Clue

What is your favorite board game? Is it Monopoly? Are you a Cranium Fan? What about Trivial Pursuit? For a period of my youth my favorite board game was Clue.

If you are unfamiliar with the concept of Clue—a board game that even spawned a movie based on it—you can check out this website with full rules on how to play. Briefly though, one moves around his or her character into different rooms on the board, then makes suggestions about who committed a murder in that particular room and with what weapon—gory I know!  As the suggestions are disproven, the players mark off these options on their detective notebook. A player after gathering sufficient clues, then can make an accusation of who committed the murder, where, and by what method. If the accusation is correct the player wins, but if not the player is finished. Wow, those are some high stakes! This final element of Clue always provided the most enjoyable element of the game.

Strangely though, to me there never seemed that much of a difference between a suggestion and an accusation. However, as I have gotten older I see this distinction more clearly. If someone suggested that I might be somewhere at a particular time and had a particular weapon on me that would be one offensive thing, but to accuse me of actually going through with a crime seems like a much more sad and sadistic story. When I read the Old Testament lesson for this coming Sunday in which Abraham nearly kills Isaac at God’s command I get this same odd feeling, as many strange suggestions can easily be made about the main characters.

When reading Genesis 22:1-14 many of us have a hard time not hurling accusations at both Abraham and God. First, the passage begins with an unflattering depiction of God testing faithful Abraham. What kind of God does that? Then, the faithful servant actually begins to go through with the gruesome act of sacrificing his only son. Isaac the observant child that he was noticed something was off, but his father cryptically pointed to God providing the animal for sacrifice when they got to the burning site. While the story ends well with only a ram being sacrificed—maybe PETA would not think so—it always leaves me feeling like I need to take a shower or at least wash my hands. How does this story speak to who God truly is?

One of the most intriguing parts of the game Clue was the fact that the answer to all the questions surrounding the murder were hidden right within an envelope at the center of the board. In that envelope were three cards: one telling the murderer, one telling the place, and one telling the weapon. The answers were tantalizingly close! At the same time in the hands of all the players are the rest of the clues, which combined also tell the details of the crime by providing all the facts that are not in the envelope. Often when I talk about God—especially in light of this passage from Genesis—all I want is to know what lies within God’s envelope, but all I get is what is on the outside. In other words, God alone knows what truly happened between God and Abraham and Isaac. What we must do is learn about God from all the outside details.

Through Holy Scripture we maintain that Abraham was a faithful servant and God remains faithful always, but how do we rectify a God who made his servant prove devotion through a near murder? One way that Christians often move around this passage is by pointing to God not withholding Jesus, God’s only Son, when he died on the Cross. While I maintain this is a profoundly valid point, I feel it sidesteps this passage from Genesis cutting the theological meaning from underneath it. If we are to be faithful readers of this text what is God hiding in the proverbial envelope? What does this story tell us about God and us?

While we may not know the mind of God, we do know what the Scripture itself says in this passage. Abraham and the community of faith believed that God was testing the father of Isaac in that moment. We know that Abraham did not revel in that moment. We know that he sheepishly led his son who sheepishly questioned where the animal was for the sacrifice. We know that the angel stepped in to stop this homicide from taking place. We know finally that Abraham was willing to be faithful to God even if it meant giving up the one person he had hoped for and God had promised him. So is that it? Just be faithful—even if it means attempting murder? Simply put, no!

This story of being faithful was helpful to a people and it remains a source of energy and conversation for faithful people to this day. Still, we are called to be people who do not tolerate violence of any kind. We must be people who point to the figure on the Cross and say this is the terrible place where violence leads us. While we remain faithful people like Abraham, we must also be people like Isaac who willingly take on self-sacrifice in our lives. The Northern Irish author and theologian Peter Rollins once said, “Violence is the end of dialogue.”[1] When we enact any sort of violence whether physical, spiritual, or otherwise upon one another we no longer are able to share God’s peace which passes all understanding. God still gives it, but we are no longer sharing in it.

We might not know what lies within the enveloping Spirit of God. We might have no clue what happened to faithful Abraham when he was tested by God—save for what Scripture tells us. We may not know precisely how God will test us. However, we who follow the Risen Christ cannot be people who turn to violence in any form. If our Savior willingly accepted the violence perpetrated against him we too must learn to willingly take on the violence of this world. The way we confront this force is not with retaliation, but with the greatest strength this world has ever seen: self-emptying love!

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[1]Rollins, Peter. "Festival of Homiletics: Preaching to Violence." Speech, Minneapolis, MN, 2014.

