Sermon for Sunday, September 26, 2010
18th Sunday After Pentecost
I Timothy 6:6-19

But as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life, to which you were called and for which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. – I Timothy 6:11-12

Story of pastor saying “goodbye” to his father, not knowing if he’ll ever see him again on this earth.  “It’s good to be completely caught up with my Father, to have said everything I wanted to have said, to have made my thank-you’s, to be totally caught up and ready for one of us to go.”  ß here is an example of the reconciled life!

Context of Paul’s first letter to Timothy: doesn’t know if he’ll ever see Timothy again, and wants to be sure that he has said everything and passed the mantle.  Paul is getting himself ready to go.

We make many goodbyes throughout our life, some as simple as “see you tomorrow,” others as final as being parted by death.  How do we make our goodbyes?  Are we ready to make our goodbyes, when the time comes (at any moment)?  Is there a particularly Christian way to say “goodbye?”

Many are likely to say that it is good to be in a state of reconciliation with those around us, if we would be ready to say “goodbye” at any time.  If there is a benefit to being a Christian, it’s that we have help in being reconciled to those around us.  Because of Jesus, who brought near those who were once far off, who broke down the dividing wall between us, who made peace with the blood of his cross, we have the help to live in a state of reconciliation – of living in unity with others and God.  In a sense, we are always making our “goodbyes,” from the minute we said hello, as we strive to live in reconciliation with those around us.

Nonetheless, reconciliation is hard work.  To reach out and make that contact, to admit that we might be in the wrong, to confront a brother or sister on how they have wronged us (which is really opening ourselves to admitting our having wronged them) – this can only be done with God’s help, with grace.

At graveside, if there is opportunity to speak, I will often remark on how the death of a loved-one is an opportunity for us to reflect on our own lives, our priorities, and how we wish to live the years allotted to us.  I also say that death is a time when all bets are off, to be reunited with those from whom we may be estranged.  It is a time for reconciliation.

Why wait?  What is preventing us from living reconciled lives today?  Our Lord can help us.  Why not ask him?

 

Homily for Boston AGO Installation of Officers
September 19, 2010
Jeremiah 31:10-14
Romans 12:1-21

Great texts for tonight:

• Jeremiah calls for singing praise in thanksgiving for God’s redemption of Israel:

“For the Lord has ransomed Jacob and has redeemed him from hands too strong for him.  They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion, and they shall be radiant over the goodness of the Lord.”

• In Romans Paul gives wonderful advice for any group of people with a purpose, be it Christian or not, be it a church or not: 

“Let love be genuine.  Hate what is evil, hold fast to that which is good.  Love one anther with brotherly affection…  Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly.… live in harmony with one another… Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all.”

• But today I want to focus on a text that comes to us from the St. Augustine in the early 5th century.  Augustine was a man of a few thousand words who had something to say about everything, including music; in what I am about to read, music as it is connected to joy.  The following comes from a sermon of Augustine’s on Psalm 33:3:  “Sing for him a new song; sound a fanfare with all your skill upon the trumpet.”

Each of us tries to discover how best to sing to God.  We must sing to God, but we must sing well.  God does not want his ears assaulted by our discordant voices.  So sing well, dear ones, sing well!

If you were asked: “Sing to please this musician,” you would not dare to do so without first having had some music lessons, because you would not want to offend such an expert in the art.  An undiscerning listener does not notice the faults that an accomplished musician would point out to you.  Who, then, will offer to sing well for God, the great artist whose discrimination is faultless, whose attention notices the minutest detail, whose ear nothing escapes?  When will you be able to offer him a perfect performance so that you will in no way displease such a supremely discerning listener? 

But see how God himself provides you with a way of singing.  You do not have to search for words, as if you had to find the right lyric to please God.  Sing to him rather simply ‘with songs of joy.’  This is singing well to God, just singing with songs of joy!

And how is this accomplished?  You must first understand that words cannot express the things that are sung by the heart.  Take the case of people singing while harvesting in the fields or in the vineyards or when any other strenuous work is in progress.  Although they begin by giving expression tot heir happiness in words, yet quite quickly there is a change.  It is as if they are so happy that words can no longer express what they feel, and they discard the restriction of language.  They burst out into a simple shout of joy, of jubilation.  Such a cry of joy is a sound signifying that the heart is bringing to birth what it cannot utter in words.

