Second Thursday in Advent

Amos 9:1-10; Rev. 2:8-17; Matthew 23:13-26

The hard words just keep coming.  Reading these readings today, I’m reminded of a book by Walter Brueggeman, on the prophetic imagination.  He said that the job of a prophet is twofold: to warn and condemn, but also to encourage.  If all we get is criticism and dire predictions, we are as likely to tune out as to repent (witness the climate change deniers, for example).  No one wants to feel helpless.  Jesus’ brilliance was in calling us to a new way of being, a way that could lead us to naturally lay down what harms us and others.  He knew about encouragement.

But we don’t hear a lot of that today.  We hear condemnation: from Amos, and from Jesus.  And to make matters worse, Jesus’ charges against the Pharisees can seem hard to translate into our lives.  It’s easy to tune out.

But hidden at the end of Revelation there is a pearl of encouragement.  “To everyone who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give a white stone, and on the white stone is written a new name that no one knows except the one who receives it.”  Hidden manna.  A new, hidden name.  As in the desert, that place of testing, I will find food when I least expect it.  And just when it seems my time is running out and I will join my anonymous ancestors, I will receive a new name.  This name signals a new life.

I can attest to the power of a new name.  I was not born with the name I have.  I heard the name Shane when I was 11, and I knew it was my true name, but I didn’t tell anyone for another 16 years.  Inside, I had a strong woman growing.  Her name was Shane.  I dreamed as Shane, but I lived as a pretty miserable and angry girl and woman.  Then, when I was 28, I let myself become Shane.  I changed my name legally.  It was awkward; it seemed crazy.  But that year was also the year I walked into the rooms of recovery.  It was the year I went back to school to finish my degree.  My whole life changed when I claimed my name.  Later I learned it means “God is gracious.”

This is the promise of baptism.  It’s the promise of all the traditions of initiation that allow for a new name.  But the deepest, truest initiation is not with a name chosen by others; it has to be a name discovered for oneself.  And the discovery does not come, I believe, without trials and little deaths.  The old self has to be worn away or transformed before the new can emerge.

Be faithful.  Stand in hope today, facing into the pain of the world and of your own soul without flinching.  You will receive hidden manna, and a new name.  I wonder what yours is?

Second Wednesday in Advent

Amos 8:1-14; Rev. 1:17-2:7; Matthew 23:1-12

Herewith a rant about the use of the title “Father” (and now “Mother”) in the Church.  Does it bother anyone else that we just blow right by Jesus’ clear instructions?  When did we decide that those words applied to the Pharisees of his day, but not to us?  Don’t get me wrong.  There are many teachings in the Gospels (and many more in the other writings!) that I think applied to Jesus’ time but perhaps not to ours.  But this one seems spiritually important and eternal.

We gather as Christians with one God, one Lord, one Shepherd.  We honor many other people, living and dead, but we don't mistake them for our one Source.  Treating humans that way is dangerous to them, as well as to us.  It’s a truism in religious life that the great sin awaiting the righteous person is pride.  This is precisely what happens with the Pharisees.  So how dangerous is it to call someone “Father” or “Mother”?  What does that do to them?

12-Step groups emphasize anonymity as a “spiritual foundation,” “ever reminding us to place principles before personalities.”  Discussion of this principle usually centers on the cost to everyone when people start taking credit for their own recovery and that of others.  Usually, when they do they fall in some big way.  Those who live and serve in contented anonymity touch lives and strengthen their own recovery.  Or, as Jesus simply puts it, “All who exalt themselves will be humbled; and all who humble themselves will be exalted.”  

“I do not call you servants any longer, . . . but I have called you friends” (John 15:15).  As the Church formed, this insight went underground; but it is a spring from which the kingdom of God continually wells up.  The body of Christ has one head.  

I call you friends.

Who needs your quiet service today?  You do.

