January 2012 Sermons

Love and Realism  -  4 Epiphany (Holy Baptism)  -  January 29, 2012

Genesis 1:2, 6-7; 20-28            Psalm 8 1 Corinthians 13                        Luke 18:15-17 

 I think Paul got it backwards.

In his great love poem in 1 Corinthians Paul declares: “When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.”

Yeah, right, Paul. We adults have really done a bang up job.

Speaking of “adults”—when the disciples get all uptight about people bringing kids to Jesus, he rebukes them: “Let the kids come see me. Don’t you dare stop them. The kingdom of God belongs to those who are like children. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.”

One thing we have to be careful of here is sentimentalizing our children. For example, when our daughter Meredith was little, she didn’t take kindly to having a little brother. (Actually, when I think about it, Meredith never did like having brothers.)

When Meredith’s brother John was just walking, he had one of those roller-thingies, like a big high chair tray with a hole in the middle, but on wheels; he could stand in it and push himself around. One time we noticed John was missing. It turned out that Meredith had rolled her brother into a closet and shut the door.

Today we have three Merediths—Lily, Rylie, and Amanda—and one John—Carson—who will receive Holy Baptism.

I recently mentioned in a sermon how much I enjoyed the baptism class with Brooke, Stephanie, Diane, and Katie. I appreciated how much these women love their children. Yet at the same time, these moms are very realistic about their kids.

This baptismal morning I would like to emphasize how love and realism speak of God and our relationship with God.

The danger of being a liturgical church like Grace is that we can glide through the liturgy on autopilot with our finger locked on the snooze button.

But the baptismal service is a wake-up call.

In a few minutes, the parents and godparents will present the candidates for baptism. Then they’ll be asked “Will you be responsible for seeing that the child you present is brought up in the Christian faith and life?”

 “Will you by your prayers and witness help this child to grow into the full stature of Christ?”

Wow. No pressure there.

I liken this part of the liturgy to Jesus’ baptism. It’s serious, yet calm. Not loud, but powerful. It has suspense: will we keep our promises?

We can dare to make these promises only because we know that what happens to Jesus at his baptism will happen to us.

And we know, if we pay attention, that it can happen every day: “And just as he was coming up out of the water, [Jesus] saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved;* with you I am well pleased’” (1).

If we are all God’s children—and we are—then we too—all of us, and every nook and cranny of our being—are loved fully by God, and God our Father and Mother takes enormous parental delight in us.

This too is realism, but it’s often a reality we have a hard time accepting.

Part of us wants to stay here forever, at baptism, basking in God’s love and delight. But the reality is different. And the Gospel knows this: “The Spirit immediately drove [Jesus] out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan” (2).

Immediately. The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.

If it were me, I’d be whining and complaining: “Don’t I even get a party first?!”

Nope.

Because next in our baptismal service comes this:

Do you renounce Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God?

All the spiritual forces of wickedness? Can’t I keep ice cream? Or at least preemptive invasion?

We moderns have made a huge mistake with Satan: we’ve equated reality with physicality and physicality with reality. For many Christians, Satan is as omnipresent as those obnoxious—and loud—Mor Furniture for Less advertisements on TV, lurking around every Godforsaken corner, ready to pounce. This Satan is a way of seeing God as a great big bully (3).

For others, Satan is some cartoon-character pitchfork-holding guy with horns and a really really bad sunburn. This caricature gives them permission to ignore him.

The reality is different.

Actually, there are two realities, and if we take them seriously, they will change our lives.

The first reality is what Terry Eagleton calls “the lamentable state of humanity.” By “lamentable state” he means

the prevalence of greed, idolatry, and delusion, the depth of our instinct to dominate and possess, the dull persistence of injustice and exploitation, the chronic anxiety which leads us to hate, maim, and exploit, along with the sickness, suffering, and despair which Jesus associates with evil (4).

The sad irony is that if we don’t take this reality as seriously as Jesus does, it not only changes our life anyway, but even controls it.

The other reality, as our baptismal service proclaims, and this community testifies, is God: God’s love for us, and delight for us. The good news, as Eagleton affirms, “is that God loves us anyway, in all our moral squalor.” Jesus’ message, he urges us to hold on to,

is that God is on [our] side despite [our] viciousness—that the source of inexhaustibly delighting life [Jesus] calls Father is neither judge, patriarch, accuser, nor superego, but lover, friend, fellow-accused, and counsel for the defense (5).