Now, who is more worthy of such a cry of jubilation than God himself, whom all the words in the world can never describe?  If words will not serve, and yet you must not remain silent, what else can you do but cry out for joy?  Your heart must rejoice in a song beyond words, soaring into an ocean of gladness, unrestrained by the fetters of language.  So, “sing to God with songs of joy.”

You who are organists, you who are choir directors, you who are singers, you are ministers of joy.  You are those who help others sing so that they can give expression to joy.

• “Me?!  A minister of joy?”  How can I possibly be a minister of joy?  Do you know what I have to deal with?  How can I possibly be a minister joy given the disrepair of my instrument, the stinginess of the church board for the music budget, the inadequate choral library I’ve inherited, the quarreling sopranos, the undependable tenors (or “tenor,” singular), never-ending round of choosing preludes and postludes, my boss..  etc.  How can I be a minister of joy?

• It is easy to lose sight of our important ministry of joy.  Everything in our daily round conspires against us being ministers of joy.  Saboteurs are everywhere!   Yet it is so important that we make the effort to see ourselves as ministers of joy.  For we live in a world that is in desperate need of joy; look at all the despair in this world.  Here is where we organists can make a difference, to help others give expression to joy, to “sing to God with songs of joy.”

If we are to see ourselves as ministers of joy, it takes much training.  Now, I’m not talking about training in terms of Harold Gleason, or hours spent on the organ bench, or continuing education, or researching new choral music – though these are all important, to be sure!  Our main training as ministers of joy comes from what St. Paul talks about in tonight’s lesson from Romans:  “Let love be genuine.  Hate what is evil; hold fast to that which is good.  Outdo one another in showing honor.  Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the lord.  Rejoice in hop, be patient in suffering, be constant in prayer.  Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.” It matters that we train ourselves in doing these things because as ministers, we are leaders of our congregation.  Those whom we lead will do as we do, they will follow where we go.  As we persevere in all these things of which St. Paul speaks, so, too, will those in our parishes be able to “sing to God with songs of joy.”  They will be able to so sing, not only in their music, but in their lives.  And this, to lead great lives and sing well to God, that most discriminating of musicians, who attention notices the minutest detail, whose ear nothing escapes, is this not why we are here on this earth?

It is my prayer for you, the organists of the Boston chapter of the AGO, for all the members and the officers we will install this evening, that the Lord uphold you in your important ministry of helping people give expression to joy.  That those whom you serve may, with your help, “show forth [His] praise, not only with [their] lips, but in [their] lives, and give [themselves] up to His service… in holiness and righteousness all [their] days.”  Amen.

Sermon for Sunday, September 19, 2010
Psalm 79:1-9

Not going to preach on today’s gospel, but since it is so unsettling a gospel, I want to at least say something. 

• Recall sermon from two weeks ago, “What to do with a difficult text?”  à  Wine maker from Bordeaux, “I do not make demands of the wine, it demands of me.” 
• Only hope for “getting” this text is to not make demands of it – that it be readily understandable, that God be seen as fair or benevolent, that our values and expectations be confirmed, etc. – but to let it make demands of us: to read it, puzzle with it, and most importantly, pray with it. 
• In regards to this text, I invite you to take the order of service home with you and to ponder this text.  Work on it and let it work on you.  Ask questions of it and let it ask questions of you.  Bring the Lord into the conversation:  “What does this text mean for us?”

 
Text I am going to focus on this morning is the Psalm: 

“O God, the heathen have come into your inheritance; they have profaned your holy temple; they have made Jerusalem a heap of rubble…Remember not our past sins; let your compassion be swift to meet us…  Help us, O God our Savior… deliver us and forgive us our sins, for your Name’s sake.”

This Psalm is one of many Psalms that comes to us from the exile, the period of time in the 6th century BC when Jerusalem and the Temple had been destroyed by the Assyrians, and the remnant of the Hebrew population taken into captivity in Babylon.  And from there the Israelites mourned the loss of their land, their temple and their way of life.  And they assume, as we can see in this Psalm, that the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple is a result of their sins and unfaithfulness.

            Remember not our past sins; let your compassion be swift to meet us… 

What I’m going to preach on this morning is the connection that this morning’s Psalm makes between our sin and our suffering, suggesting that our suffering is a result of our sin.

