Category: Sermons

Based on Revelation 1:4b-8, preached at Tualatin Presbyterian Church on Sunday, November 24, 2024

Christ the King Sunday is an odd celebration in my way of thinking.

I personally don’t relate to Jesus as a King –

the Prince of Peace maybe –

but that mention of royalty conjures up someone more like

The Little Prince – a small fair-haired boy

who falls in love with a rose and is gentle in spirit.

Of course, this is problematic as well

because the historical Jesus was likely not fair skinned,

like the blonde cherub we meet in Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s tale.

The placement of Christ the King Sunday is curious also,

for next week we will walk into Advent,

the season of waiting for the birth of the Christ child.

Today Christ is triumphant,

but in just a few weeks, we’ll sing happy birthday

to a baby boy born into very modest circumstances.

None of this makes much sense to me.

But then faith doesn’t make much sense generally anyway – does it?

Hopefully this line of thinking offers a decent segway

into the book of Revelation, from which I just read.

Some Evangelical Christians, not to mention lay people

(who only know the barest of facts about the Bible),

view this last book in our Holy Tome,

as a prediction of an apocalyptic end to our earthly realm.

And, at least on our worst days,

the state of our world might make this seem quite plausible.

If one’s attention is focused on world politics,

environmental disasters,

the widening economic gaps between people and the like –

it is easy to read into this common understanding

of the book of Revelation.

But, it is not accurate.

And you could take this as very good news, couldn’t you?

I mean unless you want the world to end, that is.

Look at this –

I’m bringing out the Good News early in my message today –

diverging from my usual method.

That alone is good news in and of itself – and slightly earth shattering! 😉

But, back to my statement denouncing a common

misunderstanding of the book of Revelation …

a thinking of it as prescriptive or prophetic of what is to come …

as in a fiery end to everything we know.

Some context may help …

the book of Revelation is commonly known

to be written by an apostle named John,

which is almost assuredly not John the disciple

who knew and loved Jesus in the flesh.

This particular John seems to have known, and been known by,

the communities to which he is writing …

the seven churches of Asia.

These communities are mentioned by name in the book of Revelation

and so this is a particular message, not a global one.

And yet, it is also symbolic …

the number 7 is used more than 50 times

in the book of Revelation alone and is representative

of divine wholeness …

being WHOLE, as in complete, healthy, actualized.

All of this is certainly a strong underpinning

of the message John wishes to convey.

In actuality, none of us humans know how to predict

what will happen in the future.

Of course, our worldly cultures encourage us to work toward that goal.

It’s what higher education is all about,

and the people who are well educated,

while occasionally mistreated in their early school years,

are ultimately lauded in our adult world.

You know:

• The Doctor always KNOWS best, … knows what our ailment is, how it formed, and how to heal it.

• The Attorney KNOWS how to proceed through the legal morass we’re in, or could be in some day (I’m thinking of Estate Law, which guides for our wishes beyond this lifetime).

• The Building Contractor KNOWS how to build a structure so that it is safe and on budget (he or she sure better know how to do that anyway).

• The Politician KNOWS how to guide our government so that he or she can lead and defend and take care of the country’s people (hopefully with a mindset inclusive of the entire world).

• Even the Weather Man (or Woman) KNOWS what Mother Nature is planning to send our way on any given day … and for a week or so in advance?!

Yes, we humans build cultures that insist

on all of us predicting how life is going to unfold,

so it makes good sense that the book of Revelation

has been understood (with its seemingly ominous message) in this way.

The only problem is that’s not correct,

which maybe isn’t a problem at all …

Human beings as a general rule are an antsy, anxious bunch,

for understandable reasons.

Once we reach about 10 years of age or so (?) –

most any of us with any learnedness at all,

understand that we aren’t getting off this planet alive

and so we can be rather curious about how things are going to go down.

When’s the next shoe going to drop,

for surely shoes have dropped in the past, and they will again.

Whether we are fearful of our mortality or just vaguely aware of it,

most of us want some assurances of how our lives will unfold …

how things will go.

And, stepping away slightly from this most heavy topic … our DEATHS …

we all face little deaths continually as well, so we want to know:

• When is the job going to vanish? Or my clients? vendors? customers?
• When is the relationship going to fail … my marriage? With my best friend or family members?
• When will my money run out? My health insurance? My resources of all kinds?
• What illness or accident will I succumb to in the coming years?

All of this probably speaks to why this Sunday

we celebrate Christ as a King.

We NEED one!

We need someone with Royal authority to author and govern our lives.

Doesn’t it seem so?

I dated a man in college who was convinced

that Karl Marx’s statement commonly translated as

“Religion is an opiate for the masses”

– was all that religion was –

just a pipe dream for weak individuals.

You know, people who couldn’t make things happen

through their own smarts or capabilities.

My dear beau figured that religious people needed a savior

who would come to their rescue … because they were inept.

Suckers, I think he thought such folks were –

his girlfriend included.

Come to think of it, this might be why that relationship didn’t last 😉

But back to the book of Revelation … as I’ve said several times now,

it does not predict how things are going to go.

No rather it describes what is already happening –

which for us in this particular case is what happened in the past

for these churches, to whom the apostle John is writing.

John speaks a word of honest truth

about the troubles these communities are already facing –

including violence and persecution.

He wrote during the time of the Roman Empire

when Christians were persecuted for being followers of Christ.

Most scholars seem to think the particulars to which John is referencing

are likely local conflicts versus

a more generalized and widespread Roman campaign.

Just last week our dear pianist, Evan, expressed his concerns

for people in his community.

And surely these concerns, even fears, are based in a reality that

he has known personally

or witnessed in the lives of people that he deeply cares about.

This is something we should all be aware of and attentive to –

Christ, King or otherwise, calls us to this time and time again.

In response to similar and most reasonable fears

within the communities John is addressing,

(John the author of the book of Revelation),

he reports to a fear-struck people … from the heavenly realm

where the view is much larger and more hopeful.

While things might look bleak here on Earth,

they appear quite different from on high.

Even as suffering goes on all around us,

the victory of the saints (those who have gone on ahead of us)

is already accomplished in the heavenly realm.

Which is why it’s lovely that our first taste

of who this unstoppable King is

happens when John begins his greeting to his recipients

… in the name of the God, Christ Jesus,

who is and who was and who is to come.

This is a God who presides over all of time (past, present, and future)

and thus has a strong, capable handle on all things.

As such, John hopes to provide reassurance and thus confidence

to those who have fallen or are in fear of their current circumstances.

That is a King that would be helpful … a King from a different realm.

And that King is also the Christ Child who we still await,

yet again this year.

Jesus is the first born and, in his life, here

he brought heaven and earth together for all eternity.

A word about the Heart Banner hanging from the pulpit.

This piece of ‘art’ has the names of your personal saints,

living still and no longer among us.

The dear souls who have loved you into being,

maybe some with a hard edge to them,

but who have formed you all the same.

This banner is not particularly beautiful to the eye, but actually it is,

for woven into it is the cloud of witnesses significant

to those of you gathered here at Tualatin Presbyterian Church,

and so it is exquisite.

And the One who is and who was and who is to come,

Christ the King, holds all of them, and all of this life

in his very capable hands.

Thanks be.

Amen.

Based on Ezekiel 2:1-5 and Mark 6:1-13, Preached at Two Rock and Tomales Presbyterian Churches on the Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 9 – July 7, 2024

“What a pity,” Annie Dillard wrote,

“that so hard on the heels of Christ come the Christians.”

Reading the call of the Prophet Ezekiel, makes one feel the same sort of disappointment.

The first chapter of his book starts in a stormy fashion.

Referred to constantly as, ‘Mortal,’ the major Prophet Ezekiel

seems to feel anything but Major.

His call story demonstrates that he felt, as is often the case,

ill-prepared to be a mouthpiece for God.

In like fashion, IF Christians are always being reminded

of just how ordinary and powerless we are, if we’re told constantly to be humble,

we may likely fulfill our own demoralized expectations

and NOT show up for God’s people in the way they need us to.

And boy oh boy do God’s people need us to show up for them now.

Same as it ever was, but really …

This theme continues in Mark’s gospel

where we hear of Jesus being rejected in his home town.

Maybe this is familiar territory for some of you.

How many of you grew up in this area?

Did you have to fight against your growing up reputation?

Or God-forbid, your families’ reputation?

That kind of stuff can be hard to live down.  

I was talking with a couple of church members the other day …

listening to some of their recent experiences with the larger world.

They were talking about a time not too long ago when some,

presumably well-meaning young people from across the Bay

were protesting near some of our ranches.

They were animal lovers and as such felt it imperative that they make their concern

for the fair treatment of animals known to our neighbors,

whom they felt, by sheer evidence that these ranchers raise livestock,

were clearly mistreating animals.

This was concerning for the ranchers who all the sudden had flocks of people

descending on their normally quiet roads,

camped out near their driveways and making it feel almost unsafe

to go run their daily errands.

I grew up in farm country. I wasn’t raised in a farming family,

but many of my good friends when I was growing up did.

In fact, one of my nearest and dearest friends grew up on a farm

and even converted his family farm from the normal practices of the 1970s and 1980s

to a pristine organic farm … no small feat of an accomplishment …

what with all the regulatory paperwork and the need for a considerable lapse of time

for the soil to release any of the harder chemicals used in traditional pesticides.

On one occasion, Marty told me about the process of taking their cattle to be ‘harvested,’

as they had been raised for the consumption of meat eaters.

The notion of this made me uncomfortable,

which then made Marty uncomfortable,

because he knew I was a meat-eater and thus had no right

to balk at the natural order of things.

So he showed me a thing or two.

