Sermon, "Thankful People: Gifted and Talented," Matthew 25:14-30

Sermon 10/30/16

Matthew 25:14-30

Thankful People: Gifted and Talented

            Two weeks from today, we’ll celebrate Consecration Sunday, and have a Celebration Dinner afterwards, as we gave thanks for all that God has given us, as we offer a commitment of giving for the year ahead out of the abundance which God has given us. You’ve heard Lauren last Sunday, and today Vicky and Steve talk about giving, and thinking about how we give, not because of what the church needs, but because of what our generous God inspires in us. We give as an act of faith, an act of thanksgiving, as a spiritual discipline. For the next few weeks, we’ll be thinking together not so much about budgets and spending plans, as we’ll be thinking together about our generous God, about what God is up to here in Gouverneur and how we can be part of that, and about how we can grow spiritually as we cultivate thankful hearts and lives.

Our gospel lesson today is a parable, one of the stories Jesus uses to talk to us about what the kingdom of God is like, what it’s like when we experience God’s way, God’s reign, on earth. This one we know as the Parable of the Talents. It appears late in Matthew’s gospel, in the midst of several other parables, some of the last of Jesus’ teachings before his arrest and trial and crucifixion. A man going on a journey calls his slaves to him and divides among them care of his property. One slave receives one talent, one two, and one five, each according to their ability. Talents were the largest unit of money, and each one was worth a significant amount. It’s hard to calculate in terms of our money today, but even conservative estimates suggest that an individual talent was worth at least a few thousand dollars. (1) Even the slave who receives the one talent is being entrusted with a significant amount of responsibility.

The slaves who receive two and five talents immediately take them, trade with them, and double their money to present to their master when he returns home. But the slave who receives just one talent digs a hole and hides the money. When the master returns, he praises the faithful slaves for their stewardship of his talents, and says, “Well done, good and trustworthy slave. You have been trustworthy in a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master.” But the third slave returns the single talent to his master, explaining that he thinks his Master is harsh, taking what is not rightfully his. So the master rebukes the slave, calling him wicked and lazy. He tells him that at the least he ought to have put the talent in the bank so it could earn some interest. He banishes the slave, and takes the one talent from him and gives it to the slave who already now had ten talents. And so, Jesus concludes with a strange sentiment: “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what we have will be taken away.”

There’s a couple of troubling things in this parable. We typically hear these parables and think of the master figure as God. But the one slave describes him as harsh, taking what doesn’t belong to him. Does this sound like God? And then there’s that concluding sentence that’s so hard to process at first. “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what we have will be taken away.” I can understand God wanting us to use what we’ve been given – but taking away from those who have nothing? Giving to those who already have so much? Even if we’re talking about more than just money here, isn’t that just a spiritual version of the poor getting poorer and the rich getting richer? Will God take anything from those who already have nothing? So what sense can we make of this parable, and what does it tell us about being generous, thankful people? I think the parable helps us think about how we see God, how we see ourselves and what we have, and how we respond because of what we see.

Is the master in the parable meant to be God? We know what the third slave says about the master: “Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; so I was afraid.” But we have to ask: Why does the slave think this? The other two slaves don’t express any such feelings. Their master praises them and invites them to be part of his “joy,” calling them good and faithful. If the master in the parable tells us something about God, either Jesus is telling us that God is harsh and selfish, which seems unlikely, or the slave has a very skewed picture of the master.

How do you see God? Is God generous? Giving? Does God pour out blessings? Is God loving and kind? In the parable, the master makes the slaves stewards of the things that belong to the master. A steward is someone who cares for something on someone else’s behalf. In biblical times, most homes would be run by the steward of the household, who would manage all the affairs of the house for the owners. God has made us stewards of the earth and all that is in it! So, on the one hand, we remember: everything that we have really belongs to God! We’re caretakers of what God has given us, and that requires our responsibility and attention. But on the other hand, we have to remember: God has let us take care of everything that belongs to God! To put someone else in charge of your household, to give someone else authority for all that is yours – it requires a deep trust. Think of all that God has entrusted to us!   

Author and advocate for the poor Shane Claiborne once shared this story: “I will never forget learning one of my best lessons … from a homeless kid in India. Every week we would throw a party for the street kids … 8-10 years old who were homeless, begging … to survive … One week, one of the kids I had grown close to told me it was his birthday. So I got him an ice cream. He was so excited he stared at it mesmerized. I have no idea how long it had been since he had eaten ice cream. But what he did next was brilliant. He yelled at all the other kids and told them to come over. He lined them up and gave them all a lick. His instinct was: this is so good I can’t keep it for myself.” Claiborne concludes, “That’s what this whole idea of generosity is all about … It’s about realizing the good things in life – like ice cream – are too good to keep for ourselves.” I see God that way – so much goodness that God just had to share it with us!

But the third slave didn’t see things that way. “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.” Author Luther Snow focuses on this particular troubling verse, writing, “How can you take away something from nothing? It’s impossible. So maybe ‘those who have nothing’ do have something after all. Maybe the point is not how much we have, but how much we think we have. The [slave] with the one talent had more than nothing, but he acted as though he had nothing. He did nothing with the talent . . . He may have looked at the other two [slaves] and thought, ‘Compared to them, I’ve got nothing’ . . . It is as if the master is saying, ‘You had my valuable gifts in your hand, and you didn’t think they were valuable.’” (2) So maybe we can better understand what Jesus is saying when we think of it in this way: From those who think they’ve been given nothing, what they really do have will be taken away. And from those who feel like they’ve been richly blessed, they’ll be blessed even more. The slave with one talent didn’t have nothing. He had something precious – he just wouldn’t see it.