• Now if you’re like me, when I hear a preacher say he or she is going to talk about sin, I have a reaction: I recoil, and I want to get out of there.
• After nearly 40 years of having this reaction, I have learned that my reaction is not so much to talk about sin and having to face my own sinfulness, my reaction is to forgiveness.
• I know I am a sinful being!  To quote from another psalm, 51, “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.”  And you know I am a sinful being.  And I know that you are sinful, and I know that you know that you are sinful.  We all are painfully aware of our sins.
• It is forgiveness that we have trouble with.
• We’ll come back to that in a moment. 

As was the case last week in regards to those difficult texts in scripture in which God is seen to be angry, vengeful, and violent, there are only less-than-satisfactory answers here.  But we can at least have an informed less-than-satisfactory answer.

To try to make sense of this question, “Is my suffering a result of my sin?” I am going to give you three things, all in the context of one other thing. 

• The three things are two stories and one image. The context is the context of exile, the same context as for today’s Psalm.
• Exile.  We know what exile is.  We recognize it, because all of us are to some degree or another in exile.  Whether we are literally in exile – we know that our home is not here in Newton, we just happen to live here – or whether because of life circumstances we are experiencing or have experienced a sense of not being “at home” – issues in our relationships, uncertainty about work, facing our own mortality or the mortality of those close to us – we know what exile is.  This is our context.
• Three things: first two stories
• Story #1.  Priest in CA.  “Am I suffering because of my sin?”  “No.  God doesn’t work that way.”
• Story #2.  Seminary professor, noting that for centuries Christians believed that our brokenness in this world results from our sin, “I am not ready to dismiss the sickness – sinfulness connection.  To take God out of the picture diminishes our ability to find meaning in suffering.”
• In mysterious way, both are right.  “No.  God doesn’t work this way.”  And “Yes,  to disconnect sin from suffering hinders our ability to make sense out of suffering.”
• Where does that leave us?  What are we to do?
• Image.  An image that comes to us from Gregory of Nyssa (4th century, present-day Turkey), an image that I’ve used before and will use again, that might help us make the connection human sinfulness to our sense of exile.

Image from Nyssa’s Hexaemeron:  Our first memory, from when we first opened our eyes, is of ourselves being held in God’s arms, with the face of God inches away from ours, having just breathed into us.  We humans spend the whole of our trying to get back to our first memory. 

• Beautiful image!  Rather than tamper with it, I will let you ponder it and unpack it, to see what it might tell you of exile, our suffering and sin.

 

Regardless of how you might answer the question, “Is my suffering related to my sins?” I want to know “What can I do?” “How can I work to end my exile and once again find home?”

• Here we come back to the issue of forgiveness.  What can we do, to come home?  We can face forgiveness.
• Forgiveness, we Christians say, is to be found in Jesus Christ.  It was he who revealed to us again the face of God, who for a fleeting 30 years gave us the tantalizing glimpse that we have been waiting for.
• The catch is, can we let him into our lives?  Even though he is what we want and can take us to what we want, yet our souls draw back.  We are afraid of forgiveness.  We don’t want to open the door of our hearts to such infinite love, such infinite mercy, because we know it will transform our lives.
• But our only hope to end our exile is to open the door and let him in.
• And he’s going to keep knocking.  He’s not going anywhere.

Leave you with part of a poem and a question.  The poem is one that I’ve read to you before, from Rainer Maria Rilke, that speaks to Jesus standing outside and knocking.  Rilke uses the image of Christ as a besieging army and us as a walled city.

You many unassaulted cities:
Have you never yearned for the enemy?
Yearned that he might besiege you
For long irresolute years, until

In hopelessness and hunger you receive him?
He extends like the land beyond your walls,
And he knows he can hold out longer.

Look from your balconies:
There he camps: he does not tire
Or diminish in size or strength.
He sends no messengers to threaten
Or to promise or persuade.

He who will overcome you
Is working in silence.

So, is our suffering the result of our sin?  It is important for our formation as Christians to wrestle with this question.  I don’t know the answer.  But I think that, if we are going to ask this question, “Is my suffering the result of my sin?” we also need to place alongside it another question: “Are we able to open the door to our hearts to accept Christ and the forgiveness he offers?” Here is our path to return home.

Sermon for Wednesday, September 15, 2010
I Corinthians 12:31-13:13
“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” – I Cor 13:4-7

[I Corinthians 13 is not about weddings, but community!]

