Michael Seiler

Author: Michael

  • Who’s Scruffy Looking?

    There’s a story I’ve heard a few times about a church that had been without a pastor for quite some time, and was looking for a new pastor. They spent the months interviewing people, and after much deliberation, finally came to hire a new pastor. They announced this to the church, and also told them the Sunday that the new pastor would start their ministry.

    On that Sunday, people came to church all excited, full of expectation. And as they started to come in from the parking lot, they noticed a homeless man near the front door of the church, dressed in rags, looking dirty, and half asleep.

    “Is he on drugs?” some people wondered? “Maybe he’s still drunk from last night?” Some of the people went to the elders of the church and asked them to remove the man, who told them it would be taken care of, and that they should find their seats. More people came, and more people saw this homeless man. And they started to wonder out loud how someone could allow themselves to fall this far. “Isn’t that just typical? Irresponsible people end up being a burden. He should never have let himself get this far. He only has himself to blame.”

    Inside the church, people were still anxiously waiting to hear the announcement of the new pastor. And finally, the elders announced the name of the pastor, and asked him to come forward. At that time, the man everyone had assumed was on drugs or half drunk, walked up the center aisle, and mounted the podium. He took off his dirty jacket, a wig, and a scruffy hat, revealing a normal, well-put together gentleman; and then he introduced himself as their new pastor.

    You have to wonder what was going through people’s minds at that point. Obviously, they had to re-examine their beliefs, and reorganize their thoughts and judgements about this guy. 

    And you have to wonder. Was it all about outward appearance? Was it because the elders of the church had vouched for him? Was that what changed their thoughts about this man?

    Psychology tells us that we are hard-wired to think that beautiful people are smarter than those that don’t fit into society’s norms of beauty. And that we think that tall people are more capable of leading, just by virtue of their size. And that people who smile are more trustworthy than those who frown or who keep an expressionless face.

    And while psychology tells us that this is our initial, hard-wired reaction, it is good that we are thinking and rational creatures, because each of us has experienced a wolf in sheep’s clothing, a salesman with a winning smile who is intending to sell you a lemon. Our hard-wired brains lie to us initially, but it is our thoughts and our understanding that helps us to see beyond the outer facade.

    This is part of what is happening in today’s Gospel. Jesus is turning and reshaping the minds of the apostles, as he helps them to understand the interaction he had with a rich young man. 

    The disciples, as many of the people in that part of the world at that time, assumed that rich people were blessed by God. And the reason for that blessing was because they were righteous. That is to say, they believed that if you were rich, you were more righteous than those who were poor. Or to say the opposite: if you were poor, you were a sinner, and if you were rich, you were the righteous people of God.

    That’s why they were so surprised when Jesus told them that it is harder for a rich person to get into heaven than for a camel to enter through the eye of a needle – a small opening in a city’s wall that was hard even for a person to climb through.

    The disciples had heard the conversation. This man had said that he had kept all the commandments – he had been righteous since birth – and Jesus tells him: “One thing you lack. Go, sell all that you possess, and give it to the poor.” And the man left, sad and upset, because he was very rich.

    Jesus saw the man’s heart. He saw beyond the outer shell, and he saw the motivations of this man’s heart. The disciples had reacted with their hard-wired – or at least – hard learned lessons about life, and expected this man to be a shoo-in to heaven. And instead. Jesus says, “Nope. Not this one. It is hard for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

    Now, despite this story being about a very rich young man with many possessions, this story is not about money. Sure, the young man is rich. And sure, Jesus talks about rich people having a hard time getting into heaven, but this is not about money. 

    It’s about priorities.

    This young man had kept the commandments since his birth, and by all accounts of the law would have been considered righteous. But Jesus sees beyond his outer shell and notices that this young man is lacking in trust. His first priority in life is not God, but his own wealth, and he has put more trust in what he owns than in God, more trust in his own status in the community, than his relation to God, the creator of life.

    This story in the gospel should make us think about our own motivations.

    First, what are our own priorities? If we have money, and wealth, do we find we trust in that wealth more than God? If we have status, positions of leadership or power, do we trust more in that position to help us, than we trust in God to help us? If we have an above average IQ, do we value that more than the intuition that comes from God, and trust our own understanding more than the wisdom of the one who protects and guides us?

    If we put our trust in those things, rather than in God, then we will look at others, and judge them on the merits of those areas where we have an abundance. That is, we will judge ourselves more favorably, and assume the worst in others, simply because they seem to lack where we excel. <pause – longer>

    “Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them.” … Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil?” … And Satan responded, “Now, stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will surely curse You to Your face!”

    And we know the rest of the story. Job, a very wealthy man, lost everything, and we find Job sitting in the dirt, covered in ashes, with boils all over his body. But he couldn’t just remove the dirty jacket, a wig, or a scruffy hat. Because Job was truly at the bottom, suffering in the dung heaps. One of Job’s friends at one point assumes that he has sinned, that it is his own fault that this has occurred to him. Another friend tells him that he ought to repent, and that this would stop his suffering. And then another tells him to repent. And then another friend tells him that only the wicked are punished.

    Sound familiar? Job brought this on himself, it was because he was sinful, because he was lacking in righteousness, because he had committed folly and recklessness before God. But we know that is not the case. Job was a righteous man, who was suffering at the hands of the evil one.

    And this brings us to the second question of the Gospel. What are our own biases? Would we have been the friends of Job, telling him that he was sinful, that he had committed folly against the Lord God Almighty, that this was his own fault?

    The disciples were shocked to learn that rich people would have a hard time getting into heaven. They asked, “Who then can get into heaven?” And Jesus responds, “With God, all things are possible.”

    And then he goes on to say, those who leave house, or brothers or sisters or fathers or mothers or wife or children or lands for my sake and the gospel, shall receive a hundredfold now, in this life, and in the age to come, eternal life. In other words, those who trust in God, more than anything else, will see the results of that trust.

    But in the meantime, if they have forsaken house and land, family and friends, for the sake of God, we might see them where they are, and not where they are going. We might see them where they are, and not as they will become. We might see them where they are, but not where God will take them.

    They may be for now, sitting in the dirt, covered in ashes, scraping at boils, and we might consider that they have brought it on themselves, but we cannot know why they are there, or what God has in store for them in the future.

    “Many who are first will be last, and many who are last, will be first.”

    When we put our trust in God above all else, when we begin to see people for the potential as children made in the image of God, when we begin to treat people with the dignity due that potential, regardless of where they are now, that is when we begin to see the abundance of life that God has promised to all.

    It could be us sitting in the dung heap. It could be us, covered in ashes. And yet, we could be as righteous as Job. 

    Wouldn’t we, in that situation, want to be seen and recognized as the Child of God that we are?

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on October 13, 2024.]

  • Alignment

    Just the other day, I went shopping at IKEA, and in the self-serve area, I managed to grab a shopping cart that had one of those wheels that seemed to have a mind of its own. Every time I hit a little seam in the concrete, the cart would dramatically swerve off in the direction of the rut. It ended up being more of a workout than a shopping experience. 

    Now, I suppose that I could have kicked that wheel repeatedly until it fell off, since it was causing my cart to stumble, but in the end, I just kept pulling the cart back into alignment. It was more work, but I was able to keep the cart in one piece that way.

    In the Gospel passage today, we see that John has seen someone casting out a demon in the name of Jesus, and tried to stop him because he did not belong to their little band of disciples. But Jesus tells him that if the person is doing good in the name of Jesus, that he should not stop them, because, “If they are not against us, then they are for us.” In other words, “It doesn’t matter if they are a part of us. If they are not actively opposing us, then they are basically on our team.”

    If the four wheels on my shopping cart were all different people, then I would have said that the only one actively opposed to our mission was the one that kept flopping around, trying to get us to smash into a shelf of glass bowls. But, it’s true that any of the other four wheels could not have cared about where I was trying to go. They weren’t deliberately trying to yank us off course, and so I would never have known where their true allegiances lay, because as far as I was concerned, they were all in alignment.

    What’s interesting in this passage is that Jesus goes from talking about alignment to talking about sin. He goes from talking about the alignment of people to the greater mission of Jesus in this world, to talking about our own alignment with Jesus. If our hand, your foot, your eye, causes you to stumble – that is, to sin – then cut them off and throw them away, because it’s better for you to go about maimed in life, than to set yourself on a course of destruction. Or, to put it into my shopping cart analogy, it is better to pull off the wonky wheel of the shopping cart that is your life, and run around with three wheels than it is to smash your shopping cart into a shelf full of glass. 