How much do you have? Something? Nothing? An abundance? I sometimes like to joke that I’ve never met a rich person – because no one will ever admit to being rich. Rich people are always people who have more than you have. I’ve read that most people say they would be happy if they had about 20% more than they have right now. The only problem is that we always say we’d be happy with just 20% more, so that whatever we have now is never enough. Jesus tells us that he comes so that we might have life and have abundant, full life. Do you feel like you’ve received that gift? How rich are you? What do you see when you look at what God has given you? Are your hands full? Or empty? Are they open to others to give? Or tightly grasping?

Ultimately, the Parable of the Talents inspires a response in us. In two of the slaves, their response to what the master had given them was to work hard, to use their talents well, to make sure they could give back to their master even more than what they’d started with. The slaves could have lost everything they’d been given by the master – but I suspect the master would have been ok with that – as long as they had been using the talents, investing with the talents, trying to make something of what they had responsibility for. One slave’s response to what he received was to do nothing. To bury the talent. To hide and respond in fear. To expect what he’d been given to be taken from him. How about you? How do you respond to what God has given you?  

Adam Hamilton shares this story: “[Years ago], our family took a camping trip to the Grand Tetons. We arrived on my birthday and set up our little pop-up camper. After we were settled, we told each of our daughters that they could have $20 spending money for the three days we would be in and around Jackson Hole. We then went to the gift shop before heading out on a walk around a small lake. We had no sooner walked into the gift shop than Rebecca started looking at ball caps. She found one, tried it on, and said, “Dad, what do you think of this hat?” I said, “Becca, it’s really cool. But all you have is $20, and that hat will take all of your money. Why don’t you wait and make your money last for the next few days.” But she said, “Dad, you told me it was my money and I could get whatever I want. And I really want this hat!” As hard as I tried to talk her out of it, and to convince her that she would have other opportunities to buy a cap in town, she would have no part of waiting. Finally, exasperated, I said, “Okay, Becca – but this is it. You’re not getting any more money the next three days.” I gave her her $20, and she bought the hat.

            “We went for a walk around the lake, and then came back to watch the sun set from a park bench. That’s when Becca handed me the hat and said, “Daddy, I bought this for you. I love you. Happy birthday.” I sat on the bench, took her in my arms, and started to cry. That hat is among my most treasured possessions, my most often worn hat to this day because every time I wear it, I think of Becca’s sacrifice for me. All these years later it still touches me to think about how my little girl gave up all her spending money because she wanted to tell her daddy that she loved him.

            “That’s how God looks at our acts of generosity.” When we share with God, our gifts are a way of saying, “God, I’m returning to you a portion of what I have … to say thank you and I love you.” (3) When we give, we don’t give because God needs what we have. We give out of love, and God who loves us, loves our gifts because of what they tell God about how we feel, because of what they say about our desire to be in relationship with God, because of what they say about how we want to care for others.

             We’re preparing for Consecration Sunday. Here’s what that means: The word consecrated means “to make something ordinary into something sacred or holy” – Con means with and sacre means sacred. Make the ordinary into something holy. That’s what we ask God to do with all manner of ordinary things in our lives. And indeed, God makes our ordinary stuff holy – from the bread and grape juice when we celebrate communion, to pieces of colored paper and shiny metal circles that we put into offering plates, even to our very lives. On Consecration Sunday, we’ll ask God to take our commitment of giving and make it holy. We’ll ask God to make our financial contributions into something sacred, so that God can help us bless others through our gifts. And we ask God to take our very lives, and make them holy too. Take our lives God, and make them holy, as we offer them as a gift, as we act as your stewards in the world of all that you have put into our hands.

Please, don’t bury your blessings, your gifts, your talents, all that God has given to you. Don’t live like our generous God has been stingy with you. Instead, offer it to God. Offer it to your neighbors. Offer it to the waiting world around you. And God will consecrate your life, and your cup will run over, and your blessings will be too sweet not to share. Amen.

(1) https://www.facebook.com/ShaneClaiborne, post on 8/7/14

(2) Snow, Luther, The Power of Asset Mapping

(3) Hamilton, Adam, Enough.

Sermon, "Prayerful: Thanksgiving," Matthew 6:24-33

Sermon 11/22/15

Matthew 6:24-33

Prayerful: Thanksgiving

My mother will tell you that in some ways, I’ve been a worrier since I was a little girl. When I started kindergarten, I went through a stretch where I kept asking my mother “what if” questions about starting school. What if I couldn’t find my bus? What if I got locked in the bathroom and no one heard me calling for help getting out? What if no one was home when I got off the bus? What if the teacher didn’t show up? What if I wore a dress on a day I was supposed to wear pants for gym? What if I didn’t have my money for milk? These were apparently serious concerns on my 5 year old mind, and my mother did her best to help me relax, to know that I would be safe and that someone would be there who could help me no matter what I encountered. I don’t even remember having all these questions myself, so she must have done a good job in calming my anxieties.

But I’m still a worrier. I might put on a good exterior show, if you think I am always calm, cool, and collected. But I am worried about matters large and small every day. There was a study that came out at the end of last year that said people who worry a lot might have higher intelligence, and I rejoiced, because it is certainly about the only benefit worrying might produce. Everybody, it seems, worries about something sometime. Are you a worrier? Do you experience stress? How do you cope with it? We’re going through a period of global fear and worry just now, aren’t we? Our minds are filled with images of violence people have been experiencing in the Middle East, in Europe, in Africa. We’ve experienced acts of violence in the US in the past year. At my job in Rochester we had to watch a video about what to do, how to respond, should someone come into the building and start shooting. It is hard not to be afraid, to be worried, and then to let our lives be ruled by our fear and worry.   

