Pandentecost

Pentecost Sunday (8th Sunday in Easter), Year B
Texts: Acts 2:1-21; 24-34, 35b; Romans 8:22-27; John 15:26-27,4b-15

14 months ago, when we first all retreated into our homes, I remember thinking how this pandemic was like a time of Lent. There were things we had to give up or from which we must fast for a while—shopping in grocery stores, eating in restaurants, shaking hands with strangers—but which we would eventually take up again. I remember thinking that the time without would make us that much more grateful for the things we would someday have back.

As the lockdown was extended from two weeks to four, then to six, and then again, as Lent gave way to Holy Week and Easter, I remember thinking how this pandemic was like a death. Our old lives have passed away; there is nothing left of them. Our old way of being is gone, lost forever. The way we’ve always done it, the only way we’ve ever known, is dead. What will rise in its place? Now that what is old has died, what new thing is springing forth in God, waiting for us to notice?

Reflecting on how things have changed over this last year, it’s begun to occur to me that this pandemic is also like Pentecost. On the first Pentecost, the believers were gathered together in one place. When the Holy Spirit arrived, the doors and windows were flung wide and they poured out into the streets. This pandemic Pentecost—Pandentecost? Pentademic?—is kind of the opposite: it drove us from the streets into our own little places. But as I’ve watched how the Church has responded in this year, I see the movement of the Spirit.

Paradox, Dust and the Reign of God

Ash Wednesday
Texts: Joel 2.1-2, 12-17; 2 Cor 5.20b-6.10; Matt 6.1-6, 16-21

Today is a day of contradictions. Spring is beginning to creep in around us, and instead of the joy of the brightening skies and warmer weather, our worship instead focuses on the sorrow of our sins and the mortality of our bodies. We—though very much alive and walking—come forward to receive ashes on our foreheads and be reminded that “we are dust, and to dust we shall return.” Even our scripture readings for tonight hold us in tension between two extremes: the reading from Joel proclaims a public observance of repentance, while Matthew’s gospel recalls Jesus’ admonitions to pray in secret and not to show any outward signs of their piety. Welcome to Ash Wednesday.

What Are We Doing Here?

Audio Recording of “What Are We Doing Here?” recorded in worship (12:22)
Reformation Sunday
Texts: Jer 31.31-34; Rom 3.19-28; Jn 8.31-36

Reformation Sunday is a holiday on which we celebrate God’s action to renew and reform the Church not only through Martin Luther and his compatriots, but also through the long line of women and men throughout the ages who have followed the urging of the Holy Spirit to lovingly, persistently, and, where necessary, forcefully nudge the Church to more faithfully live out our calling as God’s people for the world. Today we celebrate the work of God through saints and theologians, through authors and speakers, through activists and advocates, through servants and leaders, and through you and me to be the Church that is always being reformed: the ecclesia semper reformanda.

The timing of our holiday comes from the date that Luther first nailed his 95 theses to the door of the Wittenberg Cathedral. October 31st, 1517 was the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, but it was not the end. Through the centuries, God has been continuing to reform the whole Church: Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox.

And we need it. The dawning of the Information Age has brought with it the need for a new way to understand the role of the Church in the world. Congregations are no longer the center of people’s communities that they used to be, and religious adherence no longer confers the social benefit it used to. The Church has increasingly become portrayed in the culture as out of step, anti-individual and anti-intellectual, a superstitious holdover from a more naïve time.

Holy Controversy

Audio Recording of “Holy Controversy” recorded in worship (11:42)
Fourth Sunday after Epiphany; Lectionary 04, Year B
Texts: Deut 18.15-20; 1 Cor 8.1-13; Mk 1.21-28

Although it’s been several weeks now since we read the story of Jesus’ baptism, Mark’s gospel is trying to show us that we are still telling that same story. Jesus is baptized and the Holy Spirit descends on him. Immediately, the Spirit sends him into the wilderness to be tempted. When he comes back, he calls the first disciples and takes them to Capernaum, where he immediately begins teaching on the Sabbath, and immediately a man shows up with an unclean spirit. Once Jesus casts the spirit out, the news immediately spreads throughout all of Galilee. These are not a bunch of unconnected events, but a series of related incidents all resulting from Jesus’ baptism.

At the Jordan, the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus—but where did it go from there? It didn’t leave, but remained with him; it possessed him. We don’t tend to think of possession in those terms, but then we don’t tend to think of possession at all outside of horror movies. In the world of Mark’s gospel, Jesus was possessed by the Holy Spirit at his baptism, which is why when the man possessed by the unclean spirit shows up in the synagogue, Jesus cannot escape confrontation. Holy and unclean meet face to face, and a spiritual cage match ensues.

