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Sermon
Synopses - Sept/Oct 2007
Sermons
at Trinity are usually ex tempore, that is done without
notes...Please
enjoy our "Sermon Synopses" or short summaries
of sermons preached at Trinity
Link
to Sermons Synopses for
additional summaries available from this year.
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Sermon for October 28,
2007
Jeremiah 14:1-10, 19-22
Todd began by pointing out
that the reading from the Hebrew scriptures in 13 of the
next 14 weeks will be from the prophetic literature. “Let’s
take some time to look at the prophets, so that we may
be better prepared to hear what they have to say,” said
Todd. Todd
noted that the prophetic literature is alternately beautiful,
poignant and terrible, and he gave some examples of each. E.g.,
Beautiful: “They shall beat their swords into
plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; mation
shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they
learn war any more.” (Is 2:4). Terrible: “See,
the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant
and all evildoers will be stubble; the day that comes shall
burn them up, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave
them neither root nor branch.” (Mal 4:1). “What
are the prophets trying to say? How can we reconcile
that they say such beautiful things alongside such terrible
things?”
Todd said the key to understanding
the prophets was the form of their message: the prophets
note only wrote prose, but much of their writing is in
poetic form. “That
the prophets write poetry tells us something of their message,” said
Todd. Todd wondered if the message of the prophets’ poetry
was that, like words are closely related to each other
in poetry, so, too, are we to be closely related to each
other and with God. Perhaps the message of the prophets’ poetry
was that poetry trains the ear and is a discipline of listening;
think of how many times the prophets talk about listening
to God. Maybe the message of the prophets’ poetry
had to do with pattern and rhyme, upon which so much poetry
relies; our life is to be patterned after God and
rhymed with him. Todd then said, “Let’s
look to the words of a poet herself to hear what she has
to say about why poets write poetry.” Todd
read a quote from Mary Oliver’s Rules for the
Dance: A Handbook for Writing and Reading Metrical Verse (1998):
“No
poet ever wrote a poem to dishonor life, to compromise
high ideals, to scorn religious views, to demean hope or
gratitude, to argue against tenderness, to place rancor
before love, or to praise littleness of soul. Not
one. Not ever. On the contrary, poets have,
in freedom and in prison, in health and in misery, with
listeners and without listeners, spent their lives examining
and glorifying life, meditation, thoughtfulness, devoutness,
and human love. They have done this wildly, serenely,
rhetorically, lyrically, without hope of answer or reward. They
have done this grudgingly, willingly, patiently, and in
the steams of impatience.” – p 104
Prophets
wrote their writings to honor human life, to glorify the
greatness of the souls God gave us, to hold us to the high
ideals God knows us capable of, to argue for tenderness,
and to place rancor before love. It
is important to keep this perspective in mind as we hear
the words of the prophets over the coming weeks!
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Sermon for October 21,
2007
Genesis 32:3-8, 22-30
Today Todd preached about
dysfunction and reconciliation. Todd
pointed out the great dysfunction present in the family
of Isaac, Rebecca, Jacob and Esau: Jacob cheated
his twin out of his birthright and lied to his father – and
his mother Rebecca helped him do it! This led to
Jacob’s leaving home and being estranged for 20 years
from his family. Taking his cues from Genesis, Todd gave
three reasons why we often avoid reconciliation: 1) Notice
how wealthy Jacob was. Prosperity can convince us
that all is well and can lead us to assume that nothing
needs to be different. 2) Jacob correctly intuited
that reconciliation is going to be costly – see how
many animals Jacob sent ahead as a peace offering to Esau! We
often do not want to pay the cost of reconciliation. 3) Jacob
correctly intuited, too, that in reconciliation, things
will often get worse before they get better. Notice
how afraid Jacob was, how he was alone, and how he had
to wrestle through the night, a struggle that resulted
in a wound. We often avoid reconciliation because
we are unwilling to endure the suffering that comes from
things getting worse before they can get better.
We Christians
are followers of one who reconciles, who was willing to
pay the price, who was willing to endure the suffering. Every
Sunday we gather in the Eucharist to remember and celebrate
that Jesus was willing to pay the price, that he was willing
to endure the suffering, and that his struggling resulted
in reconciliation and new life. We are reminded that
Jesus’ struggles
and offering led to resurrection; he can help our sufferings
and offerings to lead to resurrection, too.
Jacob’s
estrangement from Esau ended with open arms of welcome
and tears. We have no guarantee that our
attempts at reconciliation will end as did Jacob’s,
but the witness of Jacob – and the witness of Christ – is
that, if we are faithful in seeking reconciliation and
are willing to give of ourselves and to endure a time of
acute suffering, a blessing and new life await.
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Sermon for Sunday, October
7, 2007
19th Sunday after Pentecost
“I am reminded
of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your
grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am
sure, lives in you.” -- 2 Timothy 1:5
Though the texts from Habakkuk
and Luke 17 are tempting to preach on – it is not
often we hear from Habbakuk – Todd said that
he wanted to preach on 2 Timothy 1 because “it is
the only passage in all of scripture that we find reference
to a grandmother.”
Noticing that Paul writes about faith being alive in subsequent
generations of a family, Todd will not talk so much about
grandmothers, as he will talk about what families hand
down from generation to generation – both good and
bad – and how Jesus’ redemptive work pertains
to families.
Todd noticed that families
pass on from generation to generation good things – talents
and gifts, hobbies, gregarious natures, nice smiles – and
bad things – alcoholism, authoritarian parenting,
depression, emotional “cut off.” These
traits run through our families like DNA, perhaps skipping
a generation, but popping up again and again in our family
trees.
