"What Are Your Children Up To?" December 27, 2015

I Samuel 1:26-2:11 Luke 2:21-52 How many have relatives who have gone home? How many have Poinsettias that look like this? How many of us have put away Grandma's good china and silver? How many have leftovers left over? How many have taken the ornaments off of the tree? How many have taken down the tree all together? As Americans in the 21st Century, we yearn to get things over with! Advertising for Christmas began before School started! We wait and agonize over, when something is going to come, but the minute it has arrived, we move on to the next. We live in an obsolete, disposable society. It was not always so. The 12 Days of Christmas were not about the days leading up to Midnight the 24th but the Partridge was a Symbol of the Christ. The Partridge is one of the few creatures, which when it senses dangers sacrifices itself, leads predators away from the nest, to save others. Two Turtledoves, symbolizing Judaism and Christianity together, also was the sacrifice Mary made here at the Temple. Three French Hens, referring to the Trinity, was the gift for this 3rd day of Christmas. The 12 Days of Christmas was to be Christmas until Epiphany, and not until the 6th of January did the Wise relatives from the East even arrive. There is an importance to reading these passages from the Bible this morning, the third day of Christmas when all the crowds have left. Because the coming of Christ is not only about Christ coming into the world, but everything that comes because of his entry into this life. The stories of the birth of the Savior, in addition to describing this gift of God to the people of God, tell the stories surrounding his birth and ancestry. We each have stories like this. We research Google, Ancestry.com and the Latter day Saints, for clues of our lineage, who begat us, as indication of the seeds of whom we might be. Are we descended from Royal Blood or Scoundrels? Are we of multiple races, cultures, what blood flows in our veins? We recall if our babies were early or late, how many hours of labor, the weight and length, and stories of giving birth as indication that at that moment, when we came into the world, everything changed. I delivered our first-born. With Vivaldi's Four Seasons playing on the Cassette Tape Deck, and 4th of July Fireworks outside the windows. Our youngest came into the world very quickly, 15 minutes after arrival at the hospital. Born with a full head of hair, and a tooth, and because the chord was round his neck the midwives instructed that during his birth, my wife I hug each other with all the love within us. Different stories, each a recollection of what we hoped for each child. But this morning's readings are about childhood after birth. There are family stories for every person. At 3 I was asked if I would be a minister like my father, and I declared “No, I am going to be a firefighter or a builder” I am not certain that that did not come true. At 4 I was riding a pony bareback at the family farm in Fulton, and rode her up onto my Grandmother's front porch so I could knock on the door. One of our children loved dogs and frogs and pollywogs. The other would squat down to look intently at rocks and earth and water. I recall the children of one of our families who are Korean celebrating the first year birthday of each child, and choosing between a Book, Money and Thread as an indication of their identity. Every culture has their act of claiming our children. When we began reading the Books of Samuel, The Wednesday evening Bible Study, asked “We know who Saul and David and Solomon were, but who was Samuel?” We began in the time of the Judges; after Moses had led them through the wilderness 40 years, after Joshua had led the Nation into the Promised Land; BUT before the rise of Kings and Monarchy and Jesus. There was the story of Jonah, there was Ruth, and there was a particular man Elkanah who had two wives. The one was so fertile, she became pregnant when her husband looked at her, giving birth to many children. The other wife: Hannah, like the Patriarch Jacob's wife Rachel, was the true love of her husband, but unable to conceive. Annually after the family went to Temple for Passover, there would be a great family dinner, and Hannah would realize all the more that she was alone. So one year, after the family dinner, she came back to the altar and prayed. Hannah's prayer was a model of devotion and love of God, her realization that all power belongs to God, and that real power is not about might or wealth but love, is often read in Advent, and remembered as foundational to Mary's Prayer in the Gospels called The Magnificat. Hannah prayed with such devotion and fervor, rocking back and forth with tears and laughter and singing, that Eli the priest thought she was drunk. She confessed to the priest her faith and her desire to give birth to a child, not as her possession, but so that she had a child to give to God. For which Eli blessed her and her prayer. This morning's first Testament, is of Hannah returning to the Temple 3 or 4 years later, to follow through on her vow, to fulfill her commitment and to give her child to God. This is not a public display, not the woman at Solomon's Temple in the New Testament whom Jesus recognized giving a single coin that is everything she has. This is instead, Hannah's fulfillment in private response to God's fulfillment. Later, Samuel would grow to replace Eli and his sons, as the last of the Priests and Prophets and Judges One like Moses and Aaron, Joshua and Gideon and Samson and Deborah. Later, Samuel would be the one God uses to anoint King Saul and later still to anoint King David, creating the circumstance for war. But here, this morning, this passage describes Hannah's Offering, her Sacrifice to God. The story did not end with Hannah giving birth to the child she prayed to have. The story did not skip from birth, to Samuel being an apprentice to the Priest. Instead, on this morning after Christ's birth, we read of Hannah loving her child so much as to fulfill her promise, and regularly she returned to give her son a handmade robe and Linen Ephah. While there were other Gospels which the Christian Canon chose to not include, stories which described Jesus' childhood with abilities and insights and gifts other children did not have; the Gospel of Luke alone describes Mary and Joseph presenting their child Jesus at the Temple. This might be expected in Matthew's Gospel, where connections from the Old Testament to the New are frequent, obedience and fulfillment of Jewish Law is vital, characters like Anna and Simeon are expected, and Wisemen are remembered. But Luke who only references the Old Testament and the Law 9 times, with his focus on the Shepherds in the field, is the only writer to describe Mary and Joseph going to the Temple to fulfill the Law for Purification and the Bris of Circumcision. Inextricably linked to the Circumcision is the giving of a Name. In Judaism, outside the mother and father, a child has no name until presented in worship and Named before God. This is why, although we in our immediate family knew and have been addressing Dante from before his birth as Dante, Double D or Piquito, in his Baptism we asked “And what is the name of this Child of God?” Independent of the Virgin Birth narrative, are these affirmations of Jesus even at infancy as being The Messiah, Son of God, Savior. Luke had in the first Chapter told of the birth of John the Baptist, whose parents Elizabeth and Zechariah were pious and advanced in age, his father one of the High Priests of the Temple. Here at the end of the 2nd Chapter, a couple like Zechariah and Elizabeth appear at the Temple, Anna and Simeon offering blessings and statements of the Salvation. Strangely, Luke has only nine places in the whole Gospel that cite the Old Testament and four of them are right here. Also, Matthew and Mark never use the word GRACE, and here in Luke, Grace is what this gift is all about. One of the things I love about Simeon and Anna is that routinely in rituals, we ask the individual what their intentions are, we invite them to make vows, the Ordained pray over and lay hands upon them. Think here of a Wedding, Confirmation, Ordination,even a Memorial. But Simeon and Anna are two present at this first appearance that the Temple, and as two people in the Temple they each offer their blessings and affirmations. Here we have no record of the words of Mary or Joseph or the Priest, but what Simeon and Anna did say. Would that we could record the words said in affirmation, to be recorded and remembered over our lifetimes. Hurtful words we remember and we replay. What if we each had a book of affirmations of what wise, pious, experienced people, those not in your own family have said? In polite conversation, there are routine questions we ask. Where are you going to college? What are your children doing? Would that more than providing moral expectations, we as the Community of Faith in this place and time...if we extended to each individual our caring, our hopes and affirmations for them. If we interpreted our responsibility as the church, not only as teaching, and questioning attendance of children baptized, but if we held them up by name before God? At Christmas Eve the Sanctuary was filled with children, almost all of which we have baptized, but most of whom we have not thought of since.