And in the midst of this, we find this scripture passage from the gospel of Matthew. It’s a passage we characterize as being about “worry,” although there’s certainly a lot packed into this text. In this chapter, Jesus has just talked about giving alms, praying, and fasting, followed up by saying that “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” And then Jesus starts with today’s passage. He says that one cannot serve both God and wealth. This statement is a springboard for Jesus to speak about worry. Don’t worry, Jesus says, about what to eat, or drink, or wear. Life is more than these things. The birds of the air don’t work or worry, and have plenty to eat, and we are more valuable than birds. And the lilies are clothed with great beauty, but they only last a little while. Won’t God take even greater care of us? So why worry? God knows what we need. So strive for the Kingdom of God, not these other things, Jesus concludes. Strive to live righteously, and everything else will come as well.

In some ways I love this passage – it is beautiful, comforting. But my other reaction is: Is Jesus serious? How can he be? Most of the time when reading the gospels, I’m struck by the deep wisdom of Jesus. By his perceptiveness, his way of seeing right to the heart of the matter. By the way he makes things so clear. It is one of the many reasons I choose to follow Jesus – his ability to trim away all the meaningless stuff and get to the core in a world that so needs that, when my life so needs that. But then sometimes there’s a passage of Jesus’ teaching that comes along like this one and my reaction is, “Yeah, but Jesus…,” “Jesus, you’re pretty naïve, idealistic, you really don’t understand how stressful my life is.” “Yeah, but easier said than done Jesus. Have you seen my to-do list? Have you seen the news?” A first read of this passage tells us that Jesus says we’re not supposed to worry. And perhaps some of you are like me, then, walking away from the passage worried that we worry too much.

            As usual, when we really examine the text, Jesus says something much more compelling than “Don’t worry.” He doesn’t offer easy platitudes – this isn’t “hakuna matata” or “don’t worry, be happy.”  Jesus is tying his words about worry back to his opening comments in this passage today about having more than one master. We can tell this because of how this section about not worrying starts. In our New Revised Standard Version bibles, we just get “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life.” But the original Greek is even more specific. It says, “Because of this I tell you do not worry.” So the whole section reads: “No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other; or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth. Because of this I tell you do not worry.” So, in context, what does this passage mean for us, that because of not being able to serve two masters, Jesus tells us not to worry?

When Jesus talks about worry, the word used is merimnate, which means more literally to “be preoccupied with or be absorbed by.” (1) When Jesus speaks of worry, he’s speaking of something that preoccupies us, absorbs our attention, takes our effort and energy and heart’s direction. In fact, in this way, Jesus is equating worry to something that’s very close to idolatry. Idolatry is when we take anything that is other than God, and give it the place of God in our lives. All through the scriptures, idolatry is one of the things that God most deplores about our human behavior. Again and again, we’re putting something else in a more important place than we put God. Worried? Preoccupied? Absorbed? Not only is your stress hard on you, it’s also putting your very soul at risk, because your worry is just another form of making idols. That’s why Jesus talks about worry and serving more than one master. If we don’t want to end up serving a master other than God, we must stop worrying, stop being absorbed by and preoccupied by things that aren’t God.

Instead of being naïve, Jesus is, of course, being extremely wise. He calls our worry out for what it is – a way of distancing ourselves from God and God’s plan for our lives. We worry because we’re striving for the wrong things, or striving, at the least, in the wrong order. So what do we do? How do we change? How do we give up this striving, our obsessive anxiety, our stress, our worry, our fear? How can we just “not worry” like Jesus says? He gives us the answer: We still strive, we’re still preoccupied, we’re still consumed – but all that energy is given to striving for the kingdom of God. We do that first. Strive first for God, and God’s way, God’s justice, God’s reign. Strive for God, and we’ll find that we’re too filled up with God’s abundance to be consumed by worry and fear. Strive for God, and when we live a life that is focused on serving others, we won’t find much time left over to worry for ourselves.

Does seeking God’s kingdom free us from worry? Does seeking God’s kingdom clothe us and feed us? Maybe not in the ways we’d expect. But I think striving for God’s kingdom ultimately turns our view from ourselves out to the world God has created. So striving for the kingdom lead us to feed others, to clothe others, to fill others. I’m reminded of the folk parable about heaven and hell. In hell, everyone is given huge amounts of food, but the spoons they are given have such long handles that no one can actually eat. Everyone is miserable. But in heaven, everything is just the same – except that people in heaven are feeding each other, and everyone shares in the feast.

As we draw near to Thanksgiving Day, I am meditating on the verse from 1 John: “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.” We’ve been thinking about being a prayerful people, and giving thanks to God is one of the primary ways we are called to pray. Last week we heard the psalmist say, “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.” The prayers of the psalmists are filled with praise. We can give thanks more fully when we take all of the stuff that absorbs our minds and hearts, and lay it down at the feet of Jesus, who we follow. In fact, until we do that, lay down our burdens at the feet of Jesus, I’m not sure we can really thank God like we intend to. But when we cast out the fear and anxiety that threatens to overwhelm us, we make room in our lives, in our hearts, in our world for God, and for each other. We make room to be filled up with thanksgiving. We make room to focus first on pursuing God and God’s reign on earth, God’s justice, with our whole being. My beloved: I don’t think Jesus expects us to never have a worry or care. But I do think Jesus challenges us not to be absorbed by our worries and fears, not to be ruled by them. We claim one ruler of our lives only. We can truly serve one ruler only. So let us choose to strive after God. Let us choose to pray for hearts that are learning to cast out fear and instead be filled up with love. And let us give thanks to God, who answers our prayers. Amen. 

Reflections on a Black Friday

I remember how much fun my best friend in high school and I used to have taking my mom to work early on Black Friday, and then hitting the sales. We were more in the market for $10 deals, rather than big ticket electronics, but we always had a great time, and felt very adventurous. 

