For many of us today’s gospel reading contains familiar and beloved verses. Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews, comes to Jesus at night and we get to eavesdrop on their conversation. It is from this encounter that we get the famous verse John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.” A text made particularly familiar by the 19th century composer John Stainer, though as a child I sang a version of it to “O Danny Boy”, and perhaps you did too.

Building on this verse, theologian Marcus Borg says that the passion of God is to love the world -the cosmos – for God so loved the cosmos that he sent his only Son. “And God did not send the Son into the cosmos to condemn the world, but in order that the cosmos might be saved through him.” According to Borg, our mission as the church, our calling, is to love the world – the whole of Creation - with the same fierce and passionate love that God has.

But there’s a lot more to unpack in this reading. Nicodemus does not understand when Jesus tells him that in order to see the reign of God he must be born from above. Another translation is to be “born again”.

When I was a teenager, I knew many things with great certainty and unlike Nicodemus I knew exactly what it meant to be “born again.” Clearly it meant to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. I put a lot of energy into persuading my peers and others, including one evening, a bunch of drunk old men sitting on a park bench, to say that they accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior, and I fondly imagined that once they said those words they were born again and no longer headed for hell.

Fifty plus years and a seminary education later and I am much less sure what it’s all about.
So I am wondering what being ‘born again’ or being ‘born from above’ means to you. Is it something that is important? Is it something you have experienced?  What do you think Jesus is talking about?
Please find someone to talk to and reflect with – what is Jesus talking about – what does it mean to be born again?
…
Let’s share our wisdom with each other…
…
I wonder what Nicodemus was wanting from Jesus. If we assume that Jesus was able to discern the need of Nicodemus’ heart rather than his words, perhaps his real question was “how do I see the reign of God?” or maybe, “How do you, Jesus, see the reign of God?”

And Jesus’ answer is that we need to be twice-born, not just physically born but in some way spiritually as well. I don’t think there’s a one-size-fits-all simple recipe for how that happens. I suspect that just as every physical birth is unique, so is every spiritual birth.

Spiritual experience is subjective. Yours will be different from mine. There are those of us who see visions, who are aware of angels; there are those of us who feel the love of God at a deep level; and there are those of us who don’t. Some of us have had times of feeling at one with God and all creation; others haven’t. Some of us have spoken in tongues; others haven’t. Some of us know exactly when we were “born again’; others don’t. It doesn’t matter. Whatever experience you have or don’t have is just fine.

Because God’s grace does not depend on our feelings. God’s grace does not depend on human constructs like being ‘born again’. God so loved and so loves the cosmos – which includes you and me – whether or not we feel it. God’s grace is dependent on God not on us.

As Jesus told Nicodemus, “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” We cannot control our spiritual experiences. We may notice the Spirit blowing through us or around us but we cannot control her.

What we can do is turn towards God. We can, like the psalmist, lift up our eyes and turn our intention and our attention to God. We can ask to have the eyes of our hearts opened so that we can see the reign of God and so we can see the grace of God at work in our world.

And we can trust. We can trust in the One who loved the world so passionately that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. We can trust because God’s love is totally dependable. Because, remember, God did not send the Son into the cosmos to condemn creation, but in order that all creation might be saved through him.
And that includes you and me.

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 

Today’s readings take us back to the issue of sin. I know some of you don’t want to talk about it and frankly I think sin gets far too much attention in some versions of Christianity, but it is so fundamental to Christian thinking that we can’t just ignore it. We need to take sin seriously in all its forms.

The German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer called Christian narratives which don’t acknowledge the importance of sin “cheap grace”. Cheap grace preaches forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without formation, and communion without confession. Bonhoeffer himself described this as "grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ". One of its characteristics he said is treating God's love as a superficial cover-up for sins, allowing people to continue living as they wish.

In contrast, Bonhoeffer called the obedience of following Jesus, the discipleship of ‘costly grace’. Costly grace acknowledges the need to take up our cross and follow Jesus the non-violent Savior into the desert, into his confrontation with the ease of compromise with empire, into his life-giving ministry and ultimately his death. Costly grace is not about coming to church to feel good, to enjoy the music and the liturgy and each other’s company. Costly grace is about the transformation of our lives, it is about resistance to all that masquerades as life-giving but which sucks the very life away from us.

Bonhoeffer was extremely critical of the German church of his time which he saw compromising its values. Instead of standing up to the Nazi authorities, church leaders tried to maintain a "viable" position: one that would conform to Christian doctrine, prevent the Church from dividing into opposing factions, and avoid antagonizing the Nazi authorities. Their public statements seem to have been a painstaking attempt to say neither too much nor too little about what is happening around them. Needless to say, this ruled out any real opposition to the Nazi persecution of Jews and others.[1]

For Bonhoeffer this lack of courage was “cheap grace” – preaching and receiving the love of God without the consequent responsibility of taking up the cross – which in his time meant standing up for those being killed and persecuted.

There are of course, many parallels to our own time. We have a federal administration which is centralizing power into its own hands, and seems willing to ignore systems of honor, ethics and even legality. We are seeing people rounded up in their places of works and in the streets because they look like they might be illegal immigrants. And in the process legal, passport holding Americans are shot and killed and then labelled domestic terrorists.

And it is tempting to do nothing. It is tempting to believe the propaganda that these people are all violent criminals. It is tempting to turn away from the injustices and ill-treatment being carried out in detention centers. It is tempting for us to sing and talk about the love of God without confronting the realities of sin.

But that’s not what Jesus did.

Those forty days in the wilderness Jesus confronted cheap grace. He was tempted to do it the easy way. Don’t worry about fasting – you’re hungry just order take out – a nice loaf of bread? or how about pizza? Want people to notice you? Take the easy way and jump off the top of the temple – you know the angels will catch you. Nah it’s really all about power isn’t it – take the easy way and let the empire handle all the details – don’t worry about ethics or honor or other people – don’t worry about the rich getting richer or the poor getting trampled on, join in with the rich and famous and everything will be yours.