• “Orange juice isn’t just for breakfast anymore.” 
• My campaign:  “I Corinthians 13 is not just for weddings anymore!”  Can “drink” this scripture anytime, for I Corinthians 13 is not about weddings but about Christian community

What does it have to tell us about Christian community?

• Challenging things about how we Christians are called to be with each other, how we are called to love each other:
• Listen again:

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

• Beautiful words!  Challenging words! But who can do these? 
• No one on our own.  Only by God’s grace can we do these things.

Do you think we at Trinity can aspire to this high standard?  I would sure like to try – such a community would be a thrilling place to be. 

• Will you take this passage home and pray with it? 
• And will you take me aside and call me out when I am not being patient, or when I may be envious, arrogant or insist on my own way? 
• I know this is hard to do, but it would be for the good of the community as a whole, if you did.
• Here’s a tool to help, a good line to say, “Remember when you preached that sermon about I Corinthians 13 and asked if one of us would call you out when you were rude, or irritable, or resentful?  Well, I’m calling you out on it!”
• Would you like me to do the same for you?  I pray that we each may have the courage to do so. 

Prayer (from EP)
O God, you manifest in your servants the signs of your presence:  Send forth upon us the Spirit of love, that in companionship with one another, your abounding grace may increase among us; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Sermon for Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Holy Cross Day

Intro
Had Christians early on contracted a marketing firm to publicize the faith, I have a hunch that the firm’s consultants would have strongly recommended that they find a logo other than the cross.

• Bread.  Wine.  Even fish has potential. 
• Better than a cross!
• Yet the cross has captured our imaginations.  As unseemly a logo as it may be, it has entered into our psyche, and we cannot rid ourselves of it. 
• Indeed, an indication of how humans have for centuries tried to make sense of this unlikely logo are the many ritual and artistic endeavors that the cross has spawned and continues to spawn:  the liturgies of Holy Week, the Passion Plays, some of the great poems of the English language – all the way from “The Dream of the Rood” in early Saxon poetry, through George Herbert and up to R.S. Thomas’ “The Coming” in the late 20th century.

Overview
Tonight, we’re going to talk about the formation of our imaginations in the cross, and we are going to do so by way of some fairly heavy lifting in regards to theology of the atonement.  It is important to grasp something of atonement, for it bears on our ability to carry out our role in the Church’s mission. “If we wish to be useful Christians, we must be informed Christians.”  Let’s get down to work…

[Image of Cross trains our imagination]
What the cross does as our “logo” is send the message that our mission as Christians is something that, if we are to do it well, requires a thorough formation of our imaginations.

• Background, by way of reminder:  Our mission as the Church is to restore all people to unity with God and each other through Christ. BCP, p 855(?)
• We accomplish this mission through our “primary task” of continually renewing and deepening our baptismal identity, and we were baptized into Jesus’ death.
• The more we Christians can train our imaginations and center our lives around Jesus’ death and resurrection – the more we can walk in the way of the cross – the better equipped we will be to carry out our mission “To restore all people to unity with God and each other through Christ.”
• All of the Christian faith – our scriptures, our sacraments, and – when we are at our best – our polity and church structure, helps form our imaginations around the cross, Jesus’ death and resurrection, so that we can better celebrate and live out the paschal mystery.

How does this work?
Why does the training of our imaginations in regards to the cross and our ever deepening understanding and appropriation of Jesus’ death and resurrection help us live out our mission as Christians? (Here is where we get into some heavier lifting in regards to atonement.) 

• Several different approaches in response to this question:
• Paul – “If it happened to one person, then the potential exists for it to happen to everybody.”  By sharing in his death, we can also share in his resurrection.  The more who share in Jesus’ death and resurrection, the more leaven there will be in the lump to eventually transform the whole world.
• John – our sharing in his sacrifice fits us to become as priests continually making the sacrifice of atonement on behalf of the whole world.  We are all priests on behalf of the world, working, praying, giving in order to make all holy.
• Matthew – if we share in his death, we can share in Jesus’ kingship and be part of spreading his dominion on earth.  Jesus is one who forms and teaches and has made us a new people, and the world has hope for salvation insofar as we go out and make disciples and teach them Jesus’ commandments.
• These are broad brush strokes, I know.  But it helps to root our discussion in Biblical understandings of the cross and atonement.