God as counsel for the defense is easy. But how can God be fellow-accused? Here’s how: Since we’re made in God’s image and likeness, when we sin God is fellow-accused; when we refuse to acknowledge and confess our sins and instead blame them on others, God is fellow-accused; because Jesus is human like us, when we still today nail him to the cross, God is fellow-accused.

If this were the sum total of reality, then reality would be madness, an endlessly playing post-apocalyptic movie with us as the accursed actors.

But that is not the whole of reality, or even its majority. As Eagleton concludes, as baptism confirms, and this community of faith lives out, God calls on us to do nothing except “acknowledge the fact that God is on [our] side no matter what,” in the act of loving relationship known as faith. “In fact,” he points out, “Jesus has very little to say about sin at all, unlike a great many of his censorious followers. His mission is to accept men and women’s frailty, not to rub their noses in it.”

In the 14th century Dame Julian of Norwich got it right: Christ is mother.

In the 4th century, a young monk in Egypt came to one of the greatest of the desert fathers for spiritual counsel: "My father, I have committed a transgression."

Abba Macarius says to him,

Our Lord Jesus Christ, his face full of joy for you, is like a nursing mother whose face is full of joy for her child. When the child raises his hands and his face up to her, even if he is full of all kinds of uncleanness, she does not turn away from that bad smell and excrement but takes pity on him and lifts him up and presses him to her breast, her face full of joy, and everything about him is sweet to her.

Macarius concludes by asking the monk, and us, a question: “If, then, this created person has pity for her child, how much greater is the love of the creator, our Lord Jesus Christ, for us!” (6)

We have our answer right here, right now. If we want, we can have it every day.

Now I’d call that one fabulous party. Amen.

NOTES

1.     Mark 1:10-11.

2.     Mark 1:12-13.

3.     Terry Eagleton, Reason, Faith, and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate, 20.

4.     Eagleton, 24.

5.     Eagleton, 20.

6.     The Virtues of Saint Macarius 23, in Tim Vivian, trans. St Macarius the Spiritbearer, 104.


Claire Littlefield 

Sermon 1-22-12In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Please be seated.

In our Gospel reading today Jesus says, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” At the end of this, Jesus gives us two imperatives: “to repent” and “to believe.” Repentance is a word that means to change. To repent, you must be more than sorry; you have to be willing to change your attitude, your life choices, or even your way of living. We must adjust our lives so that Christ and His Message is the focus. When we submit to Christ’s role in our lives and believe in His message, we open ourselves up to the grace and power of His love and become members of His Kingdom. To believe, you must have faith. How can we believe in this man’s message and accept it as truth? I believe it is like the faith my mother experienced when she woke up one morning with the thought of me in her heart and began the long, tedious adoption process immediately and never looked back.  I can’t imagine the faith she had to trust that Jesus would keep me safe for almost sixteen months while she waited for the invitation from the Chinese government to come and bring me home. I’m sure many of you have heard the expression “to take a leap of faith.” This seems like this is exactly what Jesus is asking us to do. He is asking us to believe in Him and His Message, and to have faith that it is good and true.

The same is true for when He asks Simon, Andrew, James, and John to drop everything and follow Him. Nowadays, if a strange man came to us when we were working and asked us to leave everything and follow him into the unknown I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t listen. The Gospel says “At once they left their nets and followed Him.” At once! They didn’t even think twice about it. They didn’t talk to their families; they just up and left. I cannot even begin to fathom that level of devotion and commitment. They had to leave not only their families, but their livelihoods. Can you imagine having a hairy man in a robe and sandals come and ask you to follow him? I know what I would do; I’d run in the opposite direction yelling, “Stranger danger!” I know times were different back then and everyone was usually hairy and robed, but even so, how many of us can truthfully say that we would leave and follow this man? I can’t say honestly that I would. But then again, God comes to us in our most unsuspecting moments. When I was confirmed, Bishop Lamb had all my friends and family gather around me as he confirmed me. In that moment I felt God’s presence more strongly than I ever have before in my life. Although I was only thirteen years old, it was a moment I will never forget.