He invited me out to the farm so I could get a better understanding of the process.

I wasn’t willing to go to the slaughterhouse,

and to be clear Marty used to tease that he had to go to the local bar

on that fateful day every year too.

No one raising animals is going to like that day … even if it does bring one their livelihood.

I learned a lot that day on the farm.

Like how Marty would play classical music for the cattle while he fed them dinner.

He told me which ones were okay to feed hay to directly

and which ones I might not want to put my hand near their mouth.

In the end, I decided that if I were a cow, I’d definitely want to be one of Marty’s.

They seemed to have a pretty good life!

And as long as I plan to continue to eat beef,

I better reconcile myself to the life cycle of cattle raised for producing beef.

What’s all this got to do with our Scripture passages for today?

Well, I hope it gives an example of how we might learn

to stretch past our initial perspectives.

We have to do this today.

We can’t rest on our laurels and expect things to go well.

If we’ve had successes, we aren’t guaranteed more;

and if we’ve had failures, we aren’t doomed to repeat them.

That is, unless we decide to close ourselves off from learning and growing.

The people in Jesus’ hometown thought they knew him because they watched him grow up.

This makes sense. He’s a known entity to them.

But no one, not even a mother and father can fully see their young ones in all their fullness.

So much growing happens inwardly.

In the botanical world a great deal of activity happens

before a seed even breaks through the soil into the sunlight.

So, we can know our people,

but we’d be wise to give them ample room to show up in new ways.

This is the case in our marital relationships and our long-term friendship too.

Just because someone always does that thing,

doesn’t mean they’re going to do it again.

I mean if you’re convinced that this is how it is going to go,

then whether it does or not, that is probably what you’re going to see.

But is that fair to the person in front of you?

Would you want that done to you?

Now when we get to the larger world, ya know like at the grocery store,

and we see the old Republican guy wearing a Make America Great Again hat;

or the young woman wearing a Title IX Rules tee shirt,

it might be a little more challenging to give the benefit of the doubt

if we don’t like the message the person is wearing.

But you know what … we just might not know the whole story.

In fact, it’s an absolute given that we don’t know the whole story …

we don’t even know their name, for God’s sake!

Are we willing to ask?

Can we offer even just a smile, whether we like the message they are wearing or not?

I think the end of Mark’s gospel lesson today is fascinating.

After being rejected by the hometown crowd,

Jesus persists with his mission.

The text says that “he was amazed at their unbelief.”

He knew how much growing he’d done.

He knew what God’s Spirit had endowed him with.

Why couldn’t they see it?

Well, if they were that short-sighted, that was none of his business.

He’d get on with the task ahead … which was a task to share God’s love …

with every last person willing to receive it.

He was smart, Jesus … ya know,

He knew he couldn’t accomplish the task on his own.

So he gathered his friends and sent them out two-by-two

to the mission fields all around them.

I like that.

You have a friend and an accountability partner if you go out two-by-two.

If one of you ‘chickens out’ with that guy in the hat or that gal in the tee shirt,

then maybe your friend can make the approach.

And what are you supposed to say?

What does Jesus want us to do?

Well the text says to go out, taking nothing except a staff;

no bread, no money in our belts; and only wear sandals and one tunic.

(Now you know … ‘clothes-horse’ that I am … I don’t like that one AT ALL)!

What’s the point of not coming prepared with a change of clothes?

Well, I think it is so that we stay focused on the task at hand

and NOT get distracted with who we are and how we show up

but keep fixed on WHO GOD IS and what God’s message is.

And what is that message?

It’s sharing God’s love. God’s providence. God’s message of redemption and grace.

For everyone.

Every. Last. One. Of. Us.

The Ezekiel text is telling too.

We in the Church might feel like the Prophet:

Too fearful, too weak, or too in shock to stand up on our own two feet,

and thus powerless to do much of anything.

Evangelism is a hard one for most Christians.

We live in a pluralistic world and so we don’t want to offend.

I had to conquer that one when I served as a Hospital Chaplain.

About half of the patients I went to see when I did my daily rounds

wanted nothing to do with me.

Those folks either didn’t want to hear from some ‘Bible-thumping-Jesus-lover,’

or they didn’t want to see the ‘Grim-Reaper.’

Heck, I wouldn’t want to visit with either of those types either, so I understood.

But you can share God’s love, Jesus’ grace with anyone

and you don’t have to name what you’re doing.

You just do it.

And, God will be pleased.

The person in front of you will appreciate the kindness.

And you might feel pretty okay too.

What if the person doesn’t receive your kindness,

… the love of God as you attempt to express it?

Both biblical texts today stress the same thing.

Don’t be attached to the outcome of your ‘mission.’

Just stay true to the call.

God goes with us.

Send us Out God … with your love and grace.

We know how much our world needs to hear from You.

Amen.

Based on Job 38:1-11 and 2 Corinthians 6: 1-13 – Preached at Two Rock and Tomales Presbyterian Churches, June 23, 2024

I have a confession to make.

Pastors aren’t supposed to have favorite people in their congregations,

but we’re human beings (newsflash), so we do.

One of my favorites from the first church I served is a man named Frank.

Frank and I couldn’t be more different in a lot of ways.

We vote differently in national politics, our personal theologies don’t always agree, and

we wouldn’t spend any time together if we were on a mutual vacation

because we like completely different pastimes,

and yet, I adore the man.

The admiration is all the sweeter because the reason I like him

has nothing to do with the ‘worldly’ factors I just listed …

politics, theology, or leisure time.

The reason I like him, and I think he likes me,

is because over the course of more than five years,

we got to see each other’s hearts for God and the Church.

The connection is ultimately based on much deeper matters

then the relatively trivial matters that tend to divide us all.

Anyway, as is often the case between friends,

Frank and I have a running joke.

It developed over the years based on a pattern that got set up one Sunday morning.

As he was greeting me after worship he would say,

“Lisa, you really need to preach more fire and brimstone sermons.”

I think the first time he said it, I was taken aback.

Do any of you want to hear a fire and brimstone message?

Well, I can be pretty slow to respond at times and so it probably took a while,

but eventually I came up with what I thought was a brilliant response:

“When hell freezes over, Frank.”

I am of the mind that Love always wins over Fear

and so fire and brimstone just doesn’t work for me.

I’m sure each of you could think of a time when a fiery approach worked for you

and so I’m sure you could correct me,

but nine times out of ten, I think holding a carrot out to someone works far better

than holding a stick over them.

At least that is my experience.

All of this makes today’s message a little difficult to preach,

since I’m touching on the story of Job.

As I mentioned last week, I always pick my sermon focus

based on a prescribed liturgical calendar that gives me only four options.

An OT/Hebrew passage, a Psalm, a Gospel message,

and a Scripture reading from the voluminous writings of the Apostle Paul.

Today I picked the OT passage from Job and the Pauline passage from 2 Corinthians.

The reason I picked Job is because it has to be one of the more challenging books

in the entire Bible, at least in my opinion.

As a reminder, the book of Job is the story of a righteous man with a good life

who has everything snatched away from him almost as soon as we’re introduced to him.

What follows is an agonizingly long conversation between Job,

three of his friends, and God Almighty.

Now if you aren’t familiar with it, or have forgotten,

Job’s friends are the worst kind of friends you could have.

You could say, “With friends like these, who needs enemies?”

The reason I say this is because they have minimal compassion for his hard circumstances

(they even blame him for his situation initially)

and then they spend a lot of effort trying to convince him to ‘turn on God’.

Ya know, if God allowed all these calamities to happen to you, Job,

then clearly, He is not to be trusted.

Job is tenacious in his faith, and he doesn’t turn on God.

Until right before the passage we read.

Even then I wouldn’t say that Job turns, he more grows weary and confused.

I mean when your earthly friends show up as enemies

and God doesn’t seem to be responding to your pain,

what’s a man to do?

Listen again to God’s response to Job’s questions of why this has happened:

Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind: 

²“Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? 

³Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.

⁴“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. 

⁵Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? 

⁶On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone 

⁷when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy? 

⁸“Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb? — 

⁹when I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, 

¹⁰and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, 

¹¹and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped’?

With a response like this, would you keep trusting God?

How would you respond?

God’s diatribe continues for a few chapters.

He really reads Job the riot act.

And do you know how Job responds,

when he’s finally given the opportunity to speak?

“I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.

… I have uttered what I did not understand.” (Job 42:2-3)

It reminds me of a Henri Nouwen quote that is quite truthful and telling:

“Theological formation is the gradual and painful discovery of God’s incomprehensibility.

You can be competent in many things, but you cannot be competent in God.”

The second scripture passage that we read came from 2 Corinthians.

In it we hear a word seeking reconciliation.

The writer, the Apostle Paul, is speaking to the community in Corinth

where there has been some in-fighting.

I can’t imagine that sort of thing happening amongst a group of people, can you?

Well, apparently it happens somewhere, or did.

And so, Paul says the following:

Companions as we are in this work with you, we beg you, please don’t squander one bit of this marvelous life God has given us. God reminds us,

“I heard your call in the nick of time; The day you needed me, I was there to help.”

Well, now is the right time to listen, the day to be helped.

Don’t put it off; don’t frustrate God’s work by showing up late, throwing a question mark over everything we’re doing.

Our work as God’s servants gets validated – or not – in the details.

People are watching us as we stay at our post, alertly, unswervingly … in hard times, tough times, bad times; when we’re beaten up, killed, and mobbed; working hard, working late, working without eating;

with pure heart, clear head, steady hand; in gentleness, holiness, and honest love;

when we’re telling the truth, and when God’s showing his power, when we’re doing our best setting things right,

when we’re praised and when we’re blamed; slandered, and honored; true to our word, though distrusted; ignored by the world, but recognized by God;

terrifically alive, though rumored to be dead; beaten within an inch of our lives, but refusing to die; immersed in tears, yet always filled with deep joy;

living on handouts, yet enriching many; having nothing, having it all.

