focus given to us from now through the end of November.

 

The section of Luke we hear this morning is one parable in a string of parables, teachings, and sayings that follow a query by the Pharisees in Luke 27:20: Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and Jesus answered, “the kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.”

 

Prof. Eric Barreto, at Princeton Theological Seminary, describes this passage as Luke’s eschatological statement. Eschatology being theology concerned with death, judgement, final destination, end of time. Before illustrating with parables, teachings, and sayings, Luke’s Gospel directly states Jesus’ understanding of God’s kindom. What follows in the text relates back to this statement. The parable we heard as today’s Gospel is understood through Luke 27: 20. Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees is that God’s kindom is not about time and is not something seen, rather it is experienced and felt. The kingdom of God is among you. Kindom is discernable where the faithful gather. Another translation is that Jesus promises that the kingdom will be “within you,’ that the kingdom reigns in the hearts of believers who, in their sojourn through this tattered world, bring God’s life in their wake.

 

When you contemplate the end of earthly life, your bodily death, and contemplate life-after, is it heaven and hell thinking? Is it individual or communal? Is it kindom oriented? Is it a realized fulfilment of God’s vision of the wholeness of covenant and creation?

Jesus’ parables, teachings, and sayings challenge these assumptions and beliefs. Jesus is quite adamant that God’s kindom is present, working, among us, and in us. Jesus’ concern and focus is not about later. Kindom is immediate.

 

The allegory of the spoons is a tale told in a variety of versions across cultures. The tale goes this way:

Once upon a time, a person approached God and asked to know what heaven and hell are like. God took the person to two doors. Behind the first door was a room with a large round table surrounded by chairs. In the centre of the table was a large tureen of soup which smelled delicious. Sitting around the table were a group of unhappy, frustrated, and angry people. They looked pale and sickly. Each person had a long-handled spoon which they dipped into the soup, but because the spoon was longer than their arm, they could not get the soup to their mouths. They were starving. God said to the person, “This is hell.”

 

Behind the second door was a room that appeared almost the same as the previous one. There was a large round table with a great tureen of soup in the middle. It smelled delicious. Gathered round the table were a group of happy, talking, and laughing people.  They looked well nourished and content. Each person had a long-handled spoon which they dipped into the soup, and because it was too long to feed themselves, they fed the person on the other side of the table. In the sharing of food and feeding the other, the kindom of heaven was present.

 

I tell this parable because during fellowship hour you are invited to gather at a table. At the centre of the table is an abundance of natural items and paint. There is a spoon for everyone!

In worship we practice how Jesus prefaces today’s parable, a need for us to pray always and not to lose heart.

Through the character of the judge, we know, that Jesus knows, that we know, that we live in a broken system of justice. The naming of a broken system opens us to offer compassion so God can bring healing; in bringing the kindom that is within us, to our current place, there is a chance- a hope for wholeness in the world.

The parable of the long-handled spoon is one that need not wait until life-after, but be the way a community is in the world. Feeding – nourishing everyone in the room, in the community’s proximity. Long handled spoons reach a long way.

The wooden spoons collected over the past few weeks, are long handled and are an immediate action of gratitude to share spoonfuls of joy and abundance. Together we present hope through a Spirit-spiced folk art exercise. Our thanksgiving, our persistent prayer, our persistent prayers for justice, our faithfulness in community prayer, changes our hearts and our living. Although injustice prevails, within the brokenness we hold to a rule of faith, we persevere in hope, compassion, and gratitude – persistence until all is whole.

Folk art brings our persistent prayer, our community heart, into a broken world; where for a moment – a kindom moment, the world’s perceptions, biases, brokenness, is interrupted by the art. Folk art is justice work. Like our arpillera it signifies inclusion, imperfection, justice, challenge, brokenness, hope, possibility – it describes a parable of the kindom of God without words.