Priceless Spirituality

Every college has its memorable professors whether they are quirky, funny, or profound. Sometimes they are all of the above. One such professor taught Religion at Sewanee and his name is Dr. Gerald Smith.

Smith—as most students referred to him—wore a tattered old teaching gown that barely held together, as he went on long tangents. Long ago—back in the early 2000s—Dr. Smith had the harebrained idea to get rid of all paper from his classes, which elated many of his text-book hating students. While there were still written assignments, one would read on his or her own to acquire the requisite sources, then email a paper to Dr. Smith. Before each class Dr. Smith wanted students to also email him questions or comments that they found interesting and pertinent to the day’s topic—most of the time the day’s conversation or lecture emanated from one of those emails. In one of those very conversations during Smith’s New Religions class I found myself completely blown away.

This New Religions class focused on the zany pseudo-religions that have originated over the last three hundred or so years. As we discussed everything from the Oneida Community to the Latter Day Saints to Scientology, one day I found myself grasping onto a common thread that wove them all together. In each of these religious organizations there was a fee to pay, a checklist to follow, or a fickle leader to placate. In other words, none of these new religions emanated from grace. Of course, even though these were new religions there was nothing new about that aspect of them.

At the start of the 200s the followers of Christ were beginning to gain traction. The integrity of their beliefs, actions, and worship meant that even in the face of persecution many in the Early Church kept the faith, which made a real impression on others. At the same time Christians were struggling to come to a consensus over the nature of God—the foundational theology of Christianity. One question came to a head in the heart of the Second Century: How can a perfect being (i.e. God) produce an imperfect world (i.e. Earth)?

One side thought that the world was God’s united Creation as spirit and matter are one, while another group believed that the world was full of dualistic forces. The latter group were the Gnostics. They saw the world through the lens of opposing forces, like good vs. bad, light vs. dark, spirit vs. matter. On the surface this does not sound problematic; however, digging deeper Gnostics also held a belief that stated Jesus did not actually suffer, for he was actually just made of all spirit and no flesh. According to them he was like a holy hologram. Tied to the shoddy belief system of Gnostics was the way they practiced their spirituality.

Gnostics believed that God was perfect and the world imperfect, so how did the world come into being? According to Gnostic theology, God created a creature called an AEon, which created another AEon and another and on and on until there were 30 of these AEons. The last AEon created the earth. Even though this belief sounds outrageous, what stands out even more was the elitist spirituality they followed.[1] Gnostics thought that Jesus had come to teach two separate doctrines one for the common person and another for the elite. Gnostics were the only ones who could get the secret knowledge, thus they had all the control of this exclusive spirituality. One man born in the Second Century could not stand for this exclusive type of Christianity and thus stood up to the Gnostics.

Irenaeus of Lyon, whom we celebrate today in the Church, observed this elitism and spent his life preaching against a belief that Christ’s full message was restricted to those with wealth, power, or resources. Whether we are speaking of modern elitism within religion, which requires one to pay top dollar to move up the spiritual ranks or the Gnostics of old, we must be like Irenaeus and stand up for not just freedom of religion, but also a religion that teaches that God’s grace is free to all.

Irenaeus, never one to hide away the light of Christ within him, exemplified three particular ways for us to share God’s message of love to all. Irenaeus preached that all churches regardless of where they were existed as part of the Church catholic. He believed that the message of the People of Israel was sacred and built the foundation for Christians, and that Christians’ task was (and is) to share the truth of God’s love with all people wherever they were. Finally, his message pointed to the Truth that Jesus came not to form an elite religion, but to free all people to serve God and one another.

We too believe that God loves all of us. We believe that Jesus came for all people. We believe that he came to lead all people into love. We must not charge people to practice spirituality, nor can we create a religion based on elitism. For God’s love may be priceless, but it is free for all to receive. And while walking the way of Christ requires one’s entire life, God makes that way available to all. Let us be like Irenaeus who lived his life to show that God freely loves us all.

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[1] Kiefer, James. IRENAEUS. April 30, 2016. http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/Irenaeus.htm (accessed June 28, 2017).

Peter and Paul: United In Faith

“For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

We have come into an odd age in human history. Perhaps we have been here for more than a moment, but to me the shift feels sudden. We are no longer to agree upon truth or facts, nor can we all say together what is reasonable or logical. Instead, we have become impassioned creatures addicted to wild emotions, simple narratives, and tribal mentalities.

If you are liberal you may easily head over to “your” news channels, outlets, and websites. And, if you are conservative you may do the same with your news media. Social Media companies are having to release statements so that people know how to spot fake news. We de-friend or stop following people because they spout off a different belief system than ourselves. We have reached the time when people are not putting up with sound doctrine, for we all have itching ears and are accumulating for ourselves teachers that suit our own desires. Call it a silo or an echo chamber, but regardless these segmented areas of life feel awfully crowded, they are incredibly loud, and in the end I believe they provide only empty promises.