Yet we know that Jesus said no. He didn’t take the easy way. He carried his cross to Calvary.
Y’all have been listening to me on or off for a year now and you know that I fully believe that God’s love is unconditional and embraces all of us. That’s grace. Grace is that we are totally accepted by God with all our warts and all our imperfections. We don’t have to be someone else in order to deserve God’s love.

Sometimes I worry that I am preaching cheap grace. So I hope I also talk enough about how our response to God’s love is to be transformed into the image of God, or perhaps back into the image of God as we were before we started to take the easy way. Before our ancestors took the easy way and ate the nice-looking fruit even though they knew it wasn’t right. No I don’t believe literally in the story of the fall but it is a myth that speaks to us again and again of how we are almost programmed to take the easy way, the way that brings us the greatest gain with the least effort, at least in the short term.

As our second reading this morning emphasizes, grace is free. Our reconciliation with God is not through anything we do or anything we earn, like points on a cosmic scoreboard - but it is the free gift of God, given to us through Jesus. Death is walking apart from God; life is walking with God.
This is the good news. We are given life. We are given the opportunity to walk with God. A little further on in the ancient story we hear, “Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”” The Lord God called, “Where are you?” God is calling for us in the cool of the day, ready to relax and hang out with us. Will we say ‘here I am Lord” or will we hide with shame because we took the easy way and never turned back?

Costly grace is not an easy path – we only have to look at Jesus’ life to see that. But it is the path of life. It is the path that brings life and hope not only to ourselves but to the stranger in our midst and to the whole of Creation.

Sin is much more than telling a few white lies or envying our neighbor their new car or their expensive landscaping. Sin is writ large in our faces every day. It is the way society rolls. Tax breaks for the wealthy and reductions in food stamps for the poor. The unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for true Americans who are not black, brown, Muslim or Hindu. We are enmeshed in a system which is sinful, I call it the sin matrix, that privileges some people and not others. And you and I my friends are among the privileged. You and I are offered the easy path.

But Jesus calls us to the path of the wilderness. The path of the cross. The path of pouring ourselves out for the good of the world. The path of costly grace. The path of Lent.

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 


[1] https://www.adl.org/resources/news/role-churches-nazi-germany

Today is the last Sunday in Epiphany and as always, however long Epiphany is, we started the season with Jesus being baptized and now we end with him being transfigured. The baptism and transfiguration act like bookends for this season of revelation, the season when Jesus is revealed to be the Messiah, the Son of God, and his disciples recognize and follow him. It is a season with two main questions – who do you say that Jesus is? And will you follow him?

During both the baptism and transfiguration, a voice from the heavens answers the first of those questions. In Matthew’s account of the baptism, “when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” And in today’s reading, ‘suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”’

We can see these two events as initiations for Jesus – his baptism starts his ministry and perhaps the transfiguration marks the beginning of his journey toward the cross.

Yet the transfiguration event does more than that. It puts Jesus firmly in the Jewish tradition of Moses and Elijah. If you had any doubt that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah this should make it clear. Moses went up a mountain and spent time with God. During that time he received the basis of the law – the ten commandments – and when he came back down his face was glowing. In fact it was so bright that he had to wear a veil so that he didn’t hurt everyone’s eyes.

Now Jesus also goes up a mountain and not only his face but his whole person becomes dazzling white, and wait, wait there’s more…Moses the embodiment of the law, and Elijah the archetype of the prophets appear there with him. You can’t get better credentials than that.

And then there’s The Voice.

It’s not surprising that Peter wanted the moment to last forever. But we are human and those moments of sudden revelation, those moments when we realize that there is no separation, are only fleeting.

The Trappist monk and mystic, Thomas Merton, had a moment like that. He wrote,

In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world, the world of renunciation and supposed holiness. The whole illusion of a separate holy existence is a dream.

I have the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun….

Then it was as if I suddenly saw the secret beauty of their hearts, the depths of their hearts where neither sin nor desire nor self-knowledge can reach, the core of their reality, the person that each one is in God’s eyes. If only they could all see themselves as they really are. If only we could see each other that way all the time. There would be no more war, no more hatred, no more cruelty, no more greed…. [i]

Just as on the mountain top it was as though a veil lifted and for a moment Jesus was visibly the Son of God, so for Merton that day in Louisville, the veil lifted and ‘it was as if [he] suddenly saw the secret beauty of [people’s] hearts, the depths of their hearts where neither sin nor desire nor self-knowledge can reach, the core of their reality, the person that each one is in God’s eyes. If only they could all see themselves as they really are. If only we could see each other that way all the time.”

Our baptismal covenant calls us ‘to seek and serve Christ in all persons.’ What if the Christ in all of us is shining like the sun, but we cannot see the light of the Christ because we have learned to see the human? What if we could learn to see the Christ as well?

Take a moment to look around the church and imagine all the people sitting here shining like the sun…

now in your mind’s eye (it may help to close your eyes) imagine yourself as you really are - the beloved of God, marked as Christ’s own for ever, and shining like the sun…

now imagine someone you love and see them too shining with the light of Christ…

and now think of an acquaintance, someone you don’t know well and imagine them shining with the light of God…

And finally, think of someone you don’t like and try to see the person they are in God’s eyes and see them also shining with the light of the Christ…
 
Any quick reflections on how that was for you? ( It is an adaptation of the Buddhist kindness practice called metta.)

In this morning’s second reading, from one of the letters of Peter, the writer talking about the transfiguration as a confirmation of prophecy says, ‘You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.’