Around the gathered table each of us is asked to fill a spoon with gratitude – God’s abundance, messages and morsels of bread for the hungry. Our gratitude spoons will be tied outside on the maple tree in the front yard, sharing a kindom perspective with passersby.  Our gratitude, stirring the air with a prayer for the wholeness – the fullness- of the world.

 

Luke’s text asks: And when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth.

Yes – as long as there are communities who persistently pray and do not loss heart; who continue to live the kindom that is within, and through present means share the persistent prayer and hope within a broken system of justice. Stirring the air  - stirring peoples’ hearts- stirring change. Once again, quoting Prof. Eric Barreto: Perhaps this is precisely the kind of faith Jesus wonders if he will find on his return – a faith that demands justice in a world coursing with injustice, a faith that persists in seeking life even in systems seemingly ruled by the forces of death, a faith that looks to God’s promises and lives as if they will be fulfilled today.

 

To the end of chapter 18, Luke’s gospel persists in faith that the kindom, God’s promises can be fulfilled today by the way the community lives. There is an emphasis of living humility in contrast to self-righteousness and self-satisfaction: a parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector and being humble before God, a teaching of letting the children come, a teaching on the question of what must I do to inherit eternal life, with a challenge to sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor.

 

This kindom is within us and works through us, and rests in a faith and hope in the words Luke ends this section with. Jesus states: What is impossible for mortals is possible for God.

 

And one last piece ends the chapter. The disciples – Peter – asks: look, we have left our homes and followed you.

Jesus’ response, truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not get back very much more in this age, and in the age to come eternal life.

 

In this age and in the age to come – faith looks to God’s promises and lives as if they will be fulfilled today.

Today I am fed and will be fed through eating with you Jesus’ community meal, where we pray an eschatological statement, kindom words: by your Spirit strengthen us to serve all in need and to give ourselves away as bread for the hungry.  May this be so. Amen.

Thanksgiving 2025

 

Earlier this week in Margaret Wheatley’s book Restoring Sanity, I read:

…this current culture, with people locked down in fear and self-protection, is destroying our relationships, our work, and our future. It is easier to withdraw than to step forward. It is safer to protect oneself than to be visible. … the current culture cannot create the conditions for these behaviours [generosity, creativity, kindness]. Although they are natural to the human spirit, this culture has normalized greed, aggression, and life-destroying behaviours. In this ruthless environment, what’s needed is not individual acts of heroism, but island communities where sanity prevails.  (Pg 15)

 

This morning, I am thankful for this place which for me feels like an island community. A place where I can come and be myself, where I can hear something more wholesome than what I hear in the world, a place where I am encouraged and challenged to be generous, creative, and kind.

 

I spent time this week contemplating what I am most thankful for. I started with harvest and apples, honey and autumn colours. Pumpkin spiced lattes, warm sweaters, crisp air, golden sunshine, the Hunter’s moon; and thanksgiving supper.

More of a Spirit spiced answer led me to be thankful for: this island of sanity, Love and community, faith and friendship, generosity and kindness. And yet, my thankful list seemed pale. I didn’t feel satisfied. Contemplating that for which I am most thankful moved beyond a list and naming exercise. I found that I wasn’t satisfied until I reached the why I am thankful; the why I am generally optimistic, hopeful, and full of gratitude.

 

Before I share the core – the heart- of my gratitude, let me be honest. Wheatley’s quote, naming the ruthless environment in which we live, not shying from stating that this culture has normalized greed, aggression, and life-destroying behaviours deeply bothers me. It bothers me because I hear a truth, a truth that there is always at the ready a power to overshadow and extinguish belief in all that is good, and kind, and beautiful.

 

This was on my mind as I read the Thanksgiving scripture from Deuteronomy. It is a beautiful text of God’s abundance and the human response of giving thanks by offering the first fruits of harvest. The ritual includes a recitation of remembering identity forming moments: once being displaced; once being slaves; once being refugees; and then as a people finding home, freedom, and abundance.