• But tonight, let’s look to a contemporary voice who expresses walking in the way of the cross and its importance for restoring unity in another way.  Look to Rene Girard, Standford literary critic turned anthropologist.
• In his studies Girard found that countless cultures and religions rest on some primal and then periodically re-enacted sacrifice.
• When a society's own divisions became too much to bear, a scapegoat is served up and sacrificed.
• The prime candidates for the position are the weak and marginal, or someone who is made vulnerable by their very prominence.
• We’ve all seen this scapegoating:  Roma in Europe, immigrants in our own country, homosexuals in regards to marriage, and so forth.
• In the cross, Christianity holds up the hope for another way
• Girard noticed that the story of Jesus on the cross was different.
• What other stories hid, this one revealed.
• What other stories told from the point of view of power, this one tells from the point of view of the victim.
• Where others stories protect people from knowledge of their complicity, this one makes the complicity of everyone plain and evident.

• Jesus was the “perfect victim” who did not pass on to others the violence done to himself, who by virtue of his cross enabled joy to come to the whole world.

Here is why Christians are called to train our imaginations!

• If we can imagine Jesus’ death on the cross and bring that imagination to bear, then we are much better equipped to bring the weight of sin to bear – all the evil done to us – not on others, but where it can do no harm – on the perfect victim on the cross. 
• If we can not only imagine placing all our hurt and pain upon the crucified Christ, but in reality place all our emptiness and hurt upon no other, then we can truly become agents of reconciliation in this world, helping to carry out the Church’s mission to “restore all people to unity with God and each other through Christ.”
• Can you imagine, what this world might be like if more and more of us could keep from passing the violence done to us on to others?  Imagine the peace, the joy that could result if we could but see the “plentiful redemption in the blood that has been shed,” and the corresponding “joy for all the members
  in the sorrows of the Head.”
• Incidentally, this is why it is so important for us, the baptized, to worship faithfully week by week; in the Eucharist, not only is our baptism into Jesus’ death and resurrection renewed, but we re-enact our sacrifice of Him, so that we need not sacrifice others.

Like to close with one of those extraordinary poems that imagines the cross.  In this poem, 20th century English poet R.S. Thomas picks up Girard’s “lightning rod” image of Christ, the one who can take and ground the world’s pain.  I hope that it will help further form our imaginations in the cross, that we might be ever more faithful in carrying out our mission to restore all people to unity with God and each other through Christ. 

The Coming
And God held in his hand
A small globe.  Look he said.
The son looked.  Far off,
As through water, he saw
A scorched land of fierce
Colour.  The light burned
There; crusted buildings
Cast their shadows: a bright
Serpent, A river
Uncoiled itself, radiant
With slime.
                On a bare
Hill a bare tree saddened
The sky.  many People
Held out their thin arms
To it, as though waiting
For a vanished April
To return to its crossed
Boughs.  The son watched
Them.  Let me go there, he said.

Sermon for Sunday, September 12, 2010
Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28

I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void…
I looked on the mountains, and lo, they were quaking…
I looked, and lo, the fruitful land was a desert,
and all its cities were laid in ruins
before the LORD, before his fierce anger.
For thus says the LORD: The whole land shall be a desolation…
I have spoken, I have purposed;
I have not relented nor will I turn back.

Today:  What to make of passages that speak of God’s anger and God’s doing violence?

• Bible is full of these passages:  Not only today’s passage from Jeremiah
• Numbers:  God striking down the Israelites in the wilderness with plagues and fires, because of their “murmuring” and rebelling against Moses
• Joshua and Judges, where God commands the Israelites to completely destroy the inhabitants of the towns and cities in Canaan, not leaving a single person alive.
• Plethora of prophet passages similar to what we heard today, in which God will punish the people for their unfaithfulness
• What do we make of these passages?

Three things:

• There are only less-than-satisfactory answers
• We can at least have an informed less-than-satisfactory answer
• Here is an opportunity for more study and prayer