    Now, in order to understand that our actions are causing us to stumble, we need a few things. Namely, we need to know what sin is. And to know what sin is, we need knowledge, which comes from reading scripture, and from spending time with others who might teach us. But more than knowledge, what we need is to acknowledge that what we are doing is causing damage to us or to others. That’s called self-awareness. And it might seem like that is an easy thing, but we only ever get self-awareness in two ways: from the Holy Spirit, or from others in community. We might know what sin is, but lack self-awareness that we are embracing it. Remember that saying about a sliver in someone else’s eye, while we ignore the log in our own eye? How are people going to know about the sliver in their eye, unless we tell them? And how are we going to know about the log that is resting in our own eye? Unless we also have the humility to allow others to tell us that, and unless we have the trust built up with others that we give them the permission to point these things out in our lives, then we are just a person with enormous knowledge of the bible, but without the ability to affect much change in our lives, or the lives of others, because we are effectively isolated from each other.

    Well, this is where Jesus’ admonition to acknowledge our sin and take action to change it comes squarely into play with the passage in James today. James was part of the early church in Jerusalem, and here we see how that early community was attempting to live with the reality that each of us can, at times, be a wonky wheel on the shopping cart of life. We cause others to veer off course, to cause themselves and the community damage, and we may not even realize what we are doing.

    “Are any among you suffering? They should pray.” 

    “Are any cheerful? They should sing songs of praise.”

    “Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord.”

    “Confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed.”

    If you look at these things, you see that the consistent thread is prayer. And the second consistency is community. That is, James and his merry band of believers were attempting to break down the isolation that comes from sin and pride. You see, even when we are aware of the sins in our lives, and acknowledge that they are there, we often do not want to share that with people. And so we live in isolation, and we suffer silently and alone. We are ashamed, and we live with guilt, and yet, we still do not want to confess those things to others, out of fear of rejection.

    And it is here, in this space, this type of thinking that we can become that wonky wheel that throws the whole cart out of whack, that causes damage to ourselves and others, and causes us and the whole community to veer off course. Because we carry too much pride, and too much fear to allow others to care for our souls.

    The prayer, the confession, the sharing and singing for joy that James brings up in this passage are all intended to first and foremost bring the community of believers into alignment. They are intended, not to make sure that everyone conforms to a particular set of beliefs, but that we all at least come to the realization that we are moving toward a larger goal. These calls to prayer and confession in James are intended, at the very least, to get us to quit being actively against our own good, and against the greater good of the community of believers. They are intended to at least make sure that we are not against one another – and therefore, for one another: aligned. Aligned with a common goal, which is to point ourselves, and our community toward God. Because it is in God alone that we are truly aligned, and can find our rest and comfort.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on September 29, 2024.]

  • A Child’s Reflection

    “Stop acting like such a child!” 

    “Grow up!”

    “You’re so immature!”

    I’m sure we’ve all heard those phrases before, either because we said them to someone else, or they said them to us. And we all know exactly what those words mean when we hear them. We want people to behave more rationally, to be more responsible, to quit being so emotionally reactive to events that do not go their way. 

    There’s a story about an old man giving advice to a younger man about the battle of good and evil within him. I’m sure you’ve seen it either on social media, or had someone tell it to you at some point in your life. The story is about two wolves, and the one that wins the battle, the story says, is the one that a person feeds the most. I’d like you to take the general idea of this story, but instead of two wolves doing battle for your soul, I want you to think of two children. Because within each of us are two children that are battling for our souls.

    The first is the angry toddler. The one with tiny hands, grabbing everything he can get his hands on, and greedily yells, “Mine!” He thinks of everything as a transaction; if you scratch his back, he’ll scratch yours; right up until he doesn’t like your backscratching anymore, and at which point he will run off and find someone else to take your place. He blows up when things don’t go his way, or he doesn’t get what he wants. He blames others for all of his problems, because nothing is ever his fault. When you finally catch him or confront him, he lies, he cheats, or accuses you of blowing things out of proportion. A royal pain, a child that is spoiled rotten to the core. 

    It’s this kind of behavior that we see in the letter from James today. It might be more grown up, and hidden better from the eyes of those watching, but the same attitudes and vices that the young toddler never learned to control are now running rampant in the grown adult, coming out as envy and selfish ambition. And that leads to disorder, and wickedness of every kind. And James makes it clear that these conflicts come from the “cravings that are at war within you.” And worst of all, he ends the thought with the command that people should purify their hearts, because they are double-minded. That is, James recognizes that we have the choice to make decisions between the good, and the bad, and that the battle rages between the selfish, angry toddler within us, and another child.

    There’s another meme that’s been making the rounds on social media recently, which says this: “Silence is golden. Unless you have kids. Then, it’s just suspicious.”

    And this we see in the disciples today in our Gospel passage. People we now call saints, but at that moment were still behaving like spoiled little toddlers who wanted what they wanted, and were willing to argue about it.

    Jesus and his disciples were passing through Galilee, and as they were walking, the disciples were arguing about who among them was the greatest. That is, they were displaying the old “King of the Hill” mentality, wanting to be better than the others, propping themselves up at the expense of the other disciples, so that they could claim the title as “greatest.”

    And when Jesus asks them what they were talking about, they suddenly get really quiet. I’m sure they suddenly got real interested in shuffling dirt with their toes, or the pretty birds that were flying, or even, “Look, a squirrel!”

    So Jesus has them sit down with him, and says to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

    Now, we like to make this passage about welcoming children, because it’s cute. Who doesn’t like children? And besides, we really do need to welcome children as though we are welcoming God into our midst, but this passage was more directed at the attitudes and desires of the disciples, because they were portraying the general tendency of the toddler within us.

    You see, when they were arguing about being the greatest, what they were arguing about was the trappings of fame, namely the adulation, the freebies, the positions of power at the feasts and banquets, the ability to get people to do things for them, or to sway people with their words. They were arguing about vanity and petty pleasures. They wanted all those trappings of greatness, but they didn’t actually want to do the work of truly being great. 

    Moreover, by arguing which one of the disciples was greater than the others, they were willing to get that fame and greatness at the expense of others. That is, they just wanted to be considered greater than the other disciples. Again, they wanted the status, but not the work of being actually great. 

    And that’s why Jesus tells them that to be truly great, they must be a servant of all, and welcome even a child.

    Now, there’s a bit of cultural and linguistic explanation we need to go over here right quick, because Jesus has made a play on words here – a dad joke, if you will – as well as made a reference to the social standing of the people in this dialogue.

    First, the words in Greek for child and servant or slave are very similar. So Jesus telling the disciples that they need to be servants of all, and then pulling a child into their midst is making the connection between those two words. The second bit of information we need to know is that children, until they could truly be put to work, were considered an economic drain, just another mouth to feed, so they were often treated as servants; as gophers, runners, people to do the menial tasks, to help out in minor ways. Once they grew up enough to be of assistance, they were put to work, and given the rights and privileges you would expect of a member of society.

    People generally didn’t think of kids as a way of getting ahead in society. They paid no attention to those kids, because what you needed in order to be great in society was people who would agree to the transactional terms of your need for greatness. They could offer you political clout, financial support, or protection in exchange for whatever you gave them. Children, especially little children, were of no political value whatsoever. They could do nothing to help you become great in the eyes of the world.

    And so when Jesus has made the play on words with the servant and the child, and tells them that they need to welcome a child, he is basically asking, “Are you willing to serve the servant?” “Will this child become just as important to you as the Kings and presidents, governors and minor nobility?” And more than just this child, the question really drives down to the heart of the matter, which is the dignity of every human being. “Will you welcome anyone, that is, everyone, in my name? Will you welcome even those who are of no benefit to you politically, socially, or financially? Because if you welcome this child, or people like this child who can offer you nothing on your path to greatness, you may very well be welcoming God.”

    For those of you who have been anxiously thinking that I’ve only mentioned one child that is at war within us, you can rest easy.

    We all can recite the story of creation, and we know that we have all been created in the image of God. Which makes you, me, and everyone, a child of God. And so when we look at those people who cannot support our mission, or help us toward our goals, or move us closer to the greatness we desire, we must stop and reflect on the fact that they, too, are a child of God. What we see before us is a reflection of Christ – the same Christ that is within us. We should see them as a reflection of ourselves.

    This child of God, this servant spirit, this child that sees Christ within every person, regardless of their social standing, their current status, their health or financial stability, is at war with the angry toddler that just wants his own way.

    Now, to be ambitious is not a bad thing. To want to be great is not a bad thing in itself. The question is how are we willing to get there, and what is our final goal? Is it about elevating ourselves, or about elevating others? Is it about placing ourselves above others, or about bringing others to an equal level? Is it about our own status, or is it about serving the Christ that we see in others?

    When we are able to humble ourselves to serve the servants, to serve the children, to serve those who cannot help us in any way to meet our own selfish desires, then we will have found the path to true greatness, because it is in those moments, with those people, that we often find ourselves standing in the presence of God.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on September 22, 2024.]

  • Can You Hear Me Now?

    The dictionary defines “social status” as “a person’s standing or importance in relation to other people within a society.” That is, a person’s social standing – my standing, your standing – is based on how important other people think we are. And the flip-side is also true. In fact, humans have an incredible capacity to stratify and categorize people in society; that is, we like to fit people within a hierarchy, based on the perceived importance we place upon them. And we use existing words and give them new meaning. 

