Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost

(The preacher is indebeted for some ideas and/or inspiration from The Rev. James Liggett who preached a sermon from these texts in 2006.)

Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Gen 2: 18 - 24; Ps 8; Hebrews 1: 1 - 4, 2: 5 - 12; Mark 10: 2 - 16

St. Stephen's Episcopal Parish, Portland OR

October 4, 2009

Only Love Can Break Your Heart

Let us pray: Loving compassionate Jesus, we are gathered here this morning every one of us, because you have summoned us, sought us and bound us to yourself in love. We celebrate your encompassing and all embracing love. We give thanks that, even though we sometimes fall away from you, you never let us go. You continue to come for us, seek us and reach for us. Give us the grace to live our lives, to reach out to our sisters and brothers, that in some small way others might see some of your reaching, seeking and embracing love in us. Amen.

(SUNG) NO MAN IS AN ISLAND. NO MAN STANDS ALONE
EACH MAN'S JOY IS JOY TO ME, EACH MAN'S GRIEF MY OWN. WE NEED ONE ANOTHER, SO I WILL DEFEND, EACH MAN AS MY
BROTHER, EACH MAN AS MY FRIEND.

"If I speak with the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal...Love is patient; love is kind; love is not evious or boastful or arrogant or rude....Love never ends....And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love." 1st Corinthians 13: various verses. "But Ruth said, 'do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go I will go; where you lodge I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die - there will I be buried. May the Lord to thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you." Ruth 1: 16 - 17. "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love....I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. This is my commandment, that you love one antoher as I have loved you." John15: various verses.

These are some of the passages and verses from our sacred scriptures that are often used at Weddings in our churches when we gather with the hope filled and happy couple that are looking to join their lives and love with the support and commitment of their Christian Community. You will notice that often the text from the author of Mark's telling of the Good News of God in Christ - the Tenth Chapter the sixth through the ninth verses will often be chosen by the happy couple "but from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the tow shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate." I have yet to be asked by a couple planning their wedding or blessing ceremony to include the following verses from the Author of Mark's 10th Chapter that follow: "Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. He said to them, 'whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery." I wonder why?

Today as we gather to hear God's word and celebrate the sacred mysteries of bread and wine become body and blood - we are challenged and probably wanting to completely avoid these words from the writers of the texts of Genesis and Mark. It would be far easier to ignore these challenges to our 21st Century sensibilities - when we hear the words which the Genesis author records and which Jesus repeats; they are harsh to our "enlightened" ears and we've moved beyond a Church that absolutely forbids divorced people from full participation in the life of the community. The wisest thing for the preacher to do, would be to focus instead on the life and actions of the monastic 10th Century young man from Assisi in whose honor our four legged friends have joined us today to receive blessing and attention. St. Francis and the prayers attributed to his ministry about peace and simplicity would preach much easier than Divorce which is painful and private. We do not like the judgmental words of Jesus that tells us anyone who divorces is guilty of adultery. Yet these words and scriptures are part of our canon and we dismiss them at our own peril if we are to understand the heart of the message in them texts which is, I believe about the sacredness of commitment in community.

The little piece from the second chapter of Genesis that we just heard, and that we just heard Jesus quote from, is like many other passages from the sacred scriptures, so familiar that we often don't even notice it. In it's familiarity it has become almost invisible. However, it is incredibly important and says some absolutely basic things about our vision of the world and of our humanity.

Do we remember the central pronouncement in the creation story? Throughout the previous chapter in the book of Genesis God has said one thing about the creation over and over again - "and God saw that it was good." But now God looks at all that has been made, everything, and says, “It is not good.”

It is not good that the man (and here “man” means, not a male person, but a human being) should be alone. Think about that. Listen to that. Everything else is good, but this isn’t. Notice also that Adam, the human being, was hardly alone in the garden. First of all, God was with Adam in the garden. That’s a lot all by itself. Then, when the animals were all done, all of nature, all of creation, was with Adam in the garden. The whole world was there. This man was not alone!

In fact, this sounds like the perfect situation for much of popular American religion -- one man alone, surrounded by nature, with God close at hand. How many times have we heard people say that this is really all the religion anyone needs: just me, God, and the great outdoors? This is the response that I almost always receive when someone finds out that I am a priest of the Church; "I find God in the mountains; all alone with the grandeur of creation that's my Church." Notice though when God saw it, when God saw one person, God, and the great outdoors, God didn’t say, “It doesn’t get any better than this.” Instead, God said, about this and only about this: “It is not good”.