What I notice standing out about the trajectory of conversation and communal life in the United States revolves around a need for a simple narrative that proves one side right and another wrong. Thus, we all yearn for myths that explain away any sense of nuance or grey area. We occupy a zero-sum system in which no compliment may be paid to someone on the other side of an issue for fear that it would give that person some leverage. This way of existing makes me so disheartened. We have seemingly forgotten that we are not islands unto ourselves. Instead, we persist in digging our heels in deeper, as we exacerbate the problem of a binary worldview.

The first step in addressing any problem comes in acknowledging that we are in denial about having a problem in the first place. We have a problem in how we relate to one another across all the constructed boundaries of race, creed, color, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, or any other category. Of course, we are not the first to have this problem.

Today we celebrate the martyrdoms of St. Peter and St. Paul. Two men who gave their lives because they would not renounce their radical belief that a man named Jesus was the Son of God. In those days when the Roman Empire controlled where Peter and Paul lived one had to profess a belief that the Emperor was God or the Son of God. To believe anything else was treasonous and punishable by death. While we celebrate these two saints separately on different days in the Church Year, today we remember their collective self-sacrificing in the face of the temptation to keep on living by renouncing their belief in Jesus as the Messiah. Make no mistake this is what we celebrate today; however, another aspect of this day stands out.

Peter and Paul did not see eye-to-eye. They followed the same Lord, but went about their mission of spreading the Good News of Christ Jesus in drastically different ways. At times this meant that they butted heads. Their journeys took them on different paths. Often factious were created. And yet, in the end they both met the same fate—death by execution—in the same city—Rome—at the hands of the same Emperor—Nero. Seemingly the Scripture chosen for these two men—the words of Paul in his second letter to Timothy and words about Peter in John’s Gospel account—also share a theme, namely telling the Truth in the face of denial, persecution, and even death.

Paul wrote to Timothy to urge him onward in his ministry. Others would seek out teaching that merely led to proving their point. Paul understood something greater. The prolific Epistle writer knew that even if he had to face suffering what matters in the end is sharing the Truth, keeping the faith, and running with perseverance the race set before him. He would not deny the Truth. Peter had to learn this lesson in humiliating fashion.

When Jesus faced his torturous death Peter watched on from a distance. People questioned whether he was a follower of Jesus. In the face of these questions Peter denied his belief in Christ Jesus. John’s story of the undoing of these denials with affirmations of love help us to see the healing that took place and can take place when we acknowledge our disowning the Truth. In Christ denial is overcome through love. This is the hope that we must take forward.

Our world appears to be burning with a desire to separate, hate, and isolate. Many live in denial that we are all connected to one another. So we seek our own teachers to provide myths that fit how we see the world. Christ came to unite us. The cure for these sins that disconnect us from God and one another does not reside in proving others wrong or outsmarting one another or yelling louder than anyone else, but instead in loving one another as we serve and serve with those with whom we have disagreements.

Welcome, Welcome, Welcome

Yesterday, I overheard a parishioner who pays very close attention to the weather saying, “We got four inches of rain last week. That was more than we did all last summer.” Over the weekend tropical storm Cindy brought significant rain and serious winds through the Tennessee Valley, as well as most of the Southeast. What I noticed more than usual in regards to weather was how this storm, which made landfall in Texas, brought with it the climate of the humid coastline there. I walked outside on Friday and thought I was in muggy Houston, then hurriedly ran back inside. Welcoming the climate of somewhere else felt hard.

On the other hand, waking up this morning—after storms had all passed by the Decatur area—and taking a walk I could not help but smile. The weather could not be better, as the weekend's storm pushed both heat and humidity away for a couple days. Quite easily I accepted how it felt outside. Isn’t it strange that even with forces like the weather that are neutral—I mean apolitical, amoral, and without opinion—we can deem some of it good, while we call some of it bad? Imagine what we do with things that we do view as political, moralistic, opinionated, or religious! In other words, we are bad at welcoming almost all change in life, even though change is the substance of life.

The Gospel text for this coming Sunday stands out as surprisingly shorter than many in this Season after Pentecost in Year A. It is only two verses long! Perhaps the framers of the Revised Common Lectionary did this so we would focus on the word that is repeated over and over again: welcome. Welcome appears six times in two verses, and really the idea of welcoming pervades every word within this teaching. Jesus cannot seem to stress enough his desire for the hearer to welcome!