Jesus’ mission for His first disciples was to “fish for people.”  Jesus Himself chose regular old fisherman. He went straight for the ordinary workers and believed that they would live up to His extraordinary request. Jesus doesn’t see us just for what we are now; He sees us for what we are capable of, and what we will become. He knows what our potential is; even if we don’t. Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you…” Jesus takes whatever we can offer Him and uses it to make His kingdom greater. In order for us to be disciples of the Lord, we must have the same mind set. We must let the Holy Spirit guide and strengthen us so that we can do the very best as disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ.

According to Psalm 25: 4, “Lead me in your truth and teach me* for you are the God of my salvation; in you I have trusted all the day long.”

Amen

Blessings Abound - 2 Epiphany

January 15, 2012 (Year B, RCL)

1 Samuel 3:1-10(11-20)           1 Corinthians 6:12-20     Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17                  John 1:43-51             

Can anything good come out of Bakersfield?

In today’s Gospel reading Jesus is looking for disciples. He finds Philip and says to him, "Follow me."

Now, have you ever wondered why these first disciples just dropped everything and followed Jesus? Was he handing out Starbucks gift cards? Or free dinner at Hooters?

All we know here is that not only does Phillip follow Jesus, apparently the first thing he does is go and find Nathanael. When Phillip finds him he says, "We’ve found the one who Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote about, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth."

OK. That does make things clearer. Phillip believes that Jesus is the prophesied savior of Israel, maybe even the Messiah.

But Nathanael isn’t buying any of it. “Yeah, right,” he says. "Next you’ll be selling me a Bridge to Nowhere. Can anything good come out of Nazareth?"

I couldn’t find why Nazareth had such a queasy reputation. At the time of Jesus it was a small agricultural village with no more than 500 people. In Jesus’ day, then, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" may have been the equivalent of, oh, "Can anything good come out of Pumpkin Center?"

But Phillip isn’t deterred by Nathanael’s sarcasm. He responds, "Come and find out."

Friday evening I met with the leadership of the Unitarian Fellowship in Bakersfield. Their minister is a colleague of mine at school and she asked me to tell them about Grace’s success.

I told the Unitarian leaders about Grace’s history, how and why’ve we grown, and how we’ve organized ourselves. The highlight of the evening for me came as I was talking about childcare, Sunday School, and youth. I emphasized how intentional Grace has been about our children. When I mentioned that we now have 30 to 40 kids of all ages, one guy’s mouth literally fell open. He just gaped at me in astonishment.

The more I spoke about Grace that evening the more proud I became of what we’ve accomplished and who we are.

Think about it. In less than five years we’ve grown from a dozen to over 150 people. For an Episcopal parish that’s astonishing. Grace is now larger than the average Episcopal parish in this country. On the one hand that’s kinda sad, but on the other that fact speaks volumes about us.

But numbers are a mere sideshow, and statistics, as we all know, can be fun house mirrors. The main event at Grace under the big top is our people—all of us—our mission and ministry.

The Unitarians asked about our ministries at Grace. For a small parish our ministries are legion—only in a good sense. Here are a few:

·         Outreach
·         Welcoming
·         Aging with Grace
·         LGBT
·         Daughters of the King
·         Book groups
·         Men’s Fellowship
·         Pastoral Ministry Team
·         Andrew is now working on starting a 20s-30s group.

Friday I got an email from Brooke and Cari that they’ve just begun a Moms Group for mothers with small children. This grew out of a suggestion made at the last baptismal class.

This new group is exactly how a church can work best. One of the moms told me how happy she was that her kids would grow up with friends at church, from pre-school to Sunday School to Youth Group.

One of the highlights for me every Sunday—aside, of course, from the spectacular sermons—is when the teenagers then the little kids come in. I don’t care how much noise they make.

Speaking of moms and kids, let me speak from the heart here. Our baptismal class consists of Brooke, Diane, Katy, Stephanie, and me. I always look forward to this class.

Why? Because we share. In learning about the meaning and spirituality of baptism we’re not memorizing the Creed or a catechism; we’re telling stories, we’re sharing stories about who we are. At last week’s get-together I was deeply moved by the visible trust and honesty, by our willingness to touch others and in turn be touched and shaped by them.

Now the moms are taking that trust and sharing into their homes, building community.