I know many folks are opting not to shop today (I'm too lazy to get up that early anymore!) and were very upset to see all the shopping deals yesterday. I get that. I delight in being able to spend the time surrounded by family on Thanksgiving, the chance to, for one precious day, cut away from the relentless pace of our world as a collective body, and say, "There are much more important things to do." I feel sad that we are eating away even at that small practice. 

But, I also think the issue is bigger than when we choose to shop, and so we need to think carefully about how we speak about what we see happening. I'm at a point in my life now where if I miss the sale price on Black Friday for something I want, I can afford to pay the higher price another day. I can afford to choose to shop locally instead of from big corporations. I can choose organic and whole foods over imported and processed items. And so I try to whenever possible.

But this hasn't always been the case in my family. In my Doctor of Ministry Research group, we've spent a lot of time talking about costs, and how the cost of things always goes *somewhere* when we are able to get something cheaply - it doesn't just disappear. But most often, the costs shift more and more to the poor - domestically and internationally - but become more hidden. Rarely do the most wealthy pick up more cost. For the cheap prices today (and every day), we perpetuate a system where the most vulnerable incur more costs - in low wage jobs, in lack of benefits, in organizing and labor rights power, etc.

We continue to live in a culture that says that all the items on sale today are valuable to have. A bigger (or super smaller) TV, headphones, tablets, smartphones, whatever. I certainly have many of these items! We create a culture that says these things are necessary. And then, we shame people, who are already struggling financially, for trying to fit in to the culture, and buy the things we've determined everyone must have - we shame them for trying to secure them at a cheaper price! 

When I think about the message of the gospel, the message of Jesus, I'm reminded that his message was so much more than opting out of a day of shopping (which I know you all know!) Jesus was about opting out of a whole system! Jesus was about opting out of the relentless culture of stuff, and offering a kingdom of God that said people were far more valuable than things, than status, than corrupt power. That true power comes from vulnerability, from service, from heading to the end of the line. And Jesus never communicated this message by shaming anyone - except maybe the rich and powerful and influential - to whom he simply to spoke the truth. 

Anyway, sorry for the rant. But I want to make sure that when we're shaking our heads at the commercialism of the day, we're doing it for the right reasons. Not because we can't believe "those people" are fighting over a good deal - but because we've created a culture where "those people," just like the rest of us, believe that these things will bring us life. That, indeed, is something to be sad about.

(This post was originally shared here on my facebook page with slight variations.)

Sermon for Reign of Christ, Year A: Fed with Justice

Sermon 11/20/11

Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24

            This time of year always brings us an interesting conjunction of church events: today we celebrate Thanksgiving Sunday – it isn’t really a liturgical holiday – Thanksgiving isn’t on the church calendar exactly. But it certainly makes sense that we focus on Thanksgiving in worship – being thankful for all we have is hardly something we do enough of! It is also the last Sunday of the liturgical year today. As the church calendar goes, next Sunday is our New Year's Day. Today is then sort of a liturgical New Year's Eve as far as Sundays go. And on the church calendar, today is Christ the King or Reign of Christ Sunday. It is a day when we consider how Jesus is King, how Jesus is ruler of our lives. How is Jesus king? It’s kind of an interesting question for us to ask about Jesus, who shunned titles like king at every turn in the accounts of ministry. And yet we call him the King of Kings. There is a tension there. Not a king, and yet the most high king. On this Sunday, we explore that tension.

            For 21^st century Americans, we have to figure out just what to do with kings anyway. Our own history shapes our views of course. In our history, people carried out a revolution to end living under the rule of a king that could make decisions for them without their input. We have never had a king. We want a say in who leads – not rules us – and how they lead. And if they don’t do it in a way we appreciate, we want the chance to elect someone new. This spring we observed with varying degrees of anticipation, indifference, distaste, or excitement as Prince William married Kate Middleton. Even in Europe, the royal family has limited power. They don’t rule, not in the absolute ways of days long past. And we aren’t quite sure what to make of it all, are we? What do we mean by saying that Jesus is king?

            We don’t often focus on readings from Ezekiel. You might be most familiar with the passage about the valley of the dry bones. But I find our text today particularly compelling for Reign of Christ Sunday. Ezekiel is writing in the time of the Babylonians exile. Babylon had invaded and occupied Israel and the people of Israel were scattered – what Ezekiel calls scattered sheep. Ezekiel spends the proceeding chapters of his prophecy criticizing the history of bad royal leadership Israel has had. When humans have tried to be king, we have done a pretty bad job at it. We are bad at being shepherds, Ezekiel says, and we aren’t even very good at being sheep. He writes, ʺYou pushed with flank and shoulder, and butted all the weak animals with your horns until you scattered them far and wide.ʺ Without a good shepherd to follow, we aren’t even good sheep! In imagery that Jesus will draw on centuries later when he speaks of himself as the Good Shepherd, Ezekiel speaks of how God shepherds us.

Here is what God as shepherd-king does for us, says Ezekiel: I will seek the lost. I will bring back the strayed. I will bind up the injured. I will strengthen the weak. I will feed them with justice. This is how God is king. And if God is king by shepherding us better than any human leaders, God can draw out of us our best sheep-behavior. We are the flock when we hear God's voice and follow Jesus our shepherd-king. What would it look like if we partnered in God's work?

            God seeks us when we are lost. How can we help those who feel lost, in the many ways we can feel lost in this world? I can’t tell you how significant being a listening ear can be for people. In my years of ministry, some of the kindest words of thanks I have received are from people who I visit for one reason or another. I find myself always wishing I had more time to give, more time to stay, because it clearly means too much to people. People who are lonely, or depressed, or struggling in some way – they need to know that someone is with them in the midst of their pain. We rely on knowing that God is always seeking after us, always calling to us, always longing to draw us closer in relationship. So in turn, how can we draw closer to one another in faith, hope, and love?

