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Reflection for the 1st Sunday of Lent 2016

extreme-makeover

Getting back to
Eden.

What does Scripture say? The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart —that is, the word of faith that we preach—, for, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

This reflection is focused on the scriptures for the First Sunday of Lent and our Lenten preaching theme – Getting back to Eden.

St. Paul is writing to the Church at Rome reminding them that they have word.

The word had been given to them and they committed it, not just to rote memory. Rather, the word became a real and meaningful part of their lives. Their reception of God’s word was life changing.

God’s word was in their hearts and their actions were changed by it. Wherever they went, the word was on their lips and they proclaimed it.

The Church at Rome received the wonderful gift of the word and that word was transformative in their lives. They were changed by it. Their confession of faith – a confession that was through and throughout their lives – saved them. That word, that salvation made such a huge difference that over the next three centuries those at Rome were willing to suffer and die for the word.

Now we’ve used a rather big word here. God’s word was “transformative” to these people. What does that mean? It means they were changed at three essential levels.

The transformative effect of God’s word changed them (1) Psychologically – they had a new understanding of who they were. (2) Convictionally – they were part of a new and powerful belief system. (3) Behaviorally – every part of their lifestyle was changed.

Getting back to Eden starts with the realization that our exile is over. The people of Rome heard that. It changed them. They were cast out and are now being let in. The gates that were closed to them have been opened. That powerful image made real in the Good News – the word – transformed the people of Rome. That powerful word transforms to this day. It has transformed the life of every person who has come to belief in Jesus by faith.

Like the Church at Rome we have received God’s word. We have found faith in Jesus and have pledged our lives to Him. We confess His name and believe in our hearts that God raised Him from the dead. We recognize we are saved and on the road back to Eden. So let us re-double our efforts in making His word active in our daily lives. Let us, like Rome, be mindful of the wonderful gift – the beautiful word – that is ours. Let us strengthen our faith, proclaim it, and allow it to work its transformative effect in our lives.

Christian Witness, Homilies, , ,

Reflection for Palm Sunday 2015

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Let us be poured
out for Him.

When he was in Bethany reclining at table in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of perfumed oil, costly genuine spikenard. She broke the alabaster jar and poured it on his head. There were some who were indignant. “Why has there been this waste of perfumed oil? It could have been sold for more than three hundred days’ wages and the money given to the poor.” They were infuriated with her. Jesus said, “Let her alone. Why do you make trouble for her? She has done a good thing for me.”

Twelve days after Christmas we celebrate the visit of the Magi, the Kings, the Wise men. They came to pour out their gifts for Jesus – gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. So too they poured out the time (almost a year), effort, and treasure it took to make the journey. Their gifts were poured out with joy in recognition of Jesus’ kingship and were also poured out in preparation for His burial.

Jesus comes to Jerusalem, well aware of what was to occur. As He enters the city the people pour out praise. They acclaim Him King, the One who comes in the Name of the Lord.

Today a woman comes and pours out costly perfume for Jesus. Mark notes that she anoints His head. John says she anointed His feet and washed them with her tears. In either case, she pours out her time, treasure, and tears for Jesus. She stands up to ridicule and pours out an embarrassing amount of love for Jesus, her Savior.

In Good Friday’s reading of the Passion we hear of Joseph of Arimathe’a and Nicode’mus who will come, risking their lives before Pilate and those who plotted against Jesus, asking for His body. Nicode’mus pours out a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds’ weight.

Throughout Jesus’ earthly ministry people came to Him. They poured out their sins, needs, troubles and tears. They poured out their expectations and their love. They poured out hatred and mistrust as well. For thousands of years since people have continued to do the same.

For all that humanity has poured out, Jesus came to pour out far more. He did not limit His ministry to what was being poured out to Him, but rather poured Himself out to take all darkness away. Through His pouring out we have been freed. Even what we fear to pour out is taken away. The deepest and darkest recesses of our lives – the places were sin and evil have taken root – Jesus came to take those away. Psalm 116 asks: What shall I return to the LORD for all his goodness to me? Let us pour out faithfulness, love, praise, worship and thanksgiving to Jesus who poured Himself out for us.

Christian Witness, Homilies, , , ,

Reflection for the Fourth Sunday of Lent 2015

What is from
God?

God's free gift

In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah, the LORD inspired King Cyrus of Persia to issue this proclamation throughout his kingdom, both by word of mouth and in writing: “Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia: All the kingdoms of the earth the LORD, the God of heaven, has given to me, and he has also charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever, therefore, among you belongs to any part of his people, let him go up, and may his God be with him!”