Second Tuesday in Advent

Amos 7:10-17; Rev. 1:9-16; Matthew 22:34-46

As we enter into reading Revelation, you may find yourself with Amaziah saying to Amos, “O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, earn your bread there, and prophesy there; but never again prophesy here, where I can hear you!  Especially don’t tell me that your words of judgment apply to me or my people.”  Amos responds that he is not the one bringing disaster on the people or the kingdom; the people themselves are doing that by practicing oppression and injustice.  They may want to hear Christmas carols, but he brings the word of God, the choice between life and death.

John refers to the persecution he shares with his correspondents, and this persecution continues to this day.  Now the persecution is not expressed through formal bans against “the Church,” but it is executed against communities who read the Gospel in ways that interfere with the business of the privileged.  Across Latin America Christians have been slaughtered, the reading of the Magnificat has been banned, by rulers who found it “too political.”  

William Stringfellow wrote that the early Christians, like many today, “knew that the message of both Advents [the first, and the one that is to come] is political.  That message is that in the coming of Jesus Christ, the nations and the principalities and the rulers of the world are judged in the Word of God. . . This is the truth, which the world hates, which biblical people (repentant people) bear and by which they live as the church in the world in the time between the two Advents.”

Jesus’ answer to the lawyer is consistent with Amos’ message.  It challenges us today.  The first commandment, the greatest; the second, like it.  No qualifications.  No “unless it costs us profits or makes us unpopular or is inconvenient.”  Standing in the light, we know when we’re living those commandments and when we aren’t.  We may not measure up - we won’t - but at least we can stop pretending or denying or killing the messenger.

Give thanks today for all those prophets, great and small, who call you to God’s dream today.  Heed their warnings, and pass it on!  

Second Monday in Advent

Amos 7:1-9; Rev. 1:1-8; Matthew 22:23-33

Did your heart sink a bit when you saw that we’re starting to read Revelation?  We just read it during the weeks before Advent; wasn’t that enough?  This book, so disliked by so many in the U.S. for its violent images and language of revenge; what is this book doing messing up our lovely Advent?

It’s right where it belongs.  As an apocalyptic book it is all about the coming of Christ.  Its visions speak hope to oppressed people around the world.  In Latin America, in Asia, in Africa, Revelation holds out the hope that injustice will end, the order of the world will be overcome.  It’s good for those of us in the global North to remember that.  For millions of faithful Christians, the United States is the new Rome; global capitalism is the contemporary face of Babylon.  When it seems there is no hope, when God is delayed, apocalyptic visions become a means of maintaining hope.

And in the midst of the terrors, John wishes grace and peace to those who are faithful.  He writes to seven churches to warn and to correct them, to admonish them in love.  

In our privileged position in the global order, it’s confusing to read this.  Are we part of the churches, to be corrected but saved?  Are we part of Babylon, to be cast into outer darkness?  Can we be both?  How might we live in Babylon and be faithful?  Can we not only survive Babylon, but transform it?  Can we be part of the healing of the nations?  Where will you stand?

That is a question worth wrestling with.  Compared to that, debates about marriage and the resurrection are simply interesting.  This is the question confronting us.  

Second Sunday in Advent

Amos 6:1-14; 2 Thess. 1:5-12; Luke 1:57-68

Today we’re at the Church of the Ascension again, and I’m preaching.  It’s John the Baptist Sunday, so at the Eucharist we get the followup to the daily Gospel: the Song of Zechariah (Luke 1:68-79) and Luke 3:1-6, introducing the adult John.  Read all of them today.  Rather than a reflection, here’s the sermon I plan to preach (unless God has other ideas!).

Thank you for inviting me to be with you today.  Yesterday Elizabeth and I led a quiet day focused on Mary’s yes to God, a response to an invitation.  Today’s readings remind us of other invitations from God.  Baruch invites the exiles to return from Babylon, and those who remained in Jerusalem to welcome them.  Zechariah’s song is a response to God’s invitation to participate in salvation as the father of John the Baptist.  And in his song, his son is invited to go before the Lord to prepare the way, to give the people knowledge of salvation.  It all sounds great.