            God brings back the strayed. You might think being lost and straying away from God are the same thing. To me it is a bit of a nuanced difference. Being lost is something that usually happens by accident. We feel lost and alone without knowing how we got there exactly. Straying from God – well, that is a little more purposeful. Have you ever witnessed or experienced this: a child is walking quickly and deliberately away from a parent who is yelling more and more loudly, ʺCome back here!ʺ Or a child is not supposed to walk too far ahead, ride a bike too far ahead of parents, but keeps pushing the limits, going just a little farther? That is straying, and I believe we do that with God. We don’t start out intending to disobey God or test God. But somehow one small questionable action on our part leads to one more and one more, and pretty soon we are living in a way that we aren’t proud of. God brings back the strayed. There is no distance – no distance that you can stray from God that is too far for God to close the gap. We are not very open in our society to others pointing out when we seem to be straying from God. And we try to mind our own business when we see others doing something that we know will be harmful to their spirits. We think it is between us and God, them and God. While we are called to not judge one another, we are also supposed to help each other keep from stumbling, and be open to someone else helping us stay close to God.

            God will bind up the injured. I believe God can heal us. I think we have all witnessed God's healing – physically, emotionally, spiritually. Some of us may have witnessed miraculous healing. Or we may have witnessed the slow and steady healing that God works over time. But Jesus was a healer – he was known far and wide for his healing, and it was the reason why people flocked to him at first, only to then find their souls were healing along with their ailments. We are in need of healing, aren’t we? We pray for healing for ourselves and our loved ones. In fact, prayer is one way we partner with God in healing. How often is prayer our last resort, instead of a tool of healing that we use with intention and purpose? I pray for healing for you and me, for our congregation, for our nation, for our world. We so need it. God binds up our wounded hearts, and makes us whole

God strengthens the weak and feeds them with justice. God is not into survival of the fittest. God is into the thriving lives of each precious child in creation. This week we focus on giving thanks, but we also might spend a lot of time focusing on what food we will have on Thursday (and Friday and Saturday), right? I have been part of very few Thanksgiving meals where we didn’t indulge and indulge some more. God says we will be fed with justice. What an image! In the scriptures, justice and poverty, concern for those who are weak or low in society often go hand in hand, as the prophets envision God's world as a place where all have enough and no one suffers at the expense of others. We can certainly be partners with God in feeding justice as we reach out in mission. Last night I had the true privilege of handing out food baskets to folks in need in our community. I cannot tell you how much I enjoy seeing the expressions of shock on people’s faces when they realize how much we will be able to give them. And it is just one way, one part of what we can do. It is to our human shame that we throw away about 50 million tons of food each year when 900 million people are hungry. We know something is wrong and needs to be corrected, brought to right. That is what God means by justice – bringing things to rights. How will you partner with God to feed justice until all are filled?

This Jesus, God on earth, come to us, we celebrate as a king. But he is a king like no other – a king who seeks the lost, who protects, who returns strays to the right path, who heals, who strengthens the weak, who feeds us with justice. This is a leader worth following. Let us give thanks, today and always. Amen.

Sermon for Thanksgiving Eve, Year C

Sermon 11/24/10

Thanksgiving Eve

John 6:25-35

            Are any of you fans of Black Friday shopping? Will any of you be standing in line at 4am, waiting for stores to open to catch some deals? I don’t mind confessing that I actually really enjoy buying gifts for people. I like doing my Christmas shopping. Now, maybe I don’t love crowds and parking lots that are full and people that become rude and angry in the name of spreading Christmas cheer. But I like getting gifts that I know my friends and family will love. And I’ll admit, that when I was younger, before I became a total night owl, when I actually still got up pretty early on a regular basis, one of my dear friends and I used to hit the Black Friday sales every year. We’d go out for an extremely early breakfast, and then hit our favorite stores. And we had a great time doing it.

            These days, though, I’m sure I won’t even make it out of my house before the special sales are over on Friday! But I still enjoy checking out the ads beforehand, seeing what the best deals are. Isn’t it interesting how stores try to motivate you to come and shop? If you buy a $25 gift card for someone else, you also get $5 bonus gift card for yourself! Purchase this, and you’ll also get a free ornament! We like to know we’re getting a little something extra in life, don’t we? We’re motivated by a sense of a bargain, a deal. We love the free gifts, the bonus items that companies or business will give away just to motivate us to choose their product or service over others. Banks, for example, compete by offering joining gifts - $75 free dollars for opening an account, or a free tote bag. Department stores will give you a special holiday teddy bear if you spend a certain amount on shopping. There’s just something about feeling like we’re getting something extra, getting a bargain, getting something for nothing, that we love, that motivates us to take the deal. In seminary even, I was part of a new organization on campus, and we were really trying to get people interested in coming to our meetings. Usually the only good time to get people to come to meetings was during lunch, but we didn’t seem to be drawing much interest. We decided that we would use our organization’s budget, then, to offer free lunch. Soon, we had a regular, steady attendance. The free lunch seemed to be the trick to motivating people to attend. What motivates you? What inspires you to act when you otherwise might not? Perhaps we’d like to think that we are motivated or inspired by some noble ideals or sense of duty or purpose. And I’m sure sometimes we are. But our human nature seems to result in us often being motivated in much more self-interested ways.