Dear, dear Corinthians, I can’t tell you how much I long for you to enter this wide-open, spacious life.

We didn’t fence you in. The smallness you feel comes from within you. Your lives aren’t small, but you’re living them in a small way.

I’m speaking as plainly as I can and with great affection.

Open up your lives. Live openly and expansively!”

I don’t know about you, but it sounds like a good invitation to me …

Going back to the beginning of this message,

I proposed that the carrot works far better than the stick.

Like I said earlier, I’m sure you can come up with times where that is not true,

but more often than not, in my personal experience, carrots are better.

Especially when in conflict.

A carrot is an attractive thing.

Even if you dislike them, or are allergic to them, they are one of the sweetest vegetables.

And generally speaking, vegetables are a good thing.

On the other hand, sticks are generally seen as weapons.

They can be used to build a fire or a structure and so they aren’t intrinsically bad.

But if you and I were in a battle of some kind

and I picked something up in my hand,

wouldn’t you prefer see a carrot then a stick?

If nothing else, it might make you laugh.

And laughter is almost always good.

The image on the front cover of your bulletin is a photo I took one day

while running errands.

The bottom of that sign which reads “We adore you …”

says something like, “… so please don’t park here …

we really don’t want to tow you out of our parking space.”

Rather than write some imposing, confrontative message,

a carrot is being held out.

If you pulled into the parking spot and read the full sign,

you might be irritated to have to move,

but you’d be apt to smile at the same time.

You might have a little compassion for the person who’s spot it is.

Because probably they need that spot,

or have paid for that spot as part of their rental property,

and maybe, just maybe they have a right to it.

We all have a place in this world.

With God’s grace, we can learn to respect what each of us brings to the table.

Because in Jesus’ world,

every last one of us has a place here.

We are all needed.

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

Preached at Two Rock Valley and Tomales Presbyterian Churches, June 16, 2024

As many of you know, I had the joy of watching my son and many of his buddies

walk the stage for their high school graduations this past week.

It was surreal and beautiful.

For any of you who may feel weighted down by national politics, world events,

or your own person trials and tribulations,

please know that it is my humble assessment that we are in good hands

with this upcoming generation.

Such handsome souls I witnessed this week … a plethora of them.

70 or so at Tamiscal in Corte Madera and 350 or so at Archie Williams in San Anselmo. Talented and beautiful … Every. Last. One. Of. Them.

It was a joy to see the parents too.

I can’t toot my own horn, pastors are supposed to be humbler than that,

but I can applaud my friends.

And so many of them helped John and I so much over the years.

For example, I saw Bob and Kristin, a couple both of whom I just adore.

I hadn’t seen them in years …

maybe not since around the time when Bob coached John in little league.

It brought a great memory to mind …

the boys were particularly wild on one particular day …

They looked like a poster for The Little Rascals …

they were all turning their caps to different angles in some sort of game

of what hour is your hat pointing to …

That’s when Coach Bob got them to straighten up.

“Boys, your hat brim always points straight ahead …

at least if you want that ball to go where you want it to when you get up to bat.”

Well, … that took care of that.

It’s a good spiritual message too.

Face forward. Even when you can’t see where you are going.

The title of my sermon is Walk by Faith, Not by Sight,

which comes out of a companion Scripture selection to the two we just read today

(2 Corinthians 5:7).

I tend to follow what’s called the Common Lectionary,

which is a three-year Church Calendar that encourages pastors

to walk through the Bible somewhat methodically.

I like it, as many of my peers do,

because it gives an immediate starting place from which to focus and preach.

It also means that I am challenged to show up,

and thus help you show up, for our faith in a way that is Bible-led, not Pastor-led.

This is important, because it means someOne other than me,

and my little human whims, is dictating what you think about today,

and hopefully, if I do my job well, this upcoming week.

So today we heard King David’s call story in 1 Samuel

and about the mighty mustard seed in the gospel of Mark.

Good, good stories about small, unimposing entities

becoming great and impressive under God’s tutelage.

I like that. And it fits well with the larger calendar of our lives,

what with graduations and Father’s Day and Juneteenth this coming week.

Both the Scripture passages we read today are about vision;

God’s expert vision and our relative lack of it.

It’s not that we can’t see, or course,

but rather than our sight can lead us astray and that often we can’t see the big picture.

In the call story of King David, even the prophet Samuel

has trouble seeing what God is up to.

Directed by God to anoint a new king, Samuel is led to the house of Jesse,

a father with eight sons, one of whom God plans to name as the country’s new leader.

When Samuel saw Jesse’s eldest son, Eliab, he was sure that the search was over.

Eliab was striking and tall and seemingly a perfect fit for a king.

But God told Samuel:

“Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”

In the end, the heart that made the cut was David’s;

Jesse’s youngest son who had been relegated to tending sheep,

rather than invited to attend the important family meeting with Samuel.

David’s a curious pick in my mind,

because the only thing we’re told about him is that he has a healthy, glowing,

handsome face and beautiful eyes.

Didn’t God just stress that outer appearances aren’t the deciding factor?

It seems clear to me that God sees something that we humans don’t

or can’t from our limited vantage point.

I read recently that sheep (which humans are often compared with in Scripture)

can’t see past the end of their noses.

Supposedly, and some of you sitting here can confirm or deny this,

they have excellent peripheral vision, but their depth perception is poor

and sight really isn’t their strongest sense.

We humans can be the same way, and as near as I can tell

it doesn’t much matter whether we need corrective lenses or not;

As an example, in one of my son’s and my most favorite movies

(at least it was a number of years ago),

Mary Poppins tells the story of a woman called in to care for the children

of a successful banker named George.

George is confident that he has his priorities straight,

but, over the course of the movie, with the help of Mary Poppins and his young children,

he becomes awakened to his shortsightedness.

Life can do this do us. Especially, I am finding, in middle age.

The number of things vying for our attention grows and grows

and before long we’re apt to loose track of what is important.

Children can actually be quite good at reminding us, if we let them.

In another childhood favorite story, The Little Prince,

who symbolizes the hope, love, innocence and insight of childhood says:

“Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves,

and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever be explaining things to them.”

Dads (and moms too, but it is Father’s Day),

listen to your children today … they might have an important message for you.

I suppose it is all a matter of perspective.

What we ‘know’ is dependent on what is important to us

and what we understand about our world.

Adults, at least some of us, understand things like

setting a budget, fixing things, operating computers, cooking meals, managing time, reading, and the list goes on.

Children, on the other hand, understand and know the importance of

smelling the flowers, playing, imagining, dreaming, creating art, & other such necessities.

Adults and children actually make a pretty good team,

even if it might take a bit of stretching to appreciate each other’s gifts.

It is however, imperative that we learn to do so.

At least if we hope to connect with loved ones …

we often have to agree to step into their world.

At the end of our service today we will be singing one of my very favorite hymns …

Guide My Feet.

We will do this because it is an African American spiritual

and this coming week is Juneteenth, a relatively new national holiday.

It’s probably long overdue in being recognized as it celebrates the freedom

of Africans in America, signified by the Emancipation Proclamation

read to enslaved African Americans on June 19^th in 1865.

Several years ago, with the brutal death of George Floyd,

most Americans were reminded that we still have a long way to come in this regard.

But naming Juneteenth as a National holiday is at least a start

to lifting up a priority we Americans can at least hope to live into better.

There’s another reason we’re singing Guide My Feet, and it’s personal.

My water broke, announcing John’s birth, to that song.

It happened at the Presbyterian Church in Windsor, California

right after I stepped down off the chancel

having offered the closing blessing to my dear clergy friend Amy

who was being installed as the Pastor there.

Without going into too much detail, it was a confusing experience for me …

to be fair John was 3 weeks early, and I wasn’t prepared for his arrival.

But he decided he was coming, and the fact that I was singing Guide My Feet

did not lose its message on me.

I got it. Loud and clear. And he still does guide my feet.

Whether you go into this day celebrating your Dad or lamenting that he’s passed on,

Whether you rue the day that He was born and wish you’d had a different one,

Whether you have a plethora of African friends and are grateful our country

is trying to do something to acknowledge

the collective pain we inflicted on a whole race of people,

Or if you just go home not really caring about either Father’s Day or Juneteenth,

I invite you to consider that God is always talking with you …

through the experiences of your day,

through your loved ones, those you like and the ones that you don’t so much.

God is with you … God is with all of us.

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

(a sermon preached for Two Rock Valley and Tomales Presbyterian Churches on June 2, 2024, message is based on 2 Corinthians 4:5-15)

In the 13^th century, Emperor Fredrick of the Roman Empire,

conceived of an experiment by which he believed

he would discover human-kind’s original language; Hebrew, Greek, or Latin.

He decided to achieve this goal by isolating a few infants

from the sound of the human voice.

Left to their own devices, he believed these little ones

would eventually speak our natural human tongue.

Nurses were forced to swear they would not speak to the infants

while feeding, bathing, and diaper changing.

Within several months instead of declaring the native tongue of humankind,

all the babies were (… brace yourself) … dead.

After reeling from the horror of this story,

I had an immediate thought.

Is this why mainline Christian churches in America are dwindling in membership,

dare I say (at least our fear says) dying?

Is it because we don’t think sharing our faith is necessary?

Is it because we think that people are born innately with a full-fledged sense of faith?

