Mystery and Surprise

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

December 15, 2019

3 Advent A

          John the Baptist is in a bad way this morning.  Last Sunday, he was out in the wilderness calling the people to repent.  The people had poured into the wilderness to confess their sins and be baptized in the Jordan.  And, no wonder.  John told the people that if they repented, or turned from their ways, they would be prepared for the One who is to come, the One whose sandals John was not even worthy to carry.  But if the people did not repent, they would be thrown into the unquenchable fire.  Not much choice there!

          This morning, John the Baptist finds himself in a different sort of wilderness. That wilderness is prison.  John is in prison for telling King Herod that Herod should not be taking his brothers’ wife as his own. Given all the talk last week about the brood of vipers and the unquenchable fire, perhaps the conversation John the Baptist had with Herod was a little short on tact. Now John is held in prison without bail or much hope of being declared innocent.  So, John sends his disciples to ask Jesus to “Are you the One to come or shall we wait for another?”

          Waiting. When I was a child, I had no clue what Advent was, but I did know that the season between Thanksgiving and Christmas was one of some serious waiting.  My brother, sister, and I waited and tried to behave as Mom cooked, shopped, and prepared our house for relatives and guests to arrive.  We waited for the Christmas break from school to begin.  We waited for grandparents to arrive. We waited to get to eat the things our mom was preparing for the big day.  We knew what we were waiting for-the magic of Christmas morning with all the glory that day held.  But when night fell on Christmas day, the magic was over and, while we had new toys and clothes, and a few leftovers to eat, we pretty much got back to our normal lives.  Since we had no clue what Advent was, you can imagine that we had no clue about the 12 days of Christmas or Epiphany, so the tree came down the day after Christmas.  Christmas, done and dusted.  And my parents breathed a huge sigh of relief, I am sure.

          As children, Sarah, Bo, and I knew what we were waiting for.  We had watched the preparations and made a list.  John the Baptist knew what he was waiting for, too.  Last week, he gave us a pretty clear job description for the One who is to come. That job description read something like this: “His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”  Here’s the problem: So far in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus has called disciples, preached the Sermon on the Mount, made it clear that he has not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it, given the Lord’s prayer, and healed many people.  John has not heard one word about wheat and chaff, judgement, broods of vipers or unquenchable fire.  John expected some hell fire and damnation out of Jesus, and there has been nary a lightning bolt.  John will soon have given his life to prepare the way for the One who is coming.  So his question is urgent: Is Jesus really the one, or are we to wait for another?  John does not have time for the patience described in the reading from James this morning.  John might be an example of suffering, but he has no time for patience.

          John thought he knew what he was waiting for.  John sends his disciples to question Jesus because Jesus does not appear to be the one whose sandals John is not worthy to carry.  John would like a “yes” or “no” answer to his question.  But what does Jesus say to John’s disciples?  He says “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”  On the one hand, this is a terribly unsatisfactory answer for John.  But on the other hand, the answer is clear.  Our reading from Isaiah begins with vengeance and terrible recompense.  John was correct to be looking for someone coming to burn the chaff with unquenchable fire.  But Isaiah goes on to say “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.”  Jesus happened to be a bit heavier on opening eyes and unstopping ears than John anticipated. 

Advent is a season of preparation.  John the Baptist was absolutely correct about that.  But here’s the catch.  I don’t know about you, but I prefer to prepare for what or who I know is coming.  If I am preparing a meal, I want to prepare specific food for a definite number of people and know how I will serve them.  I want to be ready.  But Advent is not about be ready for what we know.  Advent is about preparing for mystery and surprise.  How do we prepare for mystery and surprise? The reading from James offers some suggestions.  Patience is one of them.  But James also tells us to strengthen our hearts, and to not grumble against one another, but to practice love.  Advent is about practicing patience, preparing our hearts, and being people of love.

We do not know when or how Jesus will appear among us.  We do not know where we might find Jesus or what claim Jesus may put on our lives.  If we think we know, and prepare only for that, we may miss what God is up to in the world.  John the Baptist was sure about the One who is to come, and when Jesus didn’t quite meet John’s expectations, John wondered “Are you the One to come or shall we wait for another?”  Jesus doesn’t always meet our expectations, either, I would imagine, and our loved ones do not experience the healing we want for them, or relationships remain broken, or the hungry and thirsty remain hungry and thirsty.  And we ask “Are you the One who is to come or shall we wait for another?”  To which Jesus says “Stop assuming you know what I will do.  Open your eyes and see what I am actually doing in your midst.”  See where the Kingdom of God is breaking through, where goodness triumphs over evil, love conquers hate, and life is bigger than death.  Practice patience, prepare our hearts, and be people of love. Then, when we find Jesus in the manger on Christmas Eve, as expected and promised, we will know that the manger is just the beginning of the mystery and surprise of the gospel.

                                                                   Amen.

Wilderness

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

December 8, 2019

2 Advent A

          At Christ Church, we work hard at connecting with the community around us.  Much of this work happens out in the community, where people gather, whether at the Memorial Day Parade, or the Hudson Ice Cream Social, Merchant Trick or Treat, the Farmers’ Market, the Open Door Coffee Shop or Restrooms for Runners, coming right up on Christmas Eve.  We also connect with the community through the many groups that meet at Christ Church such as SAGE, Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts, Brownie and Daisy scouts, AA and Al Anon, Music from the Western Reserve, and the list goes on.  When we go out into the community, we take chocolate bars and pencils with our name on them, or a large banner, or prizes for games at the ice cream social.  When groups meet here, we try to make sure they feel welcome and comfortable.  Our goal is to connect with the community in ways that allow the community to experience something of our hospitality and the hospitality of God, whether in our building or out on the Green.