 

But the reading is not so simple. It is about a people giving thanks. It is about a covenant people returning the first of their harvest to the Temple, with prayer, and recognition that Creator has provided. The first fruits, according to the covenant, are brought together and there is community feasting and celebration. Included in the covenant is a redistribution of the harvest with those in society who are hungry and in need. The covenant was to practice life-giving behaviours, behaviours that at the core were relational, loving God, loving neighbour, loving creation.

What is not so simple is that this thanksgiving came at a cost. The Hebrews, fleeing slavery, exiting Egypt, moved across the dessert, and upon entering the promised land, possessed the land. The land was not empty. There where an array of peoples, who were settled in the land, with families and farms and cities. To make ‘the promised land’ the people already on the land were pushed off the land, or killed, some remained to assimilate, some were used as cheap labour. There was continued tension and war, read the books of Kings and Chronicles for some of that history. There is thanksgiving for some and suffering for others.

Present day Israel and Palestinian Territories -peoples- some who have lived on the land for centuries, refugees resettled, land given and taken after the Holocaust, armed boundaries, the illegal acquisition of land – all in a land where three faiths have communities and sacred places. Faiths whose people are called to life-giving behaviours. Called to thanksgiving and the giving of first fruits, they live in a reality ready to overshadow and extinguish belief in all that is good, and kind, and beautiful.

 

Thanksgiving --  in a world that feeds on greed, aggression, and life-destroying behaviours.

 

I am thankful for my health, would I be thankful in sickness? Thankful for freedom, could I be thankful in bondage? I am thankful for peace, would I be thankful in war? I am thankful for home, would I remain thankful without? Would gratitude remain in times of intense suffering? Would prayers of thanks be given, hope be persistent, and optimism remain, if everything were to fall apart?

 

My contemplation of that which I am most thankful for, came to a turning point when I realized that thanks, hope, and optimism would not remain, if I only had a list – no matter how full of gratitude I am – My whole list was really superficial thanksgiving. Important for sure! and helpful in fueling life-giving behaviours, but as items named could be taken away, lost, or broken, so to thanksgiving could drift away.

If I am honest with you, there is fear – it niggles back here somewhere touch back of head and sometimes here touch heart that I my thanksgiving and hope will succumb to the shadow of life-destroying behaviours.

Alone this is a strong possibility.

Together as an Island of Sanity that possibility fades.

And this is where my contemplation of that for which I am most thankful rested – the heart of my gratitude, the heart of my being – the WHY I am thankful and hopeful and optimistic.

I am thankful for Mystery (with a capital M) and Word (with a capital W). I rest in both. I grow in both. I live in both. We live and move and have our being in both.

 

Some might say we are deceiving ourselves or are living in a fairy tale. I don’t believe this. Among the stories passed from generation to generation of those who embraced Mystery and the Word, they lived life-giving behaviours under the power of catastrophic circumstances. The letter to the Philippians is an example. In this Western-most-front of the Pauline community, opposed and threatened by the Roman Empire, Paul in prison and facing possible death, the community is fracturing as strong individuals who disagree are exhibiting life-destroying behaviours. Paul reminds the community who they are and why they are who they are with a hymn in chapter 2, recalling Jesus -the Word- and God, the Mystery- and how taking human form humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Paul pleads with individuals not of the same mind to be of the same mind in the Lord. They share the same love, return to the heart of the matter, the core of the community’s thanksgiving, hope, and life together. As an Island in a world of greed, aggression, and life-destroying behaviours, Paul centres and encourages the community of Philippi to be that Island of Sanity.

Paul writes:

Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I will say, Rejoice.

Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near.

Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

The word of the Lord.

 

Paul is not finished. With more enthusiasm, with more Spirit-spice Paul adds:

Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is   pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace with be with you.

Word of God, word of life.

Hot Tamales! Living Faith

 

Hot Tamales!

The scripture readings from Habakkuk and Luke are piping hot. What a way to start Spirit-spiced month!