    Words like colors: “yellow,” or “red.” Words like plants: “pansy,” or “buttercup.” Words like food: “fruit,” “nut,” “vegetable,” or “kraut.”  Words like insects and crawling things: “cockroach,” “butterfly,” “slug,” or “leech.” But the worst words seem to come when we give new meaning to animals: “pig,” “cow,” “donkey,” “rat,” or “snake.”

    All of this is intended to place people into a social hierarchy, to define their status. Psychologists tell us that we do this, not because we feel superior, but because we are afraid. Afraid, most often, of what could happen – that is, our fears that come to life in our own imaginations.

    The American horror writer, H.P. Lovecraft, said this: “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear, is the fear of the unknown.”  

    This fear of the unknown is why our strongest words are often reserved for those who are the least like us, and our enemies, those that wish to do us harm.

    Here’s a bit of the background for today’s reading. Tyre and Sidon were Gentile territories. And in fact, they weren’t just territories that belonged to people who didn’t believe in the Jewish God, but they were considered “enemy territory.” The listeners of Mark’s Gospel would have understood this. The city of Tyre is considered a World Heritage Site, because so much of the world’s history stemmed from this area. In fact, it is connected to the construction of the Temple of Solomon. It wasn’t just a small, out of the way, gentile town. It was a big deal.

    The people there, the Syrophoenicians, were the landowners, and business owners, they were those that would have provided the jobs to others because they were wealthy, and well connected. 

    And the Gospel goes out of the way to make sure that we know that the person who came to talk to Jesus is a woman, a Gentile, and not only any Gentile, but a Syrophoenician. This is a woman of standing, in what Jesus and his disciples could call “enemy territory.” 

    Over the years, we have all probably used some slurs when speaking of others. But also, over the years, we have matured, and we have come to understand others better, and more importantly, we understand ourselves and our own insecurities and fears better, so that we no longer use these slurs. 

    Which makes Jesus using this term “dog” to describe not only the Syrophoenician woman, but all her countryfolk sound like fingernails on a chalkboard to us when we hear it. And it demands that we figure out an answer to what is happening. We certainly don’t want to think of Jesus as a bigot, nor do we want to see Jesus as a jerk, or worse, afraid of the unknown. 

    What is going on?

    The most common explanation given is that Jesus was just testing the woman’s faith, to see how strong it was, so that he could then heal her child and bless her. But if you think about this, you realize that this is just as mean as calling the woman and her countryfolk “dogs.” Here is a woman that has a demon possessed daughter, and she is afraid for her daughter’s life. She is coming to a foreigner, and, as a woman, going against this foreigner’s culture and religious laws, asking to speak with him and beg him for mercy to heal her daughter. And Jesus says, “Sure, but first, let me test your faith to see how strong it is. And if you pass this test, then I will show you mercy.” Not exactly a kind gesture toward a woman suffering from the fear of the loss of her child.

    What we need to realize is that all we have here are the written words. We do not have the tone of Jesus’ voice, nor do we have the look on his face when he said these words. But, given the context of these passages within the Gospel of Mark, we can make some assumptions about what was really happening here.

    Last week, we had Jesus telling the Pharisees and the leaders of the people that they are teaching people to follow their rules, rather than the commandments of God. He calls them hypocrites. And then, he leaves the comfort of his own region, and goes into enemy territory. It is unlikely that Jesus went in and with malicious intent called these people “dogs.”

    For those that were following the adventures of Jesus in Mark’s Gospel, they would have had no issue with Jesus calling this woman a “dog.” In fact, they would have expected it; they would have expected the name calling and the dehumanizing, because these people were “enemies of the Jews,” and not to be trusted. Even the gentiles listening to this Gospel would have expected the people of Israel to behave like this.

    And then Mark’s Gospel turns their expectations back on them, because Jesus grants the woman what she asks. He has essentially said, “Look, my children are the children of Israel. You are a mother, so you understand that I cannot feed you until my children have been fed.” And her response shows that she gets it, and she says, “Yes, but while we’re waiting for that, show me a scrap of mercy, since your children have an abundance.” The conversation is less of one intended to insult the woman or test her faith, but more of one intended to help the listeners understand.

    The people listening to this would have been more shocked by Jesus’ response to this gentile woman than they would have been by Jesus calling her a dog. 

    Over the course of Jesus’ ministry we have seen that when he heals people, he doesn’t just heal their physical ailments, but he restores them to their community, meaning that he restores their social status. A young girl who was demon possessed would have been a social outcast. This Gospel has gone out of its way to tell us that the mother is a woman, a gentile, and an enemy. Any one of those elements of this woman’s identity could have made Jesus ritually unclean, and yet, he speaks to the mother, and not only does he speak to her, but he answers her request, and her daughter is healed. In effect, Jesus has told the people that she has been granted the same love and mercy that his own children have received, and that the salvation of Israel is open to the Gentiles. That is, he had changed this woman, this mother’s social status, from one deserving hatred to one who deserves respect. She had gone from a “dog,” to a “child of God.”

    As if to underscore this, the very next story takes us to the region of the Decapolis, which, itself, is still in Gentile territory. And Jesus encounters a man who is deaf, and who has a speech impediment. This man would also have been lower on the social hierarchy because of his ailment, and Jesus says – to the man’s ears – “Be opened.” 

    Some of you may remember a commercial a few years ago for a major cell-phone provider. The spokesperson pops up in various locations around the country and in places that are remote and out of the way. And in each place, he holds a phone to his ear, and he says, “Can you hear me now?”

    This is where context is important. After this story of the interaction between Jesus and this Gentile woman – and Jesus and the deaf/mute Gentile man – the Gospel of Mark shows that Jesus’ ministry is expanded to include the Gentiles. That is, before this story, the Gospel focuses on the Children of Israel, and after this interaction between Jesus and the Syrophoenician woman with a demon possessed daughter, the Gospel focuses on all the Children of God.

    A quick recap. Mark’s Gospel calls those who would focus on the teachings of men rather than the teaching of God “hypocrites.” Then, Jesus enters enemy territory, and heals a demon possessed girl because her mother was willing to push forward and speak with Jesus against all cultural boundaries. Then Jesus heals a man who cannot hear, essentially saying, “Can you hear me now?”. And then, finally, the Gospel of Mark takes a turn to include not just the Children of Israel, but all of God’s Children, including the Gentiles, those very people that would have been called “dogs.”

    And that is the question for the listener’s of Mark’s Gospel, just as much as it is a question for us today: What do we hear Jesus saying? And can we hear him now?

    This interaction between Jesus and this Syrophoenician Gentile woman often brings up two types of reactions. For the first one, we get hung up on the idea that Jesus was a jerk, that Jesus used a derogatory slur, and that Jesus is a hypocrite himself. The Second is that we want to make this all about the woman herself, and her strong faith, so that we can feel good about Jesus and how he responded to this woman. 

    And both of those responses show us that we would rather not internalize the teachings of Jesus, but externalize them. We want to see Jesus as a bigot, or the woman as a woman of strong faith. Both of them allow us to step back from the shocking nature of the stories, and focus our minds on anything but our own relationship to Jesus, because to do so would require us to change our ways.

    The fact is, just as this story was intended to hit the listener’s of Mark’s Gospel with the truth of their own biases regarding social status and hierarchy, it is intended to hit us the same way. After all, unless you have Jewish ancestry, we are the “dogs” that this passage speaks about. You and I are only here because Jesus’ ministry turned from the Children of Israel, and opened his arms to all the Children of God.

    Jesus has come to save the pigs, the cows and the slugs. He has come to save the fruits, the vegetables, the butterflies and the snakes. And more importantly, he has come to save even those demon dogs, our enemies.

    Each time we find a way to denigrate others, to place them in a hierarchy, to define their Social Status based on the importance we give them, we need to remember that Jesus is looking at us, holding those same people in his arms and whispering:

    “Can you hear me now?”

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on September 8, 2024.]

  • Teddy Bears and Wildflowers

    As I was preparing for the service today, I thought, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a sermon that was the equivalent of Teddy Bears skipping through alpine meadows picking wildflowers and making bouquets to give to people?”

    “I wonder what the Gospel for this week says…”

    Hypocrites! You honor me with your lips, but your hearts are far from me!

    “Well gee…. That’s not terribly uplifting. Let’s see what the Epistle reading has to say today…”

    Do not be hearers of the word only, and not doers. Don’t be like people who look in the mirror and forget what they look like. Act according to what you claim to believe.

    “Okay. Guess it’s time for another sermon on introspection and self-examination.”

    Now, you might be wondering why the summer months have such an abundance of lectionary items that speak to wrestling with our faith. You see, the season of the Church year starts in Advent, with the anticipation of the Messiah. We hear the story of the bouncing baby Jesus at Christmas, his naming on January 1st, the epiphany to wise men from the East, his baptism, his ministry, his suffering, his death, and ultimately his resurrection on Easter. Then we see how the disciples and the early church responded to this dramatic event at Pentecost, and how their response to what had happened helped to shape the future of the world.