"This Changes Everything" December 24, 2015 Midnight

Luke 2:1-20 Christmas is layered in tradition. We decorate an evergreen tree because, on his way home from worship Christmas Eve, Martin Luther saw a tree glistening with icicles and snow in the moonlight. We hang stockings by the fireplace, because according to tradition, everyone wore stockings and after they were washed, dried them by the fire; so where better to hide chocolates, little presents, surprises. We sing Silent Night A Capella because a mouse chewed through the leathers of Franz Gruber's Organ. Santa Claus has a long white beard, a round belly and a red suit, instead of being a skinny old Elf in green, because according to a tradition, begun by Coca-cola in 1931, that is how they envisioned him. How many traditions are true and which have been created, none of us know. But whether we live in Berkeley, Brooklyn, or Barranquilla; whether we live part of the year in Indiana, Florida, or Carolinas; or if we live year-round in Skaneateles; Like Mary and Joseph we come to our ancestral home of what is familiar at Christmas. The smells of cookies and gingerbread, the flicker of candlelight, adults talking all night long, we each have in our hearts what makes the Perfect Christmas. My 16 year old nephew Tom's whole concept of Christmas is connected to Candlelight in this Sanctuary, because for the first thirteen years of his life, his family drove after work from Washington DC to Skaneateles and he was awakened to the pipe organ at 11:00pm, having been miraculously transported from home to Christmas. Our Humanity, following from Greek Philosophers, seems to expect that if God reveals himself at all (And that is a BIG IF), then God could only be revealed in universal truths, and not particularly in personal space and time. Greek Philosophers described this as finitus non capax infiniti. “The Finite Being InCapable of Containing the Infinite.” When actually, that is the miracle of Christmas! Tradition is also about change, personal change changes everything, the violation of expected routine. Grandma is no longer here to make her cookies, so we have to come up with our own way of doing so. Dad has cancer, and every day becomes vital/precious because we know not how many more we have. A new fiance or partner has been added to the family, so a new stocking, a new place at the Table. A new baby, and everything is different, everything is changed and new. Our Reading begins with a setting of international political world super powers, with Caesar Augustus of the Roman Empire and Quirinius like modern day Bashar al Assad of Syria, and Immigration Law; instead of building a Wall, the Roman Empire had constructed A Road, and declared that millions of people be forced to travel in order to be Taxed. YET in contrast to this historic Force of the Empire, one particular couple: Joseph and his Mary, gave birth to a baby. There is similarity to an earlier story, of Pharaoh and Egypt, and an oppressed people, when a couple give birth to a baby: Moses. Whether we go backward or forward in time, the common act of the birth of this baby at Bethlehem changed everything, changed the world. The keeping of time, the forces of the Empire, Art, Music, Architecture, would never have been the same without the birth of this child. Viewed spiritually, here I do not mean Religion, but Cosmic forces of Heaven and Earth, Divinity and Corruption. Throughout human history, there had been described an increasing Gulf separating us from God, as if every generation added more hate and division. So much so, the ancient world described an impending END of The WORLD, Creation being attacked by Armies of Angels. The idea of an apocalypse is not new to the Hunger Games or Maze Runner! One of the darkest, most hate-filled period in American history were the McCarthy Hearings, when our leaders demanded that we turn against our family, friends and neighbors. Do you recall how it all ended? Finally, another Senator turned to Senator Joe McCarthy to ask “Sir, do you have no humanity left in you? Is there not a single shred of decency and caring humanity?” When suddenly, on one particular night, just passed the Winter Solstice, the longest darkest night of the year, Shepherds keeping watch over the flocks in the wilderness, were greeted by an Army of Angels. All were declaring a Miracle: that God had bridged the divide, the Creator had Entered INTO Creation. Instead of coming to Judge and Destroy, God gave forgiveness, God had come as a vulnerable newborn to redeem all humanity. The declaration “PEACE ON EARTH” needs to be heard between Superpowers and Governments, HOWEVER in Luke, PEACE ON EARTH was the angels describing an End to our estrangement as Sinners, Humanity from God. The End, the War of the Worlds, the Apocalypse of Time & Space – All came through the birth of this child, as if One person could make a difference! One Person Could Change Everything! The Finite of this life Could Contain the Infinite! We routinely live as if unchanged, as if our lives were an unbroken line that we at least follow if not control. We live estranged, isolated and alone, awaiting someone to come as a Savior, as if Christ has yet to come, when all of this happened 2,000 years ago, changing everything. The question this Christmas is whether we live as if this world, our lives were finite and corrupt, where the Apocalypse is inevitable, war is inevitable, nothing can ever change, every day is just like all the days before; OR if one person could change everything? Sometimes all it takes is for someone to believe in you! While there are changes that weigh upon us; the message of this night is “Good News of a Great Joy for all people.” JOY is such a precious and rare thing in our world today. When the Doctor's Office calls to report that “The shadow we saw on your lung turns out to be nothing more than a shadow.” When you have been searching for a job, and you receive a call asking when you can start. Sunday, as two babies were baptized and with the 3 month old screaming, the 6 month old reached over to touch and reassure him, you could feel the joy in the Sanctuary. When we began the Congregational Meeting naming that someone phoned to commit to support the transition of our church by making a major gift to help with the transition, you could feel the joy like a great burden of stress being taken off our shoulders. This week, when Paul Ariik, one of the South Sudanese refugees phoned to say, “Pastor, my wife and I wish to be married, could you do this today?” There was joy! Other than the Liquid Dish Detergent, you cannot buy Joy. Joy is not tangible. We do not join together to have Joy, it is a byproduct of our sharing! Good News of a Great Joy, lifts our spirits and affirms, we can do this because there is less stress, less worry, less doubt, SOMEBODY ELSE Believes in us and in our star. The circumstances of our life change everything. The Ancient Greek Philosophers had it all wrong, life is not about the capability of the Finite to CONTAIN the Infinite, but the Infinite caring so much about us personally, loving us so completely, as to enter into Creation, Redeeming the lost, that is a great Joy. We have heard reports of killings and suicide bombings, until whenever there is any breaking story, we steal ourselves for how many people were killed. What would it take for there to be announcement of the permanent end of hostility, an act of JOY that makes all hate and war and terrorism totally futile? I am old enough to remember the beginning of the Lottery for the Viet Nam Draft. I recall the constant reporting of the First Gulf War, and trying to explain to the children of the church, our own children: we had wished you would never learn what war was, that peace could last forever. I recall watching incredulously as 747s flew directly into the Trade Towers. There have been so many schools, theaters, houses of worship, made into places of terrorism and fear. Whom would you need to hear it from, to believe “Good News of a Great Joy,” that Peace had come to all people, Light into this darkened world. Our President? The United Nations? The Pope? John Paul II in every one of his writings, declared “Be UnAfraid” yet here we are today. Not a temporary cessation of some singular conflict, but a change that changes everything for ever. Not only between Nations and Tribes, between Political Parties and factions; but within our families, also. Whom would we need to hear what from in order to believe and live as if, This changes everything! Angels in the wilderness, describing the most ordinary thing being the act of Salvation from God? The infinite choosing to be One with us in this finite world? I Bring you Good News of a Great Joy for all people, you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. The birth of child, every person offers that possibility, that Good News, that THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!

"Timing" November 29, 2015

Jeremiah 33:14-16 Luke 21:25-36 There is always a choice of TIMING on mornings like this. Being “Thanksgiving Weekend,” do we preach on Giving Thanks, or with Turkey Carcass made into soup and The Dinner made into sandwiches, do we look ahead in HOPE and Anxious Anticipation to the First Sunday of Advent? Thanksgiving, while a National Holiday recognizing European conquest of the land and inhabitants; a day of gorging and intoxication; a day of parades and football, is not prescribed by Scriptures! YET, a Sabbath of giving thanks to God is prescribed in the Torah and Prophets, over and over; our stopping individually, and as a Nation, and over the world as a people of God, every day, every week, every month, every year and periodically throughout life, in order to recognize who we are in relationship to God, and just how blessed we are in life. I love everything about Thanks-Giving as a celebration of faith! Gathering with family and friends. Sharing in cooking family recipes, the house smelling of pies and turkey. The table with extra places intentionally created, covered with our finest china and crystal, as a symbol of the Psalm “Thou hast prepared a Table in the presence of my enemies and my cup runneth over!” and Deuteronomy's creating a place for the Sojourner in your midst. Most especially, that people who often do not give thanks or ask the Lord's blessing, on this day: Do! But my confession is that as a very young child, I have a painful memory equated to Thanksgiving, which my family never ever let me forget. As a child I was captivated by Cartoon television shows! In particular: The Flintstones and The Jetsons, but especially when not about every day but Holidays we have. On the Thanksgiving when I was 3, there was advertised, a Thanksgiving Special of the Jetsons Meeting the Flintstones, and I could envision nothing better. However, the only time, our family ever went out to a restaurant for Thanksgiving happened that year... Throughout Thanksgiving dinner, I was anxious we would miss the “Real Thanksgiving” happening on television. At several occasions I was instructed to be silent or face the consequences. When we got home, on Thanksgiving I faced those consequences. More painful however, was that at every family celebration since, over 54 years, my brothers have reminisced about this. I truly do not recall the punishment, but I do recall afterward asking if it was now time to watch the Jetsons - Flintstones Thanksgiving Special? And was told to give up hope for that time coming. Over the years, my role in my wife's family has been to clean and stuff, cook and carve the Turkey, in part because one year someone had not removed the neck and heart and giblets before cooking; another year the bird was still frozen after it came out of the oven; and one year someone stuffed the Turkey the night before. Over the years, this has changed from volunteering to help at her grandmother's, to other's homes, to the years we went to the Macy's Parade, the year we had to have “Turducken,” and the year after when the Vegans demanded “Tofurke,” the year the bird was cooked outdoors in a deep fat fryer, and years when it was soaked in brine for days; and this year's suggestions the bird be cooked inside a Pillowcase, wrapped in Bacon, or barbequed in a trash can. The question, dependent upon whose oven, how cooked, and how large a turkey, was always TIMING. How to prepare the pies, stuffing and bird during the Parade, to be complete before the Rockettes and Santa arrived at Macy's, in order to be cooked, carved and hot but not dried out, at the perfect time for dinner? Recently, my friend Scott described that the NY Times published 75 different ways of cooking the Thanksgiving feast, searching for the ideal, whether in a slow oven, in a bag, basting, a roaster, on rotisserie spit on a grill? Their conclusion was that the ideal was TURKEY OF THE APOCALYPSE, with the best flavor, crispy skin, and moistness throughout, and pyrotechnics!, all from placing the bird in an open pan in a pre-heated 550 degree oven for 90 minutes! However, during cooking, every person would be forced into exile by the fire department because of smoke, and afterward the pan and oven needed to be replaced due to burned on grease. There will always be 3 year olds who are more pre-occupied with things other than eating. There will be family who are required to be present at multiple Tables. But the point of everything in this season, is for us to stop in Sabbath to recognize how blessed we are, LIFE is too short. Beginning a few decades before the year 2000 and correlated to events continuing today, there have been those who identified Present Signs with A Final Apocalypse and those Left Behind. They have brought their questions to the Bible and lifted these words out of context to make them mean what they worry about. There will be Earthquakes and Hurricanes, Fires, Wars and Refugees. HOWEVER Advent is the Antithesis of Worry! Advent is waiting so expectant as to Hope Fulfillment! Jeremiah in the First Testament, is continually filled with doom and gloom and exile. But here, when arrested and imprisoned, which at the time would have been to be dropped into a sink hole or the bottom of a well, still Jeremiah has HOPE that God's Time is not our Time. If we do not pluck out our favorite words, making the Bible say what we want, but instead, connect passages of a similar place across the Gospels to ascertain their meaning,... just before the warning of this morning in Luke 21, in Matthew, Mark and Luke, at the climax of Jesus' Journey of Healings going toward Jerusalem where he would be crucified, there comes a Rich, Powerful, Young, Man to ask what he must do to inherit Eternal Life? Not unlike our own family members who as soon as the meal was served were asking about Black Friday Sales and where they could go to GET THE BEST DEALS. In each of the Gospels, these whom our world identifies as Successful, Having It All, identify that they have done everything commanded: They have honored their Mothers and Fathers, they have not Lied, Cheated, Stolen or Committed Murder... To which Jesus commands one thing, that in each case causes them to go away sorrowful, Jesus asks them to Give, Give away all you have gotten, all you possess. This first Sunday of Advent is akin to Simon and Garfunkel's: “Sound of Silence” beginning “Hello Darkness, my old friend, I've come to talk with you again.” There is a story about those lyrics having been written in 1963 at the assassination of President Kennedy, at the Apocalypse of a Time, the death of one set of illusions and adoption of another. But in each of the Gospels, this is followed by a Blind Beggar, in Mark the oldest of the Gospels he is identified as as Bartimaeus, just before Jesus entering Jerusalem to describe that time is short and his purpose is about to be fulfilled. The curiosity being that the Name Bartimaeus only occured in Ancient Literature twice! In Hebrew the first three letters BAR identify this as “The Son Of” like Johnson or Stevenson, would be. So one identification of this Blind Beggar is identified as The Son of our Time = BAR-Timaeus, which is odd because Timaeus is not a Hebrew Name but Greek. The other occasion of there being a Timaeus is the Greek Philosopher Plato, who lived within 200 years before Jesus of Nazareth. In Plato's Writings, he names Timaeus as the Greek Ideal of being Educated to believe in the Theoretical, in separating the Physical of Life from the Spiritual of Faith; Timaeus provides the only description of the location of Atlantis, Timaeus identifies the formula for the Golden Ratio used by the Great Painters and by Apple in their designs. So, here we have a man, possibly the same Rich, Powerful, Young, Ruler of a few verses before; identified as Child of the Learned, Child of Education and Society's Ideals, who here sits on the curbside as a Blind Beggar. Perhaps like our own generation's children so deeply in debt from education, unemployed in the careers of their training, feeling lost and blind, now Demanding Fulfillment, demanding that Faith and Education and Life, Ideals and Reality be Given! What Bartimaeus said is recorded as “Jesus, Son of King David, Have Mercy Upon Us!” In the Church we prefer to ritualize this as on Palm Sunday singing “Hosanna.” The purpose of having us read these passages about the End of Time at the Beginning of Advent, are that from our Greek Ancestors we inherited two understandings of Time: Chronos from which we get Chronology, that Time had a Beginning and a Lifespan and will naturally have an End. And Chiros, which is the same root word as Christ, meaning that there is Time before our faith in Christ, and Time after Claiming Christ. There are those this morning who will feel disappointed. Who, trying to please family, got up early on a Sunday to come to Church in Advent, and there was only one Christmas Carol, there was no Virgin Mary, Donkey or Baby, or Wisemen. All of which are Christmas and After, not Advent, ADVENT is Waiting, Expecting, Demanding Change in our lives, Hoping. To be ready for Christmas, to Prepare to greet Christmas as the Scriptures intend for us, is to look for God to Fulfill HOPE for the Poor, to provide HOPE of Comfort for the Grieving, for the Lost, To Provide HOPE of Freedom for those addicted and held Captive by fear or Mental Illness, The Savior of the World, Savior of all Time coming for all the Nations, then comes in surprising fulfillment of all these Hopes as an innocent baby, coming to forgive the sins of all the world.