The Gospel reminds us, though, that invitations are often challenges as well.  I feel challenged to bring you a word today, and I pray God to give me that.  Baruch challenged the exiles to go back to Jerusalem, and challenged the residents of Jerusalem to welcome them.  Paul challenged the Phillippians to overflow with knowledge and insight, to be righteous.  Invitations are always challenges.  They demand a response.

Do you think that when Zechariah sang to his infant son that he could have imagined what was to come?  Zechariah was a priest in the Temple.  He served a holy function, within an institution whose leaders will eventually participate in killing Jesus.  He likely expected John to become a priest in his turn.  As a priest he would indeed help the people to worship God, and he would pray to God on their behalf.  But he would do this within the bounds of order and decency, and also within the bounds of the Roman Empire.  

That’s not what happened.  John had another destiny, and it was likely not one that Zechariah understood.  At some point he left home, left the career track, and went to the wilderness.   After a period of preparation he began preaching.  He called the people to repent.  He called all the people to repent, including all those rulers that Luke lists at the beginning of the passage.  His call to others will eventually cost him his life.  But long before that the call that he experienced, the invitation he received, cost him the life his father planned for him.  It cost him family, and secure income, and status.  It would have cost his family in honor, in that honor-driven society.  John received an invitation to fullness of life, and all he had to do was give up everything safe and familiar and risk his life for God.

This is the double edge of God’s invitations.  God’s invitations are always challenges.

When God calls the exiles back from Babylon, most of them don't want to go.  When they are called out of Egypt, most of them turn against Moses when they realize what’s happened.  And who knows?  Maybe the plagues were directed at getting the Israelites to leave, as much as getting Pharaoh’s consent!  

God’s invitations are always challenges.

Every time God or God’s messengers appear, they tell people: “Do not be afraid.”  That should give us a clue as to what they’re up to.

Do not be afraid, Zechariah!  Your prayer has been heard.  You’re going to have a child who leaves everything you understand and value, and dies in prison.

Do not be afraid, Mary!  You’re going to have a child in questionable circumstances that will cost you honor among your people.  He’ll grow up to be hunted and killed.

Do not be afraid, Joseph, to take Mary as your wife.  You’ll have to flee to Egypt and make a new home in Nazareth, and endure the whispers of the neighbors.

Oh yeah.  God’s invitations are always challenges.

Do you want to be invited?  That’s what John is up to.  He follows the invitation and becomes an inviter himself.  As his father prophesied, he goes before the Holy One to prepare the way, to let people know salvation is available, that God’s compassion is here, that release and mercy are right here.  All we have to do, he says, is repent.

Do you want to be invited?

Advent is one of the great seasons of invitation.  We’re invited to parties, to carol sings, to tree lightings, to church services.  We’re invited to donate time and money to help others.  The invitations have gotten more insistent as media multiply.  They carry the challenge to enjoy the season, to do more, to do too much.  The invitations from marketers, from neighbors, from employers and from friends add up to a season from which we can only recover.

But hidden in that pile of invitations is another.  Before it was swamped by the commerce of Christmas, Advent was a little Lent, a time of preparation for the coming Christ.  Our readings still reflect that emphasis, but we’ve lost touch with the challenge of Advent.

The challenge is not to get our Christmas shopping done, or to bake enough cookies for all our neighbors.  The challenge is not getting cards out, or surviving all the Christmas parties.  The challenge is to prepare for the coming of God.

Just when everything and everyone around us tells us to go out and do more, we are invited to sit still and wait.  We are invited to wait with women while holy children grow in them, and to wait with their baffled husbands.  We are invited to wait with the exiles and slaves until the call to go forth is clear.  We are invited to turn again, to grasp the promise of freedom.   We are invited to face our sins, whatever separates us from God, in order to lay them aside and enter the joy of God’s realm.

Do you want to be invited?

You have been.  However you choose to respond, you’ve been invited.  John invited his listeners.  Jesus invited those who heard him.  For thousands of years we’ve been invited, and today you and I are invited.