 

Habakkuk is fuming! Habakkuk lives in the unsettled time experienced between the death of King Josiah and exile to Babylon around 600BCE. Today’s reading is a snippet of the dialogue between the prophet and God. Habakkuk is exasperated by the injustice affecting everyday life. Can God not do something, now, to relieve the troubles of the world? As Habakkuk tells God, the answer is simple, execute judgement on the wicked.

 

The disciples are hot-under-the-collar! The snippet of Gospel heard this morning comes after Jesus says to them, “If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender, and if there is repentance, you must forgive. And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven time and says, “I repent,’ you must forgive.”

You must forgive, abundantly. It is this statement that causes the disciples to ask, as we read earlier, “Increase our faith!”

 

Every Oct. in Greenville, Mississippi, the city hosts a hot tamales festival. A hot tamale is seasoned ground meat, beef, pork or other, wrapped in a corn-based dough and steamed. It is traditionally served in a cornhusk sleeve. A hot tamale is not always spicy hot, the heat comes from the spices put into the meat, the brine they are steamed in, or the chilli sauces drizzled over top.

The hot tamale has its origins in the Mississippi Delata. All the creation stories for the tamale note that the food was created by cross-cultural relationships: citing Native Americans, Mexicans, African Americans, Italians; relations that were forged by historical events like war, slavery, migrant workers, and settler immigration.

Well over a hundred years later, hot tamales are as much apart of the deep South, as the Blues. In diversity and in communion with others a culturally identifiable staple was born. The tamale spread from one city to another and another creating what is today a world renown Hot Tamale Trail throughout the Mississippi Delta.

 

God where, when, is your justice? Increase our faith!

Introductory notes in the Oxford Annotated Bible say that:

Habakkuk articulates on behalf of his community their searching questions: Is this fair? To this perennial question the prophet receives an answer that is eternally valid: God is still sovereign, and in God’s own way and at the proper time will deal with the wicked. In the meantime---- in fact, at all times-----the righteous shall live by their faith, a persistent, patient, and tenacious adherence to the instructions and promises of God. (Pg. 1341 Hebrew Bible: The New Oxford Annotated Bible NRSV)

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus continues with the saying, “if you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you. This is followed by a specific example directed to first century Roman society and their cultural practice of slavery and indebtedness. Jesus speaks with revolutionary words that would draw ire from those listening. If by faith one were to apply Jesus’ words, have the will do put the words into action, an entire cultural system would be uprooted and dismantled.

 

So, what does this have to do with hot tamales?

 

The people of the Mississippi Delta lived in times not that different from those expressed in Habakkuk and Luke.  Habakkuk fumed about injustice and Jesus talks of uprooting slavery.

The injustices, the cultural systems to be uprooted…..

The Native Americans were given blankets ridden with disease, a systematic genocide.

The African Americans working in the cotton fields, slavery.

Migrant Mexican crop workers, an underpaid labour force.

Italian immigrants surviving as they experienced racism.

                                                                                                      

Despite suffering in the unjust cultural systems, despite “the wicked,” using Habakkuk’s descriptor,

those experiencing oppression formed community. Hot tamales and the Blues are two examples of cultural identifiers of the uniquely formed community. Surviving, waiting, with patience, remaining faithful, the community was resilient in hope in the face of adversity.

This closer-to-us-story of injustice illustrates that unjust cultural systems continue to exist, and we live in them; we have a part in them.

Jesus’ question has a bite to it, What are our mulberry trees? What cultural systems of today, would Jesus use as examples of what needs to be uprooted? Do we have the faith – the will- to remedy climate change, to resolve wars, to eradicate hunger?

 

Perhaps we, like the disciples beg Jesus, increase our faith.