"God The Wild Card", November 15, 2015

I Samuel 1:1-20 Mark 13: 1-8 In ancient times, there were sacred texts reserved as being available ONLY to the oldest of male priestly scholars. It was thought that the symbols, ideas and imagery could not be understood by anyone enslaved, younger, or female, without an advanced formal education in theology. By similar token, I have had a number of colleagues who blatantly dismissed that as a N.American/White/Male/ Educated/Married/Presbyterian I could understand OPPRESSION. Attending Seminary in Harlem in the early 1980s, the emphasis was on Black Theology and Feminist Theology and Asian Theology, all of whom began with self-identification of having being Oppressed, and that the best others could do was to understand our identity as Oppressors. Even 9/11, could not be compared to having generations before you in Slavery, or South Sudan, or in Afghanistan or on the West Bank. Living with constant war, fear of extermination, lynching, prejudice CHANGES YOU, changes your perspective on life from acceptance of whatever comes to railing against. But what has happened over the last 30 years, the numerous unending wars, the financial collapse of governments and our own expectations, multiple attacks most recently in Petra and France have changed us, to Anomie. Hopeless, Isolated, Alone, Depression, with No Way Out, Anomie... That is the context we have to understand for these passages about Hannah from I Samuel. Routinely, in the Church, at Worship and Bible Study, we take passages out of the Biblical whole, even at best, we read them within the context of their Book, or their half of the Bible. But this week, this morning, I suggest a new and different awareness. Suddenly I have come to a different conclusion than I have seen anywhere else, that HANNAH is the Archetype for the whole story of faith in God. For everything, from Adam& Eve, Abraham & Sarah, Jacob with Rachel & Leah, Moses, the tribes of Israel, the era of the Judges those flawed heroes of Samson, Gideon, Jephthah, Jonah and Ruth, ALL BEFORE HANNAH, and everything AFTER HANNAH: King Saul, the Monarchy of David, Solomon, the exile in Babylon and return to a devastated place, all eventually leading to the Gospel, Spirit and Savior. I believe simple, Hannah, whom no human understands, this beloved wife, trapped in circumstance, to be the turning point for the whole Bible. One of the recurrent images throughout human history is that more than biology, the identification of “being unable to conceive” meant that that generation has no hope, they have no future, their END their APOCALYPSE is NOW. For Hannah, more than a child, Conception is also a statement of survival. Whenever a husband died, the wife inherited Nothing, everything went to his children or his brother. So in this case, where there were two wives, and one had children, Peninah's sons would inherit all; being expected to care for Peninah and their own sisters, but having no responsibility for Hannah. Her husband seems to not understand her fears or loss, emphasizing everything her love means to him. Peninah rubs in her biological failure, by needling her. But Hannah does something even other women in similar circumstance had NEVER DONE; which is why I believe this is such an important passage. When confronted Adam blamed Eve; Sarah, used her Egyptian Slave Hagar to get a child; as did Rachel and Leah use their slaves; Naomi used Ruth the widow of her son to get children for her son/ to get grandchildren after his death. But Hannah turns to God, without using others, without reservation. Her prayer, which we recited as our Unison Confession, not only names her plight, the plight of the Nation, of Humanity, our TOTAL NEED for God, but then gives up any benefit for herself of getting a child, by making an OFFERING of that child's life and service TO God. In the New Testament, when Mary conceives, her song is based on Hannah's, but Mary's circumstance is different. I think, the only equivalency to Hannah's Prayer of Total Devotion and Giving this life to God without benefit for self, is Jesus on the Cross asking God to “Forgive them, they know not what they do.” That is a profound equivalency! Growing up, one of our favorite Board Games was Monopoly. Except, we were not yet skilled in reading, we saw GO with an Arrow and Dice to count how far and quickly grew to adapt our own rules. We did not understand Income tax or Luxury Tax so did not pay these. Beyond the money that was printed, we printed our own $1,000, $5,000 and $10,000 dollar bills and if you could put 10 High Rent Luxury Hotels on Broadway and Park Place, why wouldn't you? Once all of us had learned to read and discovered the rules were different, it caused us to question what the difference is between a Closed System where there is limited amount of currency, and Land and Laws, with the possibility of a true Monopoly, an End! Versus an Open System, where anything is possible? Years later when taking Economics in College, the professor described that our Economy is based on Investment, which the Closed Board Game does not provide for. You witness a need, you have an idea, you create a Business Plan, you find the investors to raise the funds, you risk going from nothing to a new future. Will it work, who knows. But it does not work, without trying, without risk. But this is not theoretical economics, this is real life, at its earthiest, Hannah goes to the Temple to risk everything, to pray to God. In essence, when God enters in, God provides a WILD CARD changing a Closed System to have new goals, a new outcome, and everything assumed changes. The Bible describes Hannah “Was Deeply Troubled, Prayed out of Great Anxiety and Vexation.” What better description of railing against a closed system, against Anomie, against the present Apocalypse? God does a New Thing in the birth of Samuel, leading to a new and different end than ever before conceived. The First and Second Chapters of I Samuel are Not about Samuel; they are about HANNAH, her desperation and faith in God. Hannah's Song becomes the “Interpretive Key” to our Understanding Faith, in spite of the horrors to come, in spite of the reality that Hannah will disappear from the Narrative after the first 5 Chapters, and even Samuel will die before the end of the first Book, HANNAH's Prayer is in a GOD WHO CARES, WHO ENTERS IN, GOD WHO IS ACTIVE, GOD CHALLENGING THE APOCALYPSE WE KNOW, CHALLENGING THE STUFF we have based our lives upon. We like our stuff, our routines, our safety. We like driving up to our homes, pushing the button to have our garage door open for us, our dogs greet us with excitement, our lights come on when we enter a room or touch a button. Hot water and cold and frozen foods preserved forever, microwave cooked in seconds. We like our control of our normal. What if nothing happened at our control, as we assumed? Our fears over the Housing Bubble, over the Stock Market all were rooted in fear that where we placed our trust was valueless! What if we lost everything we had? Who would we be without our stuff? What would we be, if our identities and relationships, suddenly meant something different, or meant nothing? Throughout human history, Kings, Empires, Religions have all built Palaces and Temples to their Grandeur. It is as if the bigger and more extravagant, the greater the stability, the greater the prominence and expansion of the future. So when Jesus came out of the Temple at Jerusalem, one of the Disciples commented What Beautiful Stones! The Washington Monument, the Vatican, Westminster Cathedral, Riverside Church in Manhattan, St. Paul's Cathedral, St. Peter's,... the list goes on and on, of Churches and Leaders fighting against their own mortality, against their limits by creating something of grandeur and permanence. When I returned to South Sudan, Government Officials and Professors from George Washington University in Washington DC toured the Clinic and declared “Emperors and Kings have built Palaces, Religions have built Sanctuaries, all to their power and influence, but a common people in a church in Upstate New York have created Health Care for people they will never meet or know.” Hearing this I sat down and wept. But Jesus replied: all of this, will be turned to dust. I wept again eight years after the Clinic was Dedicated, when everything that could be stolen, was. What I find marvelous is that the people on the ground, here and in South Sudan did not ever give up hope, and have continued to act and reach out in caring, without stuff. Repeatedly the reaction to Jesus, the reaction to proclamation: APOCALYPSE, is WHEN will this be? We want to worry over the details, the minutia, wanting security, wanting to control details in a closed Economy. Jesus replies, WHEN Does not matter! Instead of Punishment or Retribution, or a Day of Judgement, Jesus offers the most Optimistic Affirmation of the future: All the destruction and decay of built up security for ourselves, fighting against our mortality, will not be the end of God's Creation only of humanity's control, and this signaling the birth contractions of something New GOD is Doing. What if? What if we lived without concern for the stuff of this life, for belief in economies and rules as we know them? What if all our fears, of Natural Disasters, of Wars, of Terrorism, of Economies were pointless. What if we lived in that Apocalypse Now, believing God is about to do something New in GOD'S CREATION!