In Matthew 10:40-42 Jesus challenges us to welcome one another, him, the one who sent him, prophets, righteous people, and disciples. Truly, this was a starting point, as Jesus want us to expand that welcome even more. Unsurprisingly when I hear the word welcome I cannot help but recall a prayer attributed to Fr. Thomas Keating called—you guessed it—“The Welcoming Prayer.”

The prayer reads as follows:

“Welcome, welcome, welcome. I welcome everything that comes to me today because I know it’s for my healing. I welcome all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons, situations, and conditions. I let go of my desire for power and control. I let go of my desire for affection, esteem, approval, and pleasure. I let go of my desire for survival or security. I let go of my desire to change any situation, condition, person, or myself. I open to the love and presence of God and His healing action within.”

This prayer is radical. No, I do not mean this in the Ninja Turtle sense, like bodacious or awesome! I mean that what Keating proposes requires us to radically shift our priorities, our vision, and our lives. If I say the above words and mean them, then I believe something different as I welcome even those difficult changes that come my way. The challenge is hearing this prayer not as a self-help mantra, but as the invitation that it is to allow God to be present within us, to heal us, and to act in our lives.

When we open up to and welcome what is happening by the hand of God we discover something far beyond our own desires and even our imaginations. Our lives at this very moment are woven intricately together in a vast web with each of our strands coming together to form the quilt that is Life. While we may think that we have control over a vast swath of what is happening, the truth is that this Life is brought together by the force within, between, and beyond, which we often call God. Before believing that we are merely bystanders to our own life let me add one more element.

The Welcoming Prayer coupled with Jesus’ teaching on welcoming pushes me to believe that what God yearns for is a co-creative dance that opens us up to Life flowing within, between, and among us. This is not easy. We are taught especially in American culture to be independent, in control, and in charge of our lives. We take on the mantra of Frank Sinatra, as we want to say, “I did it my way.” And yet, that is not how life in Christ and this welcoming of God’s weaving works. A final helpful analogy comes to mind.

We may not have control over all things in our lives. Instead we may just be like a hand. For a hand to receive something it must be open. For a hand to give something it must be open. Often though what we want is to hold onto something—a moment, a time in life, a prized possession, how we see the world, the way we have always done things, etc.—and so we close the hand thinking this will stop life from continuing or change from happening. Perhaps, for a time things keep on going as they have, but nothing new comes in and we cannot pass along those things that we hold so valuable. Eventually the hand becomes a clinched fist that is ready to fight, as it feels the fearful myth of scarcity. Those gifts clinched within the fist are not passed on to others and so others find them strange and antiquated. Without the openness to both give and receive the hand is nearly useless.

This week I invite us to let the clinched fists go. Hear Jesus’ words of welcoming. Live into the radical nature of the welcoming prayer. Open our hands in love to serve others and receive from those with whom we serve. Allow our lives to become a co-created tapestry in which God weaves together all of Life.

More Than Two Ways

Standardized testing bothers me. It always has. I performed fairly well on these competitions of scholastic achievement, but I never liked them. Even as a kid, I found it presumptuous that the designers of the test had created something with only one right answer. It is either true or false. It’s either A) B) C) or D). Slightly better were the questions where D) was all of the above or E) none of the above. I can recall thinking in the middle of taking the SAT, “I don’t think this is how life works.”

Of course, I aim to lead a life that is not either/or but both/and. My favorite sport of soccer can end in not two, but three ways: a win, a loss, or a draw. When someone asks questions like: Pepsi or Coke? Simp’s or Railyard? Mountains or Beach? I want to answer both, of course!

Life is not typically an either/or choice. Life is not even a multiple choice test. Almost always more than one way exists to the problem of skinning a cat, or solving another challenge. With this preexisting belief I always find it troubling when at first glance Jesus lays out an either/or choice, like in today’s Gospel lesson.

Clearly Jesus articulates a dichotomous pathway of discipleship in this text. He said, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” His words sound crystal clear: choose me or choose your family. These words have a troubling tone when they hit my ear.

Being 45 days until our due date, I struggle with God Incarnate saying that I either have to choose Jesus or my unborn baby boy. This seems cruel. I am sure we all have a family member or two—think of that crazy uncle or that annoying cousin—that we would gladly leave behind for Jesus. Still I find it so challenging that Jesus outlines the way of faith being exclusionary to loving our family. But, is that what he really said?