Cyrus the Great is counted as the patron who delivered Israel from Babylonian captivity. Cyrus was the king of Persia. He was not Jewish. There is some speculation as to his religion, but as with many civil rulers to this day he believed in whatever may have suited him politically at the moment. So here is this politically savvy ruler who captured Persia, founded the Achaemenid Empire and conquered most of Southwest and Central Asia and the Caucasus. His rule stretched from the Mediterranean Sea in the west to the Indus River in the east. So why, in the first year of his reign, would he make a decree that the Temple should be rebuilt in Jerusalem and that the Jewish people who wished could return to their land for this purpose? He even allowed the treasures of the Temple, captured by Nebuchadnezzar, to be returned.

We can look at this like many look at faith – with incredulity. A savvy and strong political leader being generous – Who can believe that? Why would he empty his treasury and let these people go? There are all kinds of speculation as to why. Maybe it was a political move, gaining allegiance from all of the people Cyrus had conquered. Maybe he had an affinity for their belief system. Maybe… a thousand reasons.

St. Paul tells us: …by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from you; it is the gift of God. Paul tells us that God gives us tremendous gifts specifically so that we might have life. Cyrus is held up as an image of God’s generosity. Cyrus owed Israel absolutely nothing and they could do nothing for him. He had power and control and turns to these people and gives them everything.

The lesson is that God’s generosity is inestimable and unexplainable. God is self-sufficient yet desires to love and care for us He emptied His treasury and sent His only Son to die for us so we might enter into His eternal and heavenly city. What is from God is not power or security, or even health as the world understands those things. It is the gift of faith that is far more generous. By the gift of faith that is from God alone we enter into relationship with Him have life for all of eternity.

Christian Witness, Homilies,

Reflection for the Second Sunday of Lent 2015

faith and worry

Sometimes the test
is almost impossible.

God put Abraham to the test. He called to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am!” he replied. Then God said: “Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah. There you shall offer him up as a holocaust on a height that I will point out to you.”

Over recent weeks it seems that the number of troubles among those I know have increased greatly. These aren’t little problems, but those deep, life-shattering types of troubles that some may never experience. How life-shattering it must have been for Abraham, to face having to sacrifice his son.

A preacher was delivering a sermon before a large congregation. He pointed out that believers aren’t exempt from trouble. In fact, some Christians are surrounded by trouble — trouble to the right, trouble to the left, trouble in front, and trouble behind. At this, a man stood up and shouted, ‘Glory to God, it’s always open at the top!’

God’s test of Abraham’s faith was exactly about that. We can imagine that in walking to Mount Moriah, with his son carrying the wood that he would be sacrificed on, Abraham was in tears. His heart was breaking, the knife at his side weighed heavy, and his soul was crying out to God. He climbed the hills where Jerusalem would later stand, where the sacrificial fires of the Temple would be built, the place where Jesus would take up the wood of the cross (as Isaac carried the wood for his sacrifice). He was surrounded on every side, front and back, and could not help but look up.

What happened when Abraham and Isaac arrived at God’s designated site of sacrifice? …the LORD’s messenger called to him from heaven, “Abraham, Abraham!” “Here I am!” he answered. “Do not lay your hand on the boy,” said the messenger. “Do not do the least thing to him. I know now how devoted you are to God.” The response to Abraham’s troubles came from on high, from the top, from heaven.

Here’s the real test. Can we trust God enough to look up when those life-shattering troubles come? Can we place our reliance on Him? St. James noted: Count it all joy, my brethren, when you meet various trials, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. Troubles will either break us down, seem impossible, and cause us to look down or they will teach us to persevere and look up to heaven. The promise is that our perseverance, our looking up, will be rewarded and that we will lack for nothing particularly in eternity. We should repeat with the Psalmist: From whence does my help come? and answer: My help comes from the LORD.

Homilies,

Reflection for the First Sunday of Lent 2015

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The time is
here and now.

After John had been arrested, Jesus went into Galilee. There he proclaimed the Good News from God. ‘The time has come’ he said ‘and the kingdom of God is close at hand. Repent, and believe the Good News.’

Mark’s rendition of Jesus’ time in the desert is very short. It also focuses us on one of Mark’s key themes; Jesus’ ministry is confrontational. Think of the very real confrontations with sin, temptation, and wild beasts that Jesus engaged in in the desert. Mark shows Jesus as the One who had come to combat and defeat the forces determined to counteract God’s will for our lives and our well-being.

Mark does not portray Jesus as sent to fight human ignorance, religious or political authority. He wasn’t that kind of revolutionary. Of course those things existed, but they were only the symbols and tools of what Jesus was really confronting. Jesus came to confront the evil, the negative spiritual force that oppresses human bodies and minds and defy human attempts to subdue them.

Jesus’ experience in the wild and untamed wilderness symbolizes the difference between God’s way of life and the wilderness of life without God. The desert shows us how Jesus confronted and defeated the powers of chaos and destruction. He walked out of the desert as a victor and the bringer of God’s kingdom. He began to proclaim the kingdom to all who would hear Him.