I told the baptismal group one of my all-time favorite Grace stories. At our very first baptismal class several years ago, a large group of us was sitting in one of the classrooms here. We went around in a circle introducing ourselves. Brooke, who was new to the parish, said, “I don’t like straight people.”

We all burst into laughter. Right then I knew Grace was special. Brooke trusted us—at least a teensy weensy bit. Beneath the laughter lay Brooke’s pain. Beneath the cathartic merriment lay the hurts, aches, stings, and even agony of being gay in Bakersfield.

By acknowledging pain we can, together, heal the pain. Celebrating with laughter and embracing with joy and thanksgiving.

This is who we are.

But this is not all we are.

I told the Unitarians about our Outreach efforts, how we raised $16,000 last year. I forgot to tell them about the Grace Family Fund, which gathered another $5,000.

I shared with the Unitarians our horizontal ministry, our mutual ministry, where each and every one of us is a minister in the parish. I told them about our wonderful Pentecost Preachers and about our new pastoral and homiletic assistants.

I’ve talked to Cathy and Matt about their starting a new ministry in 2012: Spiritual Growth and Development. This ministry will plan retreats and quiet days, study and small group sharing.

I would also like to add Matt to our paid staff as a therapist and counselor.

So many people at Grace are doing so much.

In the way she closes her emails Jess has captured this giving perfectly: “Blessings Abound.”

Indeed.

At Grace, abundance abounds.

The Unitarians have two paid staff persons. Grace has nine.

Nine. Think about that. Two clergy, a Youth Director, Choir Leader, Accompanist, Webmaster, and three—count them: three—childcare providers.

We need to appreciate how amazing this is for a small parish.

We need to appreciate even more the hundreds of hours that people here give in so many ways. Last Monday, for example, while the Bishop’s Committee met, Lori and Melinda were cleaning out the Holy Closet.

I said in my recent Stewardship letter that Grace is at a crossroads and a threshold. Numerically we’re booming, in ministries we’re abounding.

But a church is like our bodies. It, like we, needs to continue growing. A parish is like our souls. It, like they, needs to continue stretching and deepening.

Here are the things I believe we need to do this year:

1.     Each of us needs to be an evangelist for Grace and for the Gospel. Tell your friends and family about us. Invite them to church.

2.    We need to get everyone involved. Ask yourself: What can I do?

3.    We’re welcoming newcomers; now we need to better integrate them and make them feel at home.

4.    We need to start a Grace mission in Tehachapi. I’m convinced we can do there what we’ve done here.

5.    We need to figure out our space problem. We’ve just about outgrown this chapel.

6.    We need to continue to make our children a priority.

In a film I showed at school this past week an anthropologist says that people are looking for two things in religion: community and spirituality. While it can be dangerous to make things too simple, I think she’s right.

Grace abounds in both community and in spirituality.

Let us pray.

Gracious and giving God,

May our bodies and souls be abounding.

May our spirits and our lives be abounding.

May our giving be abounding, as well as our receiving.

May our love abound. May our compassion abound.

May we as individuals abound.

May we as a community of faith, bound together by your love,

    In the year and years head abound even more.

Amen.

 

Sermon,  Jan 8, 2012 - Feast of the Baptism of Christ

Grace Episcopal Church - The Rev’d Vern Hill

I needed an alternative to Costco’s lengthy gas lines.  It’s a patience issue; ask Melinda.  A tip from a friend led me off 178 at Mt. Vernon, along the frontage road until Haley Street and Food Co on the corner.  Sure enough; gas nearly as cheap as Costco and NO lines.  End of commercial.  While on the frontage road, I noticed a mini-mega church called “New Beginnings”.   Hard to miss with the huge sign painted on the front of the pre-fab building – I literally stopped.  The sign shouted out a listing of “God’s Ten Commandments”.  Beneath the Ten was a boldly printed single word in red, REPENT; very big letters.  Later at home I went to their website to learn more.  The site invited me to take a test to see if I am destined, at judgment day, for hell.  And yes, to satisfy your curiosity, I am on the fast track.  BTW – it only takes one small lie to get you there though there is the on-line comfort – God will be sad about your fate.  Still we are told, God’s law is God’s law and justice must be served.

With the bold, red REPENT it occurred to me that New Beginnings might be the Church of John the Baptizer if John had organized followers who in turn had created a church.  The message was simple - Repent and Prepare for the final judgment and the ending days.  Be fearful and get your house in order.  If you have been around Grace Church much, you know that Jesus tells a different story which is why we don’t have big 10 commandment signs.  