A couple of days ago I was feeling a bit down. I had received some unwelcome news and was having trouble integrating it. I was fetching something from the sacristy and as I walked back past the font I instinctively put my fingers in and made the sign of the cross on my forehead. As I did so I remembered the commitment of my baptism – “marked as Christ’s own for ever” and I remembered that nothing can take that away and that, like you, whatever happens I am God’s beloved. I walked out of here with a lighter step.

My friends, we are God’s beloved daughters and sons.

As Merton saw, we are all walking around shining like the sun.

And as the epistle says, ‘You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.’

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 
 
 
 
 
 


[i] https://ancientanswers.org/words-to-live-by/thomas-merton/at-the-corner-of-fourth-and-walnut-in-louisville/

​ Matthew 5:13-20

When we think of someone who we see as having a special goodness about them, we might describe them as “salt of the earth.” We mean that without these people, life would lose some of its flavor. Such people help remind us of what is important. They’re like sounding rods that keep us grounded in what’s real in life. Life is richer because of their presence.
 
We have heard that we are, as Jesus says during his Sermon on the Mount, “the salt of the earth” and “light of the world.” He often used metaphorical language to help point us to deeper truth. But why is he talking about salt and light today and in what context?
 
The people of the first century would have known about salt. It was common for instance, for guests gathered for a meal to be seated in relation to the position of the saltcellar – or what today we call the saltshaker. The more honored guests were seated “above the salt,” meaning that they were located closer to the host. Those seated “below the salt” were considered to be of less importance. In Leonardo da Vinci’s painting The Last Supper, Judas Iscariot is portrayed with an overturned saltcellar in front of him. It’s an ominous visual of things to come. The Romans considered it a bad sign to spill salt and thought they could avert disaster by talking a pinch of salt and tossing over their left shoulder.
 
In the days of the Roman Empire, salt was nearly as valuable as gold. Its uses varied from enhancing the flavor of food to being used as a preservative or even a healing agent. A soldier was paid in part with salt which came to be known as salariu, from which the word salary is derived. A soldier’s salary was cut if he was not “worth his salt,” a phrase that came into use because the Greeks and Romans often bought slaves with salt.
 
Salt was often used in Jewish purification rites, and it was the custom to rub salt on a newborn infant. From this came the Christian practice in some places to add salt to the baptismal water. When I was confirmed by bishop Tom Shaw – a monk in the Society of Saint John the Evangelist and the bishop of Massachusetts  – I and the others confirmed that day were given a small vile of salt and a small candle as a reminder of Jesus’ claim that we are Salt of the Earth and the Light of the World.
 
Salt was meant to enhance, to heal, to preserve, and to purify. Salt was an extremely valuable commodity considered to be of great worth. So, what did Jesus mean that we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world? How do we ourselves enhance, heal, preserve, and purify the world around us? And what does it mean to lose our flavor – to lose our saltiness?
 
It helps to consider the context from which these words come, and we don’t have to look far. Jesus speaks to us from The Sermon on the Mount, and his claim that we are Salt of the Earth and Light of the World immediately follows the beatitudes where he outlines the characteristic qualities of one who is deeply committed to the love of God and of neighbor. So, it’s as uncomplicated as that. To be Salt of the Earth means that we are humble, meek, and merciful. We are to strive for righteousness and purity of heart and as children of God we are to be the peacemakers in the world. That sounds like salt of the earth stuff to me.
 
Although the qualities outlined in the beatitudes may seem extraordinary and a bit beyond us and where we are in our lives, they are not. These qualities are counter cultural – for sure – but they are not beyond our reach, and they are not beyond the expectations that Jesus has for all of us. These salt of the earth qualities are profound spiritual concepts for ordinary living that help bring about the kingdom of heaven right here on earth. It is the extraordinary living of the ordinary lives of God’s salt of the earth people like you and me.
 
Being salt of the earth people means that we live our lives within the knowledge of God’s abundant blessing upon all our humanness. It means that we can shake away superficial phoniness and move toward becoming pure, whole, and authentic persons that stand for values and beliefs that we know are worth dying for – and better yet, worth living for. We live in a way that enhances those around us, inspiring all people to be the best they can be, regardless of cultural, religious, or denominational stripes. It means that we promote unity, not division; peace, not violence; love, not hatred. We bring healing and purification into places that are wounded and hurting, and all the while losing ourselves as we point to the one true God of life.
 
Jesus reminds us that we are the light of the world and that we must let that light shine. We are to move in ways that illumine darkness. We must bring the light of Christ into the shadowy corners of the world. So, what does that look like and how exactly are we to do that? If we read further into the Gospel according to Matthew, we see it. Jesus states it clearly. We are to feed the hungry, give water to the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, take care of the sick and visit those in prison. When we do these things for our brothers and sisters in the world we are doing it for Jesus. It really couldn’t be any clearer. It’s not rocket science. It’s salt of the earth.
 
And we shouldn’t waste time admiring our work and patting ourselves on the back because first of all, it’s what we should be doing anyway. And secondly, it’s not about us, it’s about God. Jesus said we are the light, he did not say we should be in the spotlight or limelight. We simply love mercy, do justice, and walk humbly with God. No big headlines, just real salt of the earth stuff. Otherwise, we risk losing our salty flavor.
 
We live in a wonderful and magnificent world. Beauty is all around us. But we also live in a world that is filled with suffering. It is a world that is constantly at war and in great need of peacemakers; a world that is all too often driven by greed and consumerism in great need of a true sense of healthy priorities. We live in a world that diminishes the dignity of too many of our human family.
 
Being Salt of the Earth is the antidote to the domination systems that practice power over the people. Salt of the earth is about power with and for the people.
 