The Waters of Creation

Audio Recording of “The Waters of Creation” recorded in worship (12:50)
Baptism of Our Lord, Year B
Texts: Gen 1.1-5; Acts 19.1-7; Mk 1.4-13

According to the Babylonians, the world was born in blood. When the storm-god Marduk slew his grandmother, the goddess Tiamat in the form of a terrible sea monster, he cut her body in two; with one half he fashioned the heavens, and with the other half he made the earth. The world and all that is in it were fashioned from her guts and gore.

Illustration of an Ancient Babylonian bas-relief, possibly depicting Marduk fighting against Tiamat from the Enuma Elish. King, Leonard William [No restrictions], via Wikimedia Commons

Laborers for Justice

Audio Recording of “Laborers for Justice” recorded in worship (12:07)
2nd Sunday after Pentecost; Lectionary 11, Year A
Texts: Ex 19.2-8; Rom 5.1-8; Matt 9.35-10.23

“When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep with out a shepherd.” As I read this, I think of Jesus looking upon the crowds of people walking the streets of Minneapolis Friday night and blocking traffic on I-94 yesterday, crowds filled with anger and sorrow after the police officer who killed Philando Castile was acquitted. I think of the crowds of people who are still in mourning on the second anniversary of the Mother Emanuel shooting, crowds who fear that no place—not even a house of worship—is safe. I think of the crowds of people in this country and across the globe who have been told time and again in no uncertain terms that their lives do not matter.

Photo by Anthony Souffle, AP

In Matthew’s gospel after the Sermon on the Mount Jesus spends two chapters going around healing, curing disease and casting out demons. Today we hear that as he goes about this work he comes to a realization: there is too much pain, too much brokenness, too much sorrow for him to fix on his own. There is too much work for him to do alone. As he looks on those crowds, he is moved with compassion. In Greek, the word compassion comes from the word for ‘guts’ or ‘bowels,’ as that was believed to be where emotions originated. Consequently, Jesus isn’t just moved with pity, he doesn’t just feel sorry for these people; he is moved from his deepest, inmost self by the gut-wrenching plight of these people, harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. His guts are churning with love and compassion, and he is overwhelmed at the task ahead.

I would venture to guess that he is not alone in feeling this way as he looks out at these crowds of fed-up, forsaken people. Many of us are troubled at the effects of racism in our society, but we feel powerless to do anything about it. Let’s face it: for most of us, racism is something that other people deal with. Most of us have not ever been made to feel inferior or ignored because of our ethnicity. However, that does not mean that we are guiltless. Even if we ourselves are not racist, we benefit from the machinations of racism in our society, enjoying power and privilege due to our Whiteness that others do not.

Our complicity in a sinful system harms us. It not only denies the dignity of the oppressed, it also diminishes the humanity of the oppressor by marring the image of God within all of us, separating us from our sisters and brothers with a wall of suspicion, fear and even hate. No one gets to be neutral; there are only those who are oppressed, and those who benefit. Systemic sin like this keeps us all from living as God intends, and so it does violence to all of us.

We need to be saved from this sinful reality of racism, even those of us who don’t consider ourselves racist. The problem is not just racist people. It’s not that Jeronimo Yanez, the officer who shot Philando Castile, is a racist. It’s not that the 12 jurors who tried his case are racists. The problem is a racist system that teaches us (among other things) to presuppose that Black men are dangerous—so dangerous that even when they are doing everything they are “supposed” to do, even when they are complying with the authorities, officers like Yanez are afraid for their lives. So dangerous, in fact, that 9 people gathered for bible study in a church are a problem that must be eliminated by any and all means. The system that radicalized Dylann Roof is the same system that terrified and then acquitted Jeronimo Yanez. If you have ever been pulled over by a police officer without being worried for your safety, you have benefitted from the sin of racism.

It isn’t your fault, you didn’t do anything to make it that way, but it is the world in which we live, the original sin we inherit from those who came before us.  Until we can name that and recognize our need for God to step in and release us from our slavery to this violent cycle of death and destruction, nothing can change. We are in bondage to sin, and cannot free ourselves; and so with Jesus we pray for more laborers to do the work of God’s kingdom in exorcising this demon in our midst.