"Two Hinges" November 8, 2015

Ruth 1 Mark 12: 28-34 Have you ever had one of those moments that something happens, or is said, catching you off guard to re-evaluate everything else in life? This happened to me twice this week! Perhaps, it is having been away from routine, away from responsibilities for a month, quite possibly being vulnerable. First in the Bible Study Wednesday evening, we have been reading together the story of David in I Samuel, and are at the point of contest between David and King Saul, where the army of each is trying to win, to dethrone the other, but more than that to eliminate them as competition. When the body described that being King is a leadership shift to believing you alone have the answers. And as a knee jerk confession, it occurred to me that in the pastoral ministry this is something we cannot do, that you listen for the needs of the community, you channel the resources of the church to where they are needed, and while I have been in ministry for over 31 years, served with you for almost 19 when I have set goals they have been where I know the body intends to go with leadership rather than what I want to do. The second was sincere and humbling, that at the Y one morning, someone asked how I was feeling and I described the overwhelming support of the congregation in cards and pictures from the children, and gifts of food. To which the other simply said “We love you.” In the ministry, you hear a number of "Nice Sermons", you know the affection is there, but we all need to hear it at different times. Our culture is based on success, on being first. In this regard the Culture of the first Century was not only Survival, about being the First, the Winner, but also that the first set the example, the first stone laid became the cornerstone determining level and the parameters of what was to be constructed. So declaring what is the foundation, what is primary was vital. Jesus response was a foundation of love, love of God and compassion for everyone. How different from a foundation of self-sufficiency, of Law, of security, that our foundation of faith and life is compassion and commitment to God and the world! This week, we participated in a general election, and now we are formally a year away from electing our next President. Painfully, what we hear from every candidate is a single issue of what is wrong with the world, what is wrong with America. There are problems with the world, there are real, legitimate fears, but I wish we could more often hear an affirmation of what is right and good with our world. Oddly, the last many weeks the Lectionary has not had us following the Gospel of Mark. We began there, but as Jesus came into the city of Jerusalem, he is asked by one group about Divorce, by another group about Taxes. The last few weeks we have taken detours to read the Book of Job and Revelation, when suddenly, we are right back in Mark with a Scribe asking “What is the most important Commandment?” To be a faithful Jew, you had to follow 613 Laws from Scripture, over 300 of which were “Thou Shalt Nots” Whichever Commandment he chooses, Jesus will offend someone, so what do you stand for, what is the greatest commandment? Jesus does something no one had ever done before, he chooses two and describes you cannot do the one without the other! Literally his words are “On these two together hinge all the Laws and the Prophets.” This made my mind leap as I recognized that every door, whether the door to your home, or office or bedroom, the door to a cabinet, all have two or three hinges. One hinge will never work, because the weight of the door causes it to bind, but two or three hinges both maintain the connection and the balance of the door. Tiger Woods and Venus Williams excelled because each have families with the means to allow them, and the commitment to devote them, to using all their heart and mind and balance and intellect and effort to their sport, and they did; but we cannot ignore that each also was fortunate to have talent in these sports. I have tried playing golf and I know that no matter how much time and effort and practice I put into this, while I would get better I would but not be a professional. There is a subtlety to Mark's Gospel, that when asked by a Scribe outside the Temple at Jerusalem: what is the First commandment? Jesus replies with the Hebrew “Shema,” the commandment which set Judaism apart from the rest of the world. “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is One and God only will we serve with all our Heart and Soul and Might.” But Jesus changed the words of the Bible! Jesus said “With all your Heart and Soul and Might and Mind!” A simple addition, but the difference that makes all the difference is that Jesus is stating “Faith in God is not only about Religion, following the Laws, YOU have to think.” For the last Century in America there has been argument over Science versus Religion, for the last 500 years there has been debate over which held the answers to truth. Here Jesus names that this cannot be an argument over which has more Heat, but which also provides more Light. In Religion you do not simply burn your sacrifice, focus on your sins, NO instead we need to wrestle with ourselves, to wrestle with God, and our responsibilities for others. There are some passages that are equated to one experience or another in your life, the passage read at your baptism, the passage you read at your Confirmation. This passage from Ruth was read at my parents' Wedding. But theirs was not a traditional wedding of two persons starting life together. At 37, my father was already a widower, with three young children. My Mom had been in love with her High School Sweetheart, and the night of the Wedding Rehearsal, after the rehearsal and before the dinner, the groom came to the realization he could not go through with the wedding. And now these two, with broken, imperfect lives found love and compatibility, but also commitment, that they would support and provide for each other. Ruth is not a passage of young love, but of people with baggage with brokenness making a covenant commitment to each other, and in so doing make a commitment to God which lasted for 50 years. Following on the Book of Judges we can assume this was a time when each person did what they thought best, and only afterward considered what God was calling them to do and turned around. Here there is a famine in the land that drives a family of Israel from the Promised Land, from the land of Milk and Honey, literally from the City of Bethlehem which means The Breadbasket, to immigrate to a foreign land, and live amidst a foreign people in Moab. Part of the question of immigration is not only how to accommodate the number of people, how to provide jobs and homes and a quality of life for them, but also where are they coming from, what happened that has driven them to leave. The setting for this story is that after leaving all that they knew, Elimelech's family is further violated by the sudden death of their father Elimelech. Can you be an orphan as an adult? The sons of the family, Mahlon and Chilion take wives outside their religion, outside their race and ethnic group. Then the sons die. The setting for this book of faith is “What represents the family of Israel, when distant from home, culture, religion, when in a patriarchal culture the father and sons are taken, and the family becomes the Mother without husband or sons?” Naomi feels so broken, she no longer wishes to be called Naomi a name which means sweetness, but instead call me Mara, a name which means “bitterness.” In this culture of denial, where the family of Israel is outside the land of Israel, and without family or the resources to provide for family, Ruth: a woman, a foreigner, not of Israel, makes a vow of commitment. The pain of Ruth's identity, is that we do not even have a direct meaning for her name, we know the opposite of Ruth is to be Ruthless, singleminded, to be committed to destruction, committed to violation, without God; which leads us to understand Ruth as being Committed to rebuilding, committed to healing and wholeness, one who is with God. The beauty of those multiple hinges on a door, is that each provides connection between the door and the frame, but also, each hinge keeps the other in balance, not only from gravity which is a reality, but also from being understood in isolation. How different our commitment to one another, when this is not only a contract between two individuals, but sacred before God. How different our faith, when our beliefs are not only about what is sacred and sinful, what is the Law and means of atonement, but also how does our faith in God, our belief in the Law, in truth, in Freedom effect other people? We live in one of the few cultures in human history who adopted an amendment to our Constitution that there is a freedom of speech. I may at times disagree with a neighbor, I may be offended by their actions or ideas, but I also protect their ability to speak their mind as wrong as they are. A Christian Faith hinged on both unconditional Love of God and unreserved Love of Neighbor is not easy. Our assumption about the Pharisees is that they were committed to God's Law, regardless of how this played out for people. One of the assumptions of our culture today, is if the relationship does not work out we can always divorce, we can always walk away. The difficulty of faith is believing in unconditional Love of God and unreserved Love of the other person. That does not create a Venus Williams or a Tiger Woods, who are singularly focused on being the best at their sport; but rather a Ruth who is committed that “Where you go I will go, your people will be my people, your God is my God, and where you die I will be buried as well.”

