Michael Seiler

Blog

  • For God So Loved

    Lent is the time of the year when we contemplate Jesus’ suffering, where we contemplate our own sin, and where we take on a personal sacrifice in an effort to identify a bit more with Jesus, and what his death on the cross means to us.

    Given all that, we should probably be quite miserable, right?

    Maybe not. 

    You may see the Rose colored stole this morning. Rather than wearing the typical Lenten purple, this Sunday, called “Laetare” Sunday, we wear a Rose colored stole. This Sunday is supposed to give us a moment when we can step back a bit from our Lenten disciplines and live in the joy of our salvation. The Latin word “Laetare” means “Rejoice!” 

    The Gospel this morning gives us the reason for our rejoicing. Today we read the much quoted line in scripture that says, “God so loved the world that he sent his only son that people might not perish, but have everlasting life.” 

    But there is more to the Gospel than just this verse. You see, just before this, Nicodemus, a Pharisee, a ruler of the people, had come to speak with Jesus at night to avoid detection by his cohorts. He was truly interested in hearing what Jesus had to say. And Jesus tells him that the only way to heaven is to be born again, to be born of water and spirit. And each time Nicodemus says, “What? How is this possible?” He doesn’t understand. And then Jesus begins with the passage about how the Son of Man must be lifted up, and all who believe in him will be saved in reference to the passage about how the Israelites complained about God’s provision, and then had to contend with poisonous snakes. Just like people looked to the serpent on Moses’ rod, people must look to Jesus to be saved. Then comes John 3:16. God came to save the world, and if you believe, you will have everlasting life. 

    A good reason to rejoice, right?

    A very good reason to rejoice. 

    Unfortunately for us, several of the following verses have proven to be problematic. You see, in verse 18, the Gospel tells us that those who do not believe are condemned already. That is, if they do not believe, then God has already condemned them. And what that has meant for some people in history, is that if you are not a believer, and if God has condemned you, then do I not have the authority to condemn you as well? If you don’t share my faith, are you not expendable? Are you not inferior? Some of these attitudes were even enshrined in law, justifying the destruction of entire groups of people, simply because they did not believe the same as those who follow the Christian faith.

    And even though we don’t necessarily have the full legal justifications in place for this kind of systematic destruction of peoples, what we find is that this attitude is still ingrained in our  religious culture. By this I mean that rather than justifying the destruction of entire people we deem “unbelievers,” we still look for ways to determine what constitutes a “true believer.” We look for ways to determine who is a real Christian, as opposed to those who are just “playing at religion,” or “worshiping false gods.” Rather than looking at the direction of a person’s heart toward God, rather than seeing how closely their lives emulate God’s love – a sacrificial love that would die on the cross for us – we instead look at how they do things differently than we do.

    And we begin to draw lines in the sand, and build walls to keep people out, because, as we have decided, they do not meet the definition of a “true believer,” and therefore, I should be able to condemn them, just as God apparently has, and treat them despicably.

    “These people don’t look like me,” we say, and we draw a line in the sand, and we build a wall, and then we decide, my religion is safe from those who don’t belong.

    And then Jesus comes along and wipes away the line, and tears down the wall.

    For God so loved the world.

    “These people don’t think like me,” we say, and we draw a line in the sand, and we build a wall, and then we conclude, my religion is safe from these people who lack critical thinking skills and don’t have the proper education.

    And then Jesus comes along and wipes away the line, and tears down the wall.

    For God so loved the world.

    “These people don’t love like I do,” we say, and then we draw a line in the sand, and we build a wall, and we enact laws to make loving another more difficult or even impossible, and then we decide that we have saved the world’s children from these godless heretics.

    And then Jesus comes along and wipes away the line, and tears down the wall.

    For God so loved the world.

    “These people don’t pray like I do,” we say, and then we draw a line in the sand, and we build a wall, and we tell those in our camp to stay away from those idol worshiping, hocus-pocus loving people that say their prayers from a book, and traffic in useless tradition. And then we decide that we have saved the world from their ancient religion and sorcerer’s ways.

    And then Jesus comes along and wipes away the line, and tears down the wall.

    For God so loved the world.

    “These people don’t vote like I do,” we say, and then we draw a line in the sand, and we proof-text scriptures to show how those others are living a lie, and when they don’t come over to our camp, we begin not just to ridicule them or regale them with our impeccable logic for why we are right, but we begin to use physical violence to “convince” them that they need to change.

    And then Jesus comes along and wipes away the line, and tears down the wall.

    For God so loved the world.

    And finally, we get so mad, we turn to Jesus and we say, “Okay. Stop it Jesus! Why are you erasing these lines? How am I supposed to know the true believers from the pretenders?”

    And Jesus just comes up behind us, puts his hands on our shoulders, and turns us around… …so that we can see someone behind us, drawing a line in the sand, and building a wall, in order to keep us out. To them, we are the deplorable ones. To them, we are the pretenders, we are the fake Christians, we are those who do not believe the right way and are therefore worthy of God’s condemnation.

    And then Jesus comes along and wipes away their line, and tears down their wall… and turns to us and smiles.

    For God so loved the world.

    How can we not rejoice when we see the world – and ourselves – through the eyes of God? That the Family of God is far larger than we ever imagined? That the person across from us is just as loved by God as the person in the mirror? 

    St. Augustine says it this way: “God loves each one of us, as if there were only one of us to Love.”

    And if we have been loved in this manner, should we not rejoice and pass on that same love? Rather than focusing on differences, rather than fostering divisions, shouldn’t we focus on our similarities, on those areas where we might live and work in harmony?

    Our Gospel passage continues today, and gives us an insight into how we might accomplish this. John says that those who hate the light do not come to the light, because the light would expose their deeds. How would it expose them? It would expose their deeds as superficial, skin deep, lacking in love. Those who do come to the light have their deeds clearly seen, and their deeds will be seen to be done in God.

    What does all this mean?

    The word “believe” in John does not simply mean agreeing to a set of principles, but a word that implies trust, and a word that implies action based on trust. Action. Based in trust.

    If you were a financial advisor, and I had a million dollars to invest, I might believe you when you tell me that you have the necessary skills to invest and manage that money. But trusting you with my own personal million dollars is another thing entirely; giving you that million to steward for me might be a bit more frightening, and if I don’t trust you enough, then I may not follow through on action – even though I believe that you are capable. 

    Just not capable enough for my money.

    For John, those who believe in God are also those who trust God enough to live by the commandments that Jesus handed down. And those are simple: Love God and Love your neighbor as yourself. 

    Ten chapters later here in John’s Gospel, Jesus says, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35)

    We are commanded to love one another, and our neighbor as ourselves.

    Even if, or perhaps, especially if, those neighbors live on the other side of a line we have created ourselves. Rather than looking at our differences, we need to look for where others are loving their neighbors, and join them in that work, regardless of whether they look like me, think like me, love like me, pray like me, or vote like me.

    If we can trust God enough to bless the actions within the family of God and allow ourselves to rejoice in our mutual faith, then imagine the rejoicing that will happen when we come to understand ourselves as neighbors even to those who don’t even believe like we do. 

    For God so loved the world.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on March 10, 2024.]