            The crowds in our gospel lesson today seem also to be motivated by the prospects of getting a little something extra. Sure, they would follow Jesus around, and listen to his teachings and preaching, but there was always the prospect of getting a little something extra. Perhaps a healing – a cure for an ailment. Immediately before tonight’s passage in John’s gospel, Jesus even fed the crowds – 5000 had enough to eat because of Jesus, with baskets left over. Apparently, this new bonus prize of getting a good meal from Jesus was a motivating factor – they crowds get into boats and go to Capernaum to find Jesus and the disciples who had provided them with such a meal. When they get to the other side of the sea and locate Jesus, they seem a bit interested in pinning down his plans and schedule. “Rabbi,” they ask, “when did you come here?”

            Jesus calls their heightened interested in his movements for what it is – self-motivated interest. He says to the crowds, “very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.” He challenges them, pushes them. “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” Jesus wants them to understand that he has something better, deeper, more completely filling than any meal they could get.

But the people misunderstand – they want to know how they can do such miracles too, like a miraculous feeding. “What must we do to perform the works of God?” They want to know what they have to put in – the terms of the agreement perhaps – what must they do to get the reward again, the bonus. They want Jesus to explain the details. He answers that the work of God is to believe in the one sent. The people still don’t understand what Jesus is saying. “What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you?” If Jesus insists on them believing in him, and won’t teach them how to do his tricks, perhaps they can get him to do another sign, and get something more out of him before they are willing to believe him, commit. And perhaps trying to tempt Jesus into a bit of miracle-performing competition, they remind him that with Moses in the wilderness their ancestors got daily manna from heaven. Can Jesus top that? It reminds me a bit of the commercials on TV that promise borrowers that you can have banks competing over who gets to give you a loan. The crowds, it seems, are trying to work out a similar deal. What is Jesus gonna give them to claim status as their savior? How much is he willing to work for it?

        Jesus quickly puts things in perspective, reminding them that it wasn’t Moses who provided the manna, but God who gives true bread from heaven. And this true bread isn’t just a tasty meal – the true bread from heaven gives life to the world. Ah, finally, and offer the crowd is ready to accept. “Sir,” they say, “give us this bread.” And finally, Jesus lays it out for them – “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believe in me will never be thirsty.” If that’s the offer on the table, who needs a free tote bag on top of all that?

        Jesus continues to talk with them about this bread, later in the chapter, but here we can see the confusion of the crowds so clearly in their pattern of question after question. They seem to be looking for the best deal they can get, and when Jesus offers them the very best, they seem to be looking for loopholes, wondering what exactly the fine print will bind them to, not wanting to agree to anything where they have to give what they don’t want, or where they get less than they came for. We certainly can relate to this attitude, this approach, in the marketplace. As consumers, we are careful, wary of getting taken in. And despite our love of the bonus gift, we won’t accept it, or the main attraction, if it sounds too good to be true. We’re wary consumers, motivated by the desire for the best deal, the best bargain, but suspicious and hesitant too.

But, I think, we also have this dilemma when it comes to matters of faith. Our motivations for seeking out a relationship with God are many. What motivates us in seeking God? Hopefully, for all of us, some of the time at least, our motive for seeking God is the desire to fill the deepest longing of our heart with this grace and love God offers. But I think, for all of us, some of the time at least, our motives are completely different. We are sometimes motivated by guilt over sins or mistakes or other things we’ve done or think we’ve done wrong. Sometimes we’re motivated by a need to belong to a community, to have a social circle, to have companionship that comes with the fellowship of a congregation. Sometimes we’re motivated by a sense of obligation. There are many circumstances that bring us to a time and place where we are seeking God’s presence in our lives, and some of them are more pure and some more selfish. 

            Luckily, God is good and God is gracious. No matter what less-than-perfect motives get us to God’s house, to God’s table, open to God’s message, God is still willing to give us the best of the best, the best offer, the best gift. No matter why the crowds came to Jesus, and no matter what would have been the ideal motive for their seeking him out, Jesus still offered himself to them as the bread of life. He still offered them life-giving bread, no matter what brought them to him that day. And this gift is still offered to us. In Christ we find an offer of full, complete, abundant life, right now. Ours for the taking, free of charge, no matter why we’ve come. Unconditional love. Of all the gifts for which we give thanks, there’s nothing better than this.

            We can react like suspicious shoppers. But you can examine this deal, ask questions, scrutinize the offer all you want. There’s no fine print. No shipping and handling charges you weren’t aware of. No cut off date. No “while supplies last.” Just a gift, freely offered, for you, beloved of God. Come, and receive God’s best offer. Thanks be to God. Amen.

Sermon for Thanksgiving Sunday, "All Gathered In"

Sermon 11/22/09, Matthew 6:24-33

Giving Thanks: All Gathered In

What, if anything, do you worry about? That was a question posed to me in an interview about blogging that I did a few years back, and my response was something like this: “What don’t I worry about?” I was still serving my first congregation at the time, and my response expanded mostly in relation to pastoral ministry. I said, “I can be a worrier. I worry about my congregation, and whether I am serving them well, and if the church is growing numerically and spiritually, and if I visit enough people often enough, and if my prayers are too long, and if a new worship service will work, and, and, and . . .”

This interview response came to my mind because I was also thinking of another blog-related item about worry – a post I wrote about how I handle stress and worry. Sometimes, I can worry as that stress, anxiety, in the pit of my stomach. But sometimes, I’m stressed and worried and I can’t even remember why. I have that anxious, gnawing feeling, but I don’t know what about. This makes it feel even worse, even more worrisome. I recounted on my blog that I’ve gotten better, though, at stopping, when I feel this dread, and working to identifying the cause of my stress or worry so I can confront it and move on. One time I was feeling very anxious, and so I worked hard to find the source of my worry. Finally it hit me. I’d been reading news articles on CNN, and become worried over and article about the melting of the polar ice caps. That was my cause of stress! Now, I take issues of environmental justice very seriously – but my worrying about the ice caps wasn’t really accomplishing anything – it wasn’t helping me act with more care for the earth – it was just filling my stomach with dread without even remembering why I was so upset! What do you worry about? How does all that worrying make you feel?