          John the Baptist seems to have missed the memo on how to effectively connect with the community.  John the Baptist neither goes out into the community nor does he invite the people into a nice comfortable space.  Instead, he goes to the wilderness.  Instead of a sign that says “God loves you, no exceptions,” John the Baptist calls the people to repent, calls some of them a brood of vipers, and in the not-so-fine print, mentions the unquenchable fire.  And instead of taking chocolate bars and pencils to give to the people, the menu is locusts and wild honey.  This enterprise is doomed to fail.

          But John the Baptist does not fail!  We are told that the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to see him, and all the region along the Jordan.  People were lining up to go to the wilderness and be told to repent or else by a strange looking guy eating locusts and wild honey.  How does that work?

          Scripture is full of references to the wilderness.  The two most notable wilderness stories are about the 40 years the Hebrew people spent in the wilderness as Moses led them to the Promised Land, and the 40 days Jesus spent in the wilderness following his baptism.  In the wilderness, the Hebrew people learned what it means to belong to God and what it means to depend on God and God alone.  The people relied on God for food, water, safety, shelter from the sun and light during the nighttime.  In the wilderness, there was precious little else to rely on and the people came to understand the reliability of God.  Jesus was led into the wilderness after his baptism, after he heard the voice of God proclaim “This is my son, my chosen one, with whom I am well pleased.” In the wilderness, in the company of God and the devil, with nothing to eat and no human to rely on, Jesus came to understand his identity as God’s chosen son. 

          I believe people followed John the Baptist into the wilderness because John proclaimed the truth about the people and their relationship with God.  John demanded that the people repent in order to prepare for the one who was coming.  Repent means to turn, to turn from all that separates them from the love of God.  Perhaps in the wilderness, separated from all that lures them into a false sense of security, and where there was nothing but the people, John, and the water of the Jordan, the people could more deeply experience their relationship with God and understand where real security lies.  John told them that repentance is not just a mental or even spiritual act.  The mark of repentance is the fruit that is born by that action, and without that fruit, the repentance is nothing.  The purpose of this repentance, or turning, was preparation for the One who was to come.  In the wilderness, the people encountered the God who claimed them as God’s own and were challenged to live like people who put their trust in God. 

          Most of us will not venture into the wilderness and encounter a John the Baptist type who will call us to turn from all that provides false security and put our trust in God.  However, most of us will, at some point in our lives, find ourselves in the wilderness of grief, or change, or illness, or challenge of some sort or another.  We will find ourselves in a place where all false securities are brought to light and we will recognize our utter dependence on God, the source of deep and lasting security and peace.  In Advent, John the Baptist calls us to practice that turning, turning from all that we think gives us security-education, possessions, food, wealth, friendships-so that we will be ready for the One who is coming.  John reminds us that repentance, or turning, demands something of us, so that our actions are in sync with our hearts and minds.  If our actions do not match what we say with our lips, John tells us that we have not really turned at all.  In Advent, John calls us to turn, as John called the people of Jerusalem and all Judea to turn, so that we are prepared to welcome the One who is to come.

          The good news of Advent is the promise that whatever wilderness we find ourselves in, whether we have gone into the wilderness intentionally, or we wind up in a wilderness not of our choosing, we will find God there.  When we let go of all that we hold onto for security, when we turn to the One who claims us as God’s own, the promise of the wilderness is that the One we await this season, is actually waiting for us. 

                                                                                      Amen.

Watch

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

December 1, 2019

Advent 1

          Don and the kids and I lived in Evanston, Illinois in the mid-1990’s while I was in seminary.   Our apartment building on the seminary campus had, what was for us, an unprecedented level of security.  We needed a key to get into the building, another key to get into the stairwell, and, of course, a key to get into our apartment.  To do the laundry, we needed all of those keys minus the one to get into the building, plus a key to the hallway to the laundry facilities and another key to the cage where the washers and dryers were kept.  We had always locked the doors to our house when we were away and tried to be aware of security risks, but we found this level of security to be beyond our comprehension.  We had just moved our two young children to a place where four keys were required just to do laundry.  What were we thinking???

          I always think back to that apartment building in Evanston when I hear Jesus say “But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed away and would not have let his house be broken into.  Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”  On this first Sunday of Advent, when what I really want to hear about is the arrival of a baby, there is something very disconcerting about comparing the coming of Jesus with a break-in.  Having had both a home and an office broken into, although not in Evanston, I know that a break-in leaves one feeling angry and afraid.  Is that really how we are supposed to feel about Jesus-angry and afraid?  Can we not just focus on joyful preparation for the birth of the Christ Child during Advent?

          As much as I prefer to think about babies on pretty much any day and think they have very little to do with high level security, I would argue this morning that Jesus’ teaching about his return is also a teaching about how we are to prepare for the birth of the Christ Child.  In this reading from Matthew, Jesus first reminds us that no one, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, knows when Jesus will return.  We like to think that our calendars tell us when important dates will occur.  We can set reminders on our calendars so we do not forget important events, or things we need to do.  But there is no calendar that will tell us when Jesus will return.  Not even a Google search can tell us exactly when Jesus will arrive in our midst.

          Secondly, Jesus teaches us that Jesus will return while we are going about our every day life-our chores, even.  Some will be eating, drinking, and marrying; others will be in the field or grinding wheat.  Some will be watching college football, others will be checking email or playing video games, and still others will be at the office or out grocery shopping.  Life will not come to a standstill for Jesus’ return. 