  • Get Behind Me

    Several years ago, the editor in chief of Christianity Today recounted several conversations that he had had with pastors in his denomination. The pastors told him that when they preached from the Sermon on the Mount – you know, things like “Blessed are the meek,” “Blessed are the peacemakers,” “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” or especially, “Turn the other cheek.” When they preached from the Sermon on the Mount, people would come up to them afterwards and say, “Where did you get those liberal talking points?” But when the pastors would say, “I was literally just quoting the words of Jesus,” the people would not say, “Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize that.” Instead, they would say something to the effect of, “Okay, but that won’t work anymore. That’s weak.”1

    This is essentially what Peter did with Jesus in today’s Gospel. Peter, and most other people of his time hated the Roman oppressors in their land, and they were expecting a messiah that would come in with a mighty fist and power unseen before, and wipe out the enemies of Israel.

    But then Jesus starts talking about how the Son of Man must suffer and die for the sake of all humanity, and Peter begins to rebuke him, essentially saying, “That’s not going to work, Jesus. That’s weak.”

    And we see how well that worked out for Peter.

    “Get behind me Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”

    Get behind me Satan! When we hear that we may immediately think that what Jesus is saying is, “Get outta here!” “Scram!” or “Buzz off!” But that’s not what Jesus is saying to Peter at all. He is reminding Peter to align himself in the proper order, to literally get behind Jesus. You see, Peter had an agenda, and he wanted to make sure that Jesus did what Peter wanted. In other words, he wanted Jesus to stand behind him, to follow him, and not the other way around. 

    Last week we heard about Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. And in Matthew’s Gospel, when Jesus is tempted by the devil, he says, “Away with you Satan!” He doesn’t tell the devil to get behind him like he tells Peter, he simply tells Satan to go, to leave him. And Satan leaves him.

    There’s an interesting lesson that we can learn from these two interactions between Jesus and Satan, and Jesus and Peter.

    When Jesus rebukes Satan and commands him to leave, Satan leaves. He does as Christ says. Christ is superior to Satan and his minions, and they obey him, even though they don’t want to. I won’t unpack that any more, as I imagine you realize the implications of that for your own life.

    Secondly, when Jesus rebukes Peter, he is making us aware that we can do the work of evil in this world, simply by trying to push through our own agendas. That is, we know what God’s agenda is for humanity, and when we impose our own wills over and against the will of God, we can be seen as acting for – or at the very least – allowing evil to manifest in the world.

    If we look in the Book of Common Prayer, in the Catechism, we are told that “the mission of the church is to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.” And, that the Church pursues its mission as it “promotes justice, peace, and love.” And finally, that the ministers of the church, which include everyone, not just those curious ordained folk, but everyone, is to “carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world.”

    Reconciliation. That is a word we often hear only in Lent, when we are reminded that the Episcopal Church does in fact have the Rite of Reconciliation, which most people know of as Confession.

    This work of reconciliation is what happens when Jesus turns to Peter and says, “Get behind me Satan!” He convicts Peter of Peter’s wrong motivations, but then offers him the reconciling gesture that Peter might subordinate himself to Christ, and get behind him, or follow him. Or, to put it more bluntly: You have made an error Peter, but you are still my disciple. Get behind me, and follow me, and follow my teachings.

    Reconciliation, however, encompasses more than just a personal forgiveness of sins and a reconciliation of ourselves to God. The work of Reconciliation that the church is called to, and we ourselves are called to, is to reconcile not just the world to God, but to reconcile ourselves to each other; to promote peace; to promote love; and to promote justice.

    When we fail to do those things, when we allow our own agendas to take over our thoughts, our minds, and our actions; when we allow our own agendas to supersede the work of Christ in this world; when we allow our own agendas to creep up and push out the reconciling work of the Church; when our own agenda causes us apathy and indifference to war, to bigotry and to injustice simply because it doesn’t affect us personally – that is when we find ourselves allowing the work of evil in this world. Or worse, by simply aligning ourselves with those who promote war, bigotry and injustice, even if we don’t say or do anything ourselves, we may find ourselves actively working for those terrible evils in this world. And then, we might just hear Jesus saying the same words to us as he did to Peter: “Get behind me Satan!”

    The Good News is that it never just ends there. Just like Peter did, we too can get behind Jesus. We can accept the offer of reconciliation from Christ, and align ourselves with God’s mission in this world, and follow the teachings of Christ even when we find them more difficult than doing our own thing. 

    And that is when things will really get exciting.

    We know from our reading of Scripture that Peter did a few more things that were rather impulsive, and contrary to Jesus’ work – things like cutting off a man’s ear, or denying that he even knew Jesus – but in the end, Peter was known as one of the leaders of the Church. 

    This was what Jesus was talking about after having corrected Peter. He tells all his disciples that if they want to be his disciples, they must take up their crosses and follow Him. We must deny ourselves, and lose our lives. Not literally, mind you. Specifically, we must lose those things that work against God’s mission in this world; a mission that we are all called to; a mission of striving for peace, of striving for justice, of sharing God’s love, so that together we continue Christ’s work of reconciling the world to God.

    Our agendas need to be placed on the cross and sacrificed for the greater good of God’s redeeming work in this world. When we lose our lives for the sake of the Gospel, that is when we find it, Jesus says. What will it profit us if we follow our own agendas and “gain the whole world,” as he says; that is, what good is it if we are powerful enough to run the world, but forfeit our lives by thinking of the things of man, rather than the things of heaven?

    One of the best known saints in our canon was a wealthy young playboy who stood to inherit his father’s immense wealth. He spent his youth living an irresponsible life, caring only for his own desires. At the time, joining the military was considered “glamorous,” and so he joined up. But after spending a year as a prisoner of war, he had a profound change of heart, a conversion. He renounced his former life of extravagance after seeing how the poor in his city lived, and then dedicated his life to helping the sick, the homeless, and to rebuilding churches in and around his hometown.

    Here was a young man who had, by all accounts, all the trappings of this world, from riches, power, prestige, and the freedom to search for pleasure and meaning by whatever means he fancied. But instead of continuing to live for himself, he surrendered everything, took a vow of poverty, and dedicated himself to the work of God. 

    Some might say he lost his life for the sake of the Gospel. He willingly surrendered his position of power and wealth for poverty and weakness.

    Some of you may have already realized that I am talking about St. Francis of Assisi. And you may know that through his work he founded a religious order that has changed the world with its focus on serving the poor and the marginalized.

    Imagine if he had never surrendered those things to God, and instead had sought to preserve his lifestyle at all costs? He would have remained just a blip in the history of Assisi, another playboy going about the business of pursuing his own pleasure, constantly trying to find out who he was meant to be, but never finding out God’s true purpose for his life.

    For St. Francis, Jesus telling him to “Get behind me” meant that he had to give up his wealth and power. But for each of us, the idea of “Get behind me” means something entirely different, and it is something that only we can know for ourselves. It does not have to mean giving up wealth, or prestige, as it did for Francis. It can mean something entirely different to you than it did to Francis, or your neighbor in the pew next to you.But I can tell you, that when we hand over those things that we still want to control for ourselves, when we hand over the reins to God and make God’s agenda our own agenda, that is when we begin to flourish and thrive, when we begin to grow into the joy of God’s ultimate plan for our lives. We may not become saints like Peter and Francis, but we will be living in joy and purpose when God says, “Get behind me,” and we say, “Sure thing, Lord.”

    1. The New Republic, August 10, 2023

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

  • What’s my motivation?