Did you notice the disciples ask together and say ‘our’ faith? Not ‘my’ faith, ‘your’ faith, but ‘our’ faith. It has been suggested that the disciples ask for an increase in faith because they are thinking individually rather than a faith that is shared across a community of faithful. Shared faith and shared work, accomplishes change. From the tamale creators, we witness a life-affirming community in a life-destroying time. What sits with me about the Mississippi Delta’s people is that the diversity of communities making one community didn’t likely see their actions of the time as creating cultural identifiers. They may not even have seen themselves as one community. Yet, they were surviving, living, and sharing. They were in relationship with each other.

The Berkana Institute, an organization that works in global grassroots leadership, has the motto:

“Whatever the problem, community is the answer.” The organization believes that relationship is all that there is, and community is the most effective locus of change.

God made a covenant with a people. Jesus had disciples and a group of followers.

God urges the prophet Habakkuk to wait, be patient, remain faithful…and in time… justice will flow like streams of living waters.

…until that time, the community – a covenant people who are to live the ordinances and statues of the Law which is loving God and loving neighbour – are called to be resilient in hope in the face of catastrophe.

Scripture reminds us, this morning, that this is not an individual task; it is a community task.

 

Jane Goodall, primatologist and anthropologist, who passed away this week once said,

“What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.”

By gathering with and in this community, you have already made a decision of what kind of difference you want to make – stepping outside of the prevailing culture – you gather in faith, to remember the call to love God and love neighbour; and risk a belief, a hope that humanity can heal that which is broken.

The instability in world systems and the injustice in cultural systems are overwhelming and daunting. As a community with a shared heart and call, we go into the world to apply the Word; in faith that each and every one of us will. Together we prepare a whole feast, one tamale at a time. Forgiving one person. Sharing one thing. Fostering one relationship. Faithfully acting as one among many. Our shared acts of generosity, creativity, and kindness – in a troubled world – are extreme and risky, with an outcome of abundance in relationship and community wellness. Together, waiting patiently for that time, let cultural identifiers of covenant living spread from one city to the next, birthing a trail of uprooted and dismantled injustice.

… and in time… justice will flow like streams of living water. Thanks be to God.

For the Love of God, Dishonest Wealth

 

Luke 16: 1-13

I have a colleague who continually reminds the rest of us preachers that parables are complex-multidimensional tales with the purpose of provoking strong reactions. Parables address economy and relationships, pulling listeners into a tale where everything-they-think-they-know is upended, jumbled into a radical expression of an unknown system of organizing society.

In grade school, I remember teachers who had us practice putting ourselves into the stories read in class. Teachers would address the class: imagine you are Spot (Spot was a dog). How do you think Spot felt playing with Dick and Jane? And similar queries. The idea was not only learning to read the words of the story, but to learn to comprehend what we were reading. Spot, Dick, and Jane stories had many layers: simple words for beginner readers that made a story; the pictures that helped with understanding and added more details like the colour of Dick’s jacket, and the park they played in having trees; and the outside questions discerning a layer of feelings, and another of why, how, who, where and so on. From grade 2 seeds were planted that taught us that reading is not just the words on the page.

 

My colleague, when reading parables has a practice of asking who is God in this scenario? Generally, there is what many consider an obvious answer and yet, when following through the parable one often has to do mental gymnastics to satisfactorily make it work. Parables are complex-multidimensional tales with the purpose of provoking strong reactions.

The Gospel of Luke has a string of kindom parables emphasizing God’s economy, grace, and want of relationship. The parables are pointed making the hearer uncomfortable. And it has worked! Pr. Jim asked if he could read the Gospel on his ordination anniversary Sunday and when I told him what it was – whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother… none of you can be my disciples if you do not give up all your possessions -  it was a moment of ‘yikes, not an easy Gospel to proclaim.’ Some of you have commented recently after worship, while shaking your heads, ‘yikes, that Gospel.’ The Gospel has gotten under our skin.

