"Seeing Advent" November 27, 2016

Exodus 33 Isaiah 2: 1-5 Matthew 24:36-44 What was your favorite part of Thanksgiving? Thirty some years ago, I offered to clean and stuff the turkey for my wife’s grandmother, and somehow that became my job. When children came along, we taught them to make pie crusts, and one prefers Apple, another Cherry, a third Pumpkin, and another Mincemeat. One person prefers homemade Cranberry sauce, while another has childhood memories that Cranberry sauce needs to have the rings from the inside of a can. But far and away, my favorite part of Thanksgiving is the opportunity with family and friends to stop and give thanks to God for just how blessed we are. I recognize that my ailments of the last few years all trace back to a bad fall from a ladder, and there have been many times when I feared, I might have to retire at age 58 no longer able to carry a baby around the Sanctuary, no longer able to endure standing to preach, no longer able to marry couples, in the last two years enduring 4 knee surgeries and recovery to be able to hope there could be life after. Looking round the table to my bride and our children, to places that had been occupied by grandparents and now were filled with new friends. We dare not take this life for granted, but pause in Sabbath before the coming Advent to give Thanks to God. It seems as though we have been on a spiraling treadmill, accelerating in speed. There was one Convention, then the Olympics, then another Convention, then Labor Day and the Start of School, Halloween, the Election, Veterans’ Day and Thanksgiving and we are off on the marathon to Christmas, New Years… Life is coming at us like headlights in the dark, and all we have known to do is to keep going onward. But Advent is about envisioning something different. Christian Faith is about Seeing the Advent of things around us. Seeing differently. That where others might simply see Water, we envision the Grace of God and Spirit of God washing over all of us in Forgiveness. Where others might see a simple meal of Bread and Wine, we envision a foretaste of the Kingdom of God, where there are no divisions, no hate, but we are gifted to see through the broken-ness to witness the Glory of God. The Book of Isaiah begins with an indictment of the way things are, the corruptions, the wars, the way people like sheep each try to get their own not concerned about anyone else, trodding down the grass and muddying the waters for others. When suddenly in Chapter Two The Prophet Isaiah, son of the High Priest Amoz, records “Seeing the Word of God.” That is not the way in which we talk is it? Ordinarily, we hear the Word. But the Word which came to Isaiah came as a Vision much as Martin Luther King Jr described having a Dream of world beyond Racism, and John F. Kennedy envisioned Americans landing on the Moon. Isaiah’s Vision was of a future where there would be no war no more. Growing up, my family had a sailboat, and my father loved to take us sailing. He taught each of us, to turn your head, until you could feel the wind equally in both ears, in this way knowing which way the wind blew and came from. When we got a little older, he would have us trade places with him at the tiller to steer. While the temptation was to jerk the tiller back and forth, or to allow the wind to blow where it would, the instruction we received was to pick a point on the far horizon and keep the bow headed in that direction. Most often that point was a barn atop a high hill, or some other beacon in the distance. Isaiah’s prophecy was of Seeing the Mountain of God as that landmark that everyone chose to head for. Instead of each going off in their own direction, or competing as in a race, everyone was drawn to the glory of God. The point is not that all the world would come to be Jewish, or Christian, but that instead of simply going wherever the wind blew, or going off in our own directions, we would each seek God. I love the image, that when the Hebrew people realized they had done wrong by fashioning a golden calf as an idol for themselves, Moses used to set the Tent of Meeting outside their encampment, and when he went in to meet with God, every person stood at the door of their tent to watch. Yet still Moses sought something greater, to be able to witness the Glory of God, and God made accommodation that Moses could be hid in a crag in the rock by the hand of God, until God passed, then Moses could witness where God had been, and evidence