    Have you ever seen an actor ask, “What’s my motivation?” Usually it’s in a comedy movie, poking fun at various actors who take their craft a bit too seriously. The particular acting strategy that uses this is called method acting, and method acting is particularly well known for asking the actors to get into the mind of the character and try to understand the psychological motivations behind what they are doing.

    Now, you might be wondering why I’m talking about acting during Ash Wednesday, particularly when the Gospel reading seems to be all about hypocrisy.

    The reason for it, is that in Matthew’s gospel, the word that is translated as “hypocrites” is actually the word for “stage actors.” … That’s right. “Stage Actors.”

    You can see the link between stage actors and hypocrites if you look at what hypocrites do. A hypocrite will look you in the eye and tell you the one thing that they consider to be their highest priority in life, and they will speak with passion about how to accomplish these things, they will adamantly profess that others must hold their lives to the same standards as what they profess, and they will judge those who fail to do so. … All while they do the exact opposite of what they profess so passionately and loudly.

    In essence, they are acting. They are getting into the mind of someone who truly believes, and they are professing what they think needs to be professed, but they are only acting. And when the audience is gone, when the audience is no longer watching, then they do as they please. And usually directly contrary to what they profess to be true.

    And as long as they don’t get caught, then, as the Gospel says, “they have received their reward.” If it is the accolades and praise of people they want, then as long as they are able to keep up the front, they will have received what they were looking for. If what they are trying to do is to “look good,” and if they have managed it, then by all means, let them rejoice in “looking good.”

    But this is neither the purpose of Lent, nor the desire of God for our lives. This passage in the Gospel of Matthew tells us that what we do, we ought to do in secret. Not for the accolades of others, but for the Father, who sees in secret, and who will reward us.

    In other words, we are to ask, “What’s my motivation?” 

    We are to turn our judgements not outward, but inward, and question ourselves and why we do the things we do. Are we motivated more by the trappings of this world? Or are we motivated by those things that bring about the Kingdom of God in this world? That is, are we motivated by power, control, wealth and prestige? Or are we motivated by the Good News of Christ, and the joys of our salvation?

    Now. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that any of the things of this world are inherently wrong or sinful. Not at all. It is the direction of our hearts that Jesus is concerned about. This Gospel passage today comes at the tail end of the Sermon on the Mount, in which Jesus says things like, ‘You have heard it said … but I say to you.” And in each case he takes away the dichotomy of right and wrong, and presents us with another option. Rather than doing things out of the fear of punishment, we are to do them from a place of compassion, and a love for God and our neighbors – whether or not we receive any recognition for what we do.

    In other words, we are to ask, “What’s my motivation?”

    Today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. We spend this season of penitence seeking to understand ourselves in the light of God’s mercy and grace, and what our response to that mercy and grace should be.

    The traditional display of repentance in the Old Testament was to wear sackcloth and put ashes on one’s head. It was an outward display that said: “I have sinned, and I am attempting to repent of my wrong, and to adjust the motivation of my heart.”

    As we come forward today to receive our ashes, if we recognize that some of our motivations in life have missed the mark of loving God and our neighbor, let us repent and seek restoration with God and our neighbor, remembering that when we do, God is faithful and just, and will forgive us of all our sins.

    [This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on February 14, 2024.]

  • Points of View

    Epiphany began with the birth of a child in Bethlehem, and Epiphany always ends with the Transfiguration of Christ. There is a reason for this. Epiphanies are moments where the nature of God is revealed to us in the person of Jesus Christ. The birth of Christ is easier to unpack, because it is “Immanuel,” or “Christ with us.” It identifies Christ with us – as one of us. Human, just as we are.

    So what are we to do with the transfiguration? In the presence of the disciples, Jesus is joined by Moses and Elijah, and his clothes begin to shine a dazzling white, so white that no bleach could ever get them so clean. What does this transformation tell us about Jesus, and more importantly, about ourselves? 

    To begin with, we learn about Jesus’ identity. If we read the passages that precede the transfiguration – and we really do need to read the passages immediately preceding this one to truly understand the importance of the transfiguration for Jesus’ disciples – we see that Jesus has been healing people and casting out demons; he healed Jairus’ daughter, and cured a woman’s years-long hemorrhage; he fed a group of five thousand people, and then a group of four thousand people; he calmed a storm with just his words, and he walked on water. 

    He did miracles. Great things.

    So it’s no wonder, just before going up the mountain, that when Jesus asked his disciples “Who do you say that I am?” Peter quickly answered, “You are the Christ.”

    We have the luxury of looking at historical events, but Peter and the other disciples had to see things for themselves for the first time, and make up their minds about Jesus. Was he just another charismatic teacher, or was he truly the Christ?

    When Jesus was joined by Moses – the giver of the law and the liberator of the people of Israel – and also joined by Elijah – the first of the great prophets, and one whose appearance had long been connected with the coming of the messiah – that is when his identity was confirmed to Peter, James and John. … Jesus truly was the Messiah.

    This is the epiphany, the nature and mission of Christ is revealed to those three disciples in this transfiguration on the mountaintop. And it is revealed to those of us hearing the story after the fact. Jesus is the messiah, the chosen one of Israel, the salvation of all humanity. 

    But what does the identity of Jesus of Nazareth as the messiah reveal to us about ourselves? We most definitely are not the messiah, so we are unlikely to be joined by Moses and Elijah and be transfigured on the top of a mountain.  

    As with many of the stories we encounter in the Gospels, Peter’s responses tend to be the example that so many of us can relate to.

    Peter had seen so many miracles and acts of mighty power, that he was able to very easily slip into believing that Jesus was what most people hoped for in the Messiah. He was to be a mighty warrior, a king even. One who would crush the oppressive forces of Rome and others, and liberate Israel once and for all. But, again, in a passage just before the transfiguration, when Jesus begins to talk about how the Son of Man must suffer and die and be raised again on the third day, Peter tells him off. That can’t be! This is not how it’s supposed to happen!

    And Jesus says, “Get behind me satan!” You’re not thinking of the things of God, instead you’re focused on things that humanity wants. You want power and control. You want wealth and prestige. You don’t want what God wants, Peter. 

    How often can we find ourselves thinking the same things? We seek power, control, wealth and prestige. And we value them more than the things of heaven, more than the things of God.

    The second thing that Peter does that we might see in ourselves is that when Jesus is transfigured before them, and is standing in the dazzling light with Moses and Elijah, Peter says, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here: let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” Mark tells us: He did not know what to say, for they were terrified (Mark 9:5-6).

    Talk about a head scratcher. Why would Peter want to build something?

    Because it’s practical. It’s something he knows how to do. It’s something that would allow him to feel in control of the situation, and focus his mind on something that doesn’t terrify him. It provides a certain level of comfort in a situation that is beyond any perspective he has ever encountered.

    Have we ever done the same? When confronted with things that terrify us, that dig at our hearts and claw their way into those dark recesses of our mind where our little child sits huddled in a corner, have we then reverted to trying to do things ourselves? To take control of the situation in any way that we know how? Have we sought ways to regain power and control in circumstances that call for changing our viewpoint, rather than changing our situation through our own means?