Jesus proclamation of the in-breaking of God’s kingdom announces the arrival of God’s future for humanity. This will be a new era and a new state of affairs, one in which God rules and we no longer have to use merely human efforts to defeat evil. With the expression kingdom of God Jesus does not speak of taking people away to a new place in a far-off land. He tells those who will listen that they have the power to build the kingdom if they work in and with Him. He invites us into the kingdom’s awakening and gives us the means (by grace) to make it real and complete. The old ways and the old rules no longer have power. Evil, sin, negative spiritual forces hold no sway over us because Jesus is victorious. He has won the confrontation.

As we will see through Lent, and in particular on Good Friday, Jesus’ revolution is dangerous. As members of His kingdom and its operatives we are working to destroy the last vestiges of sin, evil, the negative spiritual force. We are the forces of the kingdom. Those tied to worldly ways and mores will resist and hate us. They are the forces of the untamed wilderness. They fight against transforming the world. The time is here and now. We must be confident kingdom builders, assured of our victory in Jesus and ready to transform all we encounter.

Christian Witness, Homilies,

Reflection for the 2nd Sunday of Passiontide (Palm Sunday) 2014

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Then Jesus said to them, “This night all of you will have your faith in me shaken, for it is written: I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be dispersed; but after I have been raised up, I shall go before you to Galilee.”

The Liturgy of the Palms is one of the most emotional liturgies for many clergy members and the faithful.

While we know that this day marks Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, we also know how the week will progress. It will later be marked by the betrayal of friends, a harsh night before false witnesses and a fixed court, mockery, a cold night in prison, the degradation in the Court of Pilate, crucifixion, death, and burial. These realities stand in stark contrast to this moment of joyous entry.

During the Liturgy of the Palms we hear the loud knock of the cross upon the door of the church. The doors swing wide and we enter as Jesus entered.

The congregation gathers around the church’s center aisle carrying palm branches. The veiled cross goes before us – always before us.

When we reach the center of the church we stop and kneel singing: Let us adore the Savior who rode in royal triumph into Jerusalem.

Then we progress to the front of the church, on the step before the altar, laying the Holy Cross down upon a pillow. We recall Jesus’ words: I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be dispersed. As those words are sung we scourge the crucifix, a solemn, salient, and very emotional recollection that His triumphal entry leads to the pillar and the cross. This is sung three times. Three times we are brought to that moment in Jesus sufferings where our sin, our abandonment of Him wounded Him so deeply.

We now enter Holy Week and we are called to live very deeply in this moment. We are called to walk with Jesus not just in His moment of triumphal entry, but also through the entirety of His Holy Week journey.

Peter stood up to boldly say (as usual): “Though all may have their faith in you shaken, mine will never be.”

We boldly say the same, and often fail as Peter did. Our faith is too often shaken and we, like Peter and the others, fail. We deny Him in big and small ways.

The key question for the week ahead and for the rest of our lives is: Will we persevere in our walk with Jesus daily? This Holy Week let us commit to walking with Him. Let us enter in triumph with Him today. Let us walk with Him to the upper room on Thursday, along the way of the cross on Friday. Let us walk to the tomb and wait there watching. Finally, let us take His hand on Easter Sunday and walk with Him into the promise of everlasting life.

Homilies, , ,

Reflection for the First Sunday of the Passiontide – 2014

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Sometimes I just
cry

When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her weeping, he became perturbed and deeply troubled, and said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Sir, come and see.” And Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him.”

‘Jesus wept’ at the death of His friend Lazarus. While the most cited passage in scripture of Jesus weeping, it wasn’t the only time He cried. Jesus wept over Jerusalem as He approached the city: “And when he drew near and saw the city he wept over it.” Jesus wept in the garden as He prayed before His betrayal: And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zeb’edee, He began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with Me.” When Jesus was dying on the cross He felt totally abandoned and alone. He cried out to His Father in deepest sadness: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”

There are several interpretations concerning Jesus’ weeping.

Jesus’ tears demonstrate that He was indeed a true man, with real bodily functions (tears, sweat, blood). His emotions and reactions were very human. In His humanity Jesus wept for His friend Lazarus.

Jesus tears also demonstrate the sorrow, sympathy, and compassion He felt for all mankind. Jesus’ tears show the rage he felt against the tyranny of death over mankind.

Jesus’ tears at the graveside showed His sympathy and empathy for all who sorrowed over Lazarus’s death. He was one with them in their sorrow.

Jesus may have cried as well at the fact that those around Him, including Martha, Mary, His apostles and disciples, and the Jewish mourners remained blind to the reality of Jesus as the Messiah. He cried in spirit because even those who were closest to him failed to recognize Him as “the resurrection and the life.”