of God’s presence but not where God was going. The English Translations of the Bible describe Isaiah’s Vision being “It shall come to pass in the Latter Days” but that is not exactly what the Hebrew says. The Hebrew is more like “In the back of the days” or better “In the midst of the present.” What Isaiah is describing is that the Present is Pregnant with God’s Presence. There is a subtlety to life, that God is about to do a new thing, and we need to be atuned to Witness God’s Doing a New Thing. In Matthew, Jesus described that this is like the time of Noah, when God took away all that was ordinary and God preserved a tiny remnant, only a couple of each kind. Over the Centuries this passage has been taken by the Left Behind Movement, to emphasize that you better get yourself in order, because the Cloud is coming and you do not want to get left out. But ironically, what Jesus said was just the opposite. That those who were unworthy would be the ones taken, and the ones left behind were the ones chosen by God to inherit the earth. Suddenly our seasons changed. A week ago yesterday it was 65 degrees in Central New York. People were outside in t-shirts and shorts. Now the snow lays all about, the skies are overcast and gray, and sunlight itself seems different. Advent requires that we see life differently. Instead of the rat-race we have been about, to stop, rather than escalating fear and distrust we need to be about making our technology into something new. When I was very young, we had a wooden train-set, made by the Larabee family here in Skaneateles New York, perhaps you had one too. At the time, I did not know of Skaneateles, but those train tracks had with them blocks for houses, and a red block with two adjoining rectangles like the towers of our church. I am told that there used to be an actual train that ran from Syracuse to Skaneateles, the Station and Wheel House being where the Banks and Tops Grocery is on Fennel Street. But that when the train stopped running, an there were a pair of steel tracks reaching all the way from here to Syracuse, that someone took up the steel and had it sliced into razor blades! That is a story about recycling and making Smooth-faced men out of the railroad pioneers who settled this territory! The added emphasis of the Scriptures is that the steel of Swords and Weapons would be folded over, heated and hammered growing in strength to be made into plows to cut the earth and rock. It seems I can no longer read this passage from Matthew, about the thief breaking in at night, without recalling our first year here. That we were having a new roof put on our home, and the College-aged roofers arrived each morning, often before our sons came down to watch television, or my wife and I to make coffee. Late Friday night, our Dog began making a ruckus, and having already been to Town Court because of her barking, we quieted her down and went back to sleep. On Saturday morning, I came downstairs and found a young man with torn slacks, looking very disheveled, asleep on our couch. I walked passed to make coffee, resolving that it must be one of the roofers who was not feeling well and had come in to rest. But the more I thought that, the more presumptuous it seemed. SO, I took a cup of coffee and roused the man from sleep. He inquired where he was, and said he had been at a Wedding Rehearsal the night before where the other Groomsmen had urged him to drink too much. He had known the family who lived in this house before us, and knew how to break in quite quietly, so as to find rest. After we were certain he was safe and had finished his coffee we sent him on his way. BUT you need to know there are many connections in this Village, and if you name to a pastor that you were at a Wedding Rehearsal the night before, it does not take 3 minutes for the clergy to know at which church and who is responsible. Twenty minutes later the Priest, the young man and his father, were back at our home apologizing for breaking our back door and disturbing our sleep. We thought nothing more of it, and said nothing to anyone. Until one of the College students from the Church came home for Christmas, and described that there were instructions being given at parties, that if you have had too much to drink, Go to the Pastor’s house, the Back door is open, they will make certain you are safe and give you coffee in the morning before sending you on your way. And I decided that was not a bad reputation for the Pastor to have.