    The voice from heaven that says, “This is my beloved son! Hear him!” is that reminder for Peter that all of those things that Jesus said about the Son of Man needing to suffer, to die, and to be raised again are true and it is meant to reveal both the nature of Jesus, and the mission of Christ in the world. It is meant to let them all know that God will accomplish what God wants, despite our desires and preferences, and that Jesus is showing them a new perspective on the work of the Messiah in this world.

    You really need to admire the beauty of how Mark put these stories together that lead up to the transfiguration. It poses all of these questions of Jesus’ identity in just a few passages; questions that people both then and now still have; questions that even Jesus’ own disciples had to begin with; it poses all these questions in a few small stories just before the nature and mission of Christ are revealed. It starts off with, Who am I? You are the christ. What am I here to do? To destroy the world with mighty power and bring about the salvation of Israel. Wrong! Get behind me satan! The messiah will suffer, die, and be raised again three days later. And if you want to follow me, you will need to lose your life – your identity – because if you give up your life for the sake of the Gospel, you will find your life and who God has truly made you to be! And then … Jesus goes off and gets transfigured, and the disciples freak out.

    And here’s the beauty of what that means to us, and to all the hearers of this gospel that came before us. Those who hear it know about the transformation that took place among Peter and the other disciples – from scared fishermen, to bold, courageous fishers of men, men who changed the world preaching the Good News of Jesus Christ – and then they think: this too can happen to me.

    We too will transform. That is what this passage, the entirety of this Gospel, of all the Gospels, really, the Good News of Jesus the Christ is all about – we will transform, and ever more change into the likeness of God, if we allow God to change our perspective, and see the world as God sees it – one where power, control, wealth and prestige are things to be lost, to be surrendered, for the sake of the Gospel. 

    The words from the collect today, “Grant us that we … be changed into his likeness from glory to glory” come from the Apostle Paul’s second letter to the Coritnthians. And what Paul means by that word “glory” is that we will be transformed each time more of the identity of God is revealed to us. That is, each time we have an epiphany and experience a change in our perspective of who God is, and understand just how that perspective of God relates to our own identity, that is when we are transformed more into the likeness of Christ. That is when our lives will take the shape that God has intended for us from before the world began, and when people will see the outward manifestation of our inward change of view.

    This is why the story of the transfiguration comes before Lent. Lent is about detaching ourselves from those things we love more than God. It is about changing our perspective on what we must give up for the sake of the Gospel, for the sake of loving God more dearly. Because when we do give these things up, not only is the nature of God revealed to us more clearly, but we begin the journey of our own transformation from Glory to Glory.

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

  • Tickled Pink

    This Sunday in the lectionary usually brings up all sorts of sermons that deal with fishing, and you’re likely wondering if I’m going to reel you in with a tall tale about the one that got away. But you’ll be disappointed. I’m not going to spend very much time talking about fish or fishing at all. Instead, I’m going to talk about hooks. Not fishing lines, or fishing nets. Not reels and boats, or bait and tackle. I’m going to talk about hooks.

    Why hooks?

    Because when we look at the Gospel reading today, we see that Jesus comes proclaiming the Good News of God. The Time is Fulfilled! Jesus says. But more than that, Jesus says that The kingdom of God is near! All the hearers needed to do was to repent, and believe in the Good News he was preaching.

    If you want to talk about a hook, that’s one that really works. Jesus is saying to his hearers That which you have waited for, that which you have hoped for, it’s here! The kingdom of God is here! This was indeed Good News. For those hoping for an earthly kingdom and release from subjugation to the Romans, it was hope. And this hook brought people in. Then, when Jesus fulfilled God’s plan on the cross, for some people, the hope of God’s Kingdom shifted from earthly power and a temporal kingdom to the Second Coming of Christ, an event that brings with it the Hope of newness of life, the communion of the saints, reconciliation with God, and everlasting life.

    We see how well it worked when we read Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. The early Christians believed very much in the hope of the return of Christ in power and glory. They were ready for it. And Paul is telling them to live as though it would be happening so soon that they could even quit thinking about their earthly responsibilities.

    Over the centuries, several people have done the exact same thing as what Paul was suggesting, selling their possessions and camping out on a mountain top, waiting for the second coming of Jesus. These people made a decision that was guided by some form of hope, even within a life that is filled with daily responsibilities and duties. Partly because they saw it as a salvation from their present struggles. For them, future hope bested their present reality. And because of that, their hope came with a sense of urgency.

    Some of you may have seen the recent uproar over the bubblegum pink and cherry red 40 oz double-walled vacuum-insulated stainless steel tumblers. A collaboration between Starbucks and Stanley, these cups were only sold at Target stores, and caused long lines, with people camping out for hours to try and get their hands on one of these cups. Why? Perhaps for the hope that their coffee would stay warm for up to 11 hours?

    Maybe you haven’t heard of this viral sensation, but I’m sure you’ve heard of some of the others over the last several decades: Pokemon, Furby, Tamagotchi, Cabbage Patch Kids, Tickle me Elmo. The list could go on and on.

    The one thing these viral trends all had in common was a sense of urgency, because of a false sense of scarcity. A fear that you would be missing out if you were not one of the first ones to get the new and latest craze. The other common factor was a false sense of hope that this product would bring with it happiness, comfort, peace, joy, you name it. If you only had this toy, or this thing, then all your hopes would be fulfilled. 

    And then, months later, after each of these crazes had ended, the garbage bins started filling up because the promised hope had all been something based on dreams. Whether a parent thought it would bring a child closer to them, or restore a broken relationship between spouses, or whatever it was, the hope was built on a thing, a product, providing some form of salvation in a broken world.

    There’s another bible story that we touch upon here today, though only tangentially. The story of a very big fish, and a very little man named Jonah. He himself did not do any fishing in that story, and the fish didn’t even get away. In fact, we can say that in this whale of a story, the fish was the fisher of men, and Jonah was the one that didn’t get away.

    Jonah, a prophet, was called by God to go to the city of Nineveh, a city about which someone might say, “You’ll never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.” And he didn’t want to go. But when he finally went, he walked about 20 miles into this huge city that was about 60 miles across, and said one simple sentence: “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” That’s it. That’s all he said. One sentence. And yet, the whole city, from the commoner up to the king were all gripped by a sense of urgency, and they all believed God, and repented. Then God spared their lives because God saw that they had turned from their evil ways, and God did not bring upon them the planned calamity.

    What are we to take from this story? Is the message that people need to be scared into changing their lives? After all, it seems that the Ninevites only changed their ways because of the threat of danger, the threat of death and destruction. Was that what caused the urgency?

    Or … should we take from this story the fact that a prophet of God was called to reconcile gentiles to God? That is, people outside the covenant of God were asked to change their ways so that they might be reconciled to God and live in God’s favor? Was the change in the people of Nineveh because they saw that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had come to them, and desired to show them mercy? Were they motivated not by fear, but by the hope of new life, and reconciliation to a merciful God?

    This idea of Nineveh’s change coming from the hope of reconciliation based on a merciful God seems to be supported by the portions of scripture we didn’t read today. The king told everyone to cry, repent and turn from their evil ways, because, he says, “Who knows? God may relent and change his mind; he may turn from his fierce anger, so that we do not perish” (Jonah 3:9). And, just a bit later in the next Chapter, we find Jonah complaining that he didn’t want to come to Nineveh, not because the city was so wicked, but, Jonah says, he knew from the beginning that “that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing” (Jonah 4:2). 