1. There are only less-than-satisfactory answers

• [Some less-than-satisfactory answers:]
• OT doesn’t apply to Christians.  “The Old Testament is superceded by the New Testament.  We don’t really need to pay such close attention to the Hebrew scriptures.”  à  Is it?  Aren’t the two testaments all of a piece?  The New Testament fulfills the Old, but the Old still reveals to us the nature of God.  It is part of our Christian canon.
• Outdated way of understanding naturaldisasters. “God’s wrath was how people then made sense of natural disaster or invasion.”  We know that such things “just happen,” and, though unfortunate, we don’t assume they were caused by God.  à Assumes that we in our day are more “advanced” than they in theirs.  “We know better.”  Or do we?  We might be more advanced technologically, but how can we be so sure with things of the Spirit? 
• Two sides of the same coin.  What kind of love would God have if God did not also have justice?  And what kind of justice would it be without love?  Rowan Williams’ explanation.  à  He’s got a point; but it still doesn’t adequately address why God’s justice is meted out in such a violent manner.  Couldn’t an all-powerful God find other ways to bring his people back to him?
• Passages have troubled Christians at least since the second century when a man named Marcion tried to excise the whole of the Old Testament and many parts of the New, to present a Christian Bible with a unified picture of a loving God.  Spawned name for this heresy, “Marcionism.” 
• Perhaps it’s appropriate – indeed, helpful – to be troubled by matters of faith:  Augustine, noting that we tend not to think too highly of things that we acquire / understand easily, said that the challenges of scripture keep us from having too low an opinion of them; indeed, opens the door for us to love them.

2.  We can at least have an informed less-than-satisfactory answer

• Historical Context:  Can always look at historical context of a passage; here, the Assyrian invasion.  Yes, Jeremiah did interpret the invasion as a result of unfaithfulness, and the Assyrians are an instrument of God’s “cleaning house.”
• Theology:  Helpful to look to theologians such as Rowan Williams, for example, to ponder how God’s justice is complemented by his love, and vice versa.
• Perhaps most helpful to look to other scriptures:  It is the scriptures that tell us of God’s wrath and justice; let them stand up and speak for themselves!
• Genesis and creation:  God has known us from the beginning; knows what we are capable of à union with him.  Will not settle for less.  Keeps urging us on.
• Genesis chapter 12:  God’s covenant with Abraham; every part of scripture is God’s doing what God needs to do to fulfill his promise to Abraham to make his name great, and to bless all nations through him.  à Whatever God is doing, it is in order to make good on God’s promise to Abraham.  Here, note how God leaves a remnant:  “For thus says the LORD: The whole land shall be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end.”
• Images:  Consider in context of great images from scriptures:  1)  Israel standing at Sinai.  Drawn to God who gives words that bring life to a community; at same time cannot draw near to the mountain or they will die.  2)  Jesus on Sermon on the Mount:   beautiful words!  Yet challenging:  bear fruit or be cast into the fire; build your house on a rock or be washed away by the flood; pluck out your eye / cut off your hand if you need to, to enter the kingdom of heaven.
• Jesus in gospels: Jesus has a prophetic role (among other roles), who calls us again and again to return, who sets forth God’s mercy and presents us with a choice. à Is the consequence of our choice any less important than it was for the Hebrews of the Old Testament?  Recall Matt 25:  “Depart from me
• All these passages – and no doubt many more – can inform our reading of these “violent” passages.
• The scriptures teach us about God:  “Maybe God is more complex than I originally thought.”  What can I learn about God from these passages?
• The scriptures teach us about ourselves.  Might be helpful to ask, “Why do I have the reaction I do to these passages?”
• The scriptures call us to do something in response. Might be helpful to consider, “What does this passage ask of me and my community?”

These questions lead us to the final step:  3)  Read and pray

• Bothered by a particular passage?  Don’t stop; keep reading it!  Read the passage again and again.  Read the passages immediately around it.  Read other passages in other places in the scriptures (key to understanding one book may be found in a completely different book).  Read the scriptures all the way through to get the gist and sweep of them (Whole bible Experience).
• Invite the Lord into your conversation.  “Lord, this passage is really disturbing.  Is God really that violent / vengeful / angry?”  Tell God what you are afraid of.  Tell God what you desire.  (Ask God what you are afraid of.  Ask Him to show you what you desire.)
• Most important step.  We cannot always comprehend scriptures on our own.  Need God’s help.  With prayer and perseverance, can begin to come to terms with violent images of God in the scriptures.

Conclusion

• Scripture is full of violent / vengeful / angry images of God.  Difficult and challenging!
• Not inappropriate.  If Augustine is right, this challenge can be an open door to come to love scriptures; makes us work for it.
• Keep in mind:
• There is no fully satisfying answer – at least I have never seen one!
• But we can at least have an informed less-than-satisfying answer.
• Read it!
• Study it
• Ready other passages, immediately around it or elsewhere, in light of the passage
• Pray
• As we are faithful in our reading, study and prayer, I have a hunch that God has wonderful things in store for us, that he will show us himself in new and startling ways, that we will learn who the extraordinary people God has created us to be, and that we will learn of the strange yet beautiful, demanding yet wonderful lives we Christians are called to lead.