(SUNG) NO MAN IS AN ISLAND, NO MAN STANDS ALONE.
EACH MAN'S JOY IS JOY TO ME, EACH MAN'S GRIEF MY OWN. WE NEED ONE ANOTHER, SO I WILL DEFEND EACH MAN AS MY BROTHER. EACH MAN AS MY FRIEND.

Creation wasn’t finished yet. As long as the man lived in isolation from other people, the creation of a good, a complete, human being, had not yet happened. It was in order to complete creation, to make a whole human being, that the other person, Eve, is created. There are a couple of things to notice here. First of all, this story is not as much about the roles of men and women as it is about what it means to be a human being. Also, it is not saying that everyone should be married or that only married people are whole people. That’s just not true. After all, Jesus, the perfect image of God, was single. But this is saying that we human beings can only grow into who we are created to be with and through the other -- through relationship and community. This growth happens in many ways, but it does not happen alone. If you ask an honest monk where his biggest and most important struggles come from, he’ll tell you “other monks.” We do not become whole or complete in isolation, but through community, through the “other.”

It is to this end that God has given us certain structures and situations in which we can, maybe, begin to discover what it means not to be alone, and where we can have our humanity drawn, and sometimes dragged, out of us. God has given us schools of love, places to grow. One of those places is certainly in committed relationship and family. These are some examples of schools of love. While not everyone is called to the vocation of marriage, for those of us who are, this business of helping one another grow into who we are created to be is one of the primary reasons God created the partnership of marriage. To be sure, there is more to it than this, but that is primary.

In much the same way, God has called us to be the Church, and called us into this church, because without something like this we simply cannot be very Christian, in spite of -- or more likely, because of -- both the difficulty and the joy other people bring. One of the central insights of Christianity is that being a part of a real, human, chunk of the body of Christ is essential to any serious Christian growth. Like covenanted relationships and families, parish life, church life, is not really about agreement, success, having our needs met, or personal "happiness". Instead it is a school of love. It is about growth into wholeness. That is why, in Church as in families, the real ties that bind are ties of love and circumstances, not of any other sort of genetics or homogeneity. This kind of growth is simply not possible without commitment to a lifetime of effort and intentionally seeking the grace and help of God. God’s intention that marriage be life-long is not an arbitrary and difficult rule God gives us to make our lives even more difficult. Instead, such intention is a gracious and necessary (if minimal) requirement if a real covenantal marriage relationship is even to be possible. In the same way, our Baptismal vows, which include a commitment to the life of the Christian community wherever we find ourselves, are also for the long haul; for better or worse. The same is true for life vows in monastic communities and the commitments involved in the other schools of love we are given. These vows are life-long in intention, because God knows we need at least that long to begin doing what we promise to do.

Obviously there are times in our lives when that does not happen. There are situations in which the reality of health and wholeness point to separation as the only option in which hope and healing can happen. Each of us has known that reality at some point in our lives and relationships. People leave churches and find new ones as most of us know from experience. In our own communion this reality has caused painful and costly fractures to the Body of Christ. Divorce, if not part of our personal experience, is a reality in our families and friendships and we have been deeply affected by it. These failures in our intention to live in life long relationship wound deeply and those wounds need our loving, caring and compassionate attention. In our vows, either baptismal, marital or spiritual we promise before God, and in community "to do all in our power to support these persons in their new lives" baptized members of the community, as newly formed partners in life; or as ordained ministers in service to the Church. None of us enters these vows lightly. Some of us, for reasons that often God alone understands are unable to fulfill them as intended - and in those situations God is at our call to lift us up in reconciliation and compassion. The function of community is to stand with each other in our successes and our failures - and share the love of God present among us in the Christ to aid in healing our deepest woundedness.

Our vows, in baptism, in covenanted marital relationship or in ordination are sacred mysteries, built into creation and into human nature. They are schools of love, gifts of a loving God. For it is not good to be alone; and the only way to goodness, to wholeness, is through commitment, relationship, community, and the grace of God.

Amen.

Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

St. Stephen's has a member who aspires to the Priesthood in the Episcopal Church. Marcos Dominquez preched this morning in that capacity.