    And then…?

    Then we get into the season after Pentecost, often called “Ordinary Time.” In agricultural communities in the northern hemisphere, this season often coincides with the growing season, and especially with the harvest. And so you will find all sorts of references to spiritual growth, to planning for the future, to dealing with difficult situations, you name it. 

    If the first half of the church year is all about Jesus and his identity, his mission, his sacrifice, and ultimately our redemption, then the second half of the year is all about our response to the knowledge of who Jesus is and what he accomplished. And also how that knowledge should inform every aspect of our lives, from how to respond to someone who wrongs us, to how to understand our finances in the light of God’s provision and grace, to planting seeds for a harvest – both physical seeds, as well as spiritual seeds.

    That’s the church year, in a nutshell.

    Those of you who grew up in small towns may remember that one kid – or maybe a few more than one – that everyone referred to as a “bad seed.” That is to say, everyone knew that there was something terrible inside this kid that made him a terror around town, and someone people wanted to avoid at all costs. Let’s call him Timmy.

    And then this kid grows up, and the young man Tim becomes what law enforcement like to call a “repeat offender.” When something bad happens in town, his house is the first place they go. They figure that if anything bad happened, it had to come from this one, because, “There’s something wrong with him on the inside. Ain’t nothing good going to come out of that one.”

    We all probably know of someone who fits that description, and we all know how to spot people who come close to that description. Because we are generally halfway decent judges of character, and can see when people have merely made an error in judgment or had a momentary lapse in their moral compass versus those who seem to be filled with scum and villainy at their core. We recognize that it was what was inside of them that defiled them and the world around them. They may use pretty words, and make promises to be better, but ultimately, their words and actions are always on opposite ends of the spectrum.

    That’s what the Gospel and the Epistle are getting at today

    Only the central figure in the passages today is not Timmy or people like him.

    It’s me. It’s you. It’s all of us.

    We are all halfway decent judges of character, and can see when people like Timmy have just made an honest mistake, or if they are rotten deep within their core. But we are much less capable of judging ourselves with such clarity and focus.

    We say one thing, but do another. We know the truth of the Gospel, but ignore it when we’d rather do something else. We look in the mirror and we see the beautiful image of Christ within us. We see that we are Children of God and made in God’s image.

    And then we turn away from the mirror, and instantly forget who we are. And we act according to our own desires and wishes.

    In the book of Galatians, we hear that the Fruits of the Spirit are Love, joy, Peace, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self-Control. These fruits grow from seeds, and those seeds come from the truth of the Gospel message about the identity, mission, death and resurrection of Christ. 

    And they will only grow if the soil gets tilled and aerated, if the weeds get pulled, and if the soil gets watered. 

    This part of the church year fits into the real world cycle of agricultural harvest, but the lectionary focuses us on the spiritual harvest. It asks us to till the soil of our souls and minds, pulling up the weeds of our own self-interest, tossing out the rocks that stand in the way of growth, so that the Fruit of the Spirit can take root and grow within us. We don’t want people to see dry and rocky soil full of weeds. What we want is a garden of abundance so that people are blessed by the sweet fragrance of Christ that grows out of us.

    Or, to put it another way.

    When people see our lives in action, do they see a “bad seed,” a “repeat offender,” a person who says one thing and does another? 

    Or do they see us like a teddy bear, frolicking in an alpine field, filled with the fruits of the spirit, gathering wildflowers to give to them as a gift?

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on September 1, 2024.]

  • We Can Do Nothing Else

    Several years ago, I read a book on finances, which talked about the concept of creating multiple streams of income – some of which we would call “side hustles” today –  but included things like investing and real estate. I learned the concepts and told all of my friends about this, because it made sense.

    A few years later, when I had a chance to meet up with one of these friends, I found out that he had taken the concepts that I had shared with him, and had purchased a bar with a restaurant. Outside of his day job as a teacher, he was running a successful bar, even though the extra work was difficult and time-consuming. He thanked me for having shared that information with him, because he felt it made his life better, and allowed him the extra money to engage his goal of traveling the world.

    Several years later, I was on a morning walk with my dad, and told him this story, both about how I had shared the good news with my friend, and how my friend had taken that knowledge and put it into practice. And then, as dads do, my father asked the question: “If this was such wonderful information, why did your friend do this, but you didn’t?” It only took me a moment to respond: “Well, I saw no purpose other than to put a few extra shekels in my coin bag. That’s not really a worthy purpose. While I knew that the information was true, I didn’t believe that the effort was worth the gain.” 

    Viktor Frankl, a survivor of the Nazi concentration camps during World War II, documented this need for purpose in his book, Man’s Search For Meaning. Even in the horrible treatment they received, the torture that they experienced, Frankl noticed that among his fellow prisoners, those that had a purpose beyond the immediate day to day were the ones who were able to endure torture, suffering and humiliation. He wrote that the greatest courage that a person can have is the courage to suffer. And, as he watched these other prisoners, he came to the realization that “those who have a ‘why’ to live, can bear with almost any ‘how.’”

    Today’s Gospel is the conclusion of the Bread of Life Discourse. Jesus has fed people with miraculous food, shaken their understanding of the Messiah, and offered them freedom. The people tried to forcibly make Jesus their king, and Jesus ran away, because this is not how God intended to save the world. He offered them eternal life through his own flesh, and told them that they only needed to believe in him and follow his example. He would not become their king, because God had other plans.

    And the people complained, and walked away. They quit being his disciples.

    It is important to realize that they did not reject Jesus because of who Jesus was. After all, they had seen him turn water into wine, walk on water, and feed 5000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. They had seen him heal people, and restore them to their lives within the community. They had watched him make the claim that he was the Messiah. And then, they tried to force him to become their king. They obviously were pretty excited about Jesus. 

    So what gives?

    We know that from time to time, in this region of the world, religious zealots would arise and amass a following, and the people often believed that these leaders would free them from the oppressive Roman rule. These people would mount an uprising against the Roman overlords – and were routinely defeated. These leaders were the strongest men in the room, those who wanted to bring a hammer to the oppressors, those who wanted to free the oppressed, and restore Israel to its former glory. And so when Jesus comes in, heals people, performs miracles, and feeds a group of people the size of an army, they obviously think: this one is it – this is the right one to make it happen for us. Finally!

    But Jesus tells them that they must eat his flesh and drink his blood. That if his body, the temple, is destroyed, he will raise it again in three days. That he will give his life as a salvation for many. That he will offer himself as a sacrifice. And he will do it out of compassion and love for all the people of the world. He would offer them freedom, if they just believed in him, and did as he did.

    And the people said: “Nope! Not going to happen.” And they walked away.

    To put this into Viktor Frank’s framework, they did not reject the “why” of this situation. They did not reject Jesus. They did not reject the “Why” of the Messiah. They did not reject the idea that a Messiah was to come, or the purpose of the Messiah. What they rejected was the “How.” They rejected “how” Jesus would offer the freedom and salvation he promised but not the “why.”

    Or, to put it a different way, they did not believe that the “how” was worth the “why.” They did not believe that the extra effort was worth the gain.

    By rejecting the “how,” these people were really saying, “We want to control how you provide for us, how you offer freedom, and how you save the world. We don’t want it to happen your way, we want it to happen our way.” And because Jesus was unmoving, because Jesus ran away from them when they tried to make him their king by force, because Jesus continued to offer his way, rather than theirs, they rejected his leadership and they left.

    Last week we talked about all the ways in which we consume Jesus, with the ultimate goal being that we take his words and the example of his life as the ultimate model for our own.  But, as one commentator puts it, 

    “The more we realize that faith calls us to consume the body and blood of Christ, to embrace his death and resurrection and to emulate his manner of living and dying for others, the more difficult the journey of faith becomes.”1

    I’ve watched people make religion about rules and regulations. I’ve watched them reduce the entirety of the faith down to the task of upholding those rules. Because rules are easy. Rules tell you where the good stops and the bad starts. Rules tell you where you will find light and where you will find darkness. They make simple the distinctions between right and wrong. 

    And more importantly, the rules are easy to control. And when we can control the rules, we can control people. We can define what it means to follow Christ or deny him, and we can tell people when they are wrong, or welcome them when they are right.

    But life is never that clear. It is a muddy mess. And the path to Jesus is never as clear as “do this and you’ll be right with God. Do that, and God will erase your name from the book of life.” Our lives are a twisted, convoluted mess of “hows” trying to move toward the “why” of Jesus.  And we will never be able to uphold the entirety of any set of rules and regulations just by sheer force of will. And trying to uphold the “how” that we – or others – have set is why so many people look at our religion and say, “This is a difficult teaching. Who can accept it?” And they walk away. Not from God, but from that version of God that would ask them to conform exactly as we define it. Because that is the example we have given. When we choose a religion of rules over the sacrifice, compassion and love of Christ, we have done exactly the same: we have turned to Jesus and said, “This is a difficult teaching. How can we accept it?” and walked away. And people are simply following our example, because we have rejected the example of Christ, and instead have chosen an easy “how.”