A sure way to claim or re-claim ourselves as salt of the earth people is to reach out and touch the hurting places in our world. Jesus puts high value on rubbing elbows with the most marginalized and disenfranchised among us. When we do that, empathy and compassion are sure to follow, and we just might experience God’s tears falling from our eyes. And when those tears run down our face and touch our lips we will taste who we are. We will taste salt. And so it is with people like us.
 
Brother Dennis

I don’t usually spend much time thinking about sin but this week I have been thinking about it. As in, what is it? And why is it?

In the Wednesday morning conversation, we heard theologian Marcus Borg talk about salvation. He said that the idea that Jesus saved us by dying for our sins is only one perspective, and that he sees salvation as being about transformation in the here and now, not about where we go after we die.

Which led us into an interesting conversation about sin.

There are many things that we may have been taught about sin. Some people say sin is an archery term which means missing the mark. Some people say it is part of our essential nature which shows that we are not divine. Some people say it becomes an essential part of each of us at conception. Some people say it is basically an issue of morality, and living a good life is all that is necessary. Other people think that we can only approach God by admitting that we are miserable sinners. The first letter to John says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, God, who is faithful and just, will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.    1 John 1:8,9”

Much of the teaching in the Old Testament points to the sin of human society. We are caught up in a sinful system – I call it the sin matrix – which has very little to do with my action but everything to do with our action. It seems as though pretty much everything we do as humans however well-intentioned has a dark side. For example, I drive an electric car in order to reduce my negative impact on the environment. But the motor probably uses rare earths and recycling the battery when it reaches the end of its life will take energy, both of which have significant negative impacts. And the clothes I wear were probably made by people in other countries earning hardly enough to live on… and then there’s the coffee I drink, and so on…  We are so bound up with one another that those of us in the rich countries can hardly get out of bed without causing oppression somewhere else. So sin is not just a personal individual thing, it’s also social.

So now it’s your turn. How do you understand sin? What have you been taught?
I encourage you to find someone else, even if it means getting up and moving around, to share your ideas with.
…
One of the questions I’ve been asking myself is where is personal sin in my life?

And what is the difference between sin and cultural expectation? That’s been a big question for me as a gay woman – is living and loving as a gay person a sin? It has been seen that way for hundreds of years but is that God’s opinion or just a human cultural understanding? Since I am standing here this morning wearing a backwards collar you will know that I have become convinced, together with The Episcopal Church, that God does not see LGBTQ people as sinners any more or less than straight people are sinners.

I think my besetting sins are irritability and procrastination. But how do I define those as sins? They are not in the Ten Commandments and Jesus never talked about them. I think of them as sins because they are not Christ-like. As far as we know, Jesus did not procrastinate and was not irritable on a daily basis.

But there are many other things I feel guilty about. Are they sins?

My front yard is a good example. It is a mess. And every day I feel bad about it and I think, “I’ll get to this tomorrow when I have time.” And I don’t. But is it sinful to have a front yard full of weeds or just an eyesore?
 
Today we have two readings which do not define sin but rather tell us how we should live in Christ, and I think focusing on how we should live is better than worrying about how we shouldn’t. Because God’s deep and abiding love for us is much, much greater than our limitations and failings. And keeping our eye on the goal is more helpful than getting stuck in the weeds.

In Matthew’s gospel there are five blocks of teaching. Scholars think that maybe he arranged things like that as an homage to the five books of the Torah. If that is so, maybe he thought of the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, as a corollary to the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments mainly describe behavior. In contrast the Beatitudes talk about attitude. They describe how our inner lives would be if they mirrored Christ.

We would be humble, meek, not afraid of grief, longing for righteousness – both personal and societal, we would be merciful and compassionate; our hearts would be pure – filled with the Spirit of God; we would be peacemakers, working for peace and justice and reconciliation; and yet we would be courageous in the face of persecution and violence.

That’s a lot isn’t it? If that’s the goal, I know I miss the mark quite often.

This is not just about being a good person. This is not just about being a solid citizen. This is something quite different. This is about being Christ-like. None of us are naturally like that. It requires a process of transformation.

Perhaps this is what Marcus Borg meant when he talked about salvation as transformation. God offers us the possibility of becoming like Godself. And Jesus is our model. It’s more than being kind, it’s more than being loving, it is a complete change. A different way of  being human.

Paul puts it like this in his letter to the Philippians:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death--
        even death on a cross!   (Phil 2:3-8)

That is the goal, my friends. To have the same mindset as Christ Jesus. That’s going to take a lot of transformation, but it is the possibility, the hope, that we have as followers of Jesus – to become like him.

God does not require that we make sacrifices for sin or abase ourselves in order to gain his love. God’s all-encompassing love is totally available to us in every moment. In humility we confess our personal sins and our participation in the sin-matrix, but we don’t need to grovel.

I love the last few verses of our first reading from Micah.

“With what shall I come before the Lord,
and bow myself before God on high?
Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with tens of thousands of rivers of oil?
Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”
And then there’s a silent NO.
No. He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?
 
It makes it seem so simple doesn’t it: What does the Lord require of us but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with our God?

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 
 
 
 
 

In the early eighties, an Indian guru, Sathya Sai Baba, became very popular among young spiritually inclined people. As well as being a spiritual teacher, Sai Baba had some unusual abilities. He could produce candy, watches and other trinkets, and more importantly an unusual scented holy ash called Vibhuti from his fingertips. Many of my friends in Scotland started to become his devotees. He appeared to them in their dreams, and his photos manifested small piles of Vibhuti.

Sai Baba did not come to me in my dreams. He did not call me to be his devotee, his disciple. He did not send me Vibhuti. I felt left out and a little unwanted. I longed to have a spiritual teacher who could teach me how to be deeply spiritual myself.

Of course what I didn’t understand, and probably didn’t want to know because it wasn’t glamorous, was that I had a spiritual teacher already - Jesus the Christ, with the Holy Spirit and our Creator.