When Matthew and his community came together to write down the Good News of Jesus they did so in a very particular context. In its most infantile stage, many believed the Way of Christ was simply an offshoot of Judaism. These ragtag followers of Jesus believed some outrageous things that many Jewish people struggled to comprehend. Namely, these disciples thought that the hope of the People of God had actually come to earth, he had fulfilled all the law and the prophets, and his victory was fulfilled in the shameful death Jesus died on the cross. I can understand why some people of Israel would have given early Christians an odd glance or two. Many members of the Early Church would have thus been standing up to their parents, or perhaps the other way around with parents converting as their children wanted to keep the way of the Torah. In this world then, an either/or choice seemingly existed: Family or Jesus.

Jesus though did not stop with his statement on family. He continued saying, “Whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” Buried in this statement about taking up the cross, following Jesus, and losing one’s life for Christ’s sake—buried in this statement—a mysterious kernel hides that pushes us to see the aforementioned choice of family or Jesus differently. The way of the Cross stands out as profoundly difficult, requiring one’s entire life, and at the same time filled with overabundance from God’s bounteous grace!

The way of the Cross actually pushes us beyond the either/or way of seeing the world. We could be presumptuous believing that Jesus only had a couple of choices when it came to the cross; however, I believe this belief is false. Jesus could have become a victim in the moment—taking on the suffering of the cross to an unhealthy point and identifying as one who was persecuted. Jesus could have become a victimizer in the Resurrection—taking out revenge on those who had killed him. And yet, he did neither. Jesus walked a third way neither becoming victim nor victimizer, but instead redeeming the world through self-emptying love. When Jesus asks us to pick up our crosses and follow him we are not being asked to make an either/or choice. No, instead we must do something much harder.

The way of Jesus requires us to give up our old way of seeing the world and living in it. We must take up the sword that Jesus speaks of not to cut others and certainly not to inflict physical harm. Instead, God calls us to discern how we might more closely follow Christ by cutting away material items, unhealthy relationships, selfish tendencies, and all that only serves to build us and our egos up. We must practice a type of living martyrdom in which we give up what we would otherwise be doing, so that Christ may live within us, through us, and between us. This is impossibly hard though and we will fail over and over again. And still we must keep going.

The world around us would have us to believe that everything is either/or: black or white, male or female, rich or poor, old or young, weak or strong, hungry or full, Muslim or Christian, us or them. And yet, we find even within our Scripture for today an example of God destroying all the binary boundaries that we so fiercely put into place, so that God could bring salvation to Hagar and Ishmael the ancestors of Muhammad, the founder of Islam.

When Father Abraham and Mother Sarah had finally conceived and bore Isaac a tension arose around Ishmael being in their household. In fact, Sarah could not stand to look upon Hagar, so the handmaid was sent on her way with enough supplies to make a short journey. When Hagar walked away from her son she had given up on life, but God had not given up on her. Though she was in the lowest station of that day—a woman, a mother without a husband, a servant, and a person without land or a support system—God not only spoke to her, but he brought about her salvation!

God will always find a way to break down the barriers of either/or that we set up in our world. The question is are we going to help God to break down those boundaries to co-create the ways beyond choice A) or B)? Love is not a finite resource. While we might be mere mortals we have within us the eternal resource of God’s unconditional love that calls us to love God by loving family, friend, neighbor, and stranger!

The Wilderness Within

My mom recently told me about a trend called “earthing” in which one puts one’s bare feet in the dirt, sand, grass, etc. for thirty minutes each day. Allegedly by doing this practice once a day one will receive the free electrons on the surface of the earth. This can help with anything from a mild sickness to jet lag. After trying it a few times—while remaining somewhat skeptical—I realized that if nothing else I was grounding myself in something much larger than myself. Whatever one calls the process of disconnecting from all the technology and buzz of modern life and grounding oneself in this earth, our fragile, island home, does not appear to matter as much as what one might find there.

Today we celebrate the transferred feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist who stands out as a pioneer of earthing. Sure, he would not have called it that, and perhaps would resent that we have even connected him with such a trend. Still, he might as well serve as the patron saint of solitude, silence, and wilderness. Before getting to the last line in today’s Gospel lesson, let us rewind to where John’s life got started.

John’s mother Elizabeth was unable to get pregnant, like Sarah before her she was said to be barren. However, one day her husband Zechariah was minding his own business working as a priest in the Temple when an angel of the Lord appeared to him. The angel told him that Elizabeth would have a child and he was to name him John. Zechariah could not believe it and when he questioned the abilities of God he was struck dumb. Being in the midst of my wife’s pregnancy at this very moment I can tell you that a silent husband could possibly be an upgrade. I am sure it also created some problems for planning what was to come.

Once Mary came to visit her cousin Elizabeth the elder cousin gave birth to a son. When everyone thought his name ought to be something more familial, like Zechariah, the father scribbled out that the child’s name was to be John. Everyone was amazed; however, what stands out as even more amazing came when Zechariah began to sing out God’s praise and prophecy.