    Hope. There may have been an element of urgency around the possibility of destruction, but the overriding motivator of the King and his people was the hope of forgiveness, the hope of reconciliation to God, and the hope of salvation.

    If we return to the Gospel today, we see that the disciples in the story “immediately” left their nets because they saw a hope in the person of Jesus. True, for them it might have been the hope of salvation from an oppressive colonizing force. But, if we accept the possibility that the Ninevites turned not because of fear, but because of hope, then we can see a connection between the words of Jesus, and the words of Jonah: the Ninevites saw hope in repentance and being reconciled to a merciful God, and the Disciples saw hope, also accompanied by belief and repentance. 

    The gospel is about mercy instead of punishment, of the hope of reconciliation with God, and of a true hope of newness of life. It is not about the fear of imminent destruction, but about life in relationship with God, with all those who also believe, and with all the rest of creation.

    The disciples may have started out hoping for the salvation of their land from the occupying forces. And by the time of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, that hope may have shifted to the second coming, a more escapist motivation in a broken world. 

    But what about now? With us? These motivations, these hopes for a brighter future may have worked almost 2,000 years ago. But, living in a country that is prosperous and free, where we do not face any persecution, or threat of destruction; living in a time where the promised return of Jesus has apparently failed to materialize, what do we say about hope? What is the hook that we share to help people understand the joys of knowing Jesus? 

    The answer to that lies in the word, fulfilled. 

    In the Gospel, Jesus comes proclaiming the Good News, saying that the time is fulfilled, and that the Kingdom of God is near. For those of us who have the Gospels to read, we know that at that moment that Jesus had not yet died on the cross or risen from the dead. But the simple fact that Jesus was on the earth, speaking about the plan that God had for humanity meant that all the future purposes that God has in store for all creation were set in motion the moment that the Christ child was born in the barn.

    So when Jesus says, the time is fulfilled, he means that All of God’s desires for the world and all creation have already been accomplished. And if they have been accomplished, then that does not mean that we need to wait for the future to experience the promises. Whether Jesus’ return happens in our lifetime or not is inconsequential, because all of God’s plans for humanity are available to us right now. Immediately. In this moment, we have newness of life, we enjoy the communion of the saints, we live in reconciliation with God, and we already know that we will have everlasting life in the presence of God. 

    The Kingdom of God truly is near.

    When we come to this realization, this understanding that in God’s timing, all has already been accomplished, but that in our sense of time, we still have things to experience; when we internalize this idea of everything has been fulfilled, but has not yet completely happened to us, then we begin to feel an urgency not because we fear destruction, but because we want everyone else to feel that same joy, to experience the same freedom, to live in the present reality of a future already accomplished.

    When we realize this we become infectious. We go viral. And people see in us a hope that is not just a speculation, but a hope that is realized in the here and now. And they want what we have. And they want it immediately.

    Our lives have, at that moment, become a Tickle me Elmo doll, or a pink 40 oz vacuum insulated stainless steel tumbler. 

    We have become the hook!

    But our lives do not peddle false hopes like these fleeting fads and viral sensations. Our lives are witness to a true hope, are witness to an ever present joy of living in a world where our future hope is actually our present reality. 

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=70jp6sJns3M%3Fsi%3DS1WuJtw5bLoSMFdb%26start%3D1024

    [This sermon was delivered at The Episcopal Church of St. Matthew in Tucson, AZ on January 21, 2024.]

  • Live a Little

    And why are we putting ourselves in danger every hour? I die every day! That is as certain, brothers and sisters, as my boasting of you — a boast that I make in Christ Jesus our Lord. If with merely human hopes I fought with wild animals at Ephesus, what would I have gained by it? If the dead are not raised, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.” Come to a sober and right mind, and sin no more; for some people have no knowledge of God. I say this to your shame. With what kind of body? But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?” Fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. And as for what you sow, you do not sow the body that is to be, but a bare seed, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain. But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body. Not all flesh is alike, but there is one flesh for human beings, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish. There are both heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one thing, and that of the earthly is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; indeed, star differs from star in glory.

    1 Corinthians 15:30-41

    This passage from the fifteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians, part of the “Resurrection Chapter,” builds upon the previous verses, where Paul tells us that if people do not rise from the dead, then neither does Christ, and therefore, all preaching is futile and so is our faith (v. 14). He goes on and says that if we only have hope in Christ in this life – as in, we won’t rise from the dead ourselves – then “we are of all people most to be pitied” (v. 19). Finally, he reiterates that Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, and then we get to this passage, where he again he talks about hope.

    How could Paul have fought wild animals in Ephesus if he didn’t believe in a resurrection? How could he have suffered through the trials and persecutions he did, the imprisonments, unless he believed in a resurrection? This is exactly why Paul said we should be pitied if we follow this hope in Christ without any hope of a future beyond this world. Why are we subjecting ourselves to persecution, ridicule, imprisonment and torture, if there is nothing beyond this life of ours? If this life is all there is, then by all means, we should “eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”

    That quote comes from Isaiah 22:13, and the prophet there was chastising the Israelites for failing to repent of their evil, and instead, choosing to make merry in the face of impending doom. God had called upon them to repent and wear sackcloth (v. 12), and instead, they decided to throw their hands up in the air, and say, “Well, tomorrow we die, so let’s just enjoy our last day.” Forget about repenting, let’s live for the moment.

    And so, Paul is admonishing believers in Corinth for living with the same mindset: “This life is all we have, so let’s live a little! We aren’t going to be resurrected, so let’s make this life all that it should be!” And, because of this mindset, they were spending time with those of “bad company,” which was clearly corrupting their morals. The rend result was that the witness of their faith in Christ was indistinguishable from those with whom they were spending time.

    Both the challenge of impending invasion facing the Israelites in Isaiah, and the view in Corinth that the resurrection was a pipe dream spoke to a lack of faith. Is God the great provider? Is God mighty and capable of turning away invaders? Is God mighty and capable of raising the dead, and therefore raising us to new life – one that brims with meaning and fulfillment? Or is God merely the purveyor of a new moral code, one that promises peace, tranquility, an abundant life and resurrection after death – but can’t really deliver?

    In some ways, choosing to live this life to the fullest is an admirable one. It chooses to make the best out of what most would consider a finite existence. But it neglects the truth that our existence is not here merely for our pleasure, nor is this life here for our own sake. We are here because God has freed us from sin and granted us new life. God has given us the tools to live our lives, and live them abundantly.

    Some focus on the hedonistic pleasures of this world because of our eventual death. Others, at times, focus too heavily on our eventual death and fail to live at all. But if there is a resurrection of the dead, then what do we really have to fear? Wild animals in Ephesus? Imprisonment? Ridicule for our beliefs? Torture? Or can we boldly go, with a “sober and right mind” into the world, proclaiming the Love of God by word and action, and live a little?

  • Seeing the Unseen

    A friend of mine turned me on to Lectio 365 and one particular week, they were working through the Questions of Jesus. On the Thursday of that week, I think, the question was all about Jesus asking his disciples: “Do you Trust Me?” The meditation ended with the call to action to ask what question God might have of us.

    So I did just that.

    And what should happen but God asked me the very same question: “Do you trust me?”

    Immediately, I knew exactly what that question was about, and what exactly I was supposed to trust God with. And, more to the point, I immediately knew my answer:

    “Yes. I do trust you. Just not as much as I want to. … Don’t you see what’s happening?”

    Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

    Hebrews 11:1
    Foggy Morning at St. Mary’s Episcopal Convent

    This past Easter Weekend, Holy Saturday to be exact, I was sitting on my patio at the convent where I was staying. The sisters had graciously agreed to let me stay there for a longer period, after an abrupt need to move out of my housing situation. I had been there a little over a week at that point, and on that foggy Saturday morning, drinking a cup of coffee, I was reflecting on how peaceful life had been that past week, and how relaxed I felt.

    And at that very moment, God said, “Now that you’ve had a chance to collect your thoughts, and remove all your distractions, I have some things I need to show you.” 

    Some things. What an understatement. From that Saturday morning, until Monday afternoon, I wrote a full 45 pages of college lined note paper. And it continued after that, though not with the same intensity, for another month. During that time, I told a few of my friends that I saw a transformation happening; or rather, that God had a transformation in store for me, and that I could vaguely see the end result, but that it frightened me, because I knew that who I would be was radically different from who I was.

    And those changes came, step by step. Graciously, with a few weeks, or even a month of reprieve in between them, until we came to this question of trust.

    Until this question where I had to say, “I do trust you, but not as much as I want.” When what I really meant was: “I trust you, as long as you let me stay in the boat. Those waves look frightening.”

    Several years ago, in the process toward ordination, I had a set back, which left me shocked and confused. The next day I sat on the patio of the church, and spoke to God, asking, “I thought you wanted me to do this?” By which I meant ordination. God replied, “I did want you to do this. And I do want you to do this.” To which I had to reply, “Were you not paying attention? Did you not see what just happened?” And a smiling God replied, “Trust me. You will do this. Just not right now.”

    Hope. Hope of things to come, but as yet unseen. 

    So many years later, the path is coming to completion. But not without being tossed around by the waves of doubt and uncertainty in the process. My friends could tell you stories about my ranting and raving, my confusion and doubts, my questioning, and ultimately my repeated return to the promise. Until I learned to walk in it, unwavering, seeing only the hope, and not the waves.

    I am gifted with a great imagination, and an analytical mind, and getting out of the boat, like Peter, to walk on the water toward a promise God has given me, makes me realize just how big those waves of doubt and uncertainty can be. Like a heads up display, I see every possible scenario, both good and bad, with its probability firmly floating above the wave, either granting hope, or threatening impending doom. 

    Just like Peter, I focus on the waves and their clear probabilities so proudly displayed above them to indicate how much credence I should give them. I see the unseen, the imagined, and grant them more confidence than they deserve.

    Until I find a thin sliver of a thread that glistens with divine mercy in the spraying mist of this emotional ocean. And when I focus on the thread, I follow it through the waves until I see a smiling God standing at the other end, reminding me: “This is my promise.” And suddenly the waves of unreal, probable scenarios are gone, and the sea is calm; I see only the promise, not the imagined tidal waves of destruction.

    And this lasts sometimes a day, sometimes three, sometimes a week. Until I focus on the probability waves again, and lose sight of the unseen promise represented in that glowing thread of hope that leads directly to the sacred heart of Jesus.

    Though it feels like it, this cyclical, emotional buffeting on the unseen waves of doubt and uncertainty is not insanity.

    It is merely the process of developing my water walking legs.

    Different seas require different legs. And no sea, no area of my life, will be entirely without the waves of doubt and uncertainty, but the more often I am willing to get out of that boat to walk on the water toward the open arms of God, the easier it will be to keep my balance and my direction when next I am confronted with ambiguity and unbelief.

  • I am a Rock? I am an Island?

    I had the sudden realization, some time past, that every life choice that I have come to regret, or to later see as unhealthy or unwise, was somehow fueled by loneliness, or my perceived lack of social connection.

    Some were clearly decisions born out of a lonely state of being, while others were more subtle, and I had to track them down, by investigating the motivations behind each and every choice that I had made, questioning my motivations behind these choices.

    We are social beings, and we want to connect with others, we want to be a part of something, and we want to know how we fit into the grand scheme of things – what our role is. Every adult has probably had a conversation with a younger human about wanting to fit in, and about the need to make wise choices about friends. And every adult has probably watched as that younger human has seemingly ignored that advice, because despite the good intentions of those who have traveled that path before, they need to find their own identity in order to know what they do and do not agree with.

    And while this example of kids finding their own way is an obvious one, as adults we often don’t realize just how many of our decisions are based on similar attempts at fitting in, at defining our identity, at finding our role within our social context. Did I come to this church because it provides the best theological teaching, or because it offers the best programs, or the best adult groups? Did I take this job because I love doing it, or because this type of job pays more money than one that I love to do – and by extrapolation, more money will allow me to get what I really crave? Did I buy this object because it serves a practical purpose, or because it is an object that shows my relevance and role within this social infrastructure?

    If we are bold enough, and honest enough with ourselves, we can usually trace every purchase beyond the necessities, every life choice beyond survival, every job choice beyond meeting our needs down to a simple motivation. These decisions are not inherently healthy or unhealthy, but more often than not, we will find that we pick these friends, do these jobs, buy these objects because they are fueling a need to place ourselves within our social context. And while we might make healthy choices – which is, after all, why we tell kids to sped time with good friends – we most often recognize our motivations when things have turned out poorly. These choices don’t necessarily fill an immediate practical need, but they offer a hope of what we really crave, which is meaning and true and authentic connections.

    Dr. Vivek Murthy, the Surgeon General, put out an advisory titled, “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation,” partly in response to the isolation that people felt during the pandemic, but also to show how the perception of loneliness has increased over the years, despite living in a society that has ever more technology to promote communication.1 The problem doesn’t lie in our communication options, but rather in the collective lack of knowledge on how to communicate.

    Social isolation is a physical state of being, though that physical isolation can lead to loneliness, which is “the painful subjective experience of feeling isolated or feeling that one’s relationships are in some ways unsatisfying or deficient (either in quality or quantity).”2 And this painful, subjective feeling of deficiency leads to an ever increasing state of fear/anxiety, despair, and rage.

    If rage is an outgrowth of loneliness, then it is clear why the surgeon general believes that social isolation and loneliness are an epidemic that must find a solution in our communities, because that rage has fueled too much division within this country, and threatens to widen the gap between those who have entrenched themselves in various political or social ideological camps. 

    It is in this division along ideological lines where people often find connection. Loneliness is related to our social identity, because not a single one of us defines ourselves merely by who we are, but by which groups we belong to.3 As adults, as hard as we might try to warn those younger people about the need to carefully choose their friends, we do the same thing, and align ourselves with those with whom we agree. And only with those we agree.

    Arthur C. Brooks, who teaches Happiness at the Harvard Business School, said in a 2022 talk, that one of the necessities for happiness is to get rid of our attachments. Quoting Thich Nhat Hanh, he says that some of our strongest attachments are to our opinions. What Brooks realized is that he was holding on to some very strong political opinions, and that he would only talk with those who agreed with him. “I was stepping over $100 bills, for the sake of a nickel,” he says, and that when he disengaged from his opinions, when he detached from tying his identity to those opinions, then it opened up his connections, because it was no longer about trying to convince people to join his camp, but instead became, “Tell me why you think this.” The conversation became interesting, rather than divisive.