In today’s reading from Matthew we hear Jesus at the beginning of his ministry calling some of his disciples. “he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.”

We are here this morning because Jesus has called us to be his disciples. And on some level, whether immediately like Simon and Andrew or rather reluctantly and slowly, like me, we have heard his call.

What does it mean to be Jesus’ disciple today?

In our conversation on Wednesday morning, theologian Marcus Borg, said that Jesus had two focuses in his teaching – the Way and the Kingdom. The Way is the spiritual path of deepening our walk with God, being devotees of Jesus and being transformed more and more into Christ-like beings. The Kingdom is our work of bringing the reign of God into manifestation in this world, as we pray in the prayer Jesus taught us, “thy kingdom, thy will be done, on earth as in heaven.” It is living the values of the reign of God here and now and working for social justice, working for the Great Shalom, where all beings live in peace, justice and dignity.

Which is very different from the world we are living in, and the one Jesus lived in. The fighting, beatings and the death of protestors we are seeing in Minnesota today would have been familiar to him, living under Roman rule in a brutal society which hit first and asked questions later, if ever.

The essence of Jesus’ life, teaching and death shows that a system based on blaming others, a system based on violence, does not bring life or human flourishing. Jesus conquered death. Jesus came back. Yet he did not blame or shame – he was the perfect self-giving victim – the one who was blamed for the unrest in Jerusalem. The one who was blamed, not just by the Roman authorities but by his very own people. Just like those who have been killed in Minneapolis Jesus was described as a ‘domestic terrorist.’

None of us wants to be blamed. None of us wants to be scapegoated. But it is part of human nature. In order to feel better about ourselves we humans gang up on others, belittling them and excluding them. Yet this is not the way of the Kingdom. in the reign of God people forgive one another, not holding grudges and making negative judgments against each other. In the reign of God power is in self-giving love, not in belittling, in violence and victimizing.

It seems that we have entered a time when the rule of law is questioned, when blaming and retribution are commonplace, where might is right. Which requires us as disciples of Jesus to be ever vigilant and refuse to be drawn into it. To resist the dominant language, the dominant mindset, of our culture.

It is hard. But discipleship is hard.

The culture around us is like a great river and it is easy for us to get swept along in the current. Then as we are pulled down the river it is easy to get caught up the detritus which is flowing down – the negativity and divisiveness; the self-aggrandizement and desire to take care of number one, the willingness to lie and to accept lies in the place of truth. Turning around and swimming upstream is difficult and that is for us the cost of discipleship.

Jesus’ disciples were living with him to learn from him, just as Sai Baba’s devotees flocked to his ashram in India to be close to him. We have the privilege of the Holy Spirit living with us to teach us in every moment. And one of the ways that the Holy Spirit works is through each other, which is why faith communities such as St Peters are so very important. One of the functions of faith community is to help us stay conscious. To help us remember our values. To help us remember the Jesus we follow.

I am deeply grateful for this community of faith. I am grateful to each one of you who shares your life, your glimpsings of God, your ideas and your inspirations.

There are many false prophets today who teach a Christianity which is not based on the teachings of Jesus. They argue that America was founded as a Christian country and should return to its roots but they forget that Jesus ate with prostitutes and sinners, they forget that he talked to women, to Samaritans and foreigners. They forget that Jesus never called anyone scum, that Jesus preached love and inclusivity and that he was a rabbi grounded in the Hebrew scriptures which repeatedly call for care for the stranger and the foreigner.

The great light which Isaiah foretold is in the gospel of Jesus – the non-violent Savior – who did not blame or shame but who triumphed over the evils of this world – the evils of victimization and violence. The gospel of Jesus the Christ who emptied himself in his human life and in his death on the cross.

This is the Jesus we follow, this is the Jesus we seek to imitate. This is the one who leads us in the Way and in the Kingdom.

Being the disciples of Jesus does not reward us with holy ash or with candy and trinkets. It rewards us with a deeper and deeper knowledge of the God who is life itself. We follow the greatest spiritual teacher of them all who makes himself known to us in creation, in scripture, in the eucharist and in the community of his beloved, the church.

Let us resist the swirling current of our culture of increasing violence and return again and again to following the one who is the Prince of Peace.

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 

Who remembers the sermon I preached on the 4th Sunday in Easter last year. Anyone?  No – I had to look it up myself. I remembered that we had talked about Jesus as the Lamb of God and I didn’t want to repeat myself, though one of the fun things about having this whole year together is that we have the opportunity to delve deeper into things so some important themes come up more than once.

Back in Eastertide we read about Jesus the Lamb in the Book of Revelation and we approached the Lamb from that perspective. Today we heard the only time in the gospels where Jesus is called the Lamb of God. Scholars think that the Gospel of John and the Book of Revelation were written about the same time so I think we can assume that “Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” was an important theme in the church around Greece and Turkey sometime between the years 90 and 100 CE.

But what does it mean to us today?

I know from our conversations that most of us experience God as primarily loving, rather than judgmental or violent, and that certainly goes along with Jesus’ teaching and with the epistles of John which boldly declare, God is Love.

Yet the idea of Jesus dying for our sins is often interpreted in a way which seems less than loving on God’s part. We have been told that the wages of sin is death and that as a result of our sin, God requires the death penalty. Jesus’ death on the cross paid our penalty and so we get to have eternal life. Thus Jesus took away the sins of the world.

I am not alone in having difficulty reconciling a loving God with the God who requires death as a penalty for sin, even though everyone of us is prone to sin. Surely a loving God would find another way to reconcile us to Godself without anyone having to be killed. Remember the story of Abraham taking Isaac up a mountain to offer a sacrifice? Abraham thought he would need to kill Isaac, but instead God provided a ram who was caught in the thicket. If God can provide Abraham with a sacrificial ram on the top of a mountain, surely God can work out a way not to kill his own Son!