The good news we hear today is that even in the pit of despair, God hears our prayers and answers them. Just as God heard the cries of the Israelites and delivered them from Egypt, God hears our cries and delivers us. We cry out for laborers for justice, and God responds: look around you! When Jesus tells his disciples to pray, the prayers are scarcely out of their mouths before he drafts them into the work for which they have just prayed. The disciples become the answers to their own prayers! Matthew tells us this story because he wants us to see ourselves in the disciples. Their work is our work. As Jesus looks out in compassion on these crowds of disaffected, dejected people, he invites us to be the agents of God’s salvation for all people.

Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard. Byzantine Gospel of 11th century, BnF, Cod. gr. 74

In baptism, we are called to the work of Jesus, just like the 12 apostles. And just like them, in our baptism we are also given everything we need to fulfill that calling. The Holy Spirit of God gives us the authority and the power of Christ to cast out the demons of systemic sin, to cure every illness and disease of our culture, to proclaim the good news of God’s kingdom to all who despair.

Today we hear about the Israelites leaving a place called Rephidim. Before they left Rephidim, the Israelites saw and learned to trust in the goodness of God. God got them across the Red Sea to escape Pharaoh’s army, God provided manna and water in the wilderness, God even saved them from an attack by the Amalekites. Like Israel, we too have seen God’s goodness at work: each and every one of us is here because we have in some way experienced the grace of God in our own lives. We are here because while we were still sinners—undeserving and unrepentant—Christ died for us; and having been joined to him in death, he now lives for us, sharing abundant, vibrant life with us.

We know that we have been given all that we need to continue the work of Christ as his Church because he has already given us so much more than we could ever earn, deserve, imagine or comprehend. We know that we have been given all we need because those who came before us—ordinary men and women—had all been gifted with the same Holy Spirit in the baptism we share with them to help them achieve what they did.

Even though the world is still broken, it is better than it was thanks to the people that Christ has called through the ages to work for God’s just and peaceable kingdom. The people of God, empowered by the Holy Spirit have already worked to end slavery, to secure the right to vote, to demand civil rights. The work is not finished, but thanks to God and the people whom God has called into service, we are headed in the right direction and, with God’s help, the goal is within sight.

The cries of the oppressed should unsettle us, because injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Each and every one of us ought to be mad as hell that a Black man can be murdered on camera and the person who pulled the trigger can still get acquitted. But more importantly, each and every one of us ought to be praying to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest, laborers to work for justice and for lasting peace; and when we pray we ought to be fully aware that we may very well be the ones that Jesus calls to go out and stop traffic or call congresspersons or run for office or do whatever it takes to cast these demons out, because that is precisely why we were baptized.

Baptized into Christ’s death and sharing in his resurrection, we trust that God will continue to bring new life for all. We are utterly free to sit on the sidelines and wait for God to do this without us. We are free to make excuses about how our gifts lie in different areas. We are free to rest in the comfort of God’s promise for a better tomorrow while others cry for help today, but if we do I have to wonder: are we really free? Or are we simply enslaved to a sinful system, kept complacent and complicit by a few table scraps while our humanity is slowly drained away?

Martin Luther once said, “God does not need your good works, but your neighbor does.” Christ looks out on the crowds, harassed and helpless, bewildered and dejected, and has compassion on them. He looks out on these crowds now as they rage and protest, as they shout to be heard and silently weep, and he says to us, “Pray for more laborers.” Like the disciples, we will find that we, the baptized, are the answers to our prayers by the help of God; and like the disciples, we will find that if we step out in faith to serve those to whom Jesus calls us, we will experience God’s salvation in our own lives, because there is so much more waiting for us than a few table scraps.

When we gather around this table, we share a foretaste of the feast to come: a feast at which everyone—not just those with power or privilege—has a seat. We gather at this table to whet our appetite for that great feast which has no end, and to be strengthened to bring that reality to light. At this table, we are filled with the hope of God’s abundant life for all creation, a hope which does not disappoint.

Philando Castile, killed during a traffic stop in St. Anthony, MN

Clockwise from top left: Susie Jackson; Sharonda Coleman-Singleton; DePayne Doctor; Ethel Lance; Daniel Simmons Sr.; Clementa Pinckney; Cynthia Hurd; Tywanza Sanders. Killed during bible study in Charleston, SC

A Beautiful Mess

Pentecost, Year A
Texts: Acts 2.1-21; 1 Cor 12.3-13; Jn 20.19-23

Today we welcome Isabelle Beaudette into this community through baptism. A baptism is a very appropriate way to celebrate Pentecost because it is, among other things, our induction into the Church of Christ, and the scripture readings today show us what kind of community it is we are baptized into. We know from Acts that the Church is often messy and chaotic. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians reminds us that the Church can be quarrelsome and petty. John’s gospel recalls that the Church is sometimes fearful and inward focused. But above all else, scripture demonstrates for us that whatever else the Church is, it is focused on Jesus and led by the Holy Spirit.