    But thankfully, that is not the “how” that Jesus envisioned. Jesus did not make a set of rules and tell us we had better – or else.

    Instead, as our eucharistic prayer says:

    “when we had fallen into sin and become subject to evil and death, you, in your mercy, sent Jesus Christ, your only and eternal Son, to share our human nature, to live and die as one of us, to reconcile us to you, the God and Father of all.

    He stretched out his arms upon the cross, and offered himself, in obedience to your will, a perfect sacrifice for the whole world.” (Eucharistic Prayer A)

    Jesus came not to be the strong man, he came to be the lamb. He didn’t come to destroy the world. He didn’t come to conquer, but to sacrifice. All so that he could reconcile the world to God.

    God, through Jesus, defined not only the “why,” but also the “how.” Jesus said that the life that he would give for the salvation of humanity is his own, and his life is all about sacrifice, compassion, forgiveness and reconciliation. 

    This is the model of “how” and this is the way in which we are to approach the world. We are to offer our own lives as a sacrifice for others, we are to show compassion, forgiveness, and seek reconciliation where possible. Our lives are to be a beacon of light in a dark world, and our words, actions and attitudes are to be the bread of life to those around us – through the example of sacrifice that Jesus set for us. Because that example leads to eternal life. But more importantly, that example leads to abundant life, and it leads to peace and joy in this life as well.

    This is what the disciples understood. When Jesus asked if they would leave him too, Peter’s response was less of a “We don’t have anywhere else to go,” and more of a “Now that we see and understand, we can do nothing else but follow you.”

    Let us pray that we too can do nothing else.

    1. Feasting on the Word, Year B, Proper 16, p. 383

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on August 25, 2024.]

  • Cannibal Christians?

    This week’s Gospel reading begins with the last verse in last week’s reading. Namely, that Jesus tells the people that the “bread that [he] will give for the life of the world is [his] flesh.” Now, this is already a statement that makes an outrageous claim, and we see it when the people begin arguing amongst themselves. But more importantly, the Jewish people would have been under strict purity laws that would have even made it taboo for them to eat the flesh or drink the blood of certain animals. To then add in the idea of eating human flesh would have been disgusting. But how would they have felt about this?

    From 1978 to 1991, there was an active serial killer in the United States who would eat the body parts of his victims after he had murdered them. Most of you are old enough to remember this being plastered across the news because one of his intended victims escaped, and then the police began to investigate. When the police entered this man’s home, they found human body parts, wrapped up in butcher paper, and neatly stacked in the refrigerator and the freezer, awaiting a future meal. 

    When asked why he had killed so many people, the man said that he was incredibly lonely. And by killing these people and consuming their flesh, he felt that they would become a part of him. And if they became a part of him, then they would be with him forever.

    Now, I can tell by some of your faces that you find this scenario pretty disgusting, and outrageous. Incomprehensible even. For those of us of sane mind and sound body.

    I want you to remember this feeling.

    The people listening to Jesus would have wanted the gift of eternal life, and the hope that they would never thirst or hunger again. They could see a glimmer of the beauty that Christ offered, but they would have been confused at this outrageous claim that they must eat his body and drink his blood in order to be a part of him. 

    How can this be? How can we eat Jesus’ flesh? But this is unusual. It is gruesome. It is shocking. It is taboo. What does Jesus mean?

    Now, we have the luxury of looking back on Jesus’ words, and we know that Jesus is shifting their minds from the physical and literal into the spiritual and eternal. We know that when we “eat his flesh,” we are partaking in spiritual realities, even though they may also have real world substance.

    But this still begs the question: How do we eat Jesus’ flesh? How do we eat, partake, and consume Jesus?

    Well, there are several ways, all of which are in our corporate worship.

    The first is what we call the Liturgy of the Word, which is just a fancy way of saying that we read the Bible and talk about it. Our lector comes up, and reads scripture from the assigned readings for the day: the Lectionary. It is through the reading of this scripture that we consume the Word of God. And we know, according to John’s Gospel, that “in the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” This, of course, is referring to Jesus, God’s Word. And Jesus came down so that his spoken words and the example of his life would be a guidepost to us. The more we hear the Word of God read aloud, the more we begin to assimilate these words into our life and attempt to live by them. 

    The sermon interprets those scriptures for us, and helps us to apply them to our daily lives. If you look closely at the words in the liturgy, you will also see how much of the liturgy has been pulled directly from Scriptures, and the inclusion of the Nicene Creed explains in detail what we believe about Jesus, the Son of God. By listening to the reading of Scripture, by listening to the sermon, and by engaging in the liturgy, we are consuming Christ through spoken word. We can also consume Christ in the spoken and written word by reading the bible on our own, or taking part in group bible studies, book studies, and group theological discussions. These ways are pretty straightforward, and they certainly don’t bring up any awkward feelings of cannibalism, but they are, in fact, a way of consuming Christ in our lives.

    The Eucharist is the second way in which we can consume the body of Christ. In the Episcopal church, we believe that the presence of Christ is truly in the elements of bread and wine. And this passage in John is part of where we get this understanding. 

    In the second chapter of John, Jesus told the people that if they destroyed the temple, he would raise it up again in three days. The people thought he was talking about the temple in Jerusalem that took 46 years to build, but Jesus was talking about his body. John’s Gospel then records that after his death and resurrection, his disciples remembered his words, and understood that he had been talking about himself when he said he would raise the temple in three days.

    Like the disciples, we also have the luxury of understanding events after they have transpired. In this passage today, Jesus says that the bread that he will give people for eternal life is his own flesh. And that if people do not eat of this flesh and drink of this blood, they will have no life in him.

    In the other Gospels, at the Last Supper, Jesus uses what we call the Words of Institution when he breaks the bread and prepares the wine – words that we hear every Sunday in the liturgy: “This is my body .. this is my blood … do this in remembrance of me.” 

    At the crucifixion, at the moment that Jesus died, there was a loud sound, as of thunder, and the temple veil that separated the holy of holies from the rest of the temple was ripped in half, symbolizing that God’s presence was available to the world through the body of Christ that hung on a cross as a forgiveness for our sins. And when he rebuilt the temple – his body – again in three days, he conquered death and brought us eternal life, and it is through this temple, Christ’s Body, that we stand in the presence of God. 

    We do not claim to understand how exactly that works. We instead allow God to maintain that mystery for us, and we accept it on faith that in some manner, these elements of bread and wine become for us the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. And we consume them and thank God that we have been fed with Spiritual Food, as we enter into the eternal promise and wait for Christ’s coming in glory.

    Of course, using words like Flesh and Blood when talking about the Eucharist brings up those awkward feelings of cannibalism. And our ancestors in the faith had to deal with the gossip and persecution that ensued from speaking about eating Christ’s body and blood, because those outside the faith would have been as disgusted at the thought of eating flesh as we were at the thought of human body parts in a freezer.

    A third way that we can consume Christ is through the community of believers.

    When telling kids about the Eucharist, we talk about the presence of God in the bread and wine, and we mention that if they have eaten of this bread and wine, then Christ is inside them. And, through the way that our bodies process food, the body and blood of Jesus becomes a part of them too.

    Then, we ask, what happens if your friend eats of this bread and wine? The kids usually understand very quickly that Jesus becomes a part of their friend too, and that now, after the Eucharist, Christ has become a part of both of them. And, if Jesus is now a part of both of them, then they are both a part of Jesus.

    Last week we read Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, in which Paul said that “we are all members of one another,” and that we are to put away all bitterness and wrath and to be kind to one another. Paul also said that we should let no evil talk come out of our mouths, but rather, only what is useful for building each other up, so that our words might be grace for those that hear. 

    And this week, Paul continues with that theme. Paul exhorts the people of Ephesus to be wise, for the days are evil. We must be wise, Paul writes, so that we can know the Will of the Father. Together we sing songs, and together we share our gratefulness and thankfulness not only with God, but with each other.

    Both of these passages from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians basically tell us that our words, our actions, our attitudes, are food that help to grow – to build up – one another in Christ. What Paul is saying is that our words are spiritual food for each other. Our words, our actions, and our attitudes toward one another are also The Bread of Life, because they are fueled by the Holy Spirit, by the Presence of God within us.

    It is when we seek God’s wisdom, and when we seek God’s will that we become food for life to one another and that we feed on the Christ that is in each of us. That is, I consume the Christ that is in you, and you consume the Christ that is in me. Because our words come from the place of wisdom that seeks to know God’s will, and to speak kindness, love, gentleness and forgiveness into each other. 

    It is for this reason that Paul tells us to be wise. Our words, our actions, our attitudes – when they stem from the wisdom of knowing the will of God, will build each other up, will build up the community, the body of Christ, because our words will be like food for the soul. 

    But when we seek our own will, and when we fall into the temptation to behave according to what the world holds dear, rather than what God holds dear, then we run the risk of eating each other in order to build up ourselves.