          Thirdly, Jesus will come like a thief in the night.  Jesus is not telling us that he is a thief, but that we should be as prepared for Jesus as we would be for a thief.  We should be as ready to open our hearts to Jesus as a homeowner is to prevent a thief from breaking in.  If we are as prepared for Jesus as we are for a thief, we will not be left feeling angry and afraid.  Instead, if we are prepared, we will be able to rejoice.  Both Jesus and Paul in the reading from Romans tell us to keep awake and be ready.

          While Jesus is talking about his return in the reading from Matthew rather than his birth, I think the same three pieces of advice help us prepare for Jesus’ birth during the holy season of Advent.  The truth is that, while our calendars say that Jesus will be born on December 24 at 2pm, 5pm or 8pm, or when Christmas dinner has been eaten and the presents have been opened, no one knows when the Christ Child will be born in our midst.  The truth is that the Christ Child is born among us far more frequently that just on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.  The Christ Child comes among us when we are going about our every day lives, doing every day sorts of things and we offer a random act of kindness, or a experience moment of peace, or gather with folks different from ourselves and discover our common humanity.  And Jesus calls us to keep awake and to watch for those places where the Christ Child is born in our midst, both so that we do not miss those occasions of incarnation, and so that we can make others aware of his presence as well. 

          The late first century Christians to whom the gospel of Matthew was written were weary.  They were weary of persecutions that left them feeling afraid and angry.  They were weary of waiting for Jesus to return, as promised, and to make the world more like the vision described in the reading from Isaiah.  In that world, sword shall be beat into plowshares, spears into pruning hooks, nations and people shall live peaceably together, and no one will learn war anymore.  We are weary of bickering and division, violence and uncertainty, and we can often wonder where Jesus is.  We, too, long for the world described by Isaiah, free of anger and fear.  On this first Sunday of Advent, Jesus reminds us that while no one knows the day or the hour, the divine promise is that Jesus is both coming and in our midst.  Jesus reminds us that while our everyday tasks seem to be the least likely places for Jesus to appear, instead they are the most likely place for us to experience Him.  And Jesus reminds us that if we keep awake and watch, if we put the same amount of effort into being prepared for Jesus that we would put into being prepared for a thief, we will experience the joy of Jesus in our midst.  My belief is that when we follow Jesus’ directions, we will recognize the Christ Child in our midst now, be prepared for the birth of the child on Christmas Eve, and be ready when Jesus returns in glory.

                                                                             Amen.

         

Nostalgia and Anxiety

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Episcopal Church

November 10, 2013

27 Proper C

Driving around Hudson and the greater Cleveland area, I typically bounce back and forth between listening to the news and listening to my favorite country music station.  The news and country music offer two very different perspectives on life.  The country station plays songs with great names like “God is great, beer is good, people are crazy” or “If You’re Going through Hell, Keep on Going.”  However, the theme of many if not most country songs seems to be nostalgia for the past.  The songs are full of longing for what was, whether a relationship, or the time when the children were young, or a time of more financial stability, or when mama was alive or whatever.  On the other hand, the news seems to focus on the future, specifically on anxieties about the future.  What will the stock market do? Where will the storm hit?  Who will or will not be elected?  What will happen if the tax levy fails?  And on and on.  When I get tired of the news, I switch to the country station, and when I get tired of nostalgia for the past, I switch to the news.  And when I am tired of both, I turned the radio off.

Today, the reading from Haggai is our dose of nostalgia for the past.  Haggai’s people have returned from exile in Babylon to the devastated land of Judah.  During the 50 years of the Babylonian exile, pretty much everyone who lived in Judah before the exile had died.  The only memories of the great temple in Jerusalem came from the stories handed down through the five decades of captivity.  Now, those who returned to Jerusalem had the daunting task of rebuilding their lives and their temple. The land had was a barren wasteland.  The infrastructure was in ruins.  Morale was low as the people pondered the somewhat pitiful replacement temple they were able to build.  The people longed for the time when God’s people dwelled in the promised land in prosperity and worshiped in a temple fit for God. 

          On the other hand, the letter to the Thessalonians is full of anxiety for the future.  The earliest Christians believed that Jesus would return right away, and they shaped their lives around that belief.  Everything they did and every decision they made was their response to the question “How do we live in a world where Jesus has been raised from the dead and will soon return to take us with him?”  Now, 20 plus years have passed, and Jesus has still not returned.  Faithful Christians began to worry that Jesus had returned, but they had missed him.  If that was true, everything they believed was for naught.  There is great anxiety among the Thessalonians about what the future might, or might not, hold.

The response to the people who have returned to Jerusalem and long for the past is the same the response to the Thessalonians who are anxious about the future.  Haggai says to the people of Jerusalem “Take courage, all you people of the land says the Lord; work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts, according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt.  My spirit abides among you, do not fear.”  Haggai reminds the people of the way God brought them out of Egypt, not so they will have an even greater longing for the past, but to remind them of the way God dwells among them now.  Haggai calls them to remember the way God acted in the past so that they can see God at work in the present, in the midst of the destruction and chaos of their lives.  Watch, for God is about to shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land.  Look and see where God is at work now.

          Likewise, in the letter to the Thessalonians, in the midst of their anxiety about the future, the Christians are called to stand firm and hold fast to the traditions they were given.  The passage ends with a prayer for the Thessalonians. “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and through grace gave us eternal comfort and good hope, comfort your hearts and strengthen them in every good work and word.”  God, the Thessalonians are told, is at work in their lives now, comforting them and strengthening them in every good work.  In the midst of their anxiety about the future, they are to pay attention to what God is doing in the present and what the good work might be that God is calling them to in the present.   When the Thessalonians find God at work in the present, they can know that God will also be at work in their future.