Probably we realize we have a contribution to make,

but maybe don’t know how to share about why we come to Church,

or we are afraid to do so in this day and time and place?

In Second Corinthians Chapter 4, the apostle Paul says:

“Just as we have the same spirit of faith, that is in accordance with Scripture

– “I believed and so I spoke” – we also believe and so we speak.

… Yes, everything is for your sake so that grace,

as it extends to more and more people,

may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.”

We believe and so we speak.

Emperor Fredrick felt his beliefs would speak on their own, with tragic results.

Beliefs are not shared unless they are spoken,

just as they aren’t shared unless they are demonstrated.

When my son John was born,

the nurse who helped me as I was leaving the hospital

instructed me to speak to him constantly;

to explain what I was doing and why,

even on mundane things like buckling him into his car seat.

She stressed to me that even newborns have some understanding of what is going on

and that furthermore they need to learn their mother’s (or a loved ones) voice.

They need to be spoken to because they are no less a person than an adult.

Infants learn this way, even when we are unable to see how.

Research tells us that the typical child takes in an average of a dozen words a day

by the time they are eighteen months old.

(So, if I’ve done the math correctly, that would mean that they ‘know’ nearly 10,000 words by the time they reach 1.5 years of age).

Whether we realize it or not, our words, and the beliefs behind them, are readily absorbed,

long before a child even begins to speak.

And it goes both ways: babies not only understand us when they are preverbal,

but we understand them, even without words.

It often takes just a short time for a new mom to distinguish between a cry that means,

“I’m hungry,” a cry that means, “I need my diaper changed,” and

a cry that means, “I’m tired.”

And if you never could tell the difference, it doesn’t mean you were a bad mom, …

most likely it means you were tired and pulled in far too many directions.

In a language acquisition study some time ago,

it was proven that parents can recognize their children from their babbles and coos.

In one particular study, a group of French laypeople were invited to listen

to recordings of pre-verbal babies from different countries.

With near perfect accuracy,

they could pick out the babblings of their French babies over all the others.

We communicate with words and with pre-verbal utterances;

but the common denominator is that speaking to one another is critical.

We speak in order to develop and sustain relationships.

We voice what we believe; we share what we feel is important.

An important reminder too … we absolutely speak without words as well …

experts posit that 93% of our communication is actually non-verbal

(this includes tone of voice, mannerisms, facial expressions and the like).

Interestingly, when my son John was young,

I tried pretty hard NOT to over-emphasize religion.

I wanted him to believe. I wanted him to know the love of God.

I wanted him to understand his mom’s professional calling,

but I didn’t want it to be all consuming for him.

PKs (Pastor’s Kids) can have a tough time growing up

– either taking on the mantle of perfectly behaved saviors for all around them

or taking the opposite approach by rebelling against their parents’ teachings with gusto.

I didn’t want to encourage either of these postures in John.

And yet, despite my intention to keep Church in a healthy balance for him,

John picked up plenty of what he heard about God, faith and Church.

And from what I could tell,

John was more expressive than most of his peers on these matters.

One day when John was in kindergarten,

he came home to inform me that he had started a ‘God Club.’

When I asked him who was in the club,

he said everyone, … well except for Sam.

As a newly called church pastor I was quite impressed with this …

(that’s a very good participation rate!)

“What do you do in your God club, John?”

“We talk about the things that God does, Mom (duh!)

You know, like create trees, flowers, food, friends – we add things to the list every day.”

Seeing how John absorbed all that swirled around him was a joy, and quite informative.

If children are that adept at picking up on what they hear,

then NOT hearing things might also be profound.

If faith is not discussed, children probably think it’s not that important.

Or, at minimum, they certainly might not know how to develop a sense of faith.

If we live in a void, where there are no expressions of faith,

how can we, like the infants not exposed to language at the start of my message here,

how can we thrive in knowing and sharing the grace of God?

I had the honor of meeting Garrison Keillor, the NPR radio-show host,

a decade or so ago at a ‘meet and greet’ before one of his shows in Carmel, CA.

When he learned I was a pastor, he shared a bit about his pastor (also a young-ish woman)

and his church, … and the dwindling membership he witnessed there.

After summarizing this unfortunately all too familiar situation, he asked me,

“Lisa, where are all the children? They don’t come and when they do,

they don’t know the first thing about Christian teachings. What has happened?”

I was surprised by the seriousness of this very funny man.

Taken aback, I nonetheless quickly quipped,

“I think they’re all on the soccer fields or basketball courts, Sir” …

… because that was my experience.

He was speaking to the choir because I was in this exact season of life and

I found myself, much to my dismay, to be at times an ‘angry church lady’

who couldn’t figure out how to get my kid to his ballgames,

which increasingly ate up all of our weekends, including Sunday mornings,

(which were definitely not sacredly set aside for Church).

In my experience of the larger world,

Church is no longer a part of the fabric of society in many pockets of America.

People are busy with a multitude of interests and activities.

This may be a bold claim, but I actually think people are tying to create their own churches

on the soccer fields and with the communal bike rides,

and they are doing this precisely because the Church has failed them

(yes, there is a whole sermon there, and no I am not touching that one today).

If we were in business, our conversation as the Church would be

“How do we increase our market share?”

How do we convince people that church is as important as soccer or that

down time with one’s family might nicely include an outing to church on Sunday mornings?

The tide is working against us.

We don’t have the latest gizmo or paradigm to share.

Our story is old, … very old.

But this does NOT make it obsolete.

Let us remember, lest we bemoan the times in which we live,

that the tide has often been working against people of faith.

The apostle Paul, author of our reading from Corinthians today,

was arguably one of the most expressive evangelists our Christian faith has ever known.

How did he come to share the Good News?

He shared his experiences,

after being struck down off his horse while traveling the road to Damascus,

supposedly blinded by Christ because he was headed to persecute Christians.

Not exactly a moment when he was at his personal best.

Sharing what we know (in our heads) is not,

as compelling as sharing why our faith moves us to show up at Church.

Sharing how we have come to believe what we believe, however,

… that can be transformative, for ourselves and others.

How do we do this in a society and time in which everything is expressed

in sound bites and text messages?

Faith doesn’t necessarily lend itself well to this sort of brevity.

I wish I could answer that question with a simple reply.

I take comfort in the words of a mentor of mine who recently reminded me that

“Leaders don’t need answers. They must have the right questions.”

And so, knowing that big endeavors require initial baby steps, I’ll ask: “How do we start?”

Maybe by sharing our faith with each other, here in Church.

Consider sharing the reasons why you are committed to this church

and the Christian walk with each other during fellowship time.

What brought you here initially? What keeps you coming?

Our answers might give us insight into how to share our faith

with people in the rest of our lives.

This is evangelism, … and it is important,

as uncomfortable as it might make some of us quiet-spoken folks

to contemplate much less engage.

Maybe we can take some of the pressure off by saying that we don’t have to do this

in order to “save folks for Christ” in a traditional sense.

We have to do this because it’s how we get to know people

and speak of things that really matter in our lives.

Like how we got through some of our personal rough patches

and how we keep our heads and hearts together when life is challenging.

Learning how to have these conversations takes practice,

but we don’t have to have theologically weighty conversations.

Often when I think of some of the points along my faith walk,

I laugh out loud and roll my eyes.

However we start sharing our faith, let us do so.

The vitality of this specific church and the Church universal needs us to be

the hands and feet and mouth through which God,

in Jesus Christ, and by way of the Holy Spirit, flows into this world.

Lord, give us the strength to follow your invitation.

Amen.

Trinity Sunday, sermon preached at Two Rock Valley Presbyterian and Tomales Presbyterian Churches on May 26, 2024

Today’s sermon title comes from a Dennis-the-Menace cartoon that

my Gram sent me years ago.

Unfortunately, the actual newspaper clipping has gone by the wayside.

I don’t remember the exact cartoon scenario, but I do remember that equation.

I’m no mathematician, but I don’t think it adds up, 1 + 1 + 1 = 1?!,

at least not in the traditional sense.

It is, however, a perfect ‘object lesson’ as we think about the Trinity.

Because the Trinity doesn’t add up in a logical sense either.

We all know that there are three members in the Christian Godhead

Creator God

Jesus Christ

Holy Spirit

Understanding how these three are actually One, however, is confounding.

To add insult to injury, the Bible never mentions the Trinity … not even once.

We are told often about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit,

(or Advocate as the Gospel of John called Her last week … and I am using Her intentionally, but as that could be a sermon in and of itself, I’m not even going to touch on that today).

Needless-to-say, the Trinity is a Holy Mystery that I suspect few of us want to explain.

The doctrine of the Trinity is arrived at by looking at the whole of Scripture,

not a single Chapter or Verse.

And so once a year, we embark on an interesting journey …

a quest to more fully know this Holy Mystery.

The Reverend Shannon Johnson Kershner,

Senior Pastor at Central Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, Georgia

does an admirable job of summing up the complexity of the Trinity

with the following statement:

When we confess belief in the Triune God,

we are making the radical claim that somehow,

• the same God who created life out of chaos also walked the earth as Jesus.

• We are claiming that the one who experienced crucifixion, at the same time experienced the death of a beloved child.

• We are claiming that the one who ascended into heaven, is the same one who is always with us.

• We are claiming that the one who prays for us at the right hand of the Father, is the same one groaning deep within our souls for the redemption of creation.

• When we say we believe in a triune God, we are boldly claiming that the active God of the past, is an on-the-move God who is acting now and will act in the future, until all has been reconciled and made new.”

That is a lot to digest … I can barely wrap my head around it,

and yet I know deep down in my bones that Rev. Shannon is absolutely right!

Our academic-oriented Presbyterian denomination wants me to explain this.