I am hoping that during Lent we can go more deeply into the ways that Christians have understood the work of Christ on the cross. So you might consider this discussion today to be a preview of a coming attraction!

Let us assume for now that God is Love, and that consequently God is not violent and does not condone or demand child sacrifice. How then are we to understand “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world”? Isn’t the lamb led to the slaughter, the one who is to be sacrificed, killed to appease God?

What if we rephrase it as “God’s Lamb who takes away the sin of the world”? That changes things for me. In every situation of sacrifice in ancient religions, it is humanity who provides the animals for the sacrifice. The effect of the sacrifice may be to appease a god or to thank a god or even to be reconciled with a god, but in every case it is the humans who bring the sacrifice. The sacrifice is usually a blood-sacrifice in that someone living is killed and their blood released, then the meat is cooked and eaten by the gods involved and by their priests and sometimes by everyone. Often it is the blood – the life of the creature - which is seen as the powerful agent of healing.

This gift of a creature to a god is totally turned around in our Eucharist. Certainly it is the humans of the altar guild who faithfully bring the bread and the wine, but in some way, it becomes for us the Body and Blood of Jesus, God’s Lamb. In this ritual of reconciliation, of becoming more and more God, it is God who provides the real, spiritual food. Let me repeat that. It is God who provides the real, Spiritual food.

So this is unlike anything that went before. God provides the sacrificial Lamb who takes away the sin of the world, not us.

Now listen up because this is a bit of mind-bender.  Jesus did not die on the cross because God is violent but because we are. Jesus did not die because God required a sacrifice. Jesus did not die because it was the only way to reconcile us to God. Jesus did not die to get rid of our sin, but because of our sin. It was human violence, human anger which led Jesus the Christ to his death. And God allowed it to happen. God allowed Jesus to become the sacrifice for the sacred meal, for our reconciliation and ultimately the reconciliation of all Creation to God.

Yesterday on NPR I heard an interview with a woman who has been part of the protests in Iran. She said, “We are empty-handed, standing in front of the bullets.” That made me cry. And I wondered if I would have the courage to protest non-violently, there or even in Minnesota today.

Yet that’s what Jesus did. He stood empty handed in front of the bullets of hatred and the pain of the nails. He took the worst that humankind could do in its violence and allowed himself to be killed.

But that wasn’t the end.

And that is why we are here today. It wasn’t the end because God brought Jesus back from death and the grave. And we are here today because Jesus shows us that God takes the worst of our violence and comes back up loving us.

As disciples of Jesus, we too are called to live non-violently.  We are called to live “empty-handed, standing in front of the bullets.” Because Jesus did not retaliate and Jesus told us to pray for our enemies. And that transforms the world, soul by soul, from one based on violence to one based on love.

This was the genius of the civil rights movement, that they chose to follow the path of Jesus, to love those opposing them and to stand empty-handed in front of the bullets. And we know that many, including Martin Luther King Jr. were killed. We also know that their work is not complete. We do not yet live in a world where skin color doesn’t matter.

In this country, Black men are imprisoned at six times the rate of white men, and Black women twice as often. And Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related cause than white women. Since the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, at least 31 states have passed 115 restrictive voting laws. 

The work of the Civil Rights movement is not yet complete, and neither is the work of the Lamb of God. Today as we gather at the table for eucharist, let us continue the work of the Lamb as we accept the free gift of God, reconciliation and healing through the life of God’s Lamb, not just for comfort but also for strength. Strength to stand empty-handed in front of the bullets.

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 

Matthew 3:13-17
 
Ten years ago, in 2016, I went on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with a group of about 20 Episcopalians led by monks of the Society of St John the Evangelist, which is a monastery in Cambridge Massachusetts. It was the most amazing and inspiring trip I have ever made. Every day I was filled with awe as we entered the stories from the gospel. We walked on the field where Jesus gave the sermon on the mount, we sat at the well where he shared water with the Samaritan woman, we went on a little replica of the boat on at the Sea of Galilee, and we celebrated the Holy Eucharist on the shore of the Jordan River.
 
At the Jordan, the location of today’s gospel, I lifted up my long black habit and waded into the river and looked up into the sky imagining the Dove coming down and the words we just heard, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” I longed to stay there all day, maybe lay down and let that water wash over me. But all too soon our leader called us back on the bus.
 
The image of the Dove as the Holy Spirit is my favorite Christian symbol. In fact, I had it tattooed on my arm on my 60th birthday. The dove is also the bird that Noah sends out from the arc to see if there is land yet. The first time it comes back with nothing but the second time the dove has an olive branch in its beak letting Noah know that that indeed the land is back and a new life can begin.
 
In today’s gospel the dove is the Spirit descending from God to his Son.  The symbol of the new era and the public endorsing of who Jesus is.
 
Jesus walks humbly into the water with others who have come to have his cousin, John the Baptist, renew them in the Jordan River. I wonder, does Jesus need the affirmation of his Father – to hear that his Father is proud of him to begin the work that is ahead? Isn’t it what all humans long for – to hear their father say these empowering words, words that express pride in their child?
 
Many of us, including me, did not receive encouraging words from our earthly fathers. I now know that my father loved me, but he didn’t know how to say it or express it. He was emotionally absent and never spoke to his daughters about anything of consequence. I never once heard the words “I love you.”  My sisters and I have adapted to the lack of fathering in different ways, but we recognize that we never once felt that he was proud of us.
 
Having been a prison chaplain for 18 years I know that most men and women behind bars have what we call the father wound. They did not have a father who told them they were special or proud of them. For most of us, with this deficiency we didn’t develop a sense of self-worth which is so critical in navigating life in a successful way.
 