Sermon for Sunday, September 5, 2010
The Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 14:25-33
And other difficult passages of scripture

Intro:  Difficult scriptures, via wine

1. Great scriptures this morning: 
2. Wonderful passage from Jeremiah about Jeremiah’s visit to the potter’s house “Can I not do to you, O Israel, as this potter has done?” and re-fashion you?
3. Philemon – shortest of all Paul’s letters, the only book of the Bible that appears in our lectionary in its entirety, appears today – as rare as Haley’s comet

1. But I want to focus on this morning’s Gospel that we just heard, for in it Jesus says some really difficult things:
2. “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”
3. And not only that, but, “Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.”
4. And, while he’s on a roll, Jesus adds, “So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions."

Bible is full of difficult sayings

1. What are we to make of these really difficult sayings?
2. Almost every Sunday, there is something in the scriptures that is hard to hear; and those who have done The Whole Bible Experience know that great swaths of scripture are really hard to take.
3. Part of being a Christian is to have some ways in our repertoire as to how to approach these scriptures
4. This morning, I am going to offer an approach to difficult scriptures – how we can hear and begin to understand them and appropriate them that I hope will come in handy in the weeks, months and years to come.
5. Going to do so with the help of wine – No, not under the influence of it! but being inspired by writings about it.
6. Article from NY Times two Wednesdays ago: 
7. So many vignerons approach their grapes with a definite kind of wine in mind, and they use whatever technology they can to make the wine they want.  They make demands of the wine.
8. Jean-Francois Fillastre of Bordeaux uses a different approach: “I don’t demand of the wine; it demands of me.”
9. [Does not try to manipulate the wine into something that might be more palatable to sell to more people; rather, lets the wine have an integrity, an excellence, of its own, to which he must “rise up” and conform to its demands.

One possible way to have in our repertoire to approach difficult scriptures:  “I don’t demand of the scriptures, it demands of me.”

1. So often we make demands on the sriptures
2. That the scripture be consistent with each other
3. That they speak to the issues we want them to speak to (e.g., human             sexuality)  
4. That God is who we expect God to be (fair, benevolent)
5. Its values are our values (tolerance and inclusion)
6. Like many vignerons in France do to wine, we do our best to achieve the scriptures we desire or the God we want
7. But the scriptures come into their own – and God can be most fully God and our faith be most powerful for transforming our lives –when we don’t demand of them, but we let them demand of us.

Scriptures make demands of us in any number of ways:

1. Sometimes, the scriptures demands are quite direct:
2. “Give to all who beg from you”
3. “Forgive, not seven times, but seventy times seven”
4. Most often, the scripture demands of us in a more oblique way.
5. What does Jesus mean when he says ““Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple?”
6. Or, “Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.”

1. These sayings are like a Zen koans;  we must wrestle with them, and they provoke a new understanding within us.  Or like “technical change vs adaptive change,” described by Harvard’s Ron Heifetz:  With a technical change, we know a solution and just have to work harder to get it.  But with adaptive change, there is no apparent solution, and we pushed to come to a new place in our hearts and minds.
2. If we can begin to set aside our demands for the scriptures – that they make “sense,” that they speak to us and our issues, that they are consistent, that they conform to our expectations – and let them stand on their own integrity…
3. …and be ready to let them make demands on us – demands of our time (that we read them!), our persistence, our prayer, our vulnerability to learn something new, to be something new…
4. ….then we shall indeed have a very fine “vintage,”a wine that will fittingly accompany this “meal” of our lives –  indeed, make the meal – a wine that can be savored and shared and that we shall always be delighted to open, in which we shall always find something new.

1. Not always easy to drink this “cup” – much easier in the short term to make demands of the scriptures; it’s safer that way…

1. But as we pray and persevere in letting the scriptures make demands of us -- engaging the scriptures, giving them time, persevering with them, being vulnerable to them – then God can more easily be God, and we can more easily be the people God created us to be. – And when we know that only God is God, that is a joy-filled, life-giving way to live!  

Conclusion

• In regards to difficult passages, “Do not demand of the scriptures, let the scriptures demand of you.”
• …and begin to savor the unusual, wonderful, demanding, enticing world of God.

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