Lutheran clergy met this week. Our practice is to talk about the readings for the upcoming Sunday. With this Gospel we reflected on and played with who represents God in the parable. Exploring the nuances and layers when God is interpreted as:

Owner     Dishonest manager    Debtor

 

As Jesus’ story progresses, we know that Jesus is crucified and dies. He is, as a manager, let go.

By human standards Jesus’ ministry squandered time, talents, and energy on healing the outcast, giving hope to the poor, performing miracles for free. Jesus abundantly scattered mercy, compassion, and teaching. Jesus spent much time confronting those with power and those holding the rule of law. The conversations he had with them did not change the systems. By human understanding Jesus’ ministry failed. Jesus had not increased his social status, did not gain power in the religious or political systems of the day, and did not accrue financial wealth. Jesus didn’t act the Messiah role the disciples and followers had hoped he would be.

According to human understanding, Jesus – God - failed.

 

There is a section of this parable that gets messy when trying to explain it out logically. So let us come to it considering that the tale is trying to express the fullness of God’s vision and love for humankind in a tale that humans might just understand. The parable is trying to convey to what lengths God will go to be and stay in relationship with humankind.

The manager goes about reducing -forgiving- a portion of debt owed by debtors. The manager, it is said, does this so that once dismissed as manager, he will be welcomed in these debtors’ homes. The master commends the dishonest manager for being shrewd.

The text comments that the children of this age are more shrewd, alluding to human understanding and human transactions in the world. Highlighting the transactions most important to humans are those involving money.

The parable expresses the manager’s work as transactional, he reduced a debt so that in return the person would welcome him.  It is expressed this way -not because God is transactional- but because transaction – getting something for something is most understandable to humans.

In the parable the manager goes about forgiving debt, notice not all the debt. Humans are suspicious of free or that which is perceived as overly merciful, so forgiveness is talked about only in part. There is still debt to pay in the parable because that is an easier love to accept and receive. It also shows a continued want by the manager and master to keep in relationship with the human being, so the action is not once and done and the human wanders off. As the gospel of Luke continues there is no doubt that all is forgiven, there is no debt held back, but that story is for another day. This is a seed planting day.

 

There are a lot of parables that talk about seeds. I believe that the parables are seeds.

This one is planting seeds for the event of Jesus’ death and the time after.

God loved the world so much that…

Do you hear what this layer of the parable is saying?

God goes to great lengths -even to being dismissed and acting as a dishonest manager – so that humankind can grasp the depths to which God unconditionally loves creation.

 

Now before you get upset about suggesting Jesus acts as a dishonest manager, consider in the parable, what is the action that is dishonest? All we are told is that the master has heard that the manager has been squandering his property. In a past parable we heard of a farmer indiscriminately and abundantly distributing seeds, in human terms of economy, productivity, and financial gain the actions are unbelievable and foolish. Perhaps the manager in this parable has squandered property according to human understanding, subverting economic expectations of the day– as in not protecting, not investing, not accumulating property. From human bystanders passing rumours squandering property could be a manager practicing re-distribution, fair-wages, environmental protection, land settlement, charitable contribution; any action using money and resources with mercy, compassion, and kindness.

In the verse that follows the telling of the parable Luke makes a point to mention: The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed Jesus.

Ridiculed because of the love of Money, whose transactions, ruled them, ruled the day and ruled every aspect of life. So much so that - Incomprehensible was the love of a relational God whose economy was abundant in mercy and forgiveness.

 

The key verse for me this week is verse 9 which reads:

And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal home.

‘Dishonest wealth’ is economy and the use of resources in a way which the world, the lovers of money, do not understand. It is labelled dishonest by the lovers of money, to dissuade the public from gravitating to relational living rather than continually being in the transactional debt of ‘I owe you-s, you owe me-s.’  Dishonest wealth is forgiving debts, being generous; spending all one’s time, talent, and possessions; abundantly casting seeds, excessively loving …

Because God so loves us.

… and in living that economy… God’s love,

when our time here is done, we are welcomed into the eternal home.