    We become Spiritual Cannibals.

    That feeling of disgust that we had at the idea of body parts wrapped in butcher paper and stored for a future meal in a freezer is the same disgust that we should feel when we watch people gossip about others, when they slander people for their own personal gain, when they call people names and question the other person’s character for political capital. We should be as disgusted at those who belittle others and denigrate them, denying the dignity of their humanity, as we are at those who would eat the flesh of another human, because in the end, it amounts to the same thing: the destruction of another human being. This sort of behavior is not spiritual food that builds up the community of Christ, and it certainly isn’t spiritual food that feeds a hurting world.

    Jesus said, “the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

    Christ wants us to consume him so utterly and completely, so that we do not consume each other.

    Christ, the bread of heaven is eternal and infinite, and when we consume Christ so completely in Word, Sacrament, and the life-giving words of a Community, we find that we have an infinite ability to feed others with the Christ that is within us.

    As the phrase goes: We are what we eat. 

    We can choose to eat what the world offers us, or we can choose to consume Christ.

    If we eat of the Word of God, and if we partake of the Eucharist, and if we live together in Community, building each other up in love and sacrifice, then what we will find is that we become ever more like Christ. We become united with him, and each other, and we become Christ’s body.

    Let us eat of this bread, so that the Christ that dwells in us might be the bread of life for others.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on August 18, 2024.]

  • Who’s Your Timmy?

    I’d like for you all to imagine yourself sitting in a doctor’s office exam room, waiting to speak to a new doctor about an upcoming surgery. As you glance around the room, you see all the medical posters about the internal organs, the skeletal system, and a poster displaying the inner workings of the heart. The exam room is clean, and professional looking, and everything about the staff that brought you in, and the ambience of this room puts your mind at ease. This new doctor, you think, will definitely be able to take care of me.

    Then there is a knock at the door, and in walks a young man wearing scrubs and soft, comfortable shoes. Something at the back of your mind sparks up a bit, and you think he looks vaguely familiar. Is this the doctor? Or an assistant?

    “I thought that was you! It’s Tim,” the young man says, “It’s so good to see you again!” He shakes your hand and says, “I used to hang out with your kids all the time, back in elementary school.”

    And suddenly you recognize him. Timmy? The same Timmy that couldn’t figure out how to use a can opener? The same Timmy that used to knock things over in your house all the time because he was so incredibly clumsy? The same Timmy that flunked 3rd grade? The same Timmy that would ignore what adults told him and do what he wanted to? The same Timmy that lied whenever you caught him doing something wrong? That Timmy!? 

    Doctor Tim sits down in the chair, and says to you, “I’m so happy you’re here. You’re in good hands with me. Let me assure you that I will do my absolute best with your open heart surgery!”

    I’m sure that your immediate reaction at that point would likely be – “My surgery is  a bit more involved than using a can opener. Not gonna happen, Timmy.”

    Just like with Timmy and his amazing ability to break things, the people that knew Jesus were saying things like:

    “I remember his parents, and how he got lost in Jerusalem when he was 12! They had to come back and find him!”

    “I remember one time he built a table with one short leg, and it used to wobble constantly!”

    “Come on now! This cannot be the Messiah! I used to babysit him!”

    And they started to grumble among themselves. Those who were opposed to Jesus, because of how they knew him way back when.

    Two weeks ago, we heard the story that set up this entire talk about the Bread of Life, the feeding of the five thousand. It was there that we learned that this entire conversation is set within the context of the Passover. And that Passover setting was intended to evoke the ideas of freedom from slavery, and a new promise of God’s provision. The reference to Manna from heaven in last week’s Gospel passage also brings the readers of John’s Gospel back to the idea that something new is going on. Something big is happening. 

    We learned last week that by calling himself the Bread of Life, Jesus had upended their view of the Messiah, and shifted their thinking from seeing God’s provision as merely physical and for their present reality, to thinking of God’s provision for all eternity, and seeing that God’s freedom and provision is intended for all people, for the entire world. All that people needed to do was to believe in him.

    But here’s the problem – at least for some of the people. To believe in Jesus meant to give up control, to give up power, and to give up the hope of future power. And we all know that people in power never want to relinquish that power willingly. This is why they start grumbling amongst themselves. They heard the claims that Jesus made, they followed his logic about eternal life, and they recognized that Jesus’ way of saving the world would require that they surrender their current power, and any hope of future power – because a Messiah that refused to be made king by force would be a Messiah that would require them to make sacrifices. And so, of course, they grumble.

    The interesting thing to note here, is that the word that John uses for “grumbling” is the same word that is used in the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures for when the people “grumbled” to Moses about not having bread to eat. They “grumbled” about being hungry, and they wished that God had let them die in Egypt instead of bringing them into the wilderness. And so, God provided manna – that is, bread from heaven – and their ancestors ate from it. John is trying to make a direct correlation between the people of Israel on their exodus out of Egypt to this moment in time, when some of the people confronted with the true Bread of Heaven in the person of Jesus grow skeptical.

    Which makes Jesus’ response about manna so much more poignant and direct.

    He had already told the people not to work for the bread that perishes, but to work for the food that endures for eternal life. And now he takes their comment about their ancestors ate Manna from heaven, and says:

    “Yes. Your ancestors ate manna from heaven. But guess what? They still died.”

    Which is to say, “All that you are working for, this earthly power, this earthly wealth, this desire that the Messiah comes and does what you want – all of that is still just thinking about the here and now, this present age. Don’t do that. Work for the things that are eternal and will carry you through more than just this life by believing that God has sent me.”

    And the people grumbled.

    One of the phrases that may be going through your mind right now is, “Familiarity breeds contempt.” And that is definitely what is going on with Jesus and those who opposed him. Just like we wouldn’t want a clumsy little oaf like Timmy doing our open heart surgery, these people didn’t want to wrap their heads around the idea that the future of their faith revolved around a carpenter’s son, someone they had known all of his life.

    For those of us who come to church, we may be thinking, “Oh good! I already believe in Jesus. I’m not opposed to thinking of Jesus as the spiritual manna from heaven.”

    But there is more to the Bread of Life than just the belief that Christ died and rose again to begin our reconciliation with God. There are the promises that Christ made for those that follow him, such as peace, joy, love and patience. There is the matter of life, eternal life, and even, the promise that Christ came that we have “abundant life.”

    What is this abundant life?

    Every Sunday, here at St. Alban’s, we sing the song, “Let there be peace on earth,” right before the Passing of the Peace. And the words within that song state that if God is our creator, then we are all siblings, and all of us are children of God.

    What that means is that the promise of abundant life, the promise of peace, of joy, of patience and forgiveness of sins has been inherited by all of us. We are all living members of the body of Christ and heirs of God’s eternal kingdom.

    In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, our New Testament passage today, he says:

    Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, and be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you. Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children, and live in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

    God has offered all these promises through believing in Jesus, the Bread of Life, and you, and I, and each of us, has become an heir in God’s kingdom because of it. And if each of us is an heir, then we ought to treat each other as royalty and respect the dignity of everyone. It is when we are imitators of God, that this abundant life begins to take hold, and this blessed ideal of peace, love, forbearance and tolerance starts to take shape in our minds and we can almost touch and feel and see how an abundant life could form among a community of believers. We can smell the sweet fragrance of love, joy, peace and gentleness wafting through the room, as we imagine what a life of sacrifice for God and each other can manifest in our lives and community.

    And then Timmy walks in. Clumsy, oafish, not-so-bright Timmy. Timmy, whom we know just a little too well, and whom we cannot trust to do the right thing. Timmy, who irritates us at our core, and makes us not just skeptical, but whose actions grab our heart and harden it, so that we directly oppose the idea that anyone should show any sort of love and patience to him. Timmy, whom we wish could be taught a lesson.

    For Timmy’s sake, of course. 

    This response is the exact same response that those who opposed Jesus had. Just like them, we do not wish to give up any kind of power, and we most certainly do not want to imitate God, and offer ourselves as a sacrifice and fragrant offering for God’s work of reconciling the world to himself. Especially if the person who needs to see our sacrifice is Timmy.

    But this is precisely the work that is needed.

    And this is why we too, sometimes, grumble and complain, and stand in opposition of the work that God is doing in this world. 

    We all have at least one Timmy in our lives. Sometimes multiple Timmys. We need to identify the Timmy in our life, and recognize that they are just as much a child of God as we are. That they have inherited eternal life and forgiveness of sin, just like we have. That they have the promise of eternal life, just like we do. And we need to try and understand why we are so opposed to them and what they do – because our opposition is often more based on what’s going on inside of us, than what’s going on with Timmy.

    And then, we offer them the Bread of Life through the same compassion and love, through the same grace and mercy that Jesus offered us when he offered his life for our sake.

    Because then we will in fact, begin to smell the sweet fragrance of Christ in our midst.

    And we will recognize that the Bread of Life is food for everyone.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on August 11, 2024.]