"And we Feared the Election" November 13, 2016

Exodus 12 Haggai 1: 14 – 2:9 Luke 20: 27 – 21:19 Perhaps I am wrong. I need you to tell me and I need to listen to understand better. It seems as though the whole world, particularly our Nation, are angry and afraid. A majority of our nation, both Republican and Democrat and Libertarian sincerely believe our system is broken and corrupt. Fear and anger is present across our lives. Perhaps it was more covert before, but the election brought this to a boiling point. I believe it would have taken place whomever won, but before the election, I feared that our Nation was so divided in our realities, we might not heal. Ever since the election, there have been riots in the streets in New York City, LA, Chicago, San Francisco. A retired minister wrote to me “I am thankful I do not have to preach this week. I need to listen. We need to listen. I need to be challenged to hear and to pay attention to what I had not heard. What I had not known to listen to” The Word I have for you is: 101 verses in the Bible say “Fear Not, I Am with you!” It is the basis of God’s Call to Abram, and what the Angel says to women at the tomb. On Monday, I came upon our sermon title, before the Election occurred. When Bible passages appointed for this day include death of 7 husbands, not trusting leaders, destruction, Signs of the End of the World, there is worse than who wins an election! The First Word I hope you will hear this morning, is ABOUT BEING AFRAID… There is a distinction between Acute Fear and Chronic Fear. Acute Fear is normal, immediate fear that protects your child from danger / that causes you to scream. Chronic Fear is a perpetual state of oppression, where you know not why you are afraid, only that going on is intolerable. In Chronic Fear, people have been known to project our fears on to others, to cause others to suffer so we do not feel so bad. Tuesday morning, the Clergy of our community met together as we do monthly. The School Superintendent shared that over the last 24 months, a group of students have been visiting an Internet chat-room, where they posted screenshots of themselves and guns, descriptions: “Going hunting for… (derogatory names ethnic groups).” This racism and aggression crossed a line. Out of pastoral concern, that our Village and Town not become another Columbine or Sandy Hook, I was prepared and impassioned to speak. That racism and intolerance, persecuting others because of our fears, particularly minorities and marginalized groups were among the evils of Nazism and Fascism and cannot be tolerated by us as Christians. As a Pastor in this community, I feel embarrassment at being a first-responder rather than a prophet. At witnessing the signs and not speaking out. Our son in 3rd grade had a classmate whose father not only committed domestic violence, he took a baseball bat to the hospital and killed his wife. I remember the Sunday morning, with helicopters flying over the lake and village, when an off-duty Police Officer and his fiancé were run over by another boat, and those who committed the crime went home to be hidden their family. As a pastor in this community, I knelt before the altar at the Catholic Church during his funeral mass and wept. I remember the feeling of helplessness as a pastor knowing that field-parties were going on and we knew not what to do. So I am speaking out to say “No! Fear not! Trust that God is with you.” Wednesday morning, we awoke to news of the election of our 45th President. During the election, there were references to our current President, just as there are now to our President Elect, that this is “Not My President.” When a person is elected to Office, and swears an oath before God to fulfill the responsibilities of that office, they are our Leaders. Regardless of whether you like them, we the people have responsibility to listen and pray for the Office. The second is to TRUST GOD IS WITH US… Imagine you were among the Hebrew slaves. Suddenly, Moses and Aaron came describing that every household needs to take a lamb into their home to bond with, as a pet of their family. Then, after the lamb has lived under your roof, been cared for/loved by your children and grandchildren, after you have nursed it from a bottle, and have the smell of the lamb upon you and you on him, you are to sacrifice the lamb for your sacrifices. Sacrificing your lamb, you are to anoint the doorways of your house with the blood. The blood of your sacrifice will be a sign upon you and for God that you already were sacrificed for. Haggai is from a time 1000 years after the Exodus. Haggai wrote one of the shortest books of the Bible, a total of 37 verses. However, Haggai is a pivotal text for the Bible. Returning from Babylon to the land of Moses and King David, they barely scratched out survival. Haggai challenged that things would never get better until they first built the Temple as a House of God. Refugees of 70 years of captivity, with little in the way of funding, the stones they laid upon stones could not compare to what the Temple had once been. Haggai’s sermon described it is not the stones they laid up for themselves, but “what God will Make Out of the House of Israel.” Haggai promises “From the poverty, despair and factionalism of this people, the Lord promises deliverance.” Rather than a stewardship sermon, about all of your gold and silver belong to God, the word translated here as “prosperity” is actually “shalom” which we know to be about peace, justice and righteousness. THIRD is Jesus called us to SEE THINGS AS THEY ARE WITH GOD, not in FEAR… Turning to the Gospel, the Saducees attempted to trap Jesus in a philosophical argument about the resurrection. At that time, the purpose of marriage was procreation, to leave behind a legacy in this life, so if a couple were unable to conceive and the man died, his nearest relative had responsibility to take her as wife, with the caveat that any children they had, were children of the first husband. So if 7 brothers each inherited a wife, and none had children, in heaven whose wife was she? To which Jesus points at their making a farce of tragic events. First, Resurrection is not about inheritance, but in this life she had such tragedy. Second, God is God of the living, and God named to Moses, being: God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, so these live. Third, the Son of Man is Lord even over King David. Fourth, leaders are human beings who love power / influence and are not trusted. Then Jesus made a wordplay using Haggai’s phrase “one stone stacked on another” to describe how we build generation atop generation, when in fact all pass away and are resurrected. But the end of our lives, even the destruction of our establishments is not The End of the World, so fear not. Personally, I have been emboldened and proud of both President Elect Trump and President Obama, who after the election attempted to put people’s fears to rest. Both described that we need to work together as the United States. Both mentioned the fear and brokenness of our Nation as never before. I heard from each the need to go back and listen, to hear what had been ignored, to re-assess and go on together. What I did not hear from either, what is difficult for politicians ever to admit, but is the basis of our Confession as Christians is “We have done wrong, we will change.”