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost – Year B – Proper 20 (RCL) 2009
Wisdom of Solomon 1:16 – 2:1, 12–22; Ps 54; James 3:13 – 4:3, 7 – 8a; Mark 9: 30 – 37
St. Stephen’s Episcopal Parish, Portland, OR
Sunday, September 20, 2009

THE ONLY THING YOU HAVE TO CHANGE IS EVERYTHING

Let us pray: God our tendency is to honor those among us who are the greatest acheivers, thinkers and leaders. We revel in competions which declare who is the greatest among us. Nobel prizes and van Kleiburn competitions – national spelling bees and American Idols grip our attentions and our accolades. You came among us to model something different. You tell us time and again that the greatest among us are those who would serve the lowliest – that achievment will be measured by the amount of service to others in your name. Help us to value the peacemakers more than the Generals, the dishwashers more than the master chief’s; the paupers more than the princesses. Challenge our conventions and shatter our sureities so that we might revel in your call to welcome the lowly and in doing so welcome you. Amen.

(SUNG) FROM THE VOICES OF CHILDREN LORD,
COMES THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE.
FROM THE VOICES OF CHILDREN LORD,
COMES THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE
THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE.

The journeing Jesus and followers continue down the paths of the Palestinian countryside, through Galilee and into Capernaum and arrive at a house to rest. All through this traveling the author of Mark’s Gospel account continues to cloak Jesus’ teachings and conversations with the disciples in secrecy. Jesus is constantly telling those whom he heals and those to whom he reveals aspects of the truth of coming among them; that they are to tell no one what has been seen or done in their midst. This “messianic secret” thread which runs through this Gospel account can often be confusing in light of the overall imperative to “preach the good news” to all the ends of the earth. Why does Jesus caution the inner circle of followers to remain silent about the deeds and revelations to which they become privy? I think that a large piece of the literary technique used by this author is to whet the appetite of those who are listening to the narrative, that we might be all the more anxious and excited to spread the message when we are finally enabled and encouraged to do so. Jesus, however, wants to be sure that the message is fully understood and grasped before the disciples set out to change the face of the world. They, like us are able to grasp the truth of Jesus’ miracles and ministry among them only in small doses; and always within the context of their everyday life experiences. Jesus, however, is always aware of the limited amount of time which he has to prepare them for their ministry – and so continues teaching in the midst of the rushed journey toward Jerusalem. Often we will experience Jesus’ frustration and observe the patient reiterating of lessons which must be grasped if the followers are to carry on the bringing of God’s Kindom among them.

Today’s story follows closely, though not immediately, on the heels of the events which we read about last week. In this 9th Chapter account we encounter the 2nd of the three passion predictions which Jesus will proclaim to the confused followers. Last week, when we heard the first – it was followed by a rebuke from Peter; this time the twelve are no more able to grasp what Jesus is trying to tell them but they have learned their lesson. No attempts at rebuking the teacher this time, instead we are told that they were afraid to ask him what they could not understand. When they arrive at Capernaum Jesus, I’m sure quite tounge in cheek, asks what they had been arguing about on the way. Can’t you just picture the response? None of them wants to admit that they had been having petty squabbles about who was the greatest among them. “No, not simon; he’s the one who’s always getting the answers wrong – and when he does get it right he sticks his foot in his mouth.” “I’m bettin on the beloved disciple – look at how much attention he gets paid?” Ego driven discipleship tends to lead to televangelists who eventually fall under the weight of their own reputations. Patiently once again the teacher takes a seat among the chosen twelve and tries to explain how different things will be in the reign of God than from what they have known.

(SUNG) FROM THE VOICES OF CHILDREN LORD,
COMES THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE.
FROM THE VOICES OF CHILDREN LORD,
COMES THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE
THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE.