As proud as I am to have weathered my four-year Master of Divinity program 20 years ago,

a program that insisted I learn two dead languages …

(‘dead’ because biblical Hebrew & Greek are different then current day Hebrew & Greek),

I don’t agree that staying in our heads and explaining it is particularly helpful.

Now to be fair, a good many of us humans do live in our heads,

but I’ve been around the block a few times and even the most cerebral of us

do not really understand life up in our heads.

Richard Rohr, Franciscan Friar and author says that the

“Trinity leads you into the world of mystery and humility,

where you cannot understand, … you can only experience.”

I agree with him.

Head knowledge only goes so far … what really teaches is experience.

That’s when the rubber hits the road …

that’s when we really have a chance to ‘get it!’

Maybe this is why are invited to hear the call story of Isaiah this Sunday.

This call story, in which a six-winged seraph comes at a would-be prophet

holding tongs full of hot coals to purify his lips

is probably not something we’d be wise to attempt to understand,

at least not in the traditional sense.

It is, however, certainly a colorful description of a call from the Divine.

Isaiah’s response illuminates our text from Romans,

because Isaiah allows the Spirit of God to lead him, rather than be enslaved to the flesh.

… Now, I’m going to digress for a moment,

because I can’t let you all leave here thinking the flesh is bad …

it isn’t, not in the way this text often gets interpreted.

The Greek word for flesh (sax) is different than the word for body (soma).

The Apostle Paul, who wrote the book of Romans,

is not advocating fleeing life in the flesh in favor of existing purely on a spiritual plane,

as it is sometimes misinterpreted.

To be enslaved to the flesh as Paul is writing means to be enslaved to anything

that resists God and is probably more aptly referring to sin.

So, Isaiah is allowing God to work in him (including his human flesh),

rather than remain in sin and resist God’s spirit.

And Isaiah’s openness to God, his willingness to be unified with God’s will,

might give us a taste of the relationship within the Holy Trinity,

which enjoys perfect harmony within itself.

This is different mind you then the Greek gods for whom there has to be a Zeus

who can dominate the other lesser gods.

What does all of this mean for us?

What might the relational style of our Christian God mean for us as children of God?

If God, in God’s very essence, is a mutually interdependent relationship,

which is so seemless that three persons are actually one entity,

what does that mean for us, who have been created in God’s image?

Might this inform the kind of relationships God calls us to have?

Would it look like the divisions we see currently in our political landscape?

Would it look like the broken communities we see in the church,

whether between Christian denominations or individuals in the same church/family?

It appears that God, by example, which really is the best teaching tool around,

is showing us what true relationship really looks like.

The Trinity invites us to consider that we don’t just exist beside each other,

we aren’t supposed to just love each other,

rather we deeply need each other.

Did you hear me? Let me say that again:

We deeply need each other to be fully human!

In order to be Christ’s body (the Church) we cannot exist on our own, in isolation.

In order to really live out our identity as children of God,

in order to live as baptized people,

we are called to be in honest relationships with each other,

as brothers and sisters in Christ.

We must share one another’s burdens, i.e. weep when one of us weeps, …

and rejoice when one of us rejoices.

Does that mean we have to see the Word (Scripture) the same way,

respond to the world (planet Earth and its inhabitants) in like fashion,

and believe the same things?

No. No! No!!

Our Trinitarian God makes it clear that we all have different expressions in the world.

The key is that we recognize the gifts each one of us brings to the whole

and that we remember, without our various expressions,

we are not a complete body of Christ.

This sounds like a big task, and on some level it is.

But it doesn’t have to show up in a flashy way.

Baptist pastor and author Tony Campolo told a story of what it might look like

to let the spirit of God drive our actions.

He tells of a Church Deacon who took a youth group to a nursing home once a month.

The Deacon was apparently reluctant and coached heavily by his pastor ….

The Deacon liked to say he was only the driver for a bunch of kids who couldn’t drive yet.

But he went. Regularly.

On one occasion an old man in a wheelchair rolled over to the Deacon,

took his hand and held it during the whole youth-led worship service.

That small action was repeated the next month and the next month and the next month.

Then one Sunday afternoon the old man in the wheelchair

wasn’t in the fellowship hall when they arrived,

so of course, the Deacon asked about his friend.

“Where is that man?”

“Oh,” the nurse said, “He’s just down the hall in the third room.

He’s unconscious, near death, but I know he’d love it if you’d visit him.”

Of course, the Deacon went. While holding the man’s hand, the Deacon said a prayer,

and when the Deacon said Amen, the old man squeezed his hand.

This made the Deacon cry.

Embarrassed, he started to leave the room as the nurse entered the room.

“He’s been waiting for you,” she said.

“I told him that after death he would meet Jesus and talk to Jesus and hold Jesus’ hand.

But he said, No. Once a month Jesus comes here and holds my hand

and I don’t want to leave until I have the chance to hold Jesus’ hand once more.”

If we yield to the Spirit,

there are important things that God wants to do in us and through us.

They may be simple,

but that does not mean they aren’t earth-shatteringly important.

May we follow God’s call.

May we notice the gift this brings others and maybe even sometimes ourselves.

With our Creator God who continually molds us,

Christ who ever walks beside us,

and the Spirit who breathes life into us,

we are given the opportunity to be in union with our Trinitarian God.

1 + 1 + 1 really DOES = 1!

Amen.

Preaching on John 15:9-17 at Two Rock Valley and Tomales Presbyterian Churches

I was visiting a good friend the other day.

She had just come from seeing her brand-new, first-born grandson at the hospital.

As soon as I arrived and heard the good news,

she enthusiastically beckoned me to come take a look at his photo on her phone screen.

She said, “I know they all look the same at first,

but isn’t he just the most adorable baby you’ve ever seen?”

In moments like this, with enthusiasm and joy oozing out of us,

it seems like the easiest thing in the world to love one another.

This is a nice reminder on Mother’s Day …

to think about how much love we feel

as we welcome these sweet little ones into our lives.

Truly, babies and puppies seem to bring out the best in most people.

That is unless we are in what I like to call “a moment.”

As life would have it, I came across one of Garrison Keillor’s old radio monologues

about the birth of his daughter while I drove home from my friend’s house.

He waxed eloquent on how smitten he was with her from the very first sight

of her bright little eyes and long delicate fingers.

And how, although that love persisted, it was challenged somewhat,

when only a few days later he was jolted awake from a deep sleep,

for the umpteenth time, at the sound of her siren call,

which apparently adhered to Australian standard time.

And so, bleary eyed he picked her up, slung the drool rag over his shoulder,

and walked the floor exhausted, stained with milk, borderline crazy,

and clearly a person no one would ever hire to look after an infant.

I guess maybe this is why Jesus might need to command us to love one another,

as he does in today’s gospel lesson from the book of John.

Love is deep, but even with our most loved ones, the feeling can be fleeting at times.

In today’s text, Jesus is addressing his disciples in one of his farewell discourses.

Even though it may seem like we just celebrated the Resurrection at Easter,

during the Season of Easter we oddly revisit Jesus’ earthly life

and so in this passage he is facing the time of his death … again.

Although Jesus forewarns of this over and over,

his disciples don’t seem to take notice.

Now, because we live on this side of the resurrection,

hopefully we can hear them with a little more gravitas,

but in reality this is about the time that most folks’ attention has just waned during a sermon,

so if you are dozing off on me, please try to plug back in 😉

Listen to these words as you might listen to a loved one on their death bed …

words that you want to take in and savor and remember for months and years to come.

It’s of course not always the case,

but often these last moments in life are ripe with poignancy …

I am thinking of an older person who has lived a long life,

maybe a parent who is still trying to offer some life-earned wisdom,

or leave us with an important last message to carry forward in our lives.

There is urgency in Jesus’ words, as he attempts to break through to these friends of his;

and his message bears repeating, this command to love one another,

which He does five times in this short passage from the Gospel of John.

You see, Jesus knows the disciples are headed into a time much more trying

then a sleepless night with a demanding infant;

they are going to be facing his death, … a horrific, painful, and frightening one.

It is one of his last attempts to impress upon them his central guiding life message:

“Love one another, as I have loved you.”

Those eight little words are what true religious observance is for him;

it encompasses all of life and it is what he came here to do.

Some have argued that you could condense the entire Christian Bible …

all 66 books and 1189 chapters … down to this simple statement.

What does it mean to love one another as Jesus has loved us?

Well for one thing it means acting on love

even when we are not experiencing the feelings of love.

My friend welcoming her new grandson was feeling the love;

Garrison Keillor in his sleep deprived state was acting on it.

As we all know, it can be challenging to act on love

when we aren’t quite in touch with those intoxicating feelings of love.

Anyone who has lost sleep night after night to take care of a baby

(or a sick loved one) knows this.

The love is there underneath all the fatigue,

but when you are that tired you can’t really feel much of anything other than crazy,

which is why I am sure that God made babies so cute.

It’s also why we all keep photos of our best days with loved ones

scattered around our homes, saved on our phones and the like …

we need to remember the good times, in the midst of the not so very good ones.

But even in those trying moments, acting with love for those we do love is one thing;

it is far more challenging to act with love when faced with a stranger.

And yet this is what Jesus is asking us to do.

Now, sometimes the stranger is our loved one … how could they just have said or done that?

But sometimes, it is a complete stranger that Jesus is calling us to love …

someone for whom we have no past reference and to whom we have no commitment.

You see, the word friends as Jesus is using it, might better be translated as strangers,

because Jesus is calling us to love his friends, not ours.

The friends Jesus is calling us to love includes all those who Jesus welcomed

in his own daily comings and goings,

i.e. tax collectors, prostitutes, and contagiously ill people.