"The After Life" November 01, 2015

The Wisdom of Solomon 2:21 - 3:9 Revelation 21: 1-6 According to Consumer Reports, we in the United States now spend as much and more on decorations and costumes for Halloween than we do for Christmas. In other parts of the world, focus is not upon All Hallow's Eve, wearing costumes, passing out candy, or shaving cream, toilet paper and eggs; but instead on this All Saints' Day, a time for naming those who are with God, going to cemeteries, lighting candles, singing a favorite hymn. We are troubled that no matter how many times, we beat cancer into remission, no matter what we have overcome, what we have accomplished, no matter whether we reach 100 years and more or not, we are mortal, we are creaturely, and we die. All Saints' Day is the proclamation of a counter-cultural reality: that Christ conquered death, and baptized with Christ, sharing in Communion through him, God is with us not for 70 or 80 or 100 years, but for all eternity! Etiology is the study of stories of origin. Where have we come from. According the Rudyard Kipling, “How the Elephant Got its Trunk” “How the Leopard Got its Spots” “The Cat Who Walked by Itself”. According to Iroquois Indians “How all creation sprung up on the back of a great Tortoise”. Genesis “How God Called Time and Space into Being, forming Humanity in God's Own Image, and breathing God's Own Spirit into Us as Life.” While every culture has stories of their etiology, the origin of things the origin of life as we know it, periodically in human culture there is fascination with Eschatology, with where we are going and the End of life as we know it. Just as the first lines of Genesis describe the identity of a thing is contained in its seed, we are who we were made to be by God, so also in Revelation our goal in life, our purpose and end also describe who and what we are. T.S. Eliot described “Our end is our beginning”, described in Latin by the Early Church as “Exitus Reditus: All things come forth from God, all things ultimately return to God.” A year ago we spent time in California with our son, and friends there described their perception of the difference between the East Coast and the West, that on the East Coast we have a 300 and 400 year history, which inspires a love of what is historic, the origin of things; whereas on the West Coast emphasis is on what is new, what is next, where we are going. Reviewing recent novels and films produced, there seems to be a pre-occupation with the end of the world, cultures particularly of teen-agers who survive ordeals, who win over conspiracies, confronting what is next after this world, after this life. Throughout the last many years we have worked to improve and restore the beauty of this Sanctuary. But as much as we have attempted to confront issues of Accessibility, Lighting, Hearing, Musical Instruments and Acoustics, this Sanctuary was designed in the late 1800s with every image, the shape of the room, the trinity of Arches, the Stained Glass Windows all taken from the Book of Revelation. Particularly from this image of a new Heaven and new Earth, a City of God. The Scripture Lessons for this day are different from our norm, the First lesson not actually included in our Pew Bibles. In an earlier era, there was what was referred to as the Catholic Bible and The Protestant Bible. The primary difference being that the Catholic Bible, and now most Bibles being published included The Apocrypha, and some the Pseudopygrapha, where the Protestant Bibles did not. The Pseudo-pygrapha were books of Gnosticism, including the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Mary, The Gospel of Judas, which although from the same time period and geography as the Christian New Testament were considered by those who codified the Biblical Canon, as based too much on Miracles, Magic, Philosophy and not on Christian Truth. The Apocrypha were books written after the period of the First Testament, after the Hebrew Bible was canonized, and before the writing of the Epistles and Gospels of our Christian Testament. These include Tobit, Judith, additional Books of Esther, The Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach, and additional Books of Daniel. Resolving our hearts and minds to death is painful. Imagine the early human creatures, whether Eve and Adam, or Professor Leake's Lucy. You have your partner, your mate, your companion, without whom your life is at risk. They share in your safety and hunting, and cooking, they are your lover and the other parent to your children. Last night as you went to sleep, you cuddled up against their warmth. But this morning, their body is cold, cold as the dawn air. Their flesh is not full, but sagging from their skeleton. All color has left them, and they do not respond to your voice or touch. After a few days they begin to smell. How do you cope with this change? How do you reconcile that at one moment they were sleeping beside you, sharing in all of life, and now they are dead? Ancient Judaism believed that after death, we were dead, our bodies and souls went to Sheol, the place of the Dead, the Foundations of the Earth. It was from the Hebrews that we had the image of On a Final Day, the day of the Lord, the day of Judgement, all souls would be released from Sheol and rise up from their graves to be with God. Greek Culture believed in a Duality to Life, that there is the Physical and the Spiritual. As described by Plato in “The Cave” I could show you a throne, a Rocking Chair, and a stool and describe all of these as being Chairs; yet, if you closed your eyes and I named for you “A Chair” we each would envision our archetype of what a Chair is supposed to be. So also with human life, that this physical life has many experiences and varieties, but there is a Spiritual life which is Immortal and Eternal. The Romans had a three-tiered conception of the Universe, with this life, and Heaven and Hell as three separate yet connected realities. Because the Greco-Roman culture co-opted Christianity, because Christianity became the religion of the Holy Roman Empire, we have inherited many of these ideas, which were not Christianity. Roman culture required that when a person was near to death, a family member or servant was paid to sit vigil beside them, in order that insofar as Breath is equivalent to Soul, when you gasped your last this other person was to catch your last breath in their mouth, from which Roman Christianity developed what is identified as A Christian Kiss, to be shared at any of the Sacraments. However our Texts for today describe something wholly different at the end of this life. According to The Wisdom of Solomon, “God created us for incorruption, made in the image of God's own eternity.” So the point of being formed in the image of God has nothing whatsoever to do with having a beard, sandals, long white hair, being male or female! We were created in the image of God, as eternal! That eternity was interrupted by the sin of humanity, and restored by Jesus Christ! “The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, where nothing can ever touch them.” Revelation describing that “The Home of God is among Mortals” defies that after death we see a bright light, or we are transported to the Pearly Gates, or that there is a Purgatory for working off and atoning for your sins, No. But that in this life, God wrestles with us, we wrestle with relationships and brokenness, and after death instead of our crossing over and going somewhere, after death God enters into each one of us. The question of the After Life is not who gets in and who does not, who is saved and who is corrupt, but that all of us, All of us, have acted and said and thought things which are not of God. After Life, God is in all of us, we are all brought together as God intended for Creation, and Communion, this physical act as well as the relational reality where we forgive one another and we are forgiven. Forgiveness changes us, and grants us a foretaste of the Kingdom of heaven where all of us serve one another, and all have enough. How amazing if instead of looking at a stranger, and questioning are they for us or against us, are we in competition for survival, for the goods and chocolate of this life, instead if we could see all the saints in our midst.

"THE OTHER" September 27, 2015

Esther 3:7 – 4:14 Mark 9:38-50 This morning I need us to recognize that faith in God through Jesus Christ is about believing in what we do not understand. Faith in God through Jesus Christ is believing in what we, individually and collectively, even through our government or military cannot control. Faith in God through Christ is not believing in myth, nor fantasy, not a dream, theoretical paradigm or virtual reality. In the reality we consider to be normal life, there is the world of our creation: waking in the morning to an alarm clock, eating breakfast, going to work or school, enjoying a meal together in the evening, having time to relax and sleeping soundly, someday retiring to happily ever after. In that reality, life is defined, we are the center of our identity. We pay taxes to our elected officials, who provide roads and schools and safety and security. We amass education to increase our knowledge and understanding, to increase our accomplishments, in a known quantified universe. In 2001 that reality changed, not because of the new millennium, not an apocalypse or armageddon, but prior to 2001 our culture naively believed that we were in control of our destiny, that we could determine our own fate, that life was basically Good and strangers were not a threat to us. Then on one beautiful Tuesday morning, where the sky was blue, and life routine; we suddenly experienced the unthinkable. Terrorism went from being the isolated random act of a few radical crazies at Ruby Ridge or Waco, Texas; AND instead, commercial airplanes became weapons of mass destruction; Manhattan went from being Madison Avenue Designers, Wall Street's Stock Exchange, Broadway's White Lights, to being Ground Zero. In the aftermath of being attacked in our places of business, on our soil, without provocation, our leaders declared: “Whoever is not for us is against us!” The home of the free and land of the brave, became reactionary and defensive, concerned with our own survival, and we began going from one crisis to another, one hurricane to another, one school shooting to another, fear upon fear. The point is not to convince you of the error of our ways. Not for one brief hour, or even 15 minutes of that, to say that two thousand years ago, on the other side of the world there was a Good and Righteous man, God in our midst. But rather, that our reality, whether naive or defensive, in control or in fear, is only the known part of life, only that part of creation we want to believe we control, or fear we do not. The wholeness of creation requires that we also believe in THE OTHER. That if there is fear, there can also be hope. If there is Control and Chaos, there can also be God, Mercy and Compassion. Like Jesus' disciples we are fearful enough to react to an Us against Them; Me against the world; survival of the fittest. The solution to the Syrian Refugee Crisis is not how many million refugees each country can take, not a question of racism or fear or economies, or immigration. Millions of people are being forced to leave their homeland because of genocide, because of war and oppression. Many of our problems are because we have accepted a basic premise without considering an alternative reality, any Other reality. The idea of “Whoever is not for us is against us!” is nothing new, it was the cultural reality of Rome, which the Caesars and Senate legislated with the Pax Romana: an Enforced Peace of the Roman Legion. Empire after Empire throughout human history have sought to eliminate those who were different, those who were feared. Jesus instruction here to the disciples was not the Golden Rule, but rather a radical up-ending of reality, to consider what if GOD is in control? What if: “Whoever is not against us is actually for us?” What if we are only afraid of our fears of what we do not control? In the 1700s Jonathan Edwards was the charismatic preacher of the Great Awakening, who preached Hell-fire and brimstone. Edwards described Hell, with flames of fire burning away at your flesh, an unending terror, in order that people might fear Sin and choose the lesser suffering of working for their redemption. We already live in an world of fear, a time where we never know if on that routine visit to the doctor's office we might have an illness; when every day the business we work for may be sold or secrets be revealed; when the stock market may tumble; our home lose all value; when our spouse may abandon us; when our children may be taken from us by drugs, by relationships, by mental illness. Someone asked me why I never preach on Hell or Sin? I think we are acquainted with these very well, but that there is an alternative, there is redemption, there is hope, these are The OTHER that we need to believe in, that we need to be convinced we want. I believe we are not convinced by Fear as by Hope. But there are two things to remember... First that we each are responsible for our actions, and to harm another, to lead one who s naive astray and abuse them is wrong, and there is judgement for our wrong. Second, that there is a cost to discipleship, a cost to caring about others, that we are human and we might take on the sins of the world. If we who are the salt of the world were to become corrupt, how could we be made new? I do NOT believe Jesus was being rhetorical! I believe this was the linchpin for the disciples to come to a new reality. Jesus had described to Nicodemus that he must be born anew that life is not a straight line, but perpetually beginning again. That if we truly believe all those Not against us ARE for us, then if we became corrupted we could trust others to help us. But also, faith loves correlations, comparisons, word plays. I believe Jesus chose SALT as the image here, because another word for Saltiness is SAVOR, so who is to restore the SAVOR of the Faithful: the SAVIOR! Growing up in the Presbyterian Church, we never heard the story of Esther. The story of David, Yes! The 10 Commandments. Solomon and his wisdom. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Gideon, Joshua, Samson, Hannah, Jonah, Rahab the Prostitute, Mary, Martha, Peter and Paul, Zachaeus; but Esther was obscure. This is a book that never mentions God. Esther is an Old Testament book that does not require following the 10 Commandments, or Redemption, or mention the Prophets, Priests or Kings of Israel. The Story of Esther is the Script of a Melodrama, read at the Feast of Purim, which annually occurs in March. This is “Theater of the Absurd,” because the ideas at the basis of this story are so absurd. After King David and King Solomon, when the People of Israel were beaten and dispersed in exile in Babylon, the Medes conquered the Babylonians, the Persians conquered the Medes, eventually the Greeks would conquer the Persians, and through it all Judaism repeatedly faced Genocide. Over and over throughout history, the people of faith have faced extermination, so the Feast of Purim and the Story of Esther were an annual remembrance that we have been here before. In a world focused on Power and Shame, on Vanity and Beauty; a world where others fear that anyone who is not like them must be against them... Here, the people of faith can offer feasts to feed the poor, to welcome enemies and strangers into our homes, and to laugh at the absurdity of our fears and prejudices of the OTHER. But also, that no matter who we are, we cannot escape the circumstance of the world; and who knows that perhaps God has put us in this place and time to act in this circumstance! To understand just how absurd is living in constant fear, reading Esther requires Other's participation. In the far off Land of Persia, there was a King Ahasuerus who was such a Fool he was only concerned with Beauty and Vanity, so pre-occupied with showing off beauty he held a Banquet and ordered his Wife the Queen to appear wearing nothing but her jewels. The queen refused, so the King called for a Beauty Pageant to pick the most beautiful woman in the Kingdom to be his new Queen, and not knowing she was Jewish, he chose Esther. SO, in the story every time you hear the name of the Foolish King Ahasuerus like Homer Simpson, the people are to say “DUH!” And every time the Name of the Beauty Pageant Winner Esther is Named, “You are to Wolf Whistle.” But where leaders are foolish and concerned with appearances, others play dangerous games of Power. Haman was the Grand Viser, who fearful and indignant calls for the Extermination of all the Jews for being different. Adding to his corruption, Haman offered Ahasuerus that for every Jew who was Killed, Haman would pay a reward into the Treasury. SO when the name of Haman is spoken, we identify the Villian with “Nya-aa-ah!” Ahasuerus has given to Queen Esther a Servant named Hathach, who had been made a Eunuch; when Hathach's name is spoken we collectively say “Ouch!” And the Hero of the story, who saved the King from a plot of assassination, who suffers indignity, wears sackcloth for the redemption of the people and never gives up hope, is Esther's Uncle Mordecai. When Mordecai's name is spoke people “Cheer!” Let's again read Esther 3:7 - 4:14.