          Nostalgia for the good old days and anxiety about the future are easy traps to fall into.  We do this as a church when we long for the days when the culture was more church friendly, or families were larger, or the building was new and the pews were full.  We do this when we get anxious about the future, whether something might change, or who will come, or what will break next.  We do this as individuals when we long for the time when the children were young, or our finances were more stable, or our loved ones were still alive.  Or we get anxious about job security, or passing the test, or adequate retirement funds.  All of these are good memories and reasonable causes for concern.  But God calls us to look to the past and see the way God worked in our lives then so we can better see God at work now.  And when we open our eyes to what God is doing in our midst now, we can trust that God will work in our futures whatever they may hold and we need not be anxious.  Anxiety is about fear, and as the wise philosopher Yoda said “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering."  Instead, God calls us to trust God’s words “My spirit abides among you, do not fear.”

Amen.

Persistence

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

October 20, 2019

24 Proper C 

          Since becoming a grandmother back in May, May 22 at 1:17am to be exact, I have found a new dimension of persistence in my life.  First, of course, is baby Evelyn’s persistence even though she is, for the most part, a very good-natured baby.  But when she is hungry, or wet, or wants to be held, she does not stop asking until she gets what she wants.  She is oblivious to the time of day, or what else her parents might be trying to get done, including sleep.  Babies have an intuitive understanding of the unrelenting persistence sometimes required to get what they need.  Babies are all about spontaneous persistence.

          And then there is my own persistence.  While Cincinnati is hardly the other side of the world, the city is not next door, either.  So, we have to think about and plan our visits.  Hardly a day goes by that I don’t think about the next time I will get to see baby Evelyn, how much she will have grown, what she will be doing.  This kind of persistence requires being deliberate, making plans, always being vigilant and watching for a hole in the calendar that would allow a quick trip to Cincinnati.  This is intentional persistence.  Then there is my persistent hounding of our son for photos.  A photo a day does not seem unreasonable to me, but I try to keep my hounding down to every few days.  That type of persistence probably falls into the category better known as maternal nagging, which is a form of persistence all its own. 

          My hunch is that most of us have some experience with persistence. Like baby Evelyn, we learn from a young age that to get whatever we want in life, we have to keep trying, and we move from spontaneous persistence-saying “I want it right now” over and over again, to intentional persistence.  If we want the job, or a spot on the team, or the A on the test, or to learn to play an instrument, we have to be intentionally persistent in our efforts.  Many times, but not always, our persistence pays off.   When we do not succeed, we often wonder whether we should have tried just a little bit harder and persisted just a little longer. But in my experience, and perhaps yours, prayer is the one area where persistence, whether spontaneous or intentional, just does not always seem to reap the results I ask for. Did my loved one not get well because I was not persistent enough in prayer?  Do I believe that if I had just prayed a little harder, or gotten just a few more people to pray, she would have been healed? I don’t think so, but today’s gospel lesson certainly seems to tell us that if we are persistent enough in prayer, we will get whatever we want from God.

In Jesus’ parable this morning, the widow wants the judge to grant her justice against her opponent. In Jesus’ time, judges were entrusted with protecting the poor, the widows and the orphans. This judge ignores the widow’s request, and, because the widow is not willing to take "no" for an answer, she repeats it. This cycle repeats, until finally worn down, the judge grants the widow justice so that she will go away. At the end of the parable, Jesus says "Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them." Jesus seems to be telling us that if we pray long enough and hard enough, if we are persistent enough and if we refuse to take "no" for an answer, eventually we will wear God down and God will give us what we want, just to get us to go away. 

            How are we to understand this parable?

            The reading from 2 Timothy invites us to use the fullness of Scripture to understand what God is calling us to be and do, so that we don’t have to rely on just our own experience and the words of a single passage of Scripture to figure out God’s call on our lives. So, perhaps thinking about widows and judges throughout scripture would be helpful here.                        

In this morning’s parable, we have a widow and an unjust judge. When we think about all of Scripture, we remember that over and over again in the gospels, especially Luke’s gospel, we see Jesus identify himself with the poor and the outcast, the widows and the orphans. In Matthew’s gospel, we hear Jesus say that whenever we minister to the hungry and the thirsty, to those on the margins of society, we minister to him. We watch Jesus care for those who have been cast aside, which would certainly include the widows of Jesus’ time. We hear Jesus say in the Book of Revelation "Behold, I stand at the door and knock." In the Hebrew Scriptures, the one who cares passionately about justice is God. And, through out Scripture, typically the ones who act unjustly and exploit other people, are people, not God. In the parables, typically, the bad king, the rude guest, the corrupt manager, or the stingy farmer represent people, not God.

So, in the context of Scripture, perhaps there is different way to understand the parable of the unjust judge. Perhaps God is the one knocking so persistently, demanding justice. Perhaps the persistence in this parable is God’s persistence, the knocking that will not stop until justice has been served. And in this parable, perhaps. we are the judge, the ones empowered by God to bring about justice, to care for the poor and the oppressed, the outcasts and the victims of injustice. The persistent knocking is an intentional knocking on the door of our hearts so that we may see and hear and feel the injustice of the world and be inspired by God to do something about it. Perhaps prayer is not just about being persistent in asking God to heal our loved ones, ourselves, and all that is broken in the world.  Perhaps prayer is, at least in part, our listening for God to tell us all that is broken in this world and to teach us how to be intentionally persistent in working on God’s behalf to bring about justice, healing, and peace.  When we respond to God’s persistence with intentional prayerful persistence of our own, the answer to the question “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” will be a resounding “yes.”