This love is not contingent upon our likes and dislikes, our values and beliefs;

it is not necessarily a call to agree with ‘the other.’

His call is to act with love for all of God’s creation, whether we feel like it or not.

Now that’s a tall order. Especially given our current days,

which maybe aren’t worse than in Jesus’ day,

but since we can’t compare it doesn’t really matter.

These are tragically tough days in our world.

I called a friend who lives in Paris this week

to ask her if the wheels were falling off the bus in Europe too.

Perpetual optimist that she is, Colleen said

“No, we’re okay here … what’s going on there, Lis?”

So I told her …

Well, for one I think everyone, no matter what their political persuasion,

is on edge in this election year when once again we have

two older white men running to be our U.S. President.

“I think it’s making us all crazy, Colleen … people are behaving so badly!”

And then I told her about the two attempted suicides

and one house fire in our little churches this week.

If you haven’t heard, this happened.

One of the suicides was successful, we lost a 21-year-old young man this week.

The other was not successful,

but the 50-something may almost wish he had been successful,

even if his attempt was more of a call for help than an actual desire.

On the heels of learning more fully about both of these situations, I called my son John.

I have a modicum of faith at this point, a modicum I said, so these situations rattle me,

(as I suspect they rattle you too) …

and so I wanted to hear my son’s voice, for some reassurance.

You know we moms may appear to have it all together … and we do,

but we still need to hear our littles and know that they are okay.

And he was, thanks be to God. It gave me a little extra strength.

I was listening to some music this morning …

I won’t play the song, as I’ve been want to do from the pulpit,

but I will read you the lyrics, because they spoke to me.

The song is called Winter, by Tori Amos and the refrain goes like this …

“When you gonna make up your mind?

When you gonna love you as much as I do?

When you gonna make up your mind?

Because things are going to change so fast …”

I think Jesus is saying this to us today … well, every day really.

“My people … Love one another, family, friend, and stranger alike

… and don’t forget to love yourself …

as I love you.

Do so, and things are going to change so fast.

As in get infinitely better.

Do this, Dear Ones.

Please.”

Amen.

This homily was preached for Fairfax Community Church on January 2, 2021

John 1:1-5, 14

“In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God,

and the Word was God.

All things came into being through him,

and without him, not one thing came into being.

What has come into being in him was life

and the life was the light of all people.

The light shines in the darkness

and the darkness did not overcome it.

And the Word became flesh and lived among us

and we have seen his glory,

the glory as of a father’s only son,

full of grace and truth.”

This is the Word of God.

Every time I read these words, 

I feel I should sit in silence 

and let them reverberate in my heart and mind.

I think these may be my favorite verses in all of Scripture, 

and anything that follows, 

surely pales in comparison. 

But a preacher preaches,

and so I’ll ignore my inclination for just a few moments.

John’s gospel opens with lofty, abstract concepts: 

light, glory, grace, and truth.

The poetic nature of his introduction 

accentuates the loftiness of these ideals.

These are lovely, big ideas, …

and, thankfully, he grounds them in the Word …

who was with God and who was God …

in the other words Jesus Christ.

The Word became flesh and lived among us

and we have seen his glory …

full of grace and truth.

In Jesus we come to know this unknowable God 

in whom we live and move and have our being.

It is in the Incarnation of Jesus that we experience God,

even as he surprisingly comes to us as a vulnerable human baby.

My favorite Christmas book is  The Littlest Angel, by Charles Tazewell.

The story is about a young angel snatched out of life 

and ushered to the pearly gates far too young.

As you might expect of a 4-year-old boy, he wrecks havoc in heaven

being terribly unhappy away from his earthly family and activities.

After pages describing his heart wrenching attempts to adjust to heaven,

an Understanding Angel helps provide 

what will calm this Littlest Angel’s soul.

It’s a rough unsightly wooden box 

that the Littlest Angel left under his bed at home.

What was in it?

“Well, there was a butterfly with golden wings, 

captured one bright summer day on the hills above Jerusalem. 

And a sky-blue egg from a bird’s nest in the olive tree 

that stood to shade his mother’s kitchen door.

Yes, and two white stones, found on a muddy river bank, 

where he and his friend had played like small brown beavers.

And at the bottom of the box, a limp, tooth-marked leather strap, 

once worn as a collar by his morel dog,

who died as he lived, in absolute love and infinite devotion.”

Possession of this box finally brings the Littlest Angel peace. 

With no angst in his soul the book almost becomes mundane 

until we learn that Jesus is to be born on Earth.

All the angels in heaven 

prepare bright, sparkling, magnificent gifts for the Christ child.

The Littlest Angel, 

unable to think of anything more special,

gifts Baby Jesus with his very un-flashy wooden box. 

Setting it amongst all the glimmering gifts from all the other angels 

he immediately becomes embarrassed and seeks to remove it 

from the mountain of shimmering boxes,

but he’s too late and with tears of anguish streaming down his little face 

he hears God say:

“Of all the gifts of all the angels, 

I find that this small box pleases Me most. 

It’s contents are of the Earth and of people, 

and My Son is born to be King of both. 

These are the things My Son, too, will know and love and cherish 

and then, regretful, will leave behind when His time on Earth is done. 

I accept this gift in the Name of the Child, Jesus, 

born of Mary this night in Bethlehem.”

At this, the Littlest Angel’s wooden box 

began to glow with a radiant brilliance, 

rose up into the sky, 

and became the shining star of Bethlehem 

with its beckoning light over the stable where Jesus was born.

On this 2nd day of 2022, I invite us all into a time of reflection.

We have here circular pieces of cardboard,

one for each of you,

along with magazines, scissors, and glue.

[Those of you at home will likely be able to gather these items 

or can probably get some from church at a later time.

There’s nothing significant about the circles …

they are just a nice base to work on].

I’ll invite you to take some supplies 

and then we’ll spend 10 minutes or so in silence as we work.

Leaf through a magazine or two 

and tear out any images or words that stand out to you.

You don’t need to know why they do …

you might be surprised by what draws you.

That’s okay.

Maybe this is Spirit speaking to you 

with some small nugget of wisdom, some small gift of awareness.

I’ll let you know when 5 minutes have passed 

and if you like, you might choose to start cutting and pasting 

your words and images onto your circle. 

Many of you might appreciate much more time than just 10 minutes …

there is no pressure to finish this during today’s worship.

This is only for you, 

and if you’re so inclined, 

you might continue to work on it this coming week,

or even on and off during the month of January.

Ultimately, I invite you to look for what you might be encouraged 

to bring to life in this new year, based on what has attracted you.

Because you too,

each one of you,

are Words made flesh.

Each one of you have lofty concepts in you …

Love, compassion, justice, truth … 

and you grace all who know you with an incarnated, full-of-life experience 

of these otherwise unknowable virtues.

And God rejoices in witnessing the person you are, 

God’s child.

God rejoices in seeing how you have lived into your unique self

and will continue to do so in 2022.

Thanks be to God. 

Amen.

This sermon was preached at Second Presbyterian Church on April 22, 2018

Read Acts 16:16-34

I grew up in the 1970s when Free to Be You and Me 

— the book, the movie, the song — was released.  

For those of you not raised (or raising children) at that time, 

Free to Be You and Me was a children’s entertainment project

involving actors like Alan Alda, Carol Channing, Michael Jackson, Jack Cassidy, Diana Ross.

The opening scene of the ABC special starts with two infants,

puppets, arguing over which one is a boy and which one is a girl.

The boy baby points out that the girl is bald

and wants to be a firefighter when she grows up,

and so she clearly is a boy.

He is similarly convinced that he is a ‘she,’

because he has dainty baby feet and wants to be cocktail waitress.

The point of the program was to highlight gender biases

and advocate for an acceptance of one’s natural identity,

free of any heavy-handed cultural expectations. 

The seventies were a time of societal change.

The Civil Rights Act had passed,

women were beginning to shatter the proverbial glass ceiling

(that invisible but solid barrier to top management and leadership).

This was a time when any personal attributes

that might keep someone from successfully pursuing their dreams

were starting to loosen their grip,

or at least that is what we wanted to believe.

In many ways, our current American climate

is demonstrating the cracks in those ambitions —

the many ways gender, race, and other characteristics

still put parameters on our lives.

Black Lives Matter, the Me-Too Movement,

teens leading rallies to demand gun control laws —

all these things are loudly exposing the ways in which our culture,

like most, limits the freedom of various populations in our country.

It’s nice to think that we’re a melting pot,

that the American dream is available to anyone willing to work for it.

But in reality, some people have a leg up on such pursuits

and others have obstacle after obstacle in their way.

This, of course, is nothing new. 

Look at the scripture from Acts that we just read.

Here we have a slave girl being financially exploited

by her owners because of her fortune-telling ability.

We have a couple of men,

presumably white men or the equivalent thereof in our time and culture,

Roman citizens, being attacked for also being Jews

and thus not as pure-bred as the citizens of Philippi would like.

We even have a jailer,

a man trusted with keys to the local prison,

who nonetheless is locked up himself by expectations so heavy

that suicide seems preferable to having to admit he was unable

to uphold his professional responsibilities. 

Is anyone, then or now, really free to be

all of who they are, in all their fullness?

It certainly doesn’t appear so.

And yet, that is only the view seen without looking through the lens

of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Towards the end of this wild combination of biblical stories

relaying themes of slavery, exploitation, accusation, anger, and natural disasters,

the jailer asks a very familiar question,

even though I often think it sounds strange to our ears —

what do I need to do to be saved? 

Certainly, as Christians, we’ve heard this question many times before,

but what really does that mean?