What about John?  How does the writer called Mark begin his Gospel?  No birth story.  He tells of a man named John who was dressed in camel and ate bugs, who “appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” John was saying that God was coming soon as an avenger in a final war with evil.  For John there are two ways, the way of good and the way of evil.  The time is short for you to decide for one way or the other.  Mark continues, observing – “And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.”

This was no innocent activity.  What John was doing was in part the function of and reason for the Temple in Jerusalem.  A Jew followed the laws in Leviticus and that was that, but it really wasn’t.  Judaism expected sinning and had a process for redemption and absolution.  Go to the temple to be cleansed – ritual bathing - and offer a sacrifice for sins (you bought something like a pigeon to offer to God).  John was claiming to offer that which the Temple claimed exclusively, and biblically as its job (a bit like Starbucks suddenly offering communion on Sunday mornings) – John offered a bath in the Jordan for the forgiveness of sins with the added kicker in his message – the time is short; get in the water.

To this Jordan preacher comes Jesus.  Jesus comes, listens to John and is baptized by him.  That this really happened is one of those things in the Jesus story we can be absolutely sure of.  How come?  Because of the problem.  Do you see the problem here for the early Christians (and maybe for some of us as well)?  REMEMBER - why were these people out there? To repent.  To be forgiven their sins.  Woops.  If Jesus is without sin (and I’ve read that), what is he doing being baptized by John?  There is probably no other part of the Jesus story which created more embarrassment and difficulty for early Christianity than this simple account – Jesus was baptized by John.  

There are nine sources for the baptism – all four Gospels plus 5  non-Biblical Gospels; all seek to explain away the problem.  Each  has its own unique solution – “John announces he is unworthy to untie Jesus’ sandals”, the gift of the Spirit comes to Jesus during the Baptism, the spirit settles upon him like a dove, God’s voice is heard to say “This is my Son”, or Jesus is “the Lamb of God who takes away the world’s sins.”

In my theological simplicity, I don’t really care much about these solutions to the embarrassment.  In my sense of the meaning of the incarnation this problem of Jesus’ baptism by John makes little difference.  I suggest that we occasionally try to remember that there really was a Jesus human.  He did human stuff.  Moreover, he was a Jew not a Christian.  He never walked away from his Jewish roots.  He made no theological statements nor any statements of doctrine.  Neither did he set out to establish a new religion or ordain clergy.  He didn’t even inaugurate celibacy.  Therefore I have to assume Jesus came to John for the same reason as the others throughout Judea.  Bruce Prewer, a retired  Australian minister and scholar comes to pretty much the same thing when he suggests:  “Jesus was baptised along with the common human herd, because he was one of us and saw himself as one of us.  He did not play the role of being a human being; he was one.  His dipping in the river was neither setting a good example nor a public relations exercise...  If this leaves us in a doctrinal tangle about the so called sinlessness of Jesus, too bad.  I would far prefer a tangle, [or] a dilemma . . . than compromise [his] essential humanity...”  

And that leads us to something that really is important -  At the intersection of this John the baptizer story and the Jesus story is the seedbed for Christian baptism.  Here the seeds for baptism into Christ are planted.  The rich symbolism of the whole John story embraces a profound message of deliverance and affirmation.  What John did and where he did it later pushes baptism into Christ far beyond John’s own fear-filled call to repentance.  Baptism into Christ becomes an act of birthing, remembering, and transformation by the spirit.

It is a lovely accident that our first reading today speaks to us from Genesis, the beginnings of created life.  We are told that the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.  What then follows is a litany of “God saids” -  "Let there be . . . and there was . . .  And God saw that [it] . . . was good.  This litany brings together Act and Blessing.   God speaks to the void, to an "astonishing emptiness."  The Word that God utters in the beginning shatters this state of nothingness and sets in motion the first ripples of the will to be – and light breaks upon the infinite expanse of darkness.  As the story unfolds; from the Spirit-wind across the waters, come the living.  Out of the merging of water and spirit our lives are brought forth.  And then, all things are “blessed” very good.