The Child in Our Midst, September 20, 2015

Mark 9: 9-37 We routinely go through life aware of the people and things around us, without seeing them in the broader picture. When we see a child maturing as a youth or a loved one aging, whom we have not seen for a while, we notice changes unobserved in day to day existence. When we read individual verses, or stories as we always have, we sometimes miss what is there in the broader context. For the last several weeks we have been following as Jesus went back and forth across the sea, from the Jewish to the Gentile world, calling, teaching, accomplishing miracles and sending the disciples out in pairs with power to preach and teach and heal. Last time, we read together of Jesus asking the disciples “Who do they think I AM?” and Whom do you say I AM? With Peter's confession that “CHRIST” is not Jesus' last name, but Jesus' identity, he is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God. After which Jesus told them of his suffering, death, resurrection, and different from healings where he said tell no one, they were afraid. Afterward, Jesus took with him Peter, James and John, going up the mountain, where the Transfiguration took place. They saw him changed in a blinding light, they saw Moses and Elijah with him, they heard a voice of affirmation from heaven: “This is my Beloved Son, listen to him!” And Jesus tells them of his being handed over to people who will cause his suffering, death and resurrection, and they were afraid in stunned silence. This morning, as they come down the mountain, they come to Capernaum. Jesus approaches a crowd, where his other disciples have been trying in vain to exorcise a demon from a boy who has been scarred by fire and water, and the boy's father is frustrated. I was surprised by the Gospel in the RSV using the word “Dumb” in the NRSV: “Stupid,” so I looked up the origin of the adjective. 1. The negative of one who is wise. And the last few weeks we have been focused on Wisdom! 2. Annoying, irritating, troublesome; 3. tediously dull, due to a lack of sense or meaning, pointless; 4. foolish, senseless; 5. in a state of stupor, stupefied, silent... Cappernaum was a small fishing village on the north end of the Sea of Galilee, like our being here at the north end of Skaneateles Sea. Cappernaum was the home of the fishermen who became disciples. Capernaum is where you and I work and play, where our children go to school, the ordinary places of our lives, where we try to make ends meet. The real place where faith and fears collide. Jesus does not spit on his fingers, or cry or groan, he prays to God. Later when the disciples ask, Why when we tried everything to cast it out, it did not work, but when you did, the boy was healed? And Jesus explained “With this kind of demon, it is very difficult, a demon without wisdom, can only be met with prayer.” There are times, when we try everything we know, we find the best doctors, the best advisors, and nothing makes sense. Prayer is not only for centering, and calming yourself, for anti-anxiety; but also for dealing with what is senseless, annoying, irritating, stupefying, scarring life. And the Scripture describes a very ordinary, shameless human ambition. Along the road to Capernaum, coming down the mountain from the Transfiguration, Peter, James and John were arguing over who is greatest. It may have been as simple as who is most loved, who healed the most people, challenged the greatest circumstance, who prays the longest, or the most eloquent. When we were little, our parents worked out that one of us got to divide a dessert or coveted thing, and the other got to choose first. Today, there is a horrific draught in California, we hear of it in fires, and rationing of water. I am told that controversy has arisen because most acres of grain are worth $1,000/acre to the farmer. But if you plant pistachios, they are currently worth $10,000/acre. Then again, pistachios take 10 times as much water to grow as do normal crops. In a time of draught, Hedge-funds have come in purchasing up individual farms, to plow under and cultivate pistachios, because it is worth 10 times as much, as you use 10 times the water. In the ancient world, childhood was a time of terror. 1/3 of all births ended in death of the child. 2/3 of children died before age 12. Disease and lack of hygiene exterminated 2/3 the total population annually. Thomas Aquinas in the Middle Ages described, “In a fire, your first responsibility is to save your father, then Grandmother, then wife, then your cow, and if there were time: children. In a famine, the strongest, the adults ate first, it was survival of the fittest. What Jesus said to the disciples was counter-cultural, a challenge to their most basic family values. To be my disciples, you must be without rank, without position. In Greek and Aramaic, the word for Child can also mean Servant, a non-person, a thing, as children and servants are unable to repay you, unable to elevate your status by showing you honor. When we hold up a child, it is not for how cute, or how perfect they are. An infant is without jealousy, or guile, without desire for honor or reputation, without memory of a moment before, life is a miracle that they are witness to. In the bulletin, we described that Jesus interrogated the disciples. Not simply that he wanted to know what they were arguing about on the road, but I believe what he was asking was WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF and also WHAT DO YOU IMAGINE IS THE NATURE OF FAITH? Because under our arguments, underneath our debates for dominance and control, are our fears. The opposite of Fear is Faith. The Opposite of Faith is not doubt, not science, not Law; the Opposite of Faith is Fear. Fear is ubiquitous through the Gospels. When the Heavenly Messenger comes to Mary, the first word is FEAR NOT! When the Heavenly Host appeared to the Shepherds in the field, they shouted FEAR NOT! Here again, and even at the foot of the Cross, Jesus' challenge to us is Fear Not, but Believe. Our Faith is not about having easy answers, telling you what you must do, how you must think in order to be perfect. But rather, to affirm that you are not alone in your doubts, you are in a community of living with questions, confronting fears, struggling to have fidelity and commitment to believe. Years ago, there was a man, who was filled with fear. He lived alone and raged at everyone. He would throw things, storm out of meetings, slamming doors, one Christmas Eve he spit in the Pastor's face. Finally, we asked why he did this? He immediately replied: Here you have to forgive. Family, School, Work, Neighbors, they can cut you off, if you demonstrate rage, anger, fear they will have no part of you... but here, here in the church you have to forgive. I named that in my experience, there had been tragedy at the very beginning of life, and the church extended love. Growing up, there had been mentors and teachers, a place of challenge and opportunity where you could explore questions and risk to say what was in your heart, knowing you would not be judged. Our whole point as the community of faith, is not to be a punching bag for others, accepting their anger, but to provide the faith, hope and love, that circumstance had denied, that fears had destroyed. Reading this Gospel passage, “Jesus put a child in their midst” My mind immediately jumped to The LionKing, with Mustafa the Baboon Priest holding the child Simba up before the world. Or The Movie Roots with Kunta Kinte lifting up his infant in this new world, holding him up before the stars, that also shown over his ancestral home in Africa. But I think what this is really about, are two other images. The first is that Jesus Called the disciples to gather in a circle, as if in judgement, surrounding the child as others had for stoning to death a sinner. But all the while, at the center of that Judgement Circle Jesus himself stood with the child. Whatever was to happen to the child, must also happen to Jesus. When I met John Dau's father in S.Sudan, Daniel was Chief of the Dinka Tribe at Duk Payuel, a Soldier, a Warrior, a Judge, a Leader standing 6'8.” His newest wife had a toddler. Daniel described, “What we need, is not for Americans to come in and carry us in their arms. What we need is simply a finger to hold onto and steady ourselves as we learn to stand and to walk and to grow without fear.”