Saved from what?  

We know the answer,

the ‘Who it is’ that does the saving.

Hopefully, Jesus is a big part of why we gather here week after week.

But what is it he saves us from, and how does he do it?

Some of you may be scratching your head right now, thinking,

“Wait a minute, one of the pastors here at Second doesn’t know what it means to be saved?

Oh, dear God, save us now!”

But, I’m pretty certain there are at least a few souls here

who are quietly saying, “Amen, sister!

Thanks for asking the question I’ve been too afraid to ask my whole life.”

Anyone in those shoes would probably consider themselves a good solid Christian,

and yet might find themselves a little uncomfortable

if someone sidled up next to them

and asked if they’d been saved by Jesus Christ.

Obviously, you know the answer,

but if the person looks at you with that look

that demands a little explanation,

a little proof,

you’d likely prefer run for the hills

than get into a deep theological conversation.

Can I have an amen? 

“What do I have to do to be saved?” asked the jailer.

In this particular story, the question doesn’t come across quite so obtuse.

The man is about to take his life,

so obviously he needs some saving.

In our vernacular, he might be asking,

“What do I need to do to survive this mess that I’m in?”

Now, that is a clear question,

and the answer seems not only clear and easy,

but very sensible as well. 

“You aren’t going to save yourself from this mess.

Only Jesus can help you on this one.

Put your trust in him, and maybe you stand a chance.

An earthquake shook the foundations of your workplace,

allowing all your direct reports the opportunity to escape,

and you are paid the big bucks to secure the place.

Yes, you are in over your head on this one,

so you might want to pray to the One who can help you most —

you know, the guy who turns water into wine and raises dead people,

the one who inspired Paul and Silas to sing hymns in the dark jail at midnight

as if in a drunken serenade.

Yes, that man could probably help you,

and he’s the only one who really can.” 

What do you need saving from?

What mess are you in?

Maybe one of your own making,

maybe one you cannot see how you could have possibly avoided.

Is it a health scare?

Relationship woes?

Work insecurity?

Maybe it’s not necessarily a mess,

but merely a scary unknown.

Are you graduating from high school and headed out into the world

in a new way for the first time?

Hopefully our high school seniors find this occasion largely exciting and even freeing,

but the shadow side likely exists also,

as it does for all of us,

no matter what big transition we might be facing.

It’s probably not advantageous to dwell on those worries,

but refusing to acknowledge them might invite them

to make long, dark shadows indeed.

If you’ve ever taken a stress inventory,

getting married or having a baby is right alongside

getting divorced or suffering the death of a loved one

on the stress scales.

Change — even if you consider it good change

and an invitation to experience more freedom,

a virtue almost everyone would stand hand-to-hand to support —

change and freedom create stress,

just like the harder stuff of life. 

Reflecting back on Free to Be You and Me,

there’s plenty that we can do as individuals and a community.

We are called as co-creators with God on this journey called life.

Commencement addresses at graduations are notorious

for encouraging action, strengthening resolve, and

demonstrating that staying the course when the going gets tough is well worth it.

I ran across an ad the other day that said

“a diamond is a piece of coal that stuck to the job.”

In spite of such helpful, uplifting inspiration,

at the end of the day or the season,

when your world is shaking apart,

unraveling at the seams,

there is one saving force above all,

and his name is Jesus.

He isn’t some abstract, distant, etherial God —

the white-haired grandfather figure in the sky —

well, maybe he is — but even if he is,

he’s also a flesh and blood human being (or he was one),

a man who walked this life journey,

his personal one being no piece of cake,

just like yours and mine.

And, He took all this on by choice,

agreeing to limit his divinity within the confines of our human dimension.

He cried, he laughed, he loved.

Sometimes he was the life of the party;

at other times he put hermits to shame.

He gets you, inside and out.

And in those moments when you doubt, say the prayer,

“Help me overcome my unbelief,”

and then listen for the still small voice of his Holy Spirit,

the gift he left you,

so that you would never feel alone.

Yes, Jesus saves.

Believing in him will set you free. 

Thanks be to God. 

For a little inspiration, watch and listen to Pharrell Williams’ Freedom video. Then play it again and DANCE!!!!

This sermon was preached at Second Presbyterian Church on January 28, 2018

Read John 3:1-21

We have a lot of new life, a lot of births happening around here lately.

Have you noticed?

For one, we just celebrated two baptisms,

welcoming the Forest twins into our church family.

Baptism is, of course, the sign of birth

that is not of flesh and blood

but that comes as a gift from above,

the sign of God’s new covenant with us through Jesus Christ.

We Presbyterians baptize infants and young children

as a way of celebrating that God cleans us, giving us new birth through the Holy Spirit

long before we have any capacity to understand the power

of that amazing claim in our lives.

Today’s baptisms are not the first ones this year,

and they will not be the last ones for very long,

as we have several more scheduled in February and March.

One church member,

a woman just a tad beyond childbearing years,

informed me that she was refusing to drink the water around here

for fear of joining the joyous trend of new births. 

But it is not just the birth of babies that is happening around here.

We are also birthing new ways of being community together.

Immediately after worship this morning,

you will be electing a new board of deacons.

Those 30 beautiful faces in your bulletin today are our nominations.

These folks will help us find fresh ways of being connected

and caring for one another.

You will also be electing a new nominating committee

so that we can continue to birth new lay leaders in 2018.

One could even say at this point in January

that we are eagerly awaiting signs of new birth in our natural world.

February 2 is Groundhog Day,

and while yesterday’s rain and gray skies may have been a bit dreary,

we might hope for the same weather again this coming Friday

so that that little critter in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania,

does not see his shadow and thus beckons an early spring.

A friend of mine said this week,

“I’ve been feeling so discouraged as I think we’ve lost our way as a nation,

but my hopefulness was brought back this week,

remembering that we ask a groundhog for his opinion on the transition of seasons.”

Yes, new life is springing up around us here in lots of ways,

and the messengers sometimes come in surprising forms. 

The lead character in our text today, Nicodemus,

often gets a bad rap for being slightly dense.

But he does know well enough to go to a reputable source for some guidance.

I always think of him as coming in the dark of night to Jesus with questions,

which is why it is important to revisit these familiar texts from time to time.

Because when Nicodemus first comes to Jesus, he did not bring a question;

instead he made an announcement,

something you might expect a learned man to do:

“I have seen your miracles, your signs and wonders, and I know that you are from God.

I know who you are.” 

Paraphrasing slightly, Jesus answered him,

“No, actually you don’t.

I guess you saw me supply wine for the wedding feast

and cleanse the temple of those making a business there,

but if you think you can use this evidence to draw logical, rational conclusions,

you are wrong.

If this is your profession of faith,

you do not know what faith is.

Faith involves commitments and risks.

Your sneaking over here in the dark of night to tell me who I am is not faith.

You need to start from scratch and be born from above, my friend.” 

Now the questions begin to roll.

“What on earth are you talking about, Jesus?

How am I supposed to be born after I’ve grown old?

Surely it’s not possible to be born a second time.”

Jesus’ response is something along the lines of,

“Listen, old dogs can learn new tricks, but you have to be open to the idea, Nicodemus,

and I’m not so sure you are.” 

To be fair, Nicodemus has put a lot of effort,

an investment of years, and a lifetime of experience

into becoming an expert as a Pharisee, a Jewish leader.

That’s a lot to let go of,

so it’s not all that hard to understand why he hesitates with a plethora of questions.

I suspect if we’re honest with ourselves, we can relate a bit.

I’m looking at a very educated and talented group of people here.

Being asked to set aside what you know,

what you have nurtured into being,

likely through many years of study and practice,

is no small matter.

Why would we let go of any semblance of control we might have,

or think we have?

As churchgoing folks, we know that our Lord and Savior

allowed himself to be utterly vulnerable,

but that doesn’t mean that we want to exhibit vulnerability ourselves.

It’s hard for most of us to admit we have needs.

Who wants to be seen as weak or incompetent, or lacking in any way?

We want to be self-sufficient!

— But, we need to face reality.

And if we can’t directly, sometimes it catches us by surprise.

A story from my own life might help illuminate this. 

About 15 years ago, I had a hernia surgery and spent 24 hours in a recovery room

with a 90-plus-year-old fellow patient.

She was agitated, calling out to a son I suspected was no longer of this earth.

At one point, she began to cry for a blanket.

The nurses must have been busy, because no one came.

Without thinking, I hopped out of bed to get one for her

and promptly crumped to the floor.

Being in my early thirties,

physically fit and never having undergone a surgery before,

it didn’t occur to me that I might be slightly incapacitated at the moment.

The IV pole I was hooked up to didn’t even clue me in.

I laughed at myself, I think, or rather I may have done my best

to spring back into bed before a nurse came and saw how foolish I had been. 

Being vulnerable is not for the weak of heart.

And yet, it is what our faith calls of us.

One could say that a spiritual journey invites us to continually fall on our faces,

and then get up, brush ourselves off, look sheepishly at God,

and take another step.

This is not a particularly pleasant process;

it’s humbling.

Barbara Brown Taylor, a renowned preacher and Episcopalian priest,

speaks for many of us, I think, when she says,

“If I had to name my disability, I would call it an unwillingness to fall.

This reluctance signals mistrust of the central truth of the Christian gospel—

that life springs from death,

not only at the last but also in the many little deaths along the way.” 

If we live long enough,

or really live fully at all,

there are countless experiences

that call us to let go of the old and embrace the new.

There are big things, like coming to terms with the actual death of a loved one.

Or “adjusting to a new normal” as we used to call it in hospital chaplaincy,

when one has been diagnosed with a chronic illness.