    The church is just a microcosm of this same cultural phenomena. Our people are socially isolated, sometimes physically, and other times emotionally. Some people feel lonely because they are unwilling to detach from their strong opinions, and others feel lonely because they are not able to find a common ground with those around them. We might be tempted to say that people simply need to do more church shopping to find the right fit, but what we are really saying with that is, find the right tribe, so that you can align yourself with those who think like you. This is why researchers list over 45,000 separate church denominations worldwide. It is because we often look to forge spiritual connection based on cultural and social identity, rather than kingdom identity.

    There’s been a lot of talk over the years about how to make the Gospel relevant, which is to say, how to make the Gospel meaningful to people in a world that craves real and authentic connection. The way to make the Gospel relevant is the same way that we build a community that unites, rather than a community that divides: we detach ourselves from our strongly held opinions and beliefs, and focus instead on inclusion and compassion; we focus on understanding what motivates others, rather than telling them what motivates us; we educate people on how to love their neighbor as they love themselves, rather than educating them on scriptures that will score points and convince others to their way of thinking; we build up communities that prove that God loves and welcomes everyone, and not just those who think like us. If we do this, we may quit stepping over $100 bills for the sake of a nickel, and find that those who are already a part of our communities come to life in a way that gives them wings, and those who do not yet belong find themselves drawn to us because of the love and acceptance we show each other.

    1. Our Epidemic of Loneliness, pp. 19-21 ↩︎
    2. Psychology Today, New Research Identifies Two Major Causes of Loneliness. ↩︎
    3. Ibid.

      Simon and Garfunkel – I am a Rock ↩︎

  • The Way Home

    One of the phrases that’s popped up in conversation for me over the last several years is people referring to themselves as “spiritual, but not religious.” This phrase has always caused me to scratch my chin and ask, “What do you mean by that?” 

    The reason for my confusion is that by our very nature as humans, we are spiritual beings. Every person has an inherent spirituality. Spirituality is merely our attempts at making sense of the nonsensical, or of taking the mystery out of the mystical; it is our attempt at bringing order to the chaos that is our existence. Sometimes we take the random things that happen in our lives and we ascribe meaning to them, and other times we assign meaning to the coincidences and near misses in our lives. It’s been going on for centuries. Look at the goddess Fortuna, or the Fates, or the Norse god Freyr. Making sense of the nonsensical is what we do as humans.

    So, to me, for someone to say that they are “spiritual, but not religious,” means that they are saying something to the effect of “I’m a human being.” 

    Of course, I’m being deliberately obtuse with my own question, because what people generally want to convey with that statement is that they simply do not subscribe to any form of organized religion, and prefer to find their own method of making sense of the world; that they do not find any meaning in the structures others have created, but prefer to create their own order within the chaos.

    John O’Donohue says that spirituality is “the art of homecoming,” by which he means that we are all trying to find a place within our own lives where we find peace, comfort, and serenity, if even for a moment. A place where we are comfortable to be ourselves; a place where we are not pushed around by the hurts, the mistrust, the urgent requirements, the oughts, and shoulds, our past regrets, or future worries. Spirituality is a way of finding in us the beauty that is ourselves. When we enter into that place, then we have come home, and from that place of peace we are able to gather the energy needed to find the love, the patience, and the joy to make positive changes in our lives. This has nothing to do with religion, though O’Donohue himself was a practicing Christian, and former Catholic priest.

    Thich Nhat Hanh, Buddhist monk and teacher, says something very similar. The task of meditation and mindfulness is to bring us to the present moment, where all of our past regrets, future worries, the mistrust, the hurt, the anger is put aside; it is, in a sense, coming home to the body, to ourselves. Then, when we have attained that moment of presence within ourselves, we can bring those things to mind that need further examination, and can deal with them out of a sense of tranquility, so that when we leave that space within ourselves and enter into the world outside, we can engage with others with more peace, with more confidence, and with more tranquility. Though he was a practicing Buddhist, this too had not much to do with organized religion, and focused more on finding that space within that gave us the energy to confront the space without.

    And this, of course, is what most people wish to convey with the phrase, “Spiritual but not religious.” They hope to convey that they have found that space within themselves that affords them this sense of peace and tranquility.

    I had a conversation with someone this past year, in which the person told me that they are in a state of constant anxiety. They blamed their upbringing, they blamed their parents, their job, their relationships. They even blamed people like me – religious types who have “gone all in” for our religion, flawed though that religion might be in their judgment. When I said that I had found a measure of peace and tranquility in my religion, and that they should give it a shot, I was told that they had already tried my religion, and that it didn’t work. 

    In fact, this person had tried almost every major religion; they had tried various retreats and philosophies; they had tried meditation practices, treatments based on the latest scientific studies, and even therapy. Nothing had worked. To which I mentioned that in my time of knowing them, I had seen them dabble in many things, but never pick one and follow through with commitment and determination. I said that each religion and philosophical practice (including therapy), offers at least the hope of enlightenment, and so they ought to pick one, follow it with determination and commitment until they reach the end, and see if enlightenment is waiting for them there.

    Then came an odd sort of confession. Apparently, they had been told the same thing by a monk at a retreat center almost thirty years ago. And, they claimed, they had done just that in the years since. My response was brief: if I’m saying the same thing to you now, thirty years later, then it’s obvious that you have not followed a path to its conclusion; instead, you’ve continued in your path of dabbling.  

    We dabble in what can bring healing and wholeness, by choosing only what feels good, avoiding those things that don’t feel good, and spending time in this space until we determine that the promise of a more complete wholeness has not materialized – generally when that promise of wholeness involves dealing with things we find unpleasant. We dabble in spiritual niceties, and avoid stepping over the threshold of the difficult and painful. 

    In an interview with Krista Tippett, John O’Donohue speaks very deliberately about thresholds in our lives, places where we begin to look at ourselves more critically, where we begin to understand ourselves more deeply, and where we enter into the beauty of wholeness. But it takes a willingness to allow ourselves to be “threshed,” to be separated from our past patterns and behaviors in such a way that a new wholeness and beauty emerges from the depths of our being. In other words, it is not an easy choice, and it needs to be a deliberate one.

    And this is where those who practice Christianity can be dabblers as well. We can be so focused on living up to the standards that those in our communities have set, that we focus on the “looking good,” rather than on the “becoming.” Because “becoming” involves “threshing” and becoming involves pain and suffering; becoming involves looking into the void, the depth of our regrets and the lengths of our errors, and finding meaning where there appears to be none. We dabble when we try to live up to the things our religion seems to demand but avoid the prompting of the Holy Spirit to transform our lives.

    There are those who are religious and not spiritual, just like there are those who are spiritual but not religious.

    And there are those, both practitioners of a particular religion, as well as those who are spiritual but not religious, that examine their lives, sit with these painful, embarrassing, or unhappy memories, and allow those moments to sprout forth new meaning and joy.

    Our tendency as humans is to avoid suffering, and that means that we even avoid thinking about painful things, about embarrassing things, about things that cause inner turmoil. But our nature as humans is also to make errors, to say things that are hurtful to others, to do things that are not beneficial to ourselves, and, in general, to just foul up good things.

    We should not cover up the pain. We take care of it. To ignore or suppress the pain would be doing violence to ourselves. Mindfulness is us, but the painful feeling is also us. There’s no fighting. This is the view of nonduality.