In the house where they were staying, Jesus picks out one of the youngsters and sets the child in the midst of them. If you think we have seen examples of Jesus reaching out to the disenfranchized and lowliest of the society before – here is the ultimate example of the undervalued or completely ignored. It’s not that children were despised or “unclean” it’s simply that they held little to no value to the adults who surrounded them. Not really able to provide any financial or labor advantages for the household – and requiring food and shelter for their upkeep; children were seen as a necessary burden to be held onto only until they could join the labor field (males) or be bartered in marriage to the best economic advantage (females). Children’s status was just a little above that of the household slaves. A perfect example of this is illustrated in the writing of the narrative. The author not only failing to name the child whom Jesus takes into his arms – doesn’t even tell us the gender – and so the translation is “then he took a little child and put it among them.” Then Jesus takes the whole social paradigm and turns it upside down. Jesus is famous for doing this – think prostitutes, tax collectors, bleeding women and lepers! Now what was seen as having the least value is held up as the very source of our connection to God – for Jesus tells them “whoever welcomes one such Child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Those of you who consider yourselves members or at least regular attender’s of this community will receive a letter in the next few weeks from our Bob Tayler who is leading our Stewardship Planning Team and it will inform us as a community of the theological underpinning of this years campaign theme, which will in some way or another will link us to Mic’s suggestion in his remarks a few weeks ago that we need to concentrate on “A Year of Mission Building”. Over the next Sundays for the month of October we will hear from our sisters and brothers who will share their insights and passions and invite us to share ours around this special place in God’s Kindom that we call St. Stephen’s. Our time in community and around the Holy Table will remind us of the necessity of our commitment with our time, talents and treasure to the builiding up of the Kindom of God among us. Each of us has a story (at least one; and probably more) of how God’s work in our lives and in the Church has affected our families, our relationships and our lives for the betterment of the world we have been given; and instructed to guard as its stewards. We spent the past 8 weeks in small groups; and hopefully in our prayer lives and our liturgical life as Parish – reflecting on what this place has meant to us, and what we can do as a community to ensure its continuing as a presence of God’s love and healing in downtown Portland. Creative and exciting ideas are beginning to emerge – ideas which will require the commitment of ALL of us to bear fruit and blossom. We also contemplate our responsibility to ensure that God’s work continues to be done and God’s Word continues to be lived out through and among us by offering our gifts of time, talent and treasure back to the God who provided them to us in the first place. Whatever contribution we decide to set apart from the first fruits of our labor – we ask God to bless and accept our offerings because we need to make them. We will gather all of our combined offerings in November – cleaverly timed to be around the season of “Thanksgiving” that we celebrate as a Nation and also around the time that we will call a new leader to come among us as Bishop. In that timeframe we will take our offerings of treasure and talent and time - and place them upon God’s holy table as the symbol of all that we have and all that we offer.

We contribute to continue this legacy of God’s work through and among us so that we may pass it on to those generations after us just as it has been passed to us from those generations which came before. In 1977 a Presbyterian clergyperson named John Westerhoff wrote a ground breaking book in which he explored the model that Christian Churches used for education of its member, this book was titled Will Our Children Have Faith. In 2003 The National Episcopal Church’s office of Ministries With Young People sponsored a conference which they titled “Will our Faith have Children?” Over 600 faith leaders gathered to explore what the Church had lost as a result of decades of indifference to forming and enriching the faith of children, youth and adults. The conference focused on the promises of embracing lifelong learning and formation at all levels of the Church’s life. We continue to reap the benefits of placing our focus on the “little child” among us as Jesus did. Our small faith community is sadly lacking the young people that used to fill our Sunday School classrooms and noisly clammor into the pews with their parents to hear God’s Word and be filled with God’s Holy food. Our hopes and dreams as a community lead us by their very nature toward imparting that important message of God’s love for our future generations. I am confident that as we begin to more clearly define where we believe God to be calling us as a Community – God will send into our midst the laborers that are needed for the building up of God’s Kindom. In the meanwhile I share with you two stories from my work with youngsters that have filled my life with joy and my heart with hope. Harry’s family had moved quite a bit in his young life. When they arrived in town they started “church shopping.” One Sunday they would visit the Unitarians, and the next the Presbyterians. When they decided that Resurrection was going to be their spritual home – Harry was starting to get used to the place; I heard from the open car window one morning as they came rolling into the parking lot and Harry recognzied the “red doors” - “Oh great we’re going to CHURCH”! Finally, my heart will always be stirred as I remember Max who had been receving communion since his first visit after being born when I would dip my pinky into the chalice and place a small drop of the Blood of Christ the Cup of Salvation onto his tounge. When Max was about 7 months old, as I was distributing communion and approached his family waiting at the rail – out of the corner of my eye I caught his little hands reaching up from his mother’s arms and saw him making those little fingers stretch out as he screeched with joy “ah, ah, ah” at the anticipation of the small bit of sacred bread and finger full of holy wine that had become his Sunday morning treat!

(SUNG) COMES THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE
THE SOUND OF YOUR PRAISE.