"Like Trees Walking" September 13, 2015

James 3:1-12 Mark 8:17-38 One of the greatest problems for having faith is there are so few surprises for us. We look forward to the release of iPhone 6 or Windows 10, or the season's recycling of plots in new television shows, seeking to be surprised, amazed and awed, to have something new and different to imagine. The 8th Chapter of Mark is the center of these 16 Chapters, the critical turning point of the Gospel. When we get to the 8th Chapter we are supposed to be on the edge of our seats, wondering, questioning our hearts, saying to our neighbors “Who is Jesus?” Have you ever asked yourself, or those closest to you, let alone neighbors: Who is Jesus? We take faith, miracles and God for granted; we debate the relevance of Jesus' life and teachings, we argue about whether to go to church … but never question: “Who Jesus is.” He called followers and taught them in parables; he healed: the blind, the lame, the deaf, lepers and mutes; he has calmed the storms and calmed irrational minds; he has fed thousands of people like Moses in the wilderness; he even resurrected a 12 year old child from death to life. We have become so accustomed to acceptance of the identity of Jesus Christ, we have dropped out verb and direct articles to make Jesus' name “Jesus Christ”, instead of the radical declaration of Peter: “You Are the Christ, the Messiah, The Son of the Living God!” Something surprising happened last week, a shocking awareness for me. I preached what I thought was a pretty good sermon, it started off with a joke, had good Bible Study interpretation and application, even a fresh interpretation I had come up with of the meaning of the words of Jesus, that I thought was controversial, as well as applications of Mom spit I thought everyone could identify. But after the sermon, someone asked “That sound! Where did it sound come from?” Knowing full well I asked what sound? And they said “You described how Jesus had taken the deaf man off away from the crowd, spit on his hands, then looked up to heaven and there came a sound I never heard before!” And again, as I believe Jesus did, I Groaned with a deep groan originating in my toes. Hearing this grunt, someone different began describing the depth of their feelings at a recent gut-wrenching experience; another the decision of their adult child to leave everything they knew to pursue a different career and life; a third that they were touched by the circumstance of another person's cancer that they could finally reach out to share their own. Similar circumstances have happened each time when we voiced God's SIGH, and when the Sudanese voiced the sound of Angels YAYAYAYAYA, and when BARKing the Barking Billy stories. My conclusion being that either this is just circumstance that we were fortunate to experience and pay attention to; OR it is people being Surprised that unleashes our willingness to share concerns; OR that rather than a well researched and creative sermon, no matter how well delivered, or the topic, by giving voice to the Holy Spirit evokes something from us different than reasoning and logic. As human beings, even though we are believers, we have difficulty letting go, trusting others. This summer, I have come to realize I have failed you as your pastor. While pride is named as a sin, I take great joy in what this church has done. When asked if we could fulfill the concern of a member to provide a home for older persons in the community, we have fed and housed all who have come for 40 years! We took on successive campaigns to raise millions of dollars, with no one giving over $100,000, and we did so! We have shared our building and resources with the community, and in the process created an identity for the church as a center of exceptional quality music and mission! We have created Health Care in the most military insecure and most food insecure place in the world, where no one else had done so, and we have continued it for over a decade! We have directly addressed domestic violence, alcohol's abuses, terrorism and fear, cyber-bullying, and war, each immediately and with a passion for changing the world, redeeming the individuals, and not casting blame. But over and over this summer, members of our congregation have described the cliques of our kids are perpetuated by adults, we talk to the same people and hold animosities from decades ago. We have preached forgiveness, we have demonstrated compassion and love, but as believers we have been cold and separate from others. I had not recognized it before this, because as pastor I visit with everyone, knowing each personally; but the grace and relationship you offer me is not extended to brothers and sisters and sometimes is quite caustic. This is nothing overt or monumental, but as subtle as the movement of a rudder, or the pulling of a bridle which determines our direction. The professors and experts have described this healing of the blind man at Bethsaida as the only occurrence in all the Scriptures where a miracle takes two efforts to become realized. However, I think perhaps all the miracles take multiple efforts! Usually Jesus tells persons to tell no one, but go present themselves for acceptance at the Temple, or to go to wash themselves. There is the grace of God being extended and there is belief in the possibility. When Jesus touches the man's eyes, Jesus offers possibility, but the man's own inability to believe means that even with grace all he can see is people as if creatures, trees walking. When they try again, the man is able to see beyond the creatureliness, to see the divinity in people. The emphasis of the Gospel of Mark, the earliest of the Gospels, is that Jesus is fully human, the son of Mary and Joseph the Carpenter, firstborn of his brothers and sisters. In the Baptism, in the Temptation in the Wilderness, in the Healings and Miracles, Jesus is personally wrestling with what it means for him to be the Messiah sent from God, and whether he can do this. We play this game with our children, asking what they will be when they are grown. Will you be a Prize fighter, a Fire fighter, a Teacher an Engineer, a Mom or Dad? While we imagine what we could be, and we work toward those accomplishments, few of us can perceive what questions and challenges will come to us by accepting these vocations and identities. When we were preparing to have a child, I imagined holding that child, loving them, feeding them, their going to school and graduating, their wedding days,... I never imagined being proud of them as adults: one being a Veterinary nurse and farmer in Brooklyn, one being an Engineer proving Global Warming and the threat to world defenses. Being a pastor, I envisioned hours of study and counseling and meetings, never traveling to S.Sudan. But my experience of a mother dying in delivery and their experience of 50% of their mother's dying in delivery was a sudden connection that allowed the Holy Spirit to work. We who have always known the story of Christianity wonder why Peter and the others were so dense. But the expectation for hundreds of years had NOT been that there would be a crucifixion and resurrection; but rather that in triumphalism, the Savior would come to overthrow the Empire. Like the Calvary rushing in, or Luke Skywalker in StarWars, the Savior would Save the Day. They individually and communally experienced miraculous wonders. They had witnessed the rise and fall of empires and cultures as part of human existence, where we observe the struggles of Greece and Syria, reacting to what we can do to help refugees. They speculated: perhaps Jesus was like an Old Testament Prophet, who would announce the coming destruction of the Romans. The replies of the disciples that “Some say Elijah and others one of the prophets, still others John the Baptist raised from the dead,” was belief that before the coming of the Messiah, before the coming of the Judgement Day, first Elijah would return, or Jeremiah or Nathan, one of the Prophets or Judges of Old. There was recognition that John the Baptist had been something special, but exactly what was uncertain, and still today, we are unclear what to make of John. Peter makes this enormous leap, that his friend, Jesus the Rabbi, the Preacher, the Miracle Worker is more than a prophet, more than any leader who has come before, he is the Christ, Divinity personified, The Son of The Living God. To which Jesus says YES AND what that means is Jesus' need for atonement for all the sins and suffering of the world, to bring reconciliation. Jesus' acceptance of being the Christ, is that Setting the captives free in a new Exodus, miracles of parting the Red Sea, destruction of the oppressors (Be that Pharaoh or Caesar and the Whole Roman Legion and Roman Senate) would never suffice. September 11th, 2001 happened, it was a horrible event, the loss of tens of thousands of lives, the devastation of families, the undermining of our economy, a change to culture... but 14 years later, September 11th happened and we went on as if any other Friday. What is mandated is to redeem the world, not only one empire, or people. To pioneer and perfect a different relationship between people and God, between People and People, and between us and all Creation. What Peter head was suffering and suicidal self-sacrifice, what jesus described was a Sacrifice of atonement that never needed repetition or ratification, once and for all. With all the miracles we have witnessed, do we see the world as a continuation of what has been, dimly reflected as if Trees are Walking; or do we see God present with us? Do we sing Joyful Joyful We Adore Thee, as a lovely old hymn, or recognize that the mountains and flowers and all creation, even you and I, can sing God's glory together?

"Jesus The Devil's Advocate" September 6, 2015

Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23 Mark 7: 24-37 Friday evening we were at Mirbeau a 5 Star Spa for a Rehearsal Dinner with all the Bridal Party and Generations of Family gathered together. There were the Parents, Grandparents Great grandparents and 5 great great grandchildren under 3 years of age. At the end of this fabulous meal, the eldest child looked under the table at the mess created by he and his cousins and announced “This place needs to have a Dog!” I fear calling attention to the fact that there is Anything religious, spiritual or sacred in a public place, for fear those wanting to avoid conflict or avoid anything Judeo-Christian, will take it down. But in our community there has long been a plaque on the wall in State Street School quoting Proverbs 1:7 “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge...” However, this is only the beginning of the proverb which continues: “But fools despise wisdom and instruction.” The plaque might be more powerful if it were only the conclusion: “Fools Despise Wisdom and Instruction!” Our readings today deal with “foolishness.” Popular culture attributes gangs, violence, racism, drugs to either a Societal Disease or Family Dysfunction. The Wisdom material of the Bible came to a different conclusion, that the ultimate responsibility for Social Order is personal and individual, a symptom of a crisis in character labeled in English as “Folly, literally being a fool.” Being a fool is not a matter of intelligence, aptitude or application of self; being a fool is being un-wise, despising wisdom and instruction, and the fear or knowledge of God. We do not really know who created the Wisdom Literature, tradition holds that in his youth Solomon wrote The Song of Solomon about his lusts and desires. In Midlife, attempting to share the wisdom he had received, Solomon wrote the Book of Proverbs. In his latter years, with cynicism about life, Solomon wrote Ecclesiastes. At the time the Bible was compiled, there was question about including the Song of Solomon and Ecclesiastes, but because they had been attributed to Solomon they were kept alongside the Psalms attributed to David. In Hebrew, there is actually not one kind of fool, but four words describing different levels of depravity, or self-imposed distance from God. First is the Naive Fool, who is gullible, unthinking, without understanding of cause and effect of behavior.This is an individual lacking maturity, lacking judgement that comes with experience. The Hebrew word for this is PETHI. This is what was often referred to as Gullible, not because they were a dumb-blonde or airhead, they simply did not have the prudence to be able to discern. Second is a Self-Confident Fool, the Hebrew word is KESIL, meaning someone full of themselves, and this is the individual the Book of Proverbs speaks against more than any other. The Self-Confident Fool has no delight in the Lord. The Self-Confident Fool identifies himself by three characteristics: His stubbornness preferring to be punished than proven wrong. He is mouthy, saying everything within his mind without control. And the Self-Confident Fool thinks it is fun to cause trouble to others. It becomes impossible to reason with the Self-Confident Fool because his sport is causing mischief. The Naive Fool does not realize that Sin has consequences. The Self-Confident Fool does not believe Sin has consequences. The third type, the Committed Fool, does not care that Sin has consequences. The Hebrew word for this is HEVIL. The Committed Fool is at war with wisdom, believing he is right in his own eye. I have come to wonder if this was what was intended in the Garden of Eden, that Eve chose to do EVIL to Take and Consume regardless of consequences, because as the serpent said You will be like God able to choose for yourself without God. To change Hevil, is like changing Evil, you cannot redirect, you can only resurrect and change nature, his only hope is the grace of God. There is according to Proverbs a level of Folly worse than being a Committed Fool and that is to be a Scorner, a Scoffer, a Contemptuous person who mocks others. In Hebrew this is LUTS rhyming with Boots.The Scornful Fool, the Book of Proverbs says, the wise believer should stay away from, they are proud and haughty, the only hope for which is Judgement. Which in the Hebrew Scriptures was the only end, yet the whole point of the Gospels is that in Jesus Christ, God offer something new. For in Jesus Christ, God chose to supersede Judgement, to change nature with grace. Rather than Wisdom and adherence to the Law, the point of relationship with God became God making us whole. To set the context for this chapter of Mark, we need to recall that Jesus has been going back and forth across the waters, the point of which is not geographic but on one side is Jewish culture, on the opposite side is the Non-Jewish Roman and Greek Gentile world. Different from the other Gospels, in Mark, Jesus is the human embodiment of God appealing to Israel and to the rest of the world. In Chapter 6 Jesus had fed the 5,000 and in Chapter 8 in a Gentile culture he will feed 4,000, so the fact that in Chapter 7 Jesus is being asked to heal a Syrophoencian Woman and a Deaf Mute are significant. Many have heard Jesus response to this woman as uncharacteristic and rude. Some have felt they would rather feed crumbs to Dogs under the table than some people. Some preachers have attempted to Save the Savior by interpreting Jesus did not actually call her a dog but rather a cute puppy. No Jesus not only called her a dog, he called her a female dog in heat bowing at his feet. It was a common racial slur, as offensive as the “N word” or Uncle Tom, or Oreo, or Cracker, similar words of prejudice today. Have you ever felt strongly about the righteousness of your position, but you knew in front of family or friends it would be unpopular and incite trouble. So instead of provoking trouble by defending your position, instead of swallowing your commitments and beliefs to say nothing; instead you play the role of advocating or representing the side you know to be wrong. The origin of “the Devil's Advocate” came from the Catholic Church in the process of Canonization for Sainthood, one church lawyer would take the role of advocating for the Canonization, identified as “God's Advocate;” while the Lawyer challenging assumptions, challenging miracles, questioning the person's righteousness was labeled as The Devil's Advocate not because they believed this but because the other side needed a voice. Here, I believe Jesus takes the role of Devil's Advocate! Tyre was a Port City, so Jesus was at the Beach. He is in a place not wanting to be found, and she seeks him out for help. The culture has identified her as a triple outcast, she is a Syrophoencian what earlier cultures had named as a Canaanite! She is a woman without a man to plead her case in a Patriarchal culture. And her child is so ill, she pleads the child's case, identifying herself and child as unclean. Jesus baits her response, and she fights for the healing of her child. The point is not whether she won the argument, this is the only occasion in the Scriptures where the reason a person is healed is not “Your Faith has made you well” but rather her reasoning, proving the case. She is a model of how all of us, Jew or Gentile, Slave or Free, Male or Female is to advocate for the wholeness of those we love. I have known persons who stuttered. It is a helpless frustrating feeling of wanting to fix the person, wanting to communicate without this barrier. Each of those I have known has felt a level of shame about their impediment, they wanted to hide, they wanted to not been seen, to not be the center of attention as a fool, which the stuttering did to them. Increasingly, I am convinced one of the implicit issues of faith is redeeming people from their shame. The Gospel describes a group bring this man to Jesus. The first thing Jesus did, was to take him off to a different place by themselves. The second was to touch him. Touch is a level of communication, of connection beyond words. Then Jesus does the most amazing thing, the Bible records “Jesus spit on his fingers and touched his tongue.” As children, did you ever have a cowlick that would not lay down, and your parent wet their fingers and held it down, or you had chocolate on your face, and with “Mom spit” it was rubbed off? Have you ever done this to another? It is an automatic response of love and affection. You want the very best for the other, so you put your scent and moisture and mark upon them, making them clean. Here, I am convinced the Revised Standard Version mis-translated the text. In Verse 34 the RSV says he looked up to heaven and “sighed.” There are places where God sighs. But here the Greek word better translates as “Jesus Groaned.” This is gutteral, it is primordial, it is a sound of maximum effort. Afterward, Jesus says “Ephathah” which is Aramaic for “Be Opened!” That is the point, the wish of Jesus for every type of fool, of Jesus being our Advocate, whether for those who cannot speak, cannot hear, have a child who is ill or circumstance beyond their control which makes them outcast as a fool, those who have to fight to be heard, even by representing the foolishness of the other's argument, or those who are Naive to Wisdom, those who are Self-Confident Fools, those who are Committed to being Wrong, and those who Arrogantly Scorn the world.