    When we avoid going home to ourselves, we allow our pain to grow.

    Thich Nhat Hanh1

    To truly find peace, we must accept that we are flawed, we must consider ourselves as “whole” and acceptable, just as we are, warts and all; we are not merely good, or just plain bad; we are a muddy whole. And when we have accepted that we are not the super heroes we make ourselves out to be, then we must allow those painful memories, those regrets and failures to “thresh” us, we must allow them to enter into our minds and into our lives where we can examine them, and allow them to till the soil of our being so that they produce that promised wholeness. 

    When we do, that is when our lives begin to double, and failure and defeat produce peace and joy, rather than pain and anxiety.

    1. Reconciliation: Healing the Inner Child, Thich Nhat Hanh, p. 148 (Kindle Edition), Parallax Press, 2006 (The link to this book is an Amazon Associates link. I receive a few pennies from Amazon if you purchase this book.)

  • Do Be Do

    This summer, as part of my requirements for ordination, I spent time as a chaplain in a hospital. One of the things that all of the staff, from doctors, nurses, social workers, and even our team of chaplains, hoped to determine, for all the patients, regardless of their diagnosis, was their Advanced Directives. That is, if their health took a sudden turn, we wanted the doctors and nurses to know the patient’s will regarding how much effort to put into life-saving tactics. With these documents, the hospital is able to put to rest any discussion by the family, especially those who claim to know what the patient would have wanted. With these Advanced Directives, the doctors can make decisions about patient care under the authority of the patient themselves.

    There’s a reason that the scribes and Pharisees asked Jesus under whose authority he was teaching. Just like the idea of Advanced Directives, there is a certain authority that comes from knowing which voice has the last say. And so, a question about authority is really a battle of wills. Is Jesus doing what the scribes and Pharisees want? No. So under whose authority – whose will – is he doing what he does? This is the reason why Jesus responded with a question about John the Baptist’s authority, and with the story of the two sons who had different reactions to their father’s requests. The question about John the Baptist’s authority was intended to confront the scribes and Pharisees with their own motivations and claims to authority. And, the story of the two sons was intended to hit that idea home. Because it too, is intended to make all the listeners rethink their own claims to righteousness. 

    I say, “claims to righteousness,” but what I really mean is that this story, on the surface, seems to be a simple judgment about which son did the will of the father. We are able to make this judgment because Jesus gives us a glimpse into the minds of each of the sons, and explains their actions and motivations to us. By extension, this story demands that we look into our own minds and review our motivations, so that we might judge ourselves by asking the questions, “Am I doing the will of God?” “How do I know?” and “By whose authority do I do what I do?”

    When an Advanced Directive is not available, we sometimes find that families begin to argue about who knows the will of the patient best. And often, these arguments about the patient’s choices are guided less by the patient’s will, and more by the desires of the family member making the claim. It’s human nature. We all have desires that can cloud our judgments.

    We can do the same with God. We can lay claim to knowing God’s will so well, that we begin to judge others, and question them about where their authority comes from, simply because we do not like what they are doing.. Sound familiar? And from that moment of laying claim to knowing God’s will, it becomes easy to justify ourselves and our actions, whether they are truly God’s will – or not.

    Justification can only come from God, but self-justification comes from a place of pride.

    This is why Paul, in his letter to the church in Philippi, exhorted the people there to be of the same mind, to have the same love, and to do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but that they should regard others as better than themselves, in all humility, and look to the interests of others.

    In humility. 

    Just like Christ humbled himself and obediently did the will of the Father who sent him. 

    Paul wants the believers in Philippi to live in that same humility, and to do the will of the Father who sent Christ Jesus as the model of our faith.

    Do the will of the Father. …  Do. 

    Recently I had an incident in which I discovered that someone had been deliberately lying to me, withholding information about what they had done and were continuing to do. And they asked me, “Who knows about this? I need to know how much damage control I need to do.” To which I responded, “No one knows, but the fact that you are more concerned about looking good than about apologizing for or changing your behavior tells me a lot about you.” 

    Paul Tillich, former professor at Union Theological Seminary, had this to say about the will of God:

    People who call themselves Christian – parents, teachers, preachers – tell us that we should be “good” and obey the will of God. For many of them the will of God is not very different from the will of those socially correct people whose conventions they ask us to accept. If we only willed such goodness, they say, we could achieve it, and would be rewarded in time and eternity – but first of all, in time.

    It is entirely possible to do the will of the Father without being moved by what we are doing. We can follow all the requirements of a good and just society, without caring about the interests of others. We can do all of these things, but care only about looking good, which is precisely the opposite of what Paul was asking of the believers in Philippi.

    If we merely do the things that we have been told is God’s will, but do it only so that we might look good in a society that values looking good, then what we have done is bent God, and God’s will, to serve our own needs.

    This is not at all a new phenomenon in human history. The French writer Voltaire made the statement: “If God has made man in his own image, we have returned him the favor.”

    It is this tendency in ourselves to use God as a means to an end, to use God as a tool for our own purposes, or at its worst, to weaponize the name of God, that Paul is confronting in his letter to the people at Philippi. 

    Do nothing out of selfish ambition, but in humility, look to the interests of others.

    It is humility that changed the heart of the first son, who at first told his father that he would not do what he was asked, but then looked to his father’s interests. And it is humility that will change our own hearts, and look to the interests of God and God’s kingdom, rather than our own. 

    Any of us who have been in a relationship know that the only way to truly know the heart and mind of another is to spend time with them, and to be vulnerable, honest, and humble. 

    And so it is with God.

    The more time we spend with God in humility, in vulnerability, and in honesty, the more the image of God that we have created in our minds begins to fade away and disintegrate. And the more that our image of God disintegrates, the more it is replaced by who God is. 

    That is, the more time we spend with God, the more God becomes less and less of what we say God is, and we come face to face with the reality of a boundless, infinite presence, unfathomable in its greatness and depth.

    And when we do, we are overcome with awe and wonder – fear and trembling – and we wish to do the will of God, not because we are afraid, but because we see the majesty and might of an endless being who, in great mercy and love, has chosen to spend time… with us.

    Humility allows God to shape us, to move in us, and mold us, to make changes in our hearts and minds. Humility brings us to the point of awe and wonder in the presence of the boundless love that is our God.

    And it is in this space of fear and trembling, this space of awe and wonder, this space of humility, that God is able to transform us, enabling us to will and to work for God’s own pleasure, so that just like the first son, we may find that what we formerly ignored, or thought of as unimportant suddenly takes on new meaning.It is less about doing the will of God, and more about drawing so close to God that God’s will becomes our will, and that God’s work becomes our work. And we do this by spending our time in this space of humility, in this space of awe and wonder, resting in the presence of the unfathomable beauty and love that has chosen to spend time with us.

    1.  Paul Tillich, The Good That I Will, I Do Not, in The Eternal Now, 1963, Scribner, New York. pp 49
    2. Voltaire, “Si Dieu nous a faits à son image, nous le lui avons bien rendu.” Notebooks, c.1735-1750

    Note: Normally there would be a video of today’s service right here. Unfortunately, the internet was not working today, so we were unable to upload the service to YouTube and I am not able to offer a video of the sermon.

    [This sermon was delivered at The Episcopal Church of St. Matthew in Tucson, AZ on October 1, 2023.]