Today, our text is about worry. It seems like an odd text, at first, to flip back to, after all these passages about discipleship in the gospel of Mark. And it seems like a strange Thanksgiving text, which is its primary purpose. Certainly it is maybe an odd choice for a text for Consecration Sunday – a day when many of us are thinking about pledges and giving and budgets and hoping things work out for the church financially. But as I think about our own life together as a congregation, I think it makes perfect sense – before we can move forward, before we can get out there and be in ministry, we have to make sure we aren’t so weighed down with burden and worry that we can’t function, can’t be disciples.

And so, I think this text is perfect for us today, because I think, as a congregation, we’ve been carrying with us a great deal of worry, and stress, and anxiety. I feel it, and I think many of you feel it as well. A long time of pastoral transition, from a pastor who was here for 28 years, to an interim ministry, and finally to a new permanent pastor, a sense of being in a suspended mode, waiting to see what would happen next, waiting to see how things would turn out, where things would go, how things would move forward, how things would or wouldn’t change – I think all of these things can cause stress, worry, and anxiety in a congregation. And in particular, we, like many churches, have been worried about money – our financial situation. We’ve been worried about keeping the lights on, keeping the bills paid, supporting our staff, supporting our denominational connections, keeping our ministry here going. We’re worried about our future, about how people will respond to our needs, about how we will take care of this faith community. And we can carry this stress, this burden, this worry with us everywhere – into every church meeting, into every gathering, into every decision we’ve been making. And I worry – I worry about what our worry does to us! I worry that with all our worries, we don’t have much energy left to do the work that Christ calls us to do. And into the midst of all this worry, comes our perfectly placed passage for the day.

This text comes as part of what we call from Matthew “The Sermon on the Mount.” It’s part of a long set of teaching by Jesus preached to crowds of people gathered with him on the mountainside. He’s just shared with the crowds a way to pray that we now call The Lord’s Prayer, and he’s been telling them that where their treasure is, there will their hearts be also. And today we hear Jesus saying that one cannot serve both God and wealth. This statement is a springboard for Jesus to speak about worry. Don’t worry, Jesus says, about what to eat, or drink, or wear. Life is more than these things. The birds of the air don’t work or worry, and have plenty to eat, and we are more valuable than birds. And the lilies are clothed with great beauty, but they only last a little while. Won’t God take even greater care of us? So why worry? God knows what we need. So strive for the Kingdom of God, not these other things, Jesus concludes. Strive to live righteously, and everything else will come as well.

In some ways I love this passage – it is beautiful, comforting. But I have to share with you my other reaction: Is Jesus serious? How can he be? Clearly he has no experience with financial stress or other worries. How can he be so naïve? How can you tell people who are hungry and homeless and without clothing or work not to worry? Sure, our own situation is not that bad – we’re abundantly blessed even though we’re facing these hard times. But how can you tell people who are going without not to worry and that everything will be ok? Is Jesus just an idealist? Is he exaggerating? Is he just out of touch?

For me, the key to understanding this passage is to consider what Jesus is really saying when he speaks of worry. The Greek word here is merimnate, which means more literally to “be preoccupied with or be absorbed by.” (1) When Jesus speaks of worry, he’s speaking of something that preoccupies us, absorbs our attention, takes our effort and energy and heart’s direction. In fact, in this way, Jesus is equating worry to something that’s very close to idolatry. Idolatry is when we take anything that is other than God, and give it the place of God in our lives. All through the scriptures, idolatry is one of the things that God most deplores about our human behavior. Again and again, we’re putting something else in a more important place than we put God. Worried? Preoccupied? Absorbed? Not only is your stress hard on you, it’s also putting your very soul at risk, because your worry is just another form of making idols.

Instead of being naïve, Jesus is, of course, being extremely wise. He calls our worry out for what it is – a way of distancing ourselves from God and God’s plan for our lives. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, writes about it this way: “Does not every man see, that he cannot comfortably serve both [God and wealth]? That to trim between God and the world is the sure way to be disappointed in both, and to have no rest either in one or the other? How uncomfortable a condition must he be in, who, having the fear but not the love of God, -- who, serving him, but not with all his heart, -- has only the toils and not the joys of religion? He has religion enough to make him miserable, but not enough to make him happy: His religion will not let him enjoy the world, and the world will not let him enjoy God. So that, by halting between both, he loses both; and has no peace either in God or the world.” (2) Wesley knew that by trying to strive for what’s important in worldly terms at the same time we strive spiritually would only make us miserable in the world and miserable in our relationship with God.

So what do we do? How do we change? How do we give up this striving, our obsessive anxiety, our stress, our worry, our preoccupation with so much that has nothing to do with God, faith, discipleship, ministry? How can we just “not worry” like Jesus says? He gives us the answer: We still strive, we’re still preoccupied, we’re still consumed – but all that energy is given to striving for the kingdom of God. And we’re able to do that when we recognize that our lives are covered already by God’s love. Our lives are given value already by God who created us, and if this God who created us even gives value to birds and lilies and grass in the field, which is here today and gone tomorrow, how can we doubt the value given to us? We’re precious to God, of such value to God. The value we get elsewhere isn’t real. The things we worry about only define us if we let them define us. But if we choose otherwise, if we strive after God’s kingdom instead, we’ll find our real value as children of God.