Or weathering a divorce.

Or even welcoming a new baby into our family.

There are also little deaths,

ones that are really quite trivial in the grand scheme of things

but which can disrupt us just the same.

For example, I got up one day this week

and traveled through the damp darkness of predawn city streets

for a 6:00 a.m. yoga class,

only to find that it had been cancelled when I got there.

It’s crazy how much that situation threw me.

I had so perfectly envisioned the way my day was going to go,

and I was thrown for a loop, out in the dark, cold, early morning,

unable to start the day as I had planned and completely at a loss

for what useful thing I could do at 5:45 a.m. 

And so, I invite each of you to consider what might need to die in your life right now.

Not a very pleasant question to consider or ask,

but it is relevant nonetheless.

A friend recently reminded me that everything we say “yes” to,

or allow to be born,

requires saying “no” to something else, allowing it to die.

So what needs to go in your life?

Are you willing to step into God’s light where these things can be revealed?

This requires considerable courage,

as seeing what needs to change is generally pretty uncomfortable.

It might help to hear a new beatitude, thanks to Dr. Michael McGriffy:

“Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape.” 

If we consider all the small gyrations we must do on a daily basis,

much less in the larger seasons of life,

we could say that life is just one adjustment after another.

Flexibility, or being attentive to where the wind blows,

is pretty important and seldom easy.

It might help to recall verse 3:16 in our reading today,

arguably the most well-known verse in the Bible,

the one Martin Luther said was the gospel in a nutshell—

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,

so that everyone who believes in him may not perish, but have eternal life.”

Jesus.

That is the One who holds us in the midst of our many necessary deaths

and continual rebirths.

We are in good hands. 

There is a canvas out in the narthex,

which I invite you to look at as you leave today.

I find that sometimes images speak louder than words.

It’s a photo I took several years ago —

or maybe I should say the Holy Spirit captured it through me

(as I was utterly shocked at the powerful image I saw on my camera screen upon first viewing it).

It’s an image of a man and a little boy holding hands

and walking through a dark tunnel into a blinding light.

For me, it is a reminder that God invites us throughout our life journey to step out in faith — into what sometimes is a blinding, disorienting light —

and grow into the new person God is manifesting in us. 

Will you pray with me?

Gracious God, guide us in the midst of life’s many twists and turns.

Help us trust you as we embrace life,

as we are called to lose certain aspects of our lives,

and invited to step into new resurrected life.

Strengthen us so that we may bravely step out of the shadows into your light,

where we are shown the need to be remade continually in you.

We give thanks for your choice to enter our world,

taking on the limitations of being human and thus being a companion like no other.

In Jesus’ name we pray, amen. 

This sermon was preached at Second Presbyterian Church on October 22, 2017

Read First Samuel 16:1-13

How would you rate your capacity to see as God sees?

If a 10 is a perfect score,

how many of you by show of hands would give yourself an 8 or above?

Okay, how about a 5 or above?

So, for the rest of you, we’re talking more like a 2 or a 3?

I guess we have some work to do, huh?

You and me both.

I’m not going to promise that you’ll rate yourself a 10 by the end of this message.

In fact, I’m leaving your outcome completely up to the Holy Spirit.

As my father says to me when he wants to be absolved of any responsibility

in a matter, “Good luck with that.” 

Most of us are likely familiar with the story we just read

about King David’s anointing.

With seven older brothers, David isn’t seen

as being even remotely needed at this important meeting with Samuel.

Our human sight knows that the baby of the family is certainly not

going to supersede all of his older brothers

and be called into leadership over them and all of Israel, …

so he’s out tending the sheep.

Maybe his father Jesse insisted that he do so.

Maybe the older brothers passed the baton down the line.

Maybe David said, “Please let me do something productive

rather than go to one of those ceremonial religious services.”

We aren’t told exactly why it is that David is in the field

rather than with his father, brothers, and their important guest Samuel.

We are just told that he is not with them, but is out working. 

Now, if David’s family status, or lack thereof, weren’t enough of a deterrent,

I’d still see David as a curious pick.

Consider how he is introduced in the story.

The only thing we are told about him as he passes before God

is that he has a healthy, glowing, handsome face and beautiful eyes.

These attributes seem like odd things to mention

since God just stressed that outer appearances aren’t the deciding factor.

Remember what we just read?

“The Lord does not see as mortals see;

mortals look on the outward appearance,

but the Lord looks on the heart.”

As a smart person said to me this week,

“God might not look at outward appearances,

but apparently the narrator of this story can’t help him or herself!” 

David is also a curious pick because if God is all knowing,

one would think that David’s eventual foibles —

of which he will have more than a few —

including some relatively grave ones

(he does end up breaking four of the ten commandments, if you recall)

would keep him from being God’s selection. 

But maybe all of this comes from the perspective of human sight

rather than divine sight. 

Upon a bit of reflection,

most of us would probably admit that our failures teach us

as much or more than our successes,

so maybe God is not looking for a perfect king.

Being the flawed and broken people we are,

King David included,

God is going to use each one of us to accomplish good in the world.

What’s interesting,

and ancient audiences might see this more readily than we do,

is that David is already demonstrating his leadership capacity

by being out with the sheep in the first place.

Whether he chose to be there or was strongly encouraged to do so,

he is doing in this moment what God wants him to do on a larger scale—

he’s leading and caring for the flock.

Maybe God’s sight or decision-making isn’t as mysterious as we sometimes think.

David seems a pretty logical choice in this way of thinking.

Select someone who is a natural,

someone who’s already doing the job. 

But even after all this analysis,

it’s quite clear that our plans, our human plans,

are not necessarily aligned with God’s plans.

Have you ever noticed that?

It shows up all throughout this short narrative. 

• Samuel, a prophet of God, thinks every brother, especially the tall, handsome ones, must be God’s pick. 

• Jesse, the father of this large pack of brothers, doesn’t think his youngest needs to be in the lineup.

• I’m pretty sure the brothers didn’t think the baby of the family was going to be selected, … and I suspect David didn’t think so either. 

• The townspeople, who were terrified by Samuel’s arrival in the first place, asking if he has come peaceably, don’t expect the selection of a new king to be on the agenda for the day, …

• not to mention King Saul, who certainly wouldn’t have anticipated that he was going to be replaced. 

And so it goes …

No one in this story seems to be clued in to what God is up to.

I wonder if any of this resonates with you?

I must confess that it does for me. 

Most of you know that I arrived here in January of this year.

About a year prior to that,

I said one of my most simple but powerful personal prayers,

and it was simply, “Mercy.”

You see, for several years I had been a solo pastor of a small church in San Francisco.

I was making three-quarters of a pastor’s salary,

whatever that means. 

The Bay Area isn’t the easiest place to have that kind of life,

especially as a single mother,

and so I said, “Mercy. I give up, God. Get me out of this predicament.”

I did the footwork and posted my PIF (Personal Information Form),

as we Presbyterian pastors affectionately call our resumes.

I posted it on Church Connections,

a website that allows churches and pastors to connect,

and it wasn’t all that long before I received a phone call from Henry here,

asking if I might be interested in talking with the call committee about this position. 

The call here felt exceedingly strong to me.

I might even have thought at the time

that I had a pretty good handle on what God was up to.

I had said “Mercy,”

and God was answering.

In some ways, what has unfolded

has been closely aligned with what I would have anticipated, —

with one huge wrinkle —

my 11-year-old son John isn’t here with me.

If God had asked me ahead of time if this would be an acceptable sacrifice,

I would have said unequivocally, “No.”

Unfortunately, God did not ask that question,

or if God did,

I failed to hear it. 

Is it possible for human beings to acquire the capacity to see as God sees?

Will studying the Word help?

I think it will.

Will listening to one’s spiritual elders —

which in my case is a certain 11-year-old boy named John in San Francisco —

will that help?

I think so,

even though neither of us saw this one coming.

How do we align ourselves with God’s plan?

How do we see as God sees? 

In Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s story, The Little Prince,

the fox who has a relatively small but very important role,

tells the Little Prince a secret.

He says it is a very simple secret, which is that

“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly.

What is essential is invisible to the eye.” 

Now, as an artist drawn to the beauty around me,

I don’t so much want to discount what my eyes see.

And as a pastor, I want to think that I do see with the heart.

So, in my way of thinking,

it would seem that using all one’s available faculties would be wise —

and maybe that is part of the challenge.

As finite human beings, we can’t see the whole picture.

We can’t know why one person succumbs to addiction and another recovers.

We can’t understand why some of our loved ones end up dying from cancer

and others live long, healthy lives.

It’s hard to comprehend how one house could burn up

in the wildfires surrounding Napa, California

and another would be spared.

Those of us who do our best to walk humbly with our God

probably struggle to understand why it is that our world

is such a broken and flawed place so much of the time. 

Maybe our goal should not be to see how God sees.

Maybe our goal needs to be to learn to trust the One who loves us,

the One who loves each and every one of us —

with a love that is beyond description —

with a love that is eternal —

with a love that no person and no thing in this world can ever take away. 

Maybe the call is to be like Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane.

To ask God to hear our prayers;

to ask God to know our desires;

to ask God to keep our best interests at heart;

BUT ultimately to work in our lives powerfully —

and in a way that will accomplish what God wishes to manifest through us.

Maybe our job is to keep looking,

keep anticipating,

that God will make a way where there is no way.

If this is the task, then we are truly quite fortunate,

because we live on this side of the resurrection.

If God did that once, who are we to think that God won’t do it again?

Our task, it seems, is to look for those little resurrections in our lives

and the lives of those we love,

because God is good

and we aren’t in this alone. 

Thanks be to God.