When we celebrate baptism, we celebrate the gift of the Spirit. Acts records that early believers received the Holy Spirit at their baptism through the laying on of hands, and our baptismal liturgy still includes a prayer for the entrance of the Spirit: “Sustain this child with the gift of the Holy Spirit: the spirit of wisdom and understanding; the spirit of counsel and might; the spirit of knowledge and fear of the LORD; the spirit of joy in your presence.” Of course, sometimes the Spirit also chooses to be present in those not baptized, bringing them to faith or helping them to do God’s work. The prophet Isaiah rejoices in the messiah, Cyrus the king of Persia, whom God called by name though he did not know the LORD to free God’s people. (Isa 45.1-5)

Like a mighty wind, the Holy Spirit blows where she will. Like a mighty flood, she is an unstoppable force. Like a raging fire, she can be a power of destruction as well as creation. In Jerusalem, the Spirit descends on the quiet, dignified, orderly gathering of Jesus’ followers with a great noise and what was likely a rather surprising—if not terrifying—light show. 120 men and women then begin babbling in a cacophony of different languages before flooding into the streets, prophesying to the amazed and fearful bystanders about the power of God. Like the story of the Tower of Babel in Genesis, God intervenes to confuse their languages—but this time, instead of dividing people the Spirit unites them in the good news of Jesus Christ.

The Church of Christ from its very beginning has included many diverse people: Judeans and foreigners, Jews and Gentiles, slaves and free, rich and poor. This diversity of people is mirrored by the diversity of gifts that the Spirit bestows on them. In his letter to the church at Corinth, Paul talks about spiritual gifts of healing, speaking in and translating tongues, prophesy, and miracle working. However, this diversity also means that the Church has from its very beginning also struggled with the human instinct to divide and compete with one another. When we see the differences in the people God has called and the differences in the gifts God has bestowed, we begin building walls, drawing lines, ranking and evaluating one another.

The Corinthians were a diverse lot. Corinth was a metropolitan city, a center of commerce and trade, home to the very rich and the abysmally poor. People from every segment of life found themselves swept up together by the Spirit in God’s church, and just as the old divisions between upper class and lower class died hard, so did the new divisions between those who showed a propensity for flashy displays of faith like healing or speaking in tongues and those whose gifts were more subdued or ordinary.

As people so often do, they took the gifts God had granted them for their mutual benefit and began to use them against one another, creating dissension and division instead of unity and harmony. Paul had to remind them in his letter that whatever gifts they had were from God, not themselves, and that they were given to build up the entire community.

This is the community of the Church. We are diverse, and often divided. We are gifted, but we sometimes use those gifts against one another instead of for the common good. We are often chaotic and confused, messy and mixed up. In the best of times, the Spirit is at the center of this storm of people and emotions and actions and reactions directing it towards God’s ends, but at the worst of times we get caught up in our own agendas and rhythms and fears and claim that power for ourselves, often with disastrous outcomes.

None of that changes the fact that we have each been called by God to be a part of this nutty community and that in spite of—and sometimes even because of—the ways we fail the Holy Spirit remains with us: helping us, guiding us, comforting us, keeping us from getting too complacent or too lost in our own busyness. It is not because of who we are that we have been chosen, but because of who God is, because God has given each of us certain gifts to build up our community, and so God chooses to call us to this community—the Church—to build it up for the common good not only of the Church, but of the whole world.

That decision on God’s part to call us and use us completely apart from our own deserving or merit is what we call grace, or “charis” In Greek. The gifts of the Spirit he calls “charismata;” the word might best be translated “grace-gifts.” Like God’s grace itself, these grace-gifts are not given to us because of our merit or worthiness, but only because God is generous and loves humankind. God gives us these grace-gifts because we are God’s grace-gift to the world, called, claimed and sent through our baptism.

Scene of baptism. Stained glass, Paris, last quarter of the 12th century. From the Sainte-Chapelle of Paris.

When we are washed in God’s promise of eternal life for all creation, we are drafted into the service of that promise. Just as God does not give gifts of tongues or healing or prophecy to build up individuals, our baptism is not for us. We reap the benefits, surely, but ultimately our baptism, like the other grace-gifts we have been given, is for the common good. In baptism God calls us and chooses us to be a part of the beautifully broken community of the Church so that the gifts God has given each us can be combined to create loving community and ultimately do nothing less than to help God save the world.