"A Story In A Story In A Story" November 6, 2016

Exodus 1-2 Luke 19: 1-10 There are preachers whose entire sermons are on words like “Salvation!” There are churches, which preach only political issues. My Calling has always been to preach the Bible, and whether Hebrew Testament or New as Our Story of Faith. Particularly, that instead of focusing on a word, or a character, or a story, I am especially intrigued when stories are like ripples in water, or nesting dolls, with one story helping to interpret another, helping to interpret another, which is what I believe we have in both this morning. Because life events do not come out of thin air, the circumstances of today have been building and will have ramifications for our future. Life is a parable, inside a riddle, inside an enigma, within a mystery of faith. Most of us know and love the image of Moses, being found as an infant by Pharaoh’s daughter. But the story within a story has so much more for us to think about and ponder in faith. For the last month we have been retelling the Ancient Genesis story that God is The Creator, yet God created Humanity with a Freedom of Will, and we sought our own desires, not God. The flood waters came, and afterward God began anew with one individual Abram, and a promise that: a nomad, called to leave everything he knew to trust and follow God, Abram, would father Great Nations and Generations, who would have a Great Name and a Great Land. Pushing beyond what we think possible, Abraham and Sarah gave birth to a miracle, when they are 100 and 80 years of age, a child Isaac, whose name means laughter. After Abram, through Isaac and Rebekkah, God provided the birth of the nations of Israel and Edom. Israel had 12 sons and a daughter, who although they sinned against one another, God used circumstance for their survival and reconciliation. At this point in the story of God’s promise with Abraham, inside the story of Isaac, within the Jacob and Esau story, all the world endured a Famine. Just as today, famine comes from war with one nation poisoning the ground of another; or by climate change of drought, heat, flooding, cold. With Joseph as Governor of Egypt for Pharaoh, all Israel went down to Egypt as foreigners in a foreign land. Generations passed, for Israel and for Egypt. The new Pharaoh neither knew nor honored Joseph or his fathers, or God. The new Pharaoh did not believe, made himself as a god, and the people as slaves. The 1st genocide was loss of faith. Then loss of the economy. Then loss of tools and equipment. The loss of freedoms. Then harder and harder bondage, as slaves building the Temples for the burial of Pharaohs for eternity. Still Pharaoh feared and hated the people, so he ordered the Midwives to kill all the Hebrew baby boys, allowing the girls to live. Think on the foolishness of Pharaoh here! The role of Midwives when a baby is healthy is to stay out of the way. When a baby or mother will not survive, then the Midwife’s purpose is to aid life! But Pharaoh has commanded these two to kill. What Pharaoh did not know or understand is that Shiphrah and Puah feared and loved God, more than Pharaoh. Pharaoh then bypassed the Middle-wives and goes directly to what Pharaoh thinks is the source of Israelites, their mothers. Pharaoh orders them to put their baby boys into the river to drown. Except, again Pharaoh misses that these circumstance are part of the faith story. The river in Egypt is the Nile, and the Nile in faith, is the source of life! So he as a self-proclaimed god has ordered mothers to drown their babies in the source of life! And a couple, descended from the tribe of Priests, give birth to a child whom they love and protect. When they can no longer, they place the child in a basket of bulrushes made water-tight with pitch and bitumen, in order to keep this remnant safe and alive on chaotic waters. Did we ever have another story like this? Noah and the Ark, this basket is the ark. And the end of that story, was God’s creation of a Covenant, a rainbow. Here, with Moses, God is creating a new Covenant to protect and save Israel inside a basket an ark, foreshadowing that later God will provide an Ark of the Covenant between Israel and God on tablets of stone. Every relationship and circumstance