  • The Food That Endures

    If we were to look at today’s Gospel as one episode of a miniseries, we would start out with a tableau of Jesus feeding the five thousand people. We would see the people laughing and patting their bellies because they were so full, more full than they had ever been. … Fade to black … then we come back in, and the people are talking to themselves, “We should make him king!” And then a scene of a horde of people chasing down Jesus, whom we see running off, and hiding. .. Another Fade to Black scene … and then the opening credits for today’s episode.

    And despite this being a new day. The only difference is that instead of running from the crowd of people, Jesus stands up and confronts them.

    You see, when the crowd figured out that Jesus had disappeared, they too got into boats and went searching for Jesus. When they found him, he was in Capernaum. They were still looking to make him their earthly king, and they were still in search of provision, of food, and of securing their future. They had seen the miracles of healing and glories unimaginable – and they were swayed instead, by Jesus feeding them with an abundance of food beyond their capacity to eat it all.

    And Jesus calls them out for this behavior, telling them that they are not looking for him because of the signs – or miracles – that they saw, but because they had eaten their fill of food.

    It’s important to note that in John’s Gospel, the word “signs” is used where other gospels talk about “miracles,” because in John’s Gospel, all the miracles that Jesus does are actually “signs” that are pointing to Jesus’ true nature as the Messiah, the chosen of God, the beginning and the end of God’s purpose and provision.

    So, what Jesus is saying to them here is basically, you are not looking for me because you saw the signs and recognized that I am the Messiah. You are only looking for me because of what I did for you, and what you think I can do for you in the future. You’re not concerned about me as God’s Chosen, you’re concerned about me as your meal ticket, your provider of the miraculous, your servant who does what you want.

    And then Jesus shifts their thinking, from the old way of looking at God’s provision as physical safety and comfort to faith in the Son of Man. He says:

    “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal.”

    And so they ask, “What must we do to perform the works of God?”

    And Jesus says, “This is the work of God: that you believe in him whom God has sent.” In other words, Jesus is saying, I am God’s provision for you; believe in me and what I am and will teach you, and God will provide for you in eternity, because I am the one whom God has sent for your salvation. Or, more bluntly put, I am the Messiah.

    And the people respond: “Well, that obviously can’t be you. If it was you, then you would show us a sign – a miracle – to prove it. Our ancestors gave us manna in the wilderness, Our ancestors gave them bread from heaven to eat. Sure, Jesus, you fed us beyond our capacity, but that’s just not a good enough sign to show us that you’re the Messiah.”

    Have you heard of the concept of a paradigm shift? The idea is that we have lived with one paradigm – one way of looking at the world – for so long, that when another viewpoint comes along we initially throw up our hands and remain skeptical. Skeptical even, to the point of resistance, because the claim seems to be so cataclysmically different than what they have known that the shift simply seems too grandiose and outrageous. 

    One such moment in history came when Nicholas Copernicus published his book arguing that the earth revolves around the sun, and not the other way around. “Heresy!” said the members of the church – both protestant and catholic alike. God created humankind, and because we were God’s chosen, the concept that we were not the center of the universe simply could not be. Oddly enough, the views expressed by Copernicus were not immediately refuted, because Copernicus was actually well known in the Catholic church, and respected. It was when other scientists, less involved with the church, began to build upon the knowledge that Copernicus provided with new ideas that threatened the status quo, that Copernicus’ books were banned, and his ideas placed under quarantine. Change was coming, and it was coming too fast for some people to bear, and so they responded with skepticism and resistance.

    This is essentially what is going on for the people here. They had been looking for a Messiah, and had been looking for signs that would show him to be God’s Chosen, but they were expecting a Messiah of their own making, and not the Messiah that God had actually sent. They were looking for Jesus in the old paradigm, and signs to fit that viewpoint.

    This is the start of their skepticism and resistance, and while they are expressing their disbelief, Jesus confirms exactly what they are thinking:

    It wasn’t your ancestors who fed you with bread from heaven, it was God. God sent that provision, and God also gives you the true bread from heaven. And that bread, that bread alone gives life to the world.

    “Sir,” the people responded, ”give us that bread. And not just now, but always.”

    And Jesus responds: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”

    If you thought people were skeptical before, imagine their skepticism now. If there was ever a grandiose claim to be made, this is a paradigm shift of epic grandeur:

    I am God’s provision for you. 
    I am the one whom God has sent to save you and to care for you.
    I am the one who will provide for you for all eternity. 
    I am life, and life abundant.
    Believe in me and you will never hunger, and you will never thirst.

    People wanted a messiah who would work for them according to their desires, who would provide for them as a king would with physical provision and safety. And instead they got a messiah that God sent them, a messiah who would be best for them. They got a messiah that said that for all eternity, they could live a life without hunger or thirst, as long as they believed in what the Son of Man would give them.

    One of the questions that the people listening to Jesus, and therefore the people listening to John’s Gospel would have wondered is this: “How can this man, this Jesus be the bread from heaven? How can he be manna from above? And more to the point, how can he be our provision so that we never again hunger and thirst?”

    Over the centuries, during wartime and famine, Christians have obviously confronted hunger and thirst, and have even died from that hunger or that thirst. So what did Jesus mean when he said, “I am the bread of life?” What did he mean when he said that those who came to him would never hunger and thirst? Well, he meant that he would be God’s provision for them in all situations, but that the provision he spoke of would transcend life and death, time and space. It shifted the paradigm from one in which Jesus would be the salvation of Israel in their lifetime only, to one in which Jesus would be the salvation of the world, for all eternity.

    While Jesus calls himself the bread of life, and is compared to manna from heaven, the fact that Jesus is the bread of life has nothing to do with eating or drinking, and instead, has to do with the identity of Christ himself, and who we consider Jesus to be.

    Years ago, I was struggling with something, and couldn’t keep myself from turning to a particular vice to cope with my frustrations and anger. In a conversation with one of my mentors, he said: “When you are confronted with this issue, ask yourself this question: ‘Why isn’t Jesus enough?’” My initial reaction was confusion, and then anger. The answer to that question is often simply this: “Because Jesus isn’t around right now, and I need an immediate result.” Or, “Because Jesus isn’t here in the flesh, and I cannot ask him for answers directly.” Or, in reality, any number of responses that showed that I wanted Jesus to act according to my own desires and my own paradigm.

    This question, “Why isn’t Jesus enough?” can be applied to any situation in our lives, even though it seems like one that might be applied to matters of the heart more than matters of the body.

    I’m struggling to buy groceries. Why isn’t Jesus enough? Because I’m broke and need immediate help, and I fear I might starve.

    I’ve just lost my job, and am facing eviction from my apartment. Why isn’t Jesus enough? Because I’m running out of money and am frightened for my family’s safety and my own.

    I’ve just been diagnosed with a chronic illness that will eventually leave me broken and bedridden. Why isn’t Jesus enough? Because there is no medical cure, and it’s been a while since I’ve seen a miracle of that sort of magnitude, and I fear the future.

    If you’re paying attention, you’ll notice that all the answers to the question of why Jesus is not enough have to do with our fears and our desires. They still have to do with what Jesus can do for us, rather than the presence of God as the provision of our lives. They have to do with Jesus feeding us physically, rather than the food that endures for eternal life. These answers show us that our needs are still at the center of our own universe.

    But the Son of Man does not revolve around us. 

    Rather, it is each of us that revolves around the Son of God, working together to bring about the work of God. In the letter to the Romans, Paul writes that “all things work together for good, for those who are called according to God’s purpose.” It doesn’t say that all things work together for our good. It says that all things work together for good. And the good that is discussed here is God’s work in this world. The work that Christ called each of us to take part in, which is to reconcile the world to God.

    It is a hard pill to swallow to realize that this does not mean that all things will work out well for us, but rather, that all things will work out for the good of God’s purpose in this world. And that means that sometimes, our pain, our suffering, or even our misfortune can be used by God, for God’s greater purpose.

    This is a huge shift in our thinking, for sure. But this is the reason that we commemorate the lives of the saints, especially those who were martyred for their faith. They faced death, and yet their lives inspired multitudes of Christians to go and serve God with all that they had, and despite the hardships they might face.

    Mother Theresa, who worked with the poorest of the poor in the slums of Calcutta, had a moment early in her life in which she felt the presence of Christ incredibly deeply. But after this, she struggled with spiritual darkness and the feeling of God’s absence for the vast majority of her ministry. Rather than lamenting the loss of God’s presence, she embraced it, and continued her work, remembering that foretaste of eternity that she had felt so many years before. Christ had become for her, even in the midst of her own suffering, the bread of life that sustained her in her work and ministry, until the day she entered the heavenly banquet of God’s presence at her death.

    And so it is for us. It is when we can shift our thinking to see the good even in our own suffering that we can begin to understand how Jesus can be God’s provision beyond our earthly needs, how Jesus can be God’s Bread of Life, how Jesus can be the food that endures for eternal life.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on August 4, 2024.]