Zechariah’s song foretold of John’s ministry, the coming of the Messiah, and the hope of Israel being fulfilled. In this song the people of God are freed, the promises of old are kept, worship happens without fear, and this child named John will be the prophet of the one coming to complete all of this. Strangely though, living up to these expectations could not have happened where John to follow directly in his father’s footsteps. In fact, John could not have lived within the normal bounds of humanity. Instead, John had to step outside to do something different.

John the Baptist lived a different sort of life. John grew strong in spirit but he remained out in the wilderness until his time of public ministry came to be. He lived out in the middle of nowhere, presumably earthing all the time with his feet in the desert sand. We may like to have fun at John’s expense, as we think of him wearing camel’s hair clothing and eating locusts and wild honey. And yet, his life path teaches me that for one to see how God brings about the fulfillment of his loving covenant, repentance of sins, and freedom to live in a new way one must step outside what is normal.

Out in the wilderness John found more than just a way to connect with the earth. Solitude causes one to confront even the most repressed wounds, the hardest truths, and the greatest mistakes. Often getting away from everything makes one aware of the wilderness within oneself. There in the midst of the wild God comes not to order everything, but to bring about growth and life and refreshment.

John the Baptist was the one who pointed to the coming of the Christ. His life started with a strange origin, Elizabeth’s miraculous pregnancy and Zechariah’s silence. Zechariah’s subsequent song foretold of John’s mission, but the way in which he went about fulfilling this calling gives us perspective on how we might point to God’s working in this world today. May we go to the wilderness to find that inner wilderness where God gives us vision to see the coming of Christ!

Lines In The Sand

Recently I heard someone say we all have lawyers in our heads. I chuckled at the comment, but the laughter faded a little bit as the person continued—something that happens often when we hear a difficult truth. “We are all hypocrites,” this person said, “However, we find ways to make sense of our inconsistent thoughts, actions, feelings, and behaviors after the fact.” This is where the lawyers come into play. After the wreckage comes our internal legal team to prove that we are right and someone else is wrong. I did not walk away from hearing this laughing—the truth hurts.

Our world feels full of hypocrisy at the moment. Hypocritical politicians—check! Two-faced corporations—yep! Corrupted religious figures—sadly, yes! As we all attempt to have our internal litigators weave our stories in line with our values, what we do not often have time for is understanding. We are far more concerned with having our “gotcha” moment, than we are at finding ways to raise not only the level of discourse, but also the level of compassion. So, what seems easiest for us to do is to draw lines in the sand forcing people to choose one side or another—our side or the wrong side. We, of course, always choose the right side.

My pastoral care professor in seminary, the Rev. Dr. Kathleen Russell, liked to ask us, “Would you rather be right or would you rather be kind?” Would you rather be right or would you rather be kind? I like what my professor said, although her words often convict me when I am trying to win an argument. The Rev. Dr. Russell’s words cut to the heart of what Jesus speaks to us today.

Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” We appear to be coming into an age when we must define every category in which we belong and divide ourselves from everyone who does not fit into our own group. We are attempting to become insulated islands into ourselves. I used to believe that people could not possibly see me as their enemy and that I am not capable of seeing another as an adversary. How wrong I was!

We may believe that our day is more divisive than any other, but I believe Jesus was struggling with the same fervor and division in his time. So what do we do with the lines that we have drawn in the sand? Well, I find it funny that we use that language.

Sand is a moveable substance. It is not like stone or concrete or metal. All the lines that we draw in the sand are only as permanent as we make them. After a few days usually the wind or rain will mess with the dividing line we have created. We have to keep drawing that line to make sure it is still there. We are the ones that have to keep making enemies of each other. For God made us all in God’s image, which means we are all united as one Creation.

Oddly enough Jesus does not make it sound like an option for us to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us. To be children of our Father in heaven, to be the offspring of a God of mercy, compassion, and love we must love our enemies. God’s grace will always meet us where we are. I believe what God yearns for us to do is to allow this grace to flow through us such that we readily erase the lines in the sand.

We may have lawyers who are ready to argue every point proving us right, but I wonder if you would rather love another or be right. Part of you will no doubt say, “I want to be right” or “There’s no doubt, I am right.” And yet, screaming our arguments at others will only retrace the lines in the sand. Instead, Jesus calls us to go beyond what is common—being nice to those who are nice to us. Let us be children of our Father in heaven by loving even those who hate us. May we love our enemies as ourselves.