of life affects us and is part of other events and relationships in our lives. None of us act in the abstract, we act because our story is part of other people’s stories, part of the Biblical story, part of the story of God. More than all the Gospels, Luke tells the story of Jesus healing people. Mark deals with Jesus being The Messiah. Matthew, Jesus fulfills all the Prophecy and Scripture of the Hebrew Bible. John, that Jesus whole life was miraculous. Luke tells stories in parable and story-form of people meeting, being healed and redeemed, by Jesus. Two weeks ago, we told the parable in Chapter 18, of Pharisee and Tax Collector. In Chapter 19, on his way to the cross at Jerusalem, Jesus was on the road to Jericho. Do you recall the story of another man on the road between Jericho and Jerusalem… That is the Good Samaritan, where the road out in the world is a dangerous place. And Jesus met a stranger, described only as a rich young ruler, who asks “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus instructs him to follow the 10 Commandments, which he says he has done all his life. Then Jesus says, “Go, sell all you have to feed the poor, and come follow me.” And the man went away sorrowful. I have to believe that that rich, young ruler, was of the class of Phariees. Scribes were literalists, taught to copy exactly letter for letter the Law and Commandments. Pharisees, were the sons of the wealthy, highly educated in the Law and Philosophy, taught to interpret and apply the Law. He was young and powerful and rich. In Chapter 20 this morning, still in Jericho, through Jesus we meet The Chief Tax Collector, Zaccheus we know from the children’s rhyme was a Wee Little Man. That may be indication he was not tall, it may also be that he was hated by people, making him small in character. We have this caricature of a Danny Devito-like figure running in robes to try to climb up a tree, because witnessing Jesus is important to him. In the ancient world, a Sycamore tree is often mentioned because they were common, they look a great deal like Fig Trees, except they produce no figs! And they are sometimes equated with being the Garden of Eden Tree of Everlasting Life. When Jesus reached the place in the road beneath the tree, Jesus stopped and invited Zaccheus to come down to be with Jesus in Zaccheus’ house for a meal. Sharing a meal, was more than eating a sandwich, this was a statement of trust and fellowship communion. Inside Zaccheus’ house we have this vow. Strangely, in all the Bibles they have translated this vow as being in “a past-present-future tense,” where he promises on the basis of Jesus’ visit, Zaccheus reflected on his past, and will ever after give 4 times as much as he has stolen from others. However, in all ancient literature, this is the only occasion of anyone ever using a present-future tense. A different possibility, is that Zaccheus was confessing to Jesus, like the rich young ruler had done regarding the 10 Commandments, what no one knew Zaccheus had done throughout his life. While the Law required making an offering of 10% to the poor, and for stolen goods returning what was stolen plus 20%; Zaccheus had always given half of what he received to the poor, and for ill-gotten gains he paid 400% restitution. For this story, this confession, Jesus describes this day, Salvation has come to this a Child of Israel. When Jesus left the house of Zaccheus, on his way out of Jericho, on the road to the Cross at Jerusalem, he met a blind beggar on the curb, named Bartimaeus, who seeks out Jesus. Reading one story as holding and interpreting another, I wonder if Bartimaeus could well be that same Rich, Young Ruler, whom we earlier identified as the Pharisee, who went away unsatisfied. That wandering away, he reflected on Jesus and what he had said, and although he struggled with the cost, he went ahead and sold all he had, giving to the poor. At which point, the formerly rich, young, powerful, Pharisee: Bartimaeus, now was poor and realizes he has been blind all his life. This person on the roadside cries out with a Hebrew phrase, meaning “Son of David, Have Mercy on Me” that phrase which then gets picked up and repeated by the crowd waving Palm branches, in Hebrew was “Hosanna, Hosanna.”