There is a happy intersection of the John and Jesus stories in Baptism.   The Word that shattered nothingness, that created the living, appears completely incarnate in Jesus.  The marriage of spirit and water takes place in his humanity – causing another John to ecstatically  declare, “the Word became flesh and lived among us.” The act of giving birth to the world is given a human face by the baptism of Jesus.   The “creative miracle” from which we emerge becomes incarnate with the descent of the spirit upon the one standing amidst the watery chaos of the Jordan and the chasm between wasteland and promised land.

It is into this marriage of spirit and water that we are received in our baptisms.  From the water we are marked as a child of God, and share in the blessing of divine goodness.  From this watery ordination we are greeted into a new community, others like us who come from the water, who believe that in Jesus is found what it means to be truly and divinely human.  From the marriage of spirit and water comes our Grace family of faith tethered to the on-going passage of the people of faith from the very beginning.

It is common today to believe that Baptism into Christ is about “my believing” or “my repenting”, that I must give the correct answer to the sin test.  But in Jesus’ time “to repent” meant much more than being sorry or remorseful.  In Jesus’ time “to repent” was associated with a return from exile, from wasteland to promised land, from Egyptian slavery into freedom, from Babylonian Captivity to homeland returned – always through the waters.  If you recall Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son, this all should start making sense.  Baptism is the father’s welcome:  being received without condition.   Baptism is really about “receiving”; receiving the full truth about the birth of ourselves, embracing our weaknesses and failures, our moments of charity and acts of love and God’s always present welcome.  Baptism brings to us a new home and new family.

And so, here we are gathered at our faith home.  This is a place of memory – to do everything in remembrance of him who leads us through the waters to life.  This water meets us at the door of the chapel (literally); the Table we gather around feeds us on the truth about ourselves and that we most completely belong to God.  This is a place of truth.  This is what we do for one another in this place called Grace.  Amen.

Readings and Link supporting the sermon:

Kathryn Matthew Huey, Blog called “New Beginnings”

Marcus Borg, Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings, and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary

Daniel Aniel Deffenbaugh, Learning the Language of the Fields: Tilling and Keeping as Christian Vocation 

Father Rick Morley, Rector of St. Mak’s Episcopal Church, Basking Ridge, NJ.  Blog.


“A Few Good Sheep”

Epiphany (observed) - January 1, 2012

Isaiah 60:1-6           Psalm 72:1-7,10-14       Ephesians 3:1-12    Matthew 2:1-12

I have a feeling some visitors and guests were a bit surprised at Vern’s sermon on Christmas Eve. If you weren’t here, I hope you’ve read it or will read it.

Vern decided that on Christmas Eve he wasn’t going to go for chestnuts roasting on an open fire. Just as well. I think Christmas Eve, like most of our befouled winter evenings here, was a no-burn day.

The more I’ve thought about Vern’s sermon, the more I’ve come to see that what Vern preached defines a good part of Grace.

My guess is that on Christmas Eve, in 90% of the churches in this country you’re not going to hear about the poor.

When we founded Grace, we had two main mission points:

·         We were going to be inclusive, welcoming everybody.

·         We were going to be an Outreach parish, living out the Gospel in part by helping others.

Next Sunday we will renew our baptismal vows. Here are two promises we’ll make:

·     We will seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves.

·     We will strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect

the dignity of every human being.

At Grace we italicize “all” and “every”; we don’t put asterisks beside them.



Most of you know that these promises are part of Grace’s logo.

If we take our baptismal promises seriously, we need to add a third mission statement:

·         Social justice.

Does anyone remember what Vern substituted for the Psalm on Christmas Eve?

It was the Magnificat, the Song of Mary.

I didn’t ask Vern why he made the substitution; my guess was that it went with his sermon.

Most of us Christians, even Episcopalians, say we’re serious about the Bible, but are we really? Listen to a little of what Luke has Mary say:

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,
my spirit rejoices in God my Savior. . . .

So far, so good. But then Mary goes all “Socialist” on us:


the Almighty . . . has shown the strength of his arm,
     he has scattered the proud in their conceit.
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
     and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.



What happens if we translate what Mary says into 2012?

God has filled the 99% with good things,
and the 1% he has sent away empty.

I can see it now on the evening news: “This just in! Saint Mary, the mother of Jesus, in favor of redistribution of wealth and class warfare!”

But you see, Luke has nailed it. He has perfectly captured, and forecast, what Jesus will do in his preaching, teaching, and healing.