Poker Faces, Eye Rolls, and God's Dream

The summer after graduating from college one of my best buddies—a guy named David—played in the World Series of Poker (WSOP) in Las Vegas, Nevada. One does not qualify for that tournament unless she or he wins a big tournament or pays the $10,000 entry fee on her or his own. For David to be there was a BIG DEAL! He had worked really hard in his limited free time to win his way to Vegas, while maintaining a stellar G.P.A. and getting a post-grad job at a big bank.

When I visited David that summer I recall talking to him a lot about the WSOP experience. He told me that it was not as glamorous as they make it seem on television. For twelve hours at a time the contestants compete. Quickly the adeptly skilled players force out the tourists only there to say that they had been. Eventually the run of the game whittles down many tables to a final table and finally one player winning the huge grand prize. David finished just outside the money, but he survived far longer than most, had a great time doing it, and will forever hold onto those memories.

Towards the end of our conversation he turned to me to say something odd. David said, “Seth, I think you would be really good at poker.” Before the words left his mouth, I laughed right in his face. While he remained complimentary I could not help but chuckle at his assessment. I am bad at calculating hands. I am worse at deciphering what other people’s faces may be saying. Worst of all I have a horrible poker face. Sometimes I can fake it until I make it, but mostly what you see is what you get. I might be as bad as Sarah was when the messengers visited Abraham and her at the Oaks of Mamre long ago.

I am so terrible at playing life with a poker face that I almost blew my opportunity at a first date with my now wife. Back when I was in seminary I worked as a night watchman. I went around locking up the doors on campus. One night I was tired and wanted nothing more than to quickly get back to my apartment to finish the hundreds of pages of reading assigned to me. When I went in to lock up the chapel a few students—including my future wife—were saying Compline. As they asked if we could come back later to lock the doors, I responded with the worst poker face possible. I dramatically rolled my eyes. I rolled my eyes with authority. I rolled my eyes, which Kim still reminds me of to this day. All worked out in the end, but there are certain moments when we cannot hide how we feel. Sometimes we cannot hide our sadness or joy or disbelief, so it was with Sarah when she laughed in God’s face.

Sarah was quite old. She was well passed the prime of child-bearing years. Others said she was barren. One day though as Abraham and Sarah sat in their tent avoiding the hot sun, God appeared to them. In that moment God appeared as three visitors. Abraham saw in the strangers the presence of God, so he went out to meet these visitors. He played the gracious host bowing before them, washing their feet, and fetching them quite a feast of bread, milk, curds, and meat with the help of his wife.

As the guests ate one asked where Sarah was. When Abraham pointed to the tent the guest said that one day they would return to find her with child. At this Sarah could not hide her poker face. She laughed out loud. All Sarah had wanted, the greatest pleasure she had hoped for in her life was always to bear life into this world and up until that moment it had always escaped her. Even the thought of such a dream coming true caused her to instinctively laugh uproariously. As she exited the tent, I imagine her upturned cheeks could not have contrasted more greatly than they did with the look on the face of the visitors.

The Lord present in those three knew the deep longing that lay within Sarah. Without so much as a smile the holy visitors wondered why she had laughed. Of course, we know why she laughed. She was passed her prime. The dream had died. She was to be surrogate mother to Ishmael—a powerful, mighty, and paramount purpose unto itself—but not what Sarah had always envisioned. And yet, the visitors persisted by asking, “Why did you laugh? Is anything too wonderful for the Lord?” Is anything too wonderful for our God?

In the deepest recesses of our souls those great dreams reside that we buried long ago. We concealed those dreams for an infinite number of reasons: it would be too impractical, I have children, there’s not enough money, I don’t have the time, we might have to move, my spouse might think I’m crazy, my friends would certainly think I’m crazy, I’m too old, I don’t have it in me, and on and on and on. We come up with a million reasons to bury our dreams—the true purposes of our lives. And, while we think that it hurts us what we never really think about is the look that Sarah saw on the face of the Lord—the same look that resides on God’s face when we dig the grave for another dream.

When we cast off our true callings in life, the greatest dreams that God gives to us within our hearts, we do not only affect ourselves, we also negatively impact those around us and the building up of God’s Kingdom. We cannot let our dreams die! These hopes are not only our own they are what God yearns for us to do, they are who God desires us to be to make this world more and more like how God dreams it can be. So, we must not think of it as only what we want, but what God purposes, like how Sarah’s child would be the first in a countless number of God’s faithful children.

Why must we not let our dreams die? For God utilizes our greatest hopes to transform this world into God’s way. To borrow Michael Curry’s line: “To turn this world from the nightmare it often is into what God dreams it can be.” How do we do this?