                                                                                      Amen

Crochet

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

November 3, 2019

All Saints Sunday

Miss Minnie Lee was my grandmother’s closest and dearest friend.

Their friendship spanned at least 6 decades. They were the best of friends, raising their children together, and sharing celebrations, heartaches, meals, some really dreadful wine, and pretty much everything else.

When Miss Minnie Lee was well into her 80's, or maybe her 90's, she crocheted an afghan for me. The afghan is navy blue, tightly crocheted, in a pattern that looks something like a net, but with larger, tight knots much closer together than a real net. I know nothing about crochet, so describing the piece in more detail is a bit like trying to speak a foreign language. The afghan is a treasure not only because my grandmother’s dearest friend made it for me, but because Miss Minnie Lee was completely blind when she crocheted the piece. She had totally lost her sight when she made this queen size, perfectly and intricately hooked, afghan.

How on earth could Miss Minnie Lee crochet without sight?     

     

After pondering this great mystery for many years, finally the answer dawned on me. After she lost her sight, Miss Minnie Lee could still crochet simply because she had crocheted her entire life. Her hands knew exactly what to do, how the yarn felt, how the hooks moved. Of course, sight was a plus, but her brain and her hands were really doing the work, not her eyes. She had practiced over and over again, over the course of many decades, until she got to the point where she really did not have to see in order to create beauty.

Today is All Saints Sunday, a major and favorite feast day of the church. The hymns are some of the most beloved hymns in the hymnal. The candles stir up powerful memories and emotions. The sound of the names of our loved ones bypasses our brains and goes straight to our hearts. So, you might think that the story of Miss Minnie Lee and her afghan is the story of an ordinary saint, an ordinary person, overcoming disability to do something creative and beautiful. And you would be partially correct. But only partially. The story of Miss Minnie Lee is really the story about a woman who practiced and practiced a skill over and over again, over years and decades, until when the time came that she could no longer see, she had embodied the skill and could continue on without her sight. The saints of God practiced their faith in exactly the same way. They practiced Bible study, prayer, worship, Christian fellowship, generosity, hospitality, and acts of mercy over and over again through the course of their lives. My guess is that sometimes that work was joyful and sometimes that work was tedious, even boring. But when put to the test, as the saints of God all were, their faith had become so embodied within them through the constant practice that they were able to live that faith to respond to the darkness they encountered. The scripture they needed for strength was imprinted on their minds. Their relationship with God which had been strengthened by years and years of prayer, sustained them. Perhaps even a great hymn or two dwelled within them to give them hope and courage. The saints of God were able to stand up to injustice, love their enemies, practice radical generosity, care for the poor and the sick, or proclaim the gospel in the face of persecution.  The saints could be the light that shines in the darkness because their lives embodied the faith they had practiced.

This morning, we hear Jesus say "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh." What makes the poor, the hungry, and those who weep blessed? And why would Jesus call woe upon the rich, the full, and those who laugh? I do not think Jesus is talking about the reversal of blessings and woes in the next life. I think Jesus is talking about blessings and woes now. What the poor, the hungry, and those who weep know, that sometimes I forget, is that we cannot make it in this world alone. We are all dependent on each other and on the goodness of others in order to survive. The poor know that we are all connected, as do those who mourn.  Those of us who are neither poor nor hungry tend to think that our success is our own and we forget that we are all connected. On All Saints Day, we do not celebrate the achievements of individual Saints. On All Saints Day, we celebrate that great body we call the communion of Saints. In the opening collect, we prayed "Almighty God, you have knit together the elect in one communion and fellowship in the mystical body of Jesus Christ, our Lord."    This All Saints Sunday, we will baptize Maisie O’Sullivan.  In baptism, she will become part of the communion and fellowship that we celebrate this day.  We promise to help Maisie practice the faith, day in and day out, so that her faith is embodied within her.  We promise to model for her the vows of the baptismal covenant which are the concrete ways that we embody our faith and recognize our connection with all humankind. That is the work of the saints and that is the work to which we commit ourselves in baptism.

As we remember those who have gone before us, their deep faith and their impact on our own lives, All Saints Day calls us to practice our faith the way Miss Minnie Lee practiced her crochet-over and over again until, when the light was gone, she could crochet in the darkness. All Saints calls us to be as connected to each other as we feel this day towards those who have gone before us, because faith is first practiced in community. And, in the midst of the candles, our prayers, the music and emotion of this day, All Saints calls us to go out into the world as people who embody our faith and be the light that shines in the darkness.                                                                 

 Amen.

Proud

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

October 27, 2019

25 Proper C

          Next Sunday, we celebrate All Saints’ Sunday with glorious music and a baptism at the later service, and the reading of the names of our loved ones who have gone before us at both services.  We sing some of the best hymns in our hymnal and we light candles as we remember the pain of loss and the hope of resurrection.  All Saints is my favorite feast day, bar none.

          Next Sunday, we also celebrate the success of our Capital Campaign.  While some might say that we are celebrating the raising of enough funds to make some substantial improvements to our building, I believe we are celebrating something much more valuable.  We are celebrating the abundant generosity and unrelenting tenacity of this parish.  We are celebrating our commitment to offer the best possible gospel welcome to all who come here, whether for Sunday services, or a support group, or any of the host of other community groups that meet here.  As I have told anyone who asks, and some who haven’t asked, I am extraordinarily proud of the work we have done together, from the cottage meetings two years ago where we dreamed about our future, to the many meetings of both committees and the whole parish to finesse those dreams and make a plan to bring them to fruition, to all the work that has gone into the campaign by so many people over the past months.  I have often found that when a church takes on a rather audacious goal, larger than what the church could reasonably hope to accomplish, the result is renewed spirit and vibrant energy.