The festival of Pentecost and the scripture readings for today are demonstrations of how the Holy Spirit is at work in us for the salvation of God’s world. The Spirit gifted those early believers to both build up their own community in loving relationship and ultimately to send them out to spread the good news of what God is doing. In other words, the Spirit is at work in us to make us charismatic and evangelical.

These two words give many Lutherans the cold sweats; but what do they really mean? When we talk about charismatic Christians, we may have images of raucous worship with hands raised in the air, but really “charismatic” simply means gifted. We have all been given gifts by the Spirit—all Christians are charismatic.

Some of those gifts are flashy: some of us are gifted at public speaking or are called to feed the homeless and clothe the naked. Many of our gifts are more subtle, but no less important. Some of us are great at tracking money, organizing volunteers, connecting with kids, or making sure the building is cleaned up. Some are gifted at preparing food, welcoming strangers with a smile, running necessary equipment, or even just knowing when to stop talking and listen. Some have more expertise, some have more passion, some have more money, some have more time.

It is also good to remember that we may have gifts about which we do not know. It’s doubtful that any of those 120 disciples who left the house that day in Jerusalem knew that they were capable of speaking in Cappadocian or Arabic. Sometimes we may find that the Holy Spirit rips us out of our comfort zone to have us do something new and frightening; it’s on one of the career hazards of baptism. And yet, if we follow the Spirit’s lead and step out in faith, we almost always find that though the work is hard, it is always rewarding beyond our imagination.

Regardless of what our individual gifts may be, we have each been given something important to contribute to this community of faith and to the global work of the whole Church, and that work to which we contribute is sharing the love of God with the world in both word and deed. That is the definition of evangelism. It’s not nothing to do with our politics or our style of worship or prayer and everything to do with sharing the benefits of God’s love with our neighbors through service, through relationship, and through telling others about the good things God is doing.

As we celebrate baptism—both Isabelle’s and our own—and Pentecost, we are celebrating what God has done and continues to do for us by building up this loony, loving community around us and somehow empowering us to be a force for God’s good work in the world. It isn’t always pretty, and it isn’t always safe, it isn’t always organized; but it is always good. Following Christ won’t make us safe or healthy, happy or prosperous, but then that was never the promise. The promise is that we would have life and have it abundantly, and that is exactly what the Holy Spirit gives: abundant life for all.

Trinity, Community, and the Image of God

Holy Trinity Sunday, Year C
Texts: Prov 8.1-4, 21-30; Rom 5.1-5; Jn 16.12-15

Today we celebrate the identity of God as triune: Father, Christ and Spirit. The idea of a God that is both one and three at the same time doesn’t make a lot of sense, but that’s because it isn’t an idea that was reasoned out and created; we experienced it. Trinity is what you get when you testify to the experience that the God of Israel raised Jesus from the dead. It’s impossible to really wrap one’s head around it, but in the end, what is truly important about the idea of trinity is not what it is, but what it means.

Paradox, Dust, and the Reign of God

Ash Wednesday
Texts: Joel 2.1-2, 12-17; 2 Cor 5.20b-6.10; Mt 6.1-6, 16-21

Today is a day of contradictions. Spring is beginning to creep in around us, and instead of the joy of the brightening skies and warmer weather, our worship instead focuses on the sorrow of our sins and the mortality of our bodies. We—though very much alive and walking—come forward to receive ashes on our foreheads and be reminded that “we are dust, and to dust we shall return.” Even our scripture readings for tonight hold us in tension between two extremes: the reading from Joel proclaims a public observance of repentance, while Matthew’s gospel recalls Jesus’ admonitions to pray in secret and not to show any outward signs of their piety. Welcome to Ash Wednesday.

Singing in Exile

Christmas 2, Year C.
Texts: Jer 31.7-14; Eph 1.3-14; Jn 1.1-18

The scene described in Jeremiah is a most appropriate one for Christmas. Christmas is supposed to be a season of joy and happiness, of celebration of what God has done. The song of God’s people, the image of God leading them back home from exile, that is the image of Christmas: God has acted, and God’s people rejoice because God’s action has made everything right.

Sadly, even as we celebrate Christmas, we know that all is not right with the world. Christ has been born, but in the thousands of years that have passed since that first night in the manger, the world has continued to endure war and famine, the oppression of the weak and the triumph of the strong. Even our Christmas celebrations sometimes seem to belie the joy they are supposed to bring us. Time spent with family can be upsetting and draining instead of loving and satisfying. Holidays remind us as much of the people who are not here to share them with us as they do the people with whom we do gather. Once the tinsel has been cleaned up, the lights have been taken down, and the wrapping paper has been recycled we may be left wondering if Christmas has changed anything.