Not knowing that you are worthy is a deep wound that can drive some to addiction or reckless behavior. It seems to be passed down generationally. If the father doesn’t value himself, he is not likely to show his appreciation for others, especially his children and so on it goes.
 
I have witnessed many incarcerated men and women turn to God to find the Fatherly love they long for. It becomes God who believes in them and inspires them to live a moral and upstanding life. They seek to live lives pleasing their heavenly father. I have seen countless men and women transform themselves and this ripple of goodness infects others including their families. Some find that their growing faith and longing to live right is challenging for their families of origin. But over time their sincerity and higher vibration elevate everyone they encounter.
 
I have also found that anyone who has been exposed to childhood trauma needs more than religion. The wounds do not magically disappear with improved behavior and attendance at church. Brave excavation of past experiences is required to live the best version of ourselves, otherwise we continue to be triggered by the past and to cause harm even when we don’t intend to.
 
I have taken this walk of healing, and it is now the work God has called me to. I facilitate a 16-week program in the California Men’s Colony prison that helps the men develop compassion for what they endured in their traumatic childhoods and an understanding of the impact it has had on their bad choices. As we say, “hurt people hurt people.” And believe me no one is as damaged by life as the men and women who live behind bars. This deep dive into the past is coupled with an honest accountability for harm caused.  This is the call to repentance that John the Baptist insists on as he offers a new life to his flock.  It isn’t easy to look back but it brings about healing and even freedom. The goal is to become healed people who heal people.
 
Friends, these are very difficult times we are living in. The teachings of Jesus to care for the least is no longer what many of our Christians siblings promote, rather the opposite, there is an actual attack on empathy.  And yet it is all too easy to vilify others. It is tempting to cast players into the roles of good people and bad people. I encourage you to remember that hurt people hurt people. I am not saying that we don’t stand up to the domination systems just as Jesus did in his time.
 
How do we navigate such times as these?  
 
I think we must be honest with ourselves. Are you becoming numb? Do you feel overwhelmed and burned out? Do you have compassion fatigue? Do you feel furious? Do you feel inadequate, like nothing you do can really help? Or are you feeling enlivened by seeking justice, making calls and protesting with signs? Whatever you might be feeling I want to suggest you double down on prayer and love of God.  Now more than ever having a robust prayer life, and a life centered on the Divine is crucial.
 
Jesus invites us to be the family of God. We are all baptized into the Beloved community. We need to really take in that we are Beloved of God just as we are at this very moment. We can open our hearts to own this truth and live in an ever more life-giving union with Divine Love.  We can metaphorically stand in the Jordan River and receive God’s Spirit of love and imagine hearing the words, “In you I am well pleased.”  And from this truth we can find the strength and courage for a challenging time.
 
The Reverend Sister Greta

Today we celebrate Epiphany – we are a couple of days early since the feast day of Epiphany is on Tuesday. Epiphany is the season of revelation – the time when we think about how Jesus was and is revealed to be the Word, the Son of God, the True Light, and we start that process today with the revelation of Jesus to the Gentiles in the form of the wise men from the East.

My good friend Ann, who is our musician this morning, thank you Ann, asked me the other day what I would be preaching about and I said that although its commonplace for us today, the inclusion of Gentiles in the revelation of God must have been mind-blowing for the Jews of the time.

And that’s very true – that the light of Christ is not just for the physical descendants of Abraham but for all people – is astonishing. But if we go there today we miss something rather darker and yet just as important.

You know that this year we are reading from Matthew’s gospel which is the only gospel that talks about the wise men. It tells us that they defied Herod by not returning to Jerusalem but “left for their own country by another road.” And - we skip this bit in our Sunday readings – Herod is not pleased, to put it mildly. Herod is so threatened by this baby that he sends his soldiers to Bethlehem to kill all the male children of two years or under.

But he misses Jesus, because Joseph has a dream in which God tells him, "Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him." Then, we are told, Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. 

If we focus on the coming of the light to the Gentiles, we miss this important backstory of murder and flight, of fear and migration.

If this were a movie we might be tempted to call it “The Clash of the Kings” Except it isn’t really a clash – Herod is lashing out and Jesus is taken away.

Perhaps “The Babe against the Tyrant King” or “A Tale of Two Kingdoms” might be better titles. Over this next year we will hear Matthew talking a lot about the kingdom of heaven. It’s a phrase which appears over 30 times in this gospel but not at all in the other three. And in this story about Herod’s anger, he’s setting up the context, beginning to develop the theme of the contrast between the kingdom of human empire grounded in violence, and the kingdom of heaven which is grounded in love.

They are quite different. The politics and economics of human empire depend on division and inequality. The rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer, those who can, bullying those who can’t. In contrast God’s politics and economics – the kingdom of heaven – is about healing all the divisions that keep us in conflict. It is about establishing true justice with equity for all God’s children and God’s creatures, indeed it is about the flourishing of all creation. It is about mutual service among equals, never about oppression of the weak by the strong.

That’s why the Son of God didn’t just appear on earth, but was born as a human baby with all the same dependence on his parents for food, hygiene, safety and love as any other baby. That’s why he was born in a stable. Because God identifies with, we can even say he has a preference for, those who are weak, those who are outcast, those who are poor, those who are running for their lives. If God were to incarnate today we might find him in Gaza or Sudan or Somalia or Venezuela or in a displaced persons camp.

It is just so counter-intuitive that the Son of God, the Prince of Peace, would be born not in New York or Geneva but among the poorest of the poor, the least powerful in a world where power is worshiped.

But Jesus broke the mold. Jesus offers an entirely new way of being human. That is the king the wise ones came to see and to worship – a king whose kingdom is not of this world, a king who does not fight but whose power is in non-violence, in humility and patience. Whose people dream dreams and hear the Spirit leading them.