You cannot pretend you didn’t get the invitation.  Sorry.  Not responding is a response.

There’s good news here.  This invitation is a challenge to enter more deeply into life.  It’s an invitation to really fulfill your deepest hunger, your oldest thirst, your primal longing.  And yes, it looks hard and scary.  We can’t see the promised land as clearly as we can see the land we’ve grown up in.  But it’s there, waiting for us.  God is waiting for us.

John came to bear witness to the light.  This light will shine for us, and guide our feet into the way of peace.  That’s not an invitation.  That’s a promise.

Prepare the way of the Lord. 

First Saturday in Advent

Amos 5:18-27; Jude 17-25; Matthew 22:15-22

Today we’re at the Church of the Ascension in New York City, leading a quiet day on “Mary’s Yes and Ours.”  Please pray for us to have a word to share, and for those gathered that they might hear God, whatever we say or don’t.

Amos reminds us that we don’t know what we’re saying “Yes” to most of the time.  Those who “desire the day of the LORD”: what are they thinking?  Likely they’re thinking that God will smite someone else and reward them.  Sorry.  We’re in this together.  And because we are, injustice is more damaging than failure to worship properly.  If my offerings come from what I profit off your labor, God is not happy.  And when God ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.

The alternative to “justice roll[ing] down like waters, and righteousness like an everlasting stream” is social chaos: distrust, anger, violence, and the consequences of violence: inability to sustain agriculture, lack of education or health care, leading to fewer options other than violence.  Sound familiar?  Fifty years after Martin Luther King quoted this passage to call the United States to racial justice, we are more divided, more suspicious of more “others,” than ever.

So we don’t need to imagine a parental God’s anger; we can see what happens when God’s will is violated.  However you understand God, whatever language or image you use, it’s clear when the healing of the world is happening and when it isn’t.  God’s will for us is wholeness and healing.  God’s will is justice and righteousness.

This week’s events remind us of the continuing spiral of violence and pain in the world.  Any week’s events show us this.  And God ain’t happy.

Where can you bring or participate in justice and righteousness today?  

Make God happy today.

First Friday in Advent

Amos 5:1-17; Jude 1-16; Matthew 22:1-14

Another scary parable, paired with an epistle that condemns “those others.”  Give me Amos.  His condemnation is direct, aimed at his listeners.  They oppress, they steal, they ignore God’s commands.  Amos calls them to “seek good and not evil, that you may live.”  Amen to that!

So often, though, we get messages that tell us that following God is a bummer.  It’s the right thing to do, but it won’t be any fun.  And surely the people Amos is aiming at think that.  If they do turn, it will be out of fear rather than hope or love.  And fear can only turn us so far. 

But the life that God calls us to is not a dour life. It’s the ultimate party.  In the Gospel passage we hear about people who pass up the invitation to party.  In the end, the only ones who come are the “uninvited,” the not so obvious choices, those willing to mix the good and the bad.  Just like Jesus, who eats with all the wrong people.

I imagine that when they got the invitation they didn’t have any idea how much fun they might have.  More than fun; deep, enduring joy.  They just heard another summons, another burden.  Another office Christmas party.  So they went their way, doing their oppressing and stealing (all very legal, of course).  And they missed the event of their lives.  I don’t mean they missed the big event out of all the events in their lives; I mean they missed their life, experienced as an event.  They missed the big now.

But what’s with the wedding robe?  Why throw out this poor guy, after going to all the trouble to get people in?  The explanation I like says that not wearing a wedding robe, a garment provided at the wedding, is a sign that the person doesn’t know he’s come to a party.  He may think he’s there for business, or to get ahead or to please someone else (just like many of us learned to go to church!).  He’s in the room, but he doesn’t know what he’s doing there.  All the celebration will just pass him by.  You might say he’s already in the outer darkness, even in the presence of the light.

He might very well be the one standing in the corner with Jude, judging everyone else in the room.

I’ve been invited - and so have you.  Seek good, that you may live!