Like mother, like son.

You know, Vern and I don’t make this stuff up.

Listen to some of the Psalm for today:

He shall defend the needy among the people; *
he shall rescue the poor and crush the oppressor.

For he shall deliver the poor who cries out in distress, *
and the oppressed who has no helper.

He shall have pity on the lowly and poor; *
he shall preserve the lives of the needy.

He shall redeem their lives from oppression and violence, *
and dear shall their blood be in his sight.

Contrast this now with the amazing story told by Richard Hughes, a retired professor at an Evangelical college: an Evangelical student in one of his classes complained about an assigned book, Mountains Beyond Mountains. The book chronicles Dr. Paul Farmer's long-time commitment to combating AIDS and TB among the desperately poor in Haiti (1).

“When I asked why she was bothered,” Hughes continues, “she said with animated conviction, ‘Because it's obvious that Paul Farmer is not a Christian.’”

Hughes says he was stunned.

When he asked the student why she thought this, she responded that she found no evidence in the book that Farmer "had a personal relationship with Jesus." She continued that even though Farmer had healed the bodies of thousands upon thousands of Haitians over the years, he hadn’t preached the gospel or attempted to save their souls. “How, then, she asked, could he possibly be a Christian?”

According to this student, Paul Farmer “hadn’t preached the Gospel.” I guess he was too busy living it.

You may be wondering: Why bring all this up? I bring it up because from everything I read, hear, and gather these days there is a huge chasm now dividing Christians in America.

You just heard about one side (2).

Grace is on the other.

Parishioners have told me that they get uncomfortable when we talk about “sides”; “us” and “them.” But as your Vicar, when I preach, I believe I have four responsibilities:

1.     help us better understand the Gospel;

2.    help us better live out the Gospel;

3.    help us see what impedes and obstructs the Gospel, whether it’s in our own lives, our parish, or our society;

4.    help us to remove those obstructions and impediments.

In the article I mentioned earlier, when Richard Hughes is confronted by the judgemental student, he thinks of Matthew 25. Then Hughes makes this startling point: Matthew 25 is the only place where Jesus offers a description of the last judgment.

When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 33and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left (Mt 25:31-33) (3).

I don’t think it’s unfair to say that when we hear this many of us will say, “Uh, oh. Am I one of the goats? What horrible sins have I committed?”

This is the default setting in Western Christianity: our Original Sinometer.

Then we wonder, “What horrible sins have these ‘goats’ done?” We automatically go to sin.

But that’s not where Jesus is going. His ways are not our ways.

His focus is on the sheep: “you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you.”

Why are these “sheep” so blessed?

Jesus’ answer is straightforward and clear: “for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.”

But in Jesus’ parable, the righteous incredulously sputter, “Lord, when was it that we did all these things?”

Jesus’ answer is simple: “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these . . .* you did it to me.”

Jesus here has just defined both “salvation” and having “a personal relationship” with God. Salvation is having a personal relationship—not with Jesus or God, but with Jesus or God through other people.

Through other people.

As I said, Vern and I don’t just make this stuff up.

Here’s another one I haven’t made up.

Lori has a teacher’s aide whom I—which means we—helped out with groceries this past Christmas. Lori’s aide works part time; she has her degree and credential but with Kern County’s unemployment rate between 15 and 20%, she can’t get a teaching job. She’s a single mom, with three kids.

I asked Lori, “Why doesn’t she get food stamps?”

Lori replied, “She makes too much money.”

Like Hughes, I was stunned.

Underemployed. Single mom. Three kids. She makes too much money.

We as a people have become a nation of goats.

Word has it that Jesus is looking for a few good sheep.

Amen.

NOTES

1.       Why Conservative Christians So Often Fail the Common Good (Part I): http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/tag/richard-t-hughes.

2.       For excellent, and sobering, looks at the dark side of American Evangelical Christianity, see Diane Butler Bass, Strength for the Journey, and Julia Scheeres, Jesus Land.

3.       This is not literal; it’s a parable. Note that Mt 25:31-46, “The Judgement of the Nations,” is a parable, and follows two others: 25:1-13, “The Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids,” and 14-30, “The Parable of the Talents.” Hughes also points to Jesus' counsel to the rich young ruler that he should "sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven" (Luke 18:22).