We cry for many of the same reasons. We feel hopeless, abandoned, and sorrowful. We feel compassion and empathy for friends, family, co-workers, and others who are sad. We cry in rage over injustice. We feel hurt when we are not recognized. We cry mostly in regret over our failings and sin; the way we fall short of our commitment to the Gospel.

To cry is to pray. When we pray we cry out to God in both our need and our joy. Today we walk through our failings and face our sins with regret and sadness at having hurt God and others. We weep. Jesus sits with us and weeps with us in sympathy. He holds out His hand with the gift of forgiveness – to relieve our sadness so that our tears of regret are transformed to tears of joy at our renewal.

Christian Witness, Homilies, ,

Reflection for the 3rd Sunday of Lent – 2014

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I hope, and will not
be disappointed.

And hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. For Christ, while we were still helpless, died at the appointed time for the ungodly. Indeed, only with difficulty does one die for a just person, though perhaps for a good person one might even find courage to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

We have all been disappointed at one time or another. These disappointments may be big or small. Perhaps a spouse, child, or friend has let us down. Maybe a job didn’t come through. Maybe we didn’t win the lotto.

Depending on our experiences we may find ourselves trusting less and less in hopes and dreams. If we have been let down a lot we may find that any offer of hope leaves us cold. We may find that we cannot even grasp onto hope at all.

Faith changes that perspective. A change takes place in our psychology, in our state of life, in our ability to hope when we become true believers.

Hope seen through faith no longer leaves us cold; it warms us. Hope seen through faith allows us to reach out and grasp God’s offer of life.

Our proclamation of faith, our regeneration, brings us to peace and confidence in the hope God offers us.

What is key is that this hope is not an invented hope.

The hope we have comes to us through the outpouring of God’s love. This love flows from the action of the Holy Spirit. This is God’s perfect, free love. It remains with us and in us engendering hope – even when we fall and fail. It call us to renewal, repentance, and forgiveness. God’s love is so strong that it looked past the failings, the disloyalty, the evils committed by men and women. It looked past faults and failing with a love so strong that God came to us and offered Himself for us.

As St. Paul says, Indeed, only with difficulty does one die for a just person … but God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

Our Lord Jesus Christ is the great Peace-bringer, the Mediator between God and man. We have the proof of witnesses and history to support our hope. Jesus picked us up from our brokenness to new life, a life filled with hope.

We said we would trust on the day we accepted Jesus. Now, in our Lenten journey, we are called to renew our trust. We are called to affirm the fact that God will not disappoint us. Whenever we face suffering, disappointment, or letdowns, let us reach out to God with confidence; the hope that says: we will not be disappointed.

Christian Witness, Homilies, ,

Reflection for the 2nd Sunday of Lent – 2014

WeWillBeChanged

He saved us and called us to a holy life, not according to our works but according to his own design and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began, but now made manifest through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus, who destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.

The Lord appeared in all His heavenly glory before three chosen Apostles at the Transfiguration.

Just a short time before Jesus had asked His disciples, “Who do the people say that I am?” And they answered, “John the Baptist; but others say, Eli’jah; and others, that one of the old prophets has risen.”

The Church Fathers tell us that the primary purpose of this Transfiguration was to clarify, for them, Who and What He is – God come to earth. It was also to reassure them.

Jesus knew the suffering, pain, humiliation, and disgrace He was about to face. He would be whipped and spit on, nailed naked to a tree in front of the entire city, His mother, brothers, and sisters. And, He would die. If He had not provided this glimpse of heaven, of Himself, His followers would have been completely crushed.

To further strengthen them they heard the voice of the Father – “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”

Going forth from that mountain Peter and James and John had a lot to think about. So do we.

We know that Peter, after having seen and experienced all this, still denied Jesus. Peter, James, and John would fall asleep in the Garden twice on the night of the Lord’s arrest. None listened very well.

We have the benefit of having the testimony of witnesses to this singular event, and the testimony of these witnesses to all Jesus said and did. We know that His death was not it, but that He would return gloriously resurrected. We have the witness of centuries of holy men and women, the saints, and our own ancestors who found strength, comfort, and power through faith and in and following Jesus. Yet, we too fall and fail. We may not outwardly deny Jesus, but we do fall asleep. We falter in our commitment. We fail to listen.

During this season of repentance and self-denial we are presented with the picture of Jesus in glory – the glory He offers to all of us. As Jesus did with the Apostles, He gives us this moment to strengthen our faith while we work toward the changes we must make in our lives. We are called to stay awake, to listen, to be changed. We clearly see not only His glory, but are helped in understanding that the struggles of today are nothing compared to the glory we will see, and change we will share, in the life to come.

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