          So, I am caught short by this morning’s gospel reading.  I believe I am justifiably proud of the work of this parish.  I believe that what we have done together has been faithful work.  But do I sound like the Pharisee in today’s parable, who feels justified by his faithful works?  Should we not be proud of what we have accomplished and strictly humble ourselves?  What are we to do with our sense of accomplishment?

          The audience of Jesus’ parable is those who trust in themselves that they are righteous and regard others with contempt.  The Pharisee is being obedient to the Law.  He fasts twice a week and gives a tenth of all of his income.  These are admirable acts of faith.  Thieves, rogues, adulterers, and tax collector were, in various ways, all violating the 10 commandments.  The Pharisee does not want to be like them. The Pharisee works hard to live a faithful life and he is doing quite well.  Should he not be proud of that?

          On the other hand, we have the tax collector.  Tax collectors were despised because they made their living by collecting the taxes due the government plus whatever else they could extort out of people to pay themselves.  There was no IRS to pay them a salary.  The tax collector cannot even make himself look up to heaven, he is so aware of his sinfulness.  He can only beat his breast and say “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” 

          Then we are told that the tax collector went home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted.  Clearly, we are to imitate the behavior of the tax collector rather than the Pharisee.

          But what, exactly, are we to imitate?  Does God not want us to do good works like the Pharisee?  And wouldn’t God rather us not work at jobs that exploit other people, like the tax collector?

          The reading from Joel reminds us that the rain and the grain, the wine and the oil, all come from God.  Everything we have comes from God.  Then Joel tells us that God will pour out God’s spirit on all flesh, and sons and daughters will prophesy, old men will dream dreams and young men will see visions.  All the good that we do comes from God’s spirit working within us.  That, I believe, is the difference between the Pharisee and the tax collector.  The Pharisee has everything under control. He is making a report of his good works.  He asks nothing of God and seems to need nothing from God.  His identity comes from his acts of piety and not being like the thieves, rogues, adulterers, and tax collectors.  The tax collector, on the other hand, makes a request of God.  “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”  The tax collector has no good works to fall back on and he is, well, a tax collector.  He knows he needs God and asks for God’s mercy.  His identity comes from his relationship with God and the gift of God’s mercy.    

          Jesus is speaking to those who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt.  If I am proud of all that we have accomplished at Christ Church and think our accomplishments make us better than others and secure our relationship with God, then I am sadly mistaken and I am behaving like the Pharisee.  But the career choice of the tax collector is not what Jesus holds before us this morning, either.  What Jesus holds before us is the knowledge that our identity comes, not from our accomplishments, however amazing those might be, but from our relationship with God, which is rooted in God’s mercy.  All that we accomplish is God working through us.  And one of the things we have learned at Christ Church is that, in the words of a passage from the letter to the Ephesians, God working through us can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine.  As long as we put our trust in God working through us, I believe this rector and all of us can be both proud and humbled by the work God is doing in and through Christ Church!

                                                                             Amen.

Potential

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

October 13, 2019

23 Proper C

          Helen Myers was a 90 plus year old parishioner in my former parish when she called about 12 years ago and asked me to come visit her.  I was a little surprised, since I had just visited Helen the week before.  But she was an absolute delight and time spent with her was always a treat.  We set a date for the following week.

          After exchanging pleasantries, Helen got right to business.  She had an investment account with $103,000 in it.  That money was not doing anyone any good sitting in that account and she wondered what the church might do that sum.  On the one hand, the church had a wonderful, historic organ with two divisions still in need of restoration.  Helen had contributed generously to the restoration of the first three divisions of the organ, so perhaps she would be interested in that project.  On the other hand, the roof on the church was at least 10 years past its prime and the vestry hoped to replace the asphalt shingles with a slate roof to restore the historic integrity of the 1870’s building.  Helen thought about these options for about a nano-second before reminding me that her husband had been an engineer and that he would want to take care of the roof.  What was the point of having a fine organ if the roof could not keep the water off the instrument?

          And so, we had the advance gift for a capital campaign that put a beautiful slate roof on our historic building.  But there is more to this story than simply abundant generosity.

Helen was born in 1916 and attended a small Presbyterian church. She grew up poor, even before the Great Depression when everyone in Springfield, Ohio was poor.   She married her high school sweetheart, Charles, who grew up in the Episcopal Church in Springfield and sang in the choir as a young boy. After they married, Helen and Charles moved to Pennsylvania and Connecticut and other places before returning to retire in Springfield.  Charles died suddenly shortly after retiring and at some point thereafter Helen joined the church where her husband had been raised, going to the Wednesday morning Eucharist until she could no longer drive, sending out reminder cards for various ministries for many years, and consuming every issue of the newsletter as soon as the newsletter came out.  However, she was only rarely able to set foot in the church building and knew very few of the people in the parish other than what she read about them in the newsletter.

So, you might wonder what inspired such generous love for a church that Helen really never attended.   

When Charles, Helen’s husband, was a young boy growing up as an Episcopalian in Springfield, his father died.  His mother worked hard to raise Charles, but times were difficult financially and life was a struggle for them.  The people of that church stepped in and made sure Charles stayed in school and the family had what they needed.  Those folks mentored Charles, encouraged him, and saw that he finished high school.  When Charles graduated, the general expectation of family and friends was that Charles would get a job and support his mother.  But the people of the church stepped in again and prevailed.  They saw potential in Charles and made sure he had the resources to go college and reach his goal to become an engineer.  When he graduated from Ohio State with his degree in engineering and had a job, he and Helen married after having dated for about 8 years, and they began their moves around the country.  Charles’ career as an engineer was long and quite lucrative.