"A Listening Heart" August 16,2015

I Kings 2: 1-4 John 6: 51-58 (This is a sermon of simultaneous words and actions. The preacher needs 4 bread bagetes, 3 large round loaves {about 12” in diameter}, 2 Communion Chalices and 1 white flat bedsheet or Tablecoth. Periodically throughout the preaching of the sermon, the preacher places an additional loaf upon the Communion Table. 1 Round loaf at the end of the Table. 1 Round loaf adjacent to the first. A bagete on either side of the second loaf. Another round loaf, then two bagetes, then the 2 cups. At the conclusion of the sermon, a large white sheet is placed over the elements, revealing the shape of Jesus' human body on the Table.) We went to the Latest Superhero Movie, and just before the lights went out, I whispered to my wife: “If you could have any super power, anything unique to you, what would it be?” Would you want to be invisible, to be invincible, to fly? The question for Solomon is that God promised David that his child would be King, then as king, is asked by God what would you want? To be rich, to be healthy, to be loved? We have paraphrased Solomon asking for Wisdom, what he literally requested was “A Listening Heart.” Compare this to Pharaoh's Hard-Heart! Compare this to Warriors with the Heart of a Lion. Compare this to those who die of a Weak heart, or Love. A Listening Heart is description of compassion. Ironically, like the Wizard gifting the Scarecrow a Diploma instead of a Brain, the Lion a Badge instead of Courage, the Tin Man a Clock instead of a Heart, what God gave to Solomon WAS Wisdom, and not a Listening Heart. Would that there could be a leader with Wisdom & Compassion! Heart and Mind, Flesh and Blood. The Lectionary only has us read a few verses, when the Book of Kings in total, describes both the right hand and the left. This is history similar to the Book of Deuteronomy where like the Book of Judges, each leader did what was right in their own heart, until they turned around and sought God. Once upon a time there was a prince, who following the death of his father, married a princess and settled down to live happily ever after, when God appeared to him in a dream offering whatever he desired. Being a humble man, the new King described, “I am only a child, therefore give your servant a Listening Heart to govern your people discerning between good and evil.” The wisdom of the King was written down as the Book of Proverbs, attracting blessings from nations around the world, as the king built cities, and a navy, temples and palaces, during a time of 40 years of peace and prosperity. This King is remembered throughout the histories of every culture of the world, as Wisest of Wise, Greatest of Kings, with the Greatest of Wealth, the Greatest of commitment from his people, the most grand temple ever built for God. Once upon a time there was a prince, who like Michael Corleone in The Godfather II, following the death of his father, killed his elder brother Fredo, I mean Abithai who was the principle competitor for power; then killed Joab his father's General for not doing exactly what the king commanded in being merciful to Absalom. Then believing himself to have divine wisdom and a divine mandate, he built the kingdom of his dreams, a kingdom of power, prestige, 700 wives and 300 concubines. To support his extravagance the king levied heavy taxes. To complete his building programs he forced thousands into slavery, as had happened under the Pharaohs of Egypt. To support his desire for spirituality, he brought together all the idols and sacrifices of every pagan worship intermixed with the faith of Israel, so that people could not differentiate between child sacrifice, abomination, and the Word of the Lord. After 40 years he died and the Northern tribes rebelled abandoning the Southern Kingdom of Judah and its Capital at Jerusalem. Both of these are equally true descriptions of Solomon. He was the wisest of Kings, he was the greatest of fools. He was the embodiment of everything Samuel had warned the Nation about having a King. The Temple he built was three stories tall, with 30 foot tall free-standing bronze columns the tops of which were carved with lilies. Cedar ceilings, Cyprus Floors, Olive wood doors, and enough gold ornamentation to have bankrupted Fort Knox. The Daily menu for Solomon's Court required 1,000 measures of flour; 10 Oxen, 20 Steers, 100 Sheep, ample sides of deer, antelope, gazelle, roebuck and fattened fowl. Reading the passages selected, there is an idea which often comes Mid-August of asking “SO WHAT!” Solomon was King over 900 years before Jesus Birth! Jesus had a lengthy argument over the quality of his sacrifice with the Judeans, over 2000 years ago! I recognize that Biblical Scholars from Augustine to Luther to Calvin to my own professors of Theology and the Bible have identified there was controversy in the early Church over the importance or lack thereof in celebrating the Lord's Supper. But what does bread and wine representing Jesus' flesh and blood, have to do with life, when a daughter is Anorexic, or a spouse has Parkinson's, or a loved one being in a life and death dangerous situation, or College loans becoming greater than Mortgage Debt? Like the crowds, we grow tired of abstract phrases and metaphors about Jesus being “the Bread of Life,” taking my flesh into your flesh and drinking my blood. And we want to scream “Stop all the Nonsense, we need something better than metaphors and empty abstract phrases!” To which, Jesus has one of those moments like an exasperated child speaking to an adult, where turning from the crowd, he speaks directly into the camera, right to us, saying “I am telling you the gospel truth. If you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, not simply consuming religious ritual but gnawing on the bones of what this is about, you will not have life in yourself. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life.” Greek had two different verbs for eating, Phagein meaning to eat to consume, and Trogein meaning to gnaw and chew, working at digesting, and here Jesus used both, to emphasize communion is about receiving, but more an experience of life to be worked at. This passage, along with the New Testament Letters were the reason behind Roman persecutions of Christians for Cannibalism! In her book The River, Flannery O'Connor described a child trying to re-enact his baptism, by going too deep into the water to see the Kingdom of God. When criticized, O'Connor explained saying: In a world where nearly everyone is nearly blind, you have to draw really big caricatures. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are about Life and Death. This is not simply about religion, or good/ bad, or wisdom/ understanding. What Jesus said was “My flesh and blood are the real food and drink.” And suddenly we recognize Jesus is serious! This is not theory or metaphor... When the South Sudanese: Andrew, Jacob and John first arrived in Syracuse, I remember our members showing them that we had provided them everything we could think they might need or want, Can-openers, potholders, pots and pans and flower vases, coats and sweaters, dressers and beds and sheets and pillows and pillowcases. When one asked, “Thank you, but where are our Bibles? We were taken at gunpoint to a river filled with hippopotamus and crocodiles, and we did not know how to swim, and they shot at us as we made our way back into the war-zone that was our home, all the while praying to God that we wanted to believe, we wanted to read for ourselves the word of God. Where are Bibles?” When I went to South Sudan the first time, that night there was gunfire. The next morning at worship, it was explained that a man had come home and found his wife with another man and shot them dead. The Pastor had described how their blood had drained into the ground, and this sand that was their home and their bed, now contained their life blood. When I began to preach the sermon, I knelt down and taking a pinch of sand from the ground put it in my mouth and swallowed. “Your flesh is my flesh, your blood is in me. To eat flesh and drink blood was brutal animal-like slaughter. When we celebrate the Sacrament, we tend to treat this as sacred, holy, serving, it is a prayerful act; whereas what Jesus was naming was confrontation of our sin, claiming and owning our brokenness and unwillingness to forgive or be forgiven, the only remedy for which is for Jesus to offer his own flesh for our division and his blood for our redemption. It is difficult for us to imagine just how offensive Jesus' words were to the Judeans. 7 Times Jesus said “Eat Me!” In Aramaic, the common language of the Disciples' time, the title for the Devil was not Beelzebub, or Valdemort, Lucifer, or Satan, but “Flesh Eater!” In Judaism, eating flesh and drinking blood were Evil. According to Leviticus, blood and the fatty flesh were ritually dedicated exclusively to God, because this is the seat of life. Life blood is from God, and belongs to God, so to consume blood was to claim a sacrifice, to try to be like God! Jesus' Words sound like the Serpent in the Garden of Eden, “Eat of it, you will be like God!” Yet, here we are not at the beginning of Creation, but near the Climax of the Gospel with the Messiah with us. George Barna leads one of the great survey research programs internationally. A few years ago, the Barna group asked what are the words we all most long to hear? What they found were three phrases: “I love you” “I forgive you” and “Dinner Time” in offering his flesh and blood, Jesus said all three.