This is our calling, people of God, followers of Jesus.

We are called to be an entirely different kind of human. We are called to cultivate peace and humility in our hearts and our lives. We are called to forgive our neighbors, our enemies, and yes ourselves as well. We are called to respond to events we can scarcely take in with compassion not only for the victims but also for the perpetrators.

And that is why we are here today. We are not here just to see our friends, though that is a joy; we are not here just to sing, though that is good for our brains and our immune systems; we are not here just because people who go to church live longer!

We are here to be transformed. We are here to learn how to follow Jesus. We are here to be sustained in our journey by the presence of God in this place, in one another and in the eucharist. And we are here to pray.

Prayer is our superpower. Prayer is what lets the light in. Prayer is how we align ourselves with Spirit and how we invite Spirit into our hearts and into our world and into Congress and the White House and the Pentagon. And that is powerful. So powerful.

The wise men, the Magi, followed the star which led them to Jesus. We don’t need a star, we can come directly to the throne of God, to the feet of the one who is both our big brother and our Savior. And there we can ask for grace, which is always freely given. Grace to love where we have never dared love before.

Because that is who our God is. Our God is light and our God is love and our God shows us in Jesus an entirely new way to be human. And by deep, gentle, humble loving we become the light of the world. God moving in us and through us can do more than we have ever imagined possible.
Alleluia!

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall
 

We have been waiting and waiting. And finally, we are getting close – the Advent candles are lit and this morning’s gospel reading starts with the exciting words, “Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way.” But then it really doesn’t tell us anything about the birth of Jesus. This is one of the interesting things about having four gospels – each one has a different perspective. This year we are hearing from Matthew who tells us the story from Joseph’s perspective.

Matthew starts his gospel with a genealogy from Adam to Joseph even though he makes it quite clear that Joseph is not Jesus’ biological father. There is nothing at all about Mary’s experience. And after this passage Matthew jumps immediately to the coming of the three Magi and Herod’s attempts to assassinate the young Jesus.

Nothing here about the Angel Gabriel, the journey to Bethlehem, nothing about the stable, the shepherds and the choir of angels. All that comes from Luke’s gospel.

Instead, Matthew tells us about Joseph’s dilemma when he finds his fiancé is pregnant. In those times an engagement was as binding as the actual marriage so had Joseph gone ahead and ended the relationship Mary would have been considered a divorcee.  He’s a kind guy and intends to do it quietly, and not make a big public fuss shaming Mary for her promiscuity, But then something happens.

Something happens that changes everything.

Joseph experiences a transformation.

Transformation is a mark of the people of God. We are changed by our experience of God and of living in community with God’s people. Sometimes transformation is dramatic, as it was for Joseph, Spirit breaks into our lives and we are never the same again. Often it’s quieter, a gentle slower transforming time. We can be sure that as we live out our baptismal vows, as we continually turn away from all that we recognize as evil and turn to God, as we continue in the apostles teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers, we will be transformed.

A couple of people have given me permission to share experiences of transformation that they have had recently. Eldra is currently in Cottage Hospital but expects to be home soon for a week or so before going back for surgery. Last week she talked about how she has for the first time started to experience herself as deeply accepted by God. She has also felt the direction of the Holy Spirit encouraging her to visit our members and others at Casa de Flores and Bayside Nursing Home. Jill had an experience a few weeks ago when she was sitting quietly and felt the profound presence of God. Since then she has been able to trust God more deeply.

These are experiences of transformation. They are not big and flashy. Unlike Jospeh neither Eldra nor Jill had a vision or saw an angel but like Joseph they were changed. I wonder how you are being transformed?

Let’s take a few minutes to think about that. How are you being transformed? Or how would you like to be transformed? How would you like God to be working in your life?
…
Please find someone else to talk with and let’s reflect on that together – what experiences of transformation have you had? And if you can’t think of any – what would you like to have?
…
The gospels are full of stories of transformation – of people meeting Jesus and having their lives changed. And it’s still happening today. It is usually quieter and subtler but we are still being transformed – transformed into the likeness of Christ to the extent that we allow it. For God never forces herself on us.

Mary could have said no. Joseph could have said no.

Perhaps Mary was not the first young woman that Gabriel approached. Perhaps she was the first to say yes, ‘behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word.’

We don’t know, we only have glimpses of the backstory.

What we do know is that both Mary and Joseph took the risk of saying yes. They said yes to God and as a result, Jesus the Messiah was born; Emmanuel, God with us.

Their yes led to the transformation of the cosmos because God took on flesh – that is God became one with matter – especially human and animal matter – in a way that never happened before. Spirit and flesh united in Jesus. Emmanuel, God with us.

Just as personal transformation can be quiet and subtle, so too planetary transformation may not be noticeable.

At times like these when the values of those in leadership seem diametrically opposed to those of Jesus, it is easy to lose heart and to think that planetary transformation is just a pipe dream, but we can hold on to this one thing, God is with us.

And yet we sing, “O Come, o come Emmanuel” because our longing is for more - we long to experience that God-with-us-ness in a more complete way. We long to be one with God and we long for peace and justice – for the Great Shalom when all beings are treated with respect and dignity – a world where no one goes hungry, no-one is bullied or hated – a world where Christ is all in all.

We have glimpses of Emmanuel but until the end times when Christ  is fully revealed we continue to sing ‘O Come, O Come Emmanuel.” O Come, O Come Lord Jesus.

And in our cry of ‘Come Lord Jesus’ we add our voices to Mary’s and to Joseph’s as we say Yes. Yes to the coming of the reign of God, yes to transformation, yes to living with God here and now.
As Dag Hammarskjöld said, “For all that has been THANKS, for all that will be YES.”

And all God’s people say “Amen”.

the Rev. Dr. Caroline Hall