To her dying breath, Helen was extraordinarily grateful for what the church had done for her husband, and thus her family, some 90 years prior.  Helen considered her generosity to be simply an expression of her gratitude to a church that transformed the life and the potential of one child and that child’s future family.  Her deep love for the church was born of that gratitude.  Her generosity was gratitude in action.

This morning, we hear the story of Jesus and the 10 lepers.  Nine of the lepers are, in my opinion, unfairly criticized for failing to return and thank Jesus.  They were only doing exactly what Jesus told them to do.  “Go and show yourselves to the priests.”  While the 10th leper’s act of gratitude may be a little demonstrative for us reserved Episcopalians, obviously the point is that the healed man understood the magnitude of what had been done for him and was filled with such gratitude that he could do nothing but return to give thanks.  The parallel between the story of the healed man and Helen’s story is clear.  Helen also understood the magnitude of the difference God, through the church, had made in her husband’s life and in her own, and she acted on that gratitude.

Gratitude and generosity are both commendable and well worth imitating.  But I think there is a challenge in Helen’s story that runs even deeper than the challenge to think about how our own lives reflect our gratitude for all God has done for us.

Helen’s gratitude in the last decades of her life was for what a church had done for her husband when he was a child in the 1920’s. What are we doing as a parish, both as individuals within a parish and as a parish as a whole, that 90 years from now will cause someone to look back with the kind of gratitude Helen had for her church?  How are we working to be a community of faith that will inspire that kind of gratitude?  My hunch is that there was no vestry resolution to take care of Charles, no sermon from the rector, and no committee or Ministry Team got involved.  My guess is that some folks got together, saw a need and recognized potential, and made something happen that transformed a life.  In the story of the 10 lepers, Jesus saw a need, had the ability, recognized potential and made something happen, too.  Where do we see need, recognize potential, and have the ability to make something happen?  The reading from Jeremiah reminds us that we are called to take action now, where we are presently located, in the current circumstances of our lives, and not wait until our life situation changes to something more suitable for doing the work of God.  Jesus calls us to see need, recognize potential, and use our abilities to make amazing things happen now.  Our response to that call will transform both our lives and the lives of others.  Both the story of the 10 lepers and the story of Helen Myers call us to gratitude and generosity, no doubt about that.  But these stories also remind us of Jesus’ call to see need, to recognize potential, and to be generous with our abilities.  Such faith is the stewardship of our lives in action.                                                 

                            

Amen.

Gap

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

September 29, 2019

21 Proper C

          “Mind the gap” is a phrase used in England to remind people to be careful as they step off the subway onto the platform.  “Mind the gap” is a lovely British way of saying “watch your step.” However, “mind the gap” seems to have implications beyond getting off the train.  I am reminded of phrases like “Mind your manners.”  “Mind the gap” seems to ask us to tend to the gap, or pay attention to the gap, or be mindful of where we put our feet.  The request is a call to attentiveness more than a warning.  Being mindful of the gap allows us to bridge the distance between one surface and another, to overcome the gap rather than ignoring the distance and suffering the consequences.

          Both the reading from Jeremiah and Jesus’ parable about the rich man and Lazarus seem to be about minding a gap. In the story of Lazarus and the rich man, Lazarus spent his days lying at the gate of the rich man’s house, covered with sores, hungry and humiliated. The rich man spent his days dressed in purple and fine linen and feasting sumptuously. When they both die, the roles are reversed and Lazarus has the far better life in Hades than does the rich man, who wants Lazarus to wait on him. When the rich man can get no relief for his misery, he asks Abraham to send Lazarus to his father’s house to warn his five brothers of their fate. But Abraham says no. "If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead." The rich man’s sin was that he ignored Lazarus lying at his gate, if he ever really saw him to begin with. The rich man ignored the vast gap between himself and Lazarus.  Moses and the prophets have a good bit to say about how the poor are to be treated. The book of Deuteronomy makes numerous provisions for the poor, and the Psalms are full of references to the way God will lift up the poor and crush the oppressor. The rich man may have ignored Lazarus and the gap between the two men, but God was most certainly aware of both Lazarus and the distance of that gap.

           This morning, in the passage from Jeremiah, we hear Jeremiah make what appears to be a run of the mill real estate agreement. The details of the agreement are a bit foreign to us. Jeremiah has the right of redemption by purchase to the land being sold by his cousin Hanamel. The right of redemption is something like first right of refusal, although in the case of right of redemption the land stays in the family. We are given every little detail of the transaction, so between those details and the fact that God endorses this transaction, this real estate agreement looks to be in Jeremiah’s best interest.  However, the property is a very bad piece of real estate and Jeremiah is actually in prison. Jeremiah has told the people of Judah, his own people, that God is using the Babylonians, the enemy, to punish the people of Judah for their sins. Those sins were things like worshiping foreign gods and ignoring the poor in their midst.  For his efforts, Jeremiah has landed in jail.  The real estate is a bad investment because the Babylonians will soon invade Judah and completely destroy Jerusalem. Jeremiah’s property will be destroyed, abandoned, and worthless. But God tells Jeremiah to put the deeds to the land in an earthenware jar where they will last a long time. For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: "Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land." Despite all evidence to the contrary, and in the midst of impending disaster, God calls Jeremiah and the people to hope in a future that is better than their current situation or the immediate future. 