Does seeking God’s kingdom free us from worry? Does seeking God’s kingdom clothe us and feed us? Maybe not in the ways we’d expect. But I think striving for God’s kingdom ultimately turns our view from ourselves out to the world God has created. So striving for the kingdom lead us to feed others, to clothe others, to fill others. If the whole world strives after God first, I think we’ll find that Jesus is right – all the rest is added to us as well. We face some difficult times ahead as a congregation – we always will, as we struggle to exist in a world that is full of worry, ever torn, as John Wesley described, between more than one master, never being satisfied by either. Our life together can be so much more than we sometimes settle for. Strive first for God, God’s kingdom, God’s justice. If we do that together, God promises that the rest will come to us as a gift to God’s beloved children.

Today, we’re consecrating our gifts to God, our pledges, or our hopes for what we can give to support our ministry in the year to come. This very Sunday and all the responsibilities that come with it can be a source of stress and anxiety for us. Will it be enough? Are we giving enough? If there’s not enough, what do we cut? What do we go without? What do we not pay? But today is also Thanksgiving Sunday, and God always means giving thanks to be an act of joy, giving to be an act of love and hope and promise from God to us and from us to God. God seeks for us to give and receive with thanks, hope, and holy anticipation in the same way that we would feel about waiting for a loved one to open the carefully selected treasure we’ve chosen just for them. Today, then, as we consecrate our gifts to God, I’m seeking to let go of my worries, which take my energy from seeking after God and God’s kingdom. And instead, I’m letting myself be filled with Thanksgiving for the signs of the kingdom I see everyday, right in our midst.

This very week, I am thankful for Derek and Becky Hansen and the energy they’ve instilled into our young people for participating in the life of the church. I’m thankful for the youth that tried something new this weekend and went to learn about God with hundreds of other young people of faith. I’m thankful for Dale and Lori who stepped in to support our youth coordinator in his time of need. I’m thankful for your outpouring of support for the refugees over the past month in response to a plea for help, and for the people you will feed over the next weeks through your support of our Thanksgiving baskets. I’m thankful for those of you who consistently reach out to our homebound members, so that when I visit, they can tell me that they’ve already heard from one of you recently. I’m thankful for a congregation pulling together a church dinner that could go on while I was on vacation. I’m thankful for those who have been working hard to find ways to make our church more welcoming who those who come here seeking a closer walk with God. Our church is overflowing with blessings and riches that will help us as we seek to draw close to the heart of God, as we strive after the kingdom of God.

Today, as we offer our gifts to God to be consecrated, my prayer is that we ask God to use our gifts in ways we can’t even imagine yet. That God can transform our worries into thanksgivings. That God can turn our dollars into lives touched by God’s love through our congregation and beyond. Jesus said, “Strive first for the kingdom of God, and God’s righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” May it be so for us. Amen.

Rev Gals Friday Five: Post Thanksgiving Day

Since I'm not doing anything particularly productive on my vacation (I guess that's how vacation is supposed to be, but I feel like I should be doing work), I may as well play the Rev Gals Friday Five instead of striving for a more theologically-trying post. (I replaced the RevGals pic with a Tofurky pic to better represent my Thanksgiving experience)

So here it is:

1. Did you go elsewhere for the day, or did you have visitors at your place instead? How was it?

This year we went to my aunt's house. For the past four years, we had Thanksgiving dinner at my parsonage, but now that I live in New Jersey, I couldn't get everyone to come to my new parsonage! We had 18 people altogether, including four generations of the extended Mudge Family. We had a good time. Now that my cousins are mostly grown (the youngest is 13, most of us are in our 20s and 30s), we seem to have rekindled our interest in getting together and keeping in touch/keeping close. We've always had a close extended family, although we've had some shaky years, and I think we're starting to remember and re-value that tradition.

2. Main course: If it was the turkey, the whole turkey, and nothing but the turkey, was it prepared in an unusual way? Or did you throw tradition to the winds and do something different?

We have a mixture of meat-eaters, vegetarians, and vegans at our dinner. Main dishes: Turkey, tofurky, spinach tortellini. Stuffing cooked in the turkey. Vegetarian stuffing. Vegan stuffing. Chocolate milk. Eggnog. Soy eggnog. Mash potatoes. Mash potatoes made with soy milk. We've been doing this long enough though that this is a pretty typical meal for us now.

3. Other than the meal, do you have any Thanksgiving customs that you observe every year?

-Most years, we have crayons set out to color on our table cloth.
-We exchange names for our "cousin exchange" for Christmas shopping. We started doing this because we have a huge number of cousins in the family, and we used to try to buy for everyone. It got to be too much. So we started drawing names and just buying for one cousin. Now, we don't actually draw names. It was too tricky to make sure everyone got someone not in their immediate family, or to honor special requests, so now I just tell everyone who they're buying for. (Ah, what power I have!)

4. The day after Thanksgiving is considered a major Christmas shopping day by most US retailers. Do you go out bargain hunting and shop ‘till you drop, or do you stay indoors with the blinds closed? Or something in between?

When I was in high school and my mom (a nurse) would have to work a very early shift on Black Friday, my friend and I would drop her at work, go get Dunkin Donuts, and then hit the early sales. Now, it depends. I did shop some today - my mom had the day off for the first time in years (actually, she's currently out of work with an injury). We didn't go at the crack of dawn though! And my locations included places like Cokesbury, Fair Trade Marketplace, and the Syracuse Food Coop. (Ok, and Target.)

5. Let the HOLIDAY SEASON commence! When will your Christmas decorations go up?

Growing up, we had firm rules on this. Advent Calendar - December 1st. Everything else, not until the 15th. I'm not exactly sure why, but I would lean toward this tradition myself if there were no other circumstances. BUT, now I have an open house every year, so I usually decorate a couple days before that, whenever it falls. (And the Advent Calendar still goes up on the 1st.)