  • Filled to Fullness

    These past few weeks I’ve had to deal with insurance companies on getting my medication sent to me. It’s incredibly frustrating, irritating, and stressful. In the Gospel today, we see that people had heard that Jesus was out in the wilderness, curing people, and that they rushed after him to find him, so that they could be healed. Now, these people were poor, very likely could not afford their insurance premiums or the doctor’s visit copays. I can tell you, there were moments where I was so frustrated that if I had heard about someone running around in the desert healing people, I would have dropped everything and run off to find this stranger so that I could be cured. Just like these people in the Gospel who were following Jesus everywhere he went.

    The interesting thing about today’s passage is that we know that Jesus knows why these people are running after him and his disciples – they want healing. But what does Jesus do? He turns to his disciples and says, “How are we going to pay for all these people to eat?”

    Wait? What? Jesus knows they are coming to him for healing from their illnesses, and instead of preparing the disciples to act as medical assistants and get people ordered into a queue for healing, he turns to them and asks how they were going to feed these people. The people come for healing, and Jesus wants to feed them. A curious thing, and one we’ll come back to later. 

    But first, the Gospel tells us that Jesus already knows what he is going to do, and he asks his disciples how to pay to feed all these people in order to test the disciples.

    To test them.

    These responses by the disciples are really examples of how we all often react.

    The first response is by Philip, who looks at the size of the people in the crowd, does a mental calculation, and says, “Six months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” Now, it’s true, Jesus might have set him up with the question on how they were going to pay for it all, but Philip takes that question, and runs with the idea that he and the other disciples need to make it happen. That the onus to feed these people is all on them and their resources. And for Philip, it’s about money.

    Now, what’s interesting to note about this passage, is that it has often been used by those who preach the Prosperity Gospel. This message states that God wants all of us to be blessed financially, and that those who sacrifice to God like the young boy in the story that gave up his barley bread and fish lunch for others will receive that blessing. That is, God will multiply what you give, and you will reap the earthly reward of extreme financial blessing. 

    That’s a tempting teaching to follow, isn’t it? If I just give five bucks to the church, God will multiply it, and I will be financially blessed. 

    But notice the mindset. The recipient of the blessing is always me, the one who gives, and gives sacrificially. More to the point, if I am giving to the church in order to receive, then I have to admit that I am using God as a strategy, a means to manipulate God into blessing me with abundance.

    Now, I know we might look at ourselves and say, thankfully, we don’t believe that sort of thing. But how often do we tell ourselves that blessings will come upon us if we just read our bible more? Or go to church more? Or pray more? We may not be thinking of financial blessing, but only of spiritual blessing. But these are all part of the same coin, which is that we think that God’s abundance is somehow dependent upon what we do, rather than on God’s compassion and love for us. The Gospel of Matthew tells us that God makes his sun rise on evil and good, and sends rain to the just and the unjust alike. That is to say, God defines our path, and our state in life is not related to our level of righteousness. In fact, God’s grace and mercy always shine a light on what Jesus did on the cross more than on what we try to do for God.

    And also, here’s the thing: the one who makes the sacrifices in this story is the boy. He gave of his barley bread and his fish, and yet the people who benefit are all the assembled people. Not just this boy. Everyone benefited. God took what was sacrificed, and multiplied it – for the benefit of all the people.

    Now, the second response we get is from Andrew, Peter’s brother. His response to Jesus’ question has nothing to do with money, but has to do with available resources. He’s the one who makes Jesus aware that they do have resources available, but then he immediately admits defeat, and asks, “But what are they among so many?” 

    Andrew’s response is coming from a mindset of scarcity. It proclaims defeat before even beginning. It’s almost as if Andrew is saying, “Well, we do not have enough, so let’s not do anything at all.” 

    Another way that people have tried to rationalize or explain this miracle of feeding the five thousand is this: this boy was willing to make a sacrifice and share his food, and by Jesus drawing attention to that sacrificial giving, everyone in the crowd was driven to share their own food. Food that they apparently had stashed away and were trying to hide from others. In other words, what happened was less a miracle of multiplication, and more of an impromptu potluck.

    The trouble with this interpretation is that it reduces this miracle to nothing more than a moral platitude, a reminder that everything we ever needed to know we learned in kindergarten. It makes the assumption that people are inherently greedy and unwilling to share. It makes the assumption that none of these people were poor, or even going hungry, but rather that they just didn’t want to share any of their own resources. These people were not secretly hiding a stash of food, trying to avoid sharing with others. It was a miracle, and God multiplied what was given to him.

    Now, it’s true. We can all share, and sometimes we do all need to be reminded to share our own blessings with others. After all, that’s why the church takes donations. It is through our sacrificial giving that the church is able to help those who are struggling, both within our church and out in the community. 

    One commentator put it this way:

    “Jesus needs what we bring him. It may not be much but he needs it. It may well be that the world is denied miracle after miracle and triumph after triumph because we will not bring to Jesus what we have and what we are … little is always much in the hands of Christ.” (Barclay, John, V. 1, p. 205)

    But notice again the thread of the above comment. Jesus takes what we give him, and multiplies what little we bring into an abundance. Not to accomplish our goals, but to accomplish God’s goals. Not to bless us only, but to bless all the people of God through miracles and triumphs across the world. It’s just that The People of God includes us as well, so when God takes what we give to accomplish God’s purposes, we benefit as well, along with others; the entire community of believers benefits.

    Now, the third response to Jesus’ question is his own. We were already told that he knew what he was going to do when he tested his disciples with this question about money. But the interesting thing is the turn that Jesus takes in his response. We know that these people had been running through the countryside to find Jesus so that he could heal their physical ailments, to be cured of their sicknesses, to be relieved of the stress and irritation their illnesses might be causing them.

    And what does Jesus do? Rather than line them up for healing, instead, he feeds them. He has them all sit down, and he feeds them food. They came for a miracle of healing, and what they got was a belly full of food. What is going on here? What exactly is Jesus doing with these people?

    One clue is found in the statement at the very beginning of the passage: “Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near.” This entire story is set in the context of the Feast of the Passover. And if we remember, the Passover celebrates the Israelites freedom from slavery in Egypt. On the road to the Promised Land, God provided for them with manna from heaven. All of this would have been in the mind of John’s readers and listeners, and a connection would be made between God’s miraculous provision, and the promises of God for God’s people, the people of Israel.

    In the ancient world, one of the easiest ways for kings to manipulate their followers was to control the flow of bread. Or, in other words, to feed the people. It is how they showed mercy, and how they showed power. And so, we have this multitude of people coming for healing, and Jesus feeds them instead. They eat so much that they are exceedingly full, and there is food left over. Jesus took what little was offered, and he multiplied it into an abundance – without trying to control them. Being fed, being provided for, would have made these people compare Jesus to a king, and not just any king, one who was compassionate as well. And it is for this reason that the crowd of people came to try and make him king by force. The listeners of John’s gospel would have recognized this, and would have expected the crowd to behave in this very way. They would have seen that Jesus was being compared to God, the same God who provided for the people through miraculous food as God led them out of slavery in Egypt into freedom.  

    And so they understand when people come by force to make Jesus their king, because that is what they would expect people to do.

    But what does Jesus do?

    He flees into the mountains to get away from the people, because he does not wish to be their king. At least not in the earthly sense. 

    These people had seen the miracle, and had only thought about what Jesus could do for them. They were focused on what they could get from God. They wanted Jesus for what he did for them. They too were hoping to manipulate Jesus into future provision by making him their earthly ruler.

    This is why Jesus ran away.

    Because Jesus had other plans.

    The stark contrast between behaving like an earthly king and providing for people, coupled with Jesus running away when they tried to make him their king would have made the listener’s of John’s Gospel question what was coming next.

    You see, they would have made the connection between Passover, and Jesus miraculously providing for the people as being a precursor to a new type of freedom. That freedom could have meant any number of things to those who were there, or any number of things to those listening to John’s Gospel. 

    And they would have been wondering what that freedom could possibly be.

    The last few weeks, the lectionary has been providing us readings from the Gospel of Mark, but today we switched over to John. This passage from John is the first in a series of readings from John’s Gospel in the lectionary, and it comes just before something called the Bread of Life discourse. This Bread of Life discourse culminates in Jesus’ declaration that “those who eat my flesh and drink my blood will have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day” (John 6:54). 

    Those listening to John’s Gospel were in for a real treat. They were about to see the shift in God’s purpose for humanity from earthly provision of their needs to one of eternal significance. This feeding of the five thousand anxious souls who wanted only to be healed, and instead were miraculously filled beyond fullness with earthly food, helps to foreshadow the Spiritual Food that is Christ Jesus. They were about to see Jesus laying out the path to a new type of freedom, and a path to abundant life for all people. 

    Those listening would soon understand what Paul meant in his letter to the Ephesians, when he wrote:

    I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

    Ephesians 3:18-19

    That fullness is for all people.

    Because even spiritually, God takes what we give and multiplies it abundantly so that all might live in the Abundant Grace of God.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on July 28, 2024.]