What do Jeremiah’s real estate transaction, and the story of Lazarus and the rich man have to do with minding the gap? In the story of Lazarus and the rich man, and through out the gospels, Jesus calls us to see those whom the world ignores or simply does not see. Jesus calls us to open our eyes to see the need around us. Sometimes that need is obvious, like a man lying at the gate, covered with flies and having his wounds licked by wild dogs seeking blood. Other times the need is less obvious and far easier to ignore.  Who, in our own community, does not feel like a fully valued participant?  Who has needs that we cannot see because we do not look?  Or on a larger scale, have we become so numb to gun violence that we no longer hear the cries of those who have been wounded and see the tears of those who have lost loved ones?  When we mind the gap, we see the people God sees, and create a bridge to travel the gap. 

Jeremiah’s real estate transaction reminds us that God sees hope where we see disaster. Just as God saw hope in Jeremiah’s purchase of land that would soon be destroyed, God calls us to mind the gap between the hope God sees and places where the world sees failure and would give up. We mind the gap when we invest time and resources in children who struggle to learn, or those who feel totally overwhelmed by life, or when we, like Greta Thunberg, decide there is something one person can do to make a difference in the enormous problem of climate change.  God calls us to see and work for hope where the world sees disaster or refuses to look at all.   

Who do we not see because we are afraid to look?  Where do we fail to mind the gap between despair and hope?  Today we hear God call us to open our eyes and look carefully at the world around us. God challenges us to see those that God sees but the world does not, and, despite any impending disaster, to invest in God’s hope for the future. God calls us to mind the gap.

                                                          Amen

Appreciate

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

September 22, 2019

20 Proper C

          Whenever Jesus leaves me completely baffled, as he does this morning, and the commentaries offer no help, I often turn to one of the great 20^th century theologians for help.  That theologian is Fred Rogers.  Mister Rogers, ordained in the Presbyterian Church, invited us into his neighborhood where we were told that we are all appreciated and loved, just the way we are.  He reminded us of the goodness in the world when times were hard and called us to be our very best selves for others.  One of my favorite Fred Roger’s quotes is from his commencement address at Middlebury College in 2001. “I believe that appreciation is a holy thing, that when we look for what’s best in the person we happen to be with at the moment, we’re doing what God does; so in appreciating our neighbor, we’re participating in something truly sacred.”

          What, you might reasonably wonder, does this quote have to do with a parable in which Jesus seems to commend dishonesty, embezzlement, laziness, and self-interest?

          One way to look at the parable is this: The rich man fires the manager for squandering his property.  The manager’s options going forward are limited.  He could dig, but he is too lazy, or he could beg, but he is too proud.  So he decides to put the employers’ customers in his own debt by reducing their bills so they will give him a place to stay once he is homeless.  Since he has already squandered his employers’ property, cooking the books is not a great moral leap for the guy.  Now, the manager has squandered the master's property, and taken 50 or 80 cents on the dollar as payment for debt owed the master.  But then the scoundrel is told that he will be welcomed into the eternal homes.   This makes no sense whatsoever.

          But, suppose there is another way to look at the story.  What if, rather, than assuming the worst about the manager’s character and actions, we approach the parable looking for the best.  What if the manager has so badly squandered the master's property that getting back 50 or 80 percent of what is owed to the master is actually a great bargain?  Instead of looking at a total loss, the rich man is actually getting back 50- 80% of what he is owed, thanks to the manager’s shrewdness.  Given that the manager has squandered the rich man's property, now we have a win-win.  The master is happy to get something back.  The manager is happy because now he has friends to stay with.  The clients are happy because their debt load is now lower.  Jesus follows the parable by saying "Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful in very much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much."  In some admittedly bizarre way, the manager has actually been faithful in a very little and will be welcomed into the eternal homes.

Scripture is full of stories about people who find themselves in tight spots, often of their own making.  In the book of Genesis, Adam and Eve are evicted from the garden for disobedience.  Cain, the first born of Adam and Eve, killed his brother Abel in the first act of sibling rivalry.  Jacob, the trickster, stole his brother’s birthright. In each of these cases, where humans had made a complete mess of things, God could have judged and seen only what was wrong.  But instead, God saw what was good and used each of them to further the story of salvation history.  Jesus called tax collectors and sinners to follow him, despite their dishonorable ways.  So, perhaps we should not be surprised at this parable in which Jesus commends the dishonest manager and calls out something good from his life.  Jesus could see the capacity for something good to come even from a crook, which brings me back to the Mister Roger’s quote.  Perhaps Jesus looked for the best in the manager, seeing the manager as God sees, and experiencing something holy in the man’s shrewdness. 

Jesus follows the parable by saying "Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful in very much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much." 

          Jesus tells many parables throughout the gospels about the potential for something small to become something large.  The mustard seed becomes the greatest of all shrubs.  The yeast leavens a mind-boggling amount of dough.  A small bit of bread and fish become enough to feed thousands of people.  I wonder if the manager in Jesus’ parable this morning was faithful in very little, but Jesus is telling us that the smallest amount of faith can grow into something larger, even in a lazy, dishonest, embezzling manager. 

          Perhaps Jesus is using this bizarre parable to teach us something about what it means to live a faithful life.  Perhaps living a faithful life means living like people who believe that God will take the little bit of faith we have and grow that faith into something larger.  Or perhaps living a faithful life means living as people who know that God will take our messed up lives and help us be creative if not shrewd in finding gospel ways forward.  Or perhaps, living a faithful life means seeing ourselves and all people as God sees us, even those with whom we disagree, or who are different from us, or who are dishonest scoundrels, looking for the best rather than the worst, and appreciating the holy.  Only God knows the gospel difference a bunch of messed up people with a little bit of faith can make in this world.

                                                                                      Amen.