We Christians have hope to
be released from passing the evil done to us onto others,
Todd said. In Jesus we have what theologians call
a “perfect victim,” one against whom evil was
done but who did not pass that evil along to anybody else. As
followers of the perfect victim, we can make Jesus’ saving
acts our own, we have the chance of sharing in his life
so that we, too, need not pass along to others the evil
done to us.
How do we unite ourselves
to the life of Christ, the saving victim? The Church
makes provision for us to unite ourselves to Jesus’ death
in the sacrament of Baptism. For centuries theologians – taking
their cues from Paul – speak of baptism as a death,
a sharing in Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection. Jesus
is like a lightning rod for evil, the cross being a ground
for all the evil “charge” of sin. As
we join ourselves to Christ’s suffering, death and
resurrection, we, too, can take advantage of the ground
of the cross, so that we need not pass the evil done to
us along to others. And the extent to which we are
able to realize and live into our Baptism – to ground
our life in the cross – is the extent to which we
are able to pass along the evil done to us to nobody else
but Christ.
For most of us, our baptism
was years ago. Even if we were baptized as an adult,
we probably don’t remember our baptism very well. The
Church makes provision for us to renew our sharing in Jesus’ suffering,
death and resurrection every week in the Eucharist. In
the Eucharist we the baptized appropriate to ourselves
again the story of Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection. We
take this story into ourselves, internalize it – digest
it – and then we take it out into the world to live
renewed lives of resurrection.
Todd said that he is humbled
weekly – even daily – by the realization of
what he is passing on to those closest to him in his family. He
takes great hope in the Christian message, that there is
the possibility of not passing on evil done to him onto
others closest to him. He takes great hope, too,
in the example of Lois, Eunice and Timothy, that, in spite
of whatever else he might pass on to the next generation,
he can hand on the faith, too.
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Sermon for Sunday, September
30, 2007
18th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 16:19-31
Todd began by telling how
he had sometimes heard couples who had been married for
50 or more years say that, despite having lived with their
spouse for so long and knowing them so well, their spouse
would occasionally do or say things that completely surprised
them. “I thought I knew him,” the wife
might say. “But he still does things that make
me realize that I don’t know him as well as I thought
I did.”
Being in relationship with the Scriptures can be like being
in a relationship with a long-time spouse or friend whom
one knows very well. We spend more and more time
with her and we love her dearly, but, on occasion, she
says or does something that completely takes us by surprise. “I
thought I knew her,” we might say to ourselves. “But
she still takes me by surprise sometimes.”
Todd said that he had been
hearing stories from Luke – including this morning’s
story of Lazarus and the rich man – for nearly 40
years. He thought he knew Luke. He loves Luke: the
infancy narratives, Mary’s singing the Magnificat,
the angels appearing to the shepherds, the parable of the
Good Samaritan, the parable of the Prodigal Son. But
in hearing the story of Lazarus and the rich man that we
heard today, Todd says he had an experience of being taken
by surprise. “I thought I knew Luke,” he
said. “But he still takes me by surprise sometimes.”
Todd said he is surprised
that, according to what we are told in the story, the rich
man ends up in Hades for no other reason than he is rich. Lazarus,
conversely, ends up in heaven for no other reason than
that he was poor. “Surely, there must be more
to the story that we are not told, some merit or lack thereof
that leads each of them to their fate.” Todd
said he looked elsewhere in Luke to find some other passages
that might suggest a fuller picture, but came up only with
passages that further confirmed what we read here in chapter
16 – our final destination in the hereafter seems
based on our wealth or poverty in this world. See
the Magnificat, Luke 1: “He has cast down the
might from their thrones” for no other reason than
that they are mighty. He has “lifted up the
lowly” for no other reason than that they are lowly. See
Luke’s “Sermon on the Plain,” chapter
6. Whereas Matthew spiritualizes the Beatitudes – “Blessed
are the poor in spirit,” and “Blessed are those
who hunger and thirst after righteousness” – Luke
says merely “Blessed are the poor,” and “Blessed
are you who are hungry now.” Luke adds insult
to injury by adding a series of “woes” to his
Beatitudes: “Woe to you who are rich now,
for you have received your consolation,” and “Woe
to you who are full now, for you will be hungry.”
“I thought I knew
Luke,” Todd said.
What are we to do, especially
since we are middle-class North Americans whom most of
the rest of the world regards as rich? Todd said
that he trusted that God was a loving God, and the only
thing he knew to do was to continue in relationship with
God. The best way to continue that relationship is
to continue hearing and reading the scriptures. “For
us for now, the scriptures are the face of God,” said
Todd, quoting Augustine. Todd said that it might
help to keep in mind that the scriptures are not so much
something to be “understood” and grasped intellectually,
as they are something to be entered into relationship with. “We
are told that we are to ‘read, mark, learn, and inwardly
digest’ the scriptures,” said Todd. “We
are called to be in relationship with them.” “Understanding” them
is not as critically important. We will not always
understand the scriptures – just as we will not always
understand others whom we love and are in relationship
with. But the important thing is to keep on in the
relationship, said Todd. Keep gathering weekly to
hear the scriptures read and preached upon, keep taking
time out during the week to read and pray with them on
our own.
The scriptures were written
for us, and we were created for God. There is no
relationship more rewarding than coming to know God in
the scriptures among the community of fellow Christians. If
we continue faithful in our relationship with the scriptures – even
if we are often surprised by them, even if we don’t
understand them – we will eventually discover the
pearl of great price, that treasure hidden in the field.
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