In the 15^th Century the iconographer Andrei Rublev painted or prayed one of the greatest religious pieces of artwork ever. The piece portrays the scene we read from Genesis today and is entitled The Hospitality of Abraham. In the work three visitors sit at a table. The power of the piece comes in that the figures lean in towards one another, but they also leave enough space for us to imagine ourselves within the space. This is the hope of our prayers to know more fully our place within God’s life in this world, God’s work in this world.

We must not let our dreams die, for even the most outlandish ones are possible with God. We must dream those impossible dreams. God calls us to imagine how those outrageous visions fit into God’s yearning for this world. Then, together we must push on, fighting with all that we have within ourselves to keep those dreams alive. So like those disciples in today’s Gospel we are sent out, not with all the supplies we need, but with the dream of God. Let us go forth to dream with God, for nothing is too wonderful for our Lord.

Changeless Change

The city of Austin, Texas boasts almost two hundred and thirty days of sunshine per year. After moving there from a foggy mountain in Tennessee I remained grateful for all the natural vitamin D that came my way until the day I moved here to Decatur. Oddly though, the two week period of “winter” in Austin brought out a strange quality in her residents. When the clouds rolled in or the temperatures dipped down into the forties Austinites’ moods soured. One day as a barber explained the locals’ inability to handle the cold she said something that I have now heard elsewhere—even in Alabama. “If you don’t like the weather wait five minutes and it will change.” The statement bemused me enough that it has remained in my memory.

We can joke about the weather. At almost all parish functions someone makes a comment about the current state of the out of doors. “It’s awful humid” seems to be the current refrain. Of course, when a cold front turns a summer’s day into a mild one someone will point out just how pleasant it is. In the fall we will remark on how blue the sky is. During winter we will complain about the cold. Then in the spring when we get all four seasons in a few days we can say again, “If you don’t like the weather wait five minutes and it will change.” Weather quite often we want to change, but so much else in life we fight tooth and nail to keep it just like it is. Fiddler on the Roof will soon grace the stage here in Decatur and I cannot help but hear those opening lyrics from “Tradition”.

So what about those things that we hold so dear? Do they change or do they stay the same? What about the Church? What about our Faith? What about our Traditions? What about God?

There is a prayer that I find myself praying quite often when I say Compline.

“Be present, O merciful God, and protect us through the hours of this night, so that we who are wearied by the changes and chances of this life may rest in your eternal changelessness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen” (Book of Common Prayer, 133). While I steadily believe that God’s nature of creation, agape love, forgiveness, peace, charity, self-sacrifice, redemption, reconciliation, etc. never changes; I do believe though, that our understanding of God continues to shift and yes (gasp!) even change!

We did not always believe in the abundant divine community known as Father, Son, and Spirit or Trinity. The Church took a long time to figure it out. We most likely would not have ever gotten to this grand realization and this huge shift in the way we relate to God without the saint whom we celebrate today.

Basil the Great was once just a boy who studied classical philosophy in the 4^th Century. Had it not been for the faith of his sister Macrina and the death of his beloved little brother he may never have been baptized. Though once he was at age 28 his life certainly changed.

For a time he helped to reorganize the anchorite order. They had been for a time a very individualistic group of monastics, but he brought them together to create communities of prayer and work. Later, he was ordained a priest at about the height of the conflict between warring sides of Christianity. Basil became Bishop of Caesarea by a narrow margin and set out to expand with other Orthodox Christians the view that Father, Son, and Spirit are One in glory, majesty, and unity. And, the language that the Church used in that day needed expansion, such that all three persons of the Trinity were properly adored. Without his tireless fighting we may not have ever understood the powerful mystery that is our three-in-one God. Sadly though Basil died before this change could be affirmed by the Second Ecumenical Council.

What Basil teaches us in our lives might seem a little strange. This great one sought a new way of seeing God. In each new age we must see afresh the face of God. We are often tempted to just settle on how things have always been, but just like the weather always changes God is eternally creating anew all things. Yes, as strange as it sounds this very moment God abundantly creates the vast expanse of interstellar space, even you and me.

As God continues to create we are called to create with God. Our life is to be part of the spreading of God’s way. We are to be like Basil and all those other great ones who have helped to point the Church to both God’s eternal changelessness and the every changing nature of God’s Creation at the same time! Like the mystery of the Trinity we will not understand this always. Still God beckons us to live in the relationship of the Trinity as we aim to make the world God’s place and rest in God’s abiding love.

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Children of Encouragement

Do you know anyone who possesses within them the uncanny gift of encouraging you? The hunch that resides within me points to all of us having someone in our life that particularly excels in lifting us up from a place of sadness to joy, fear to peace, even from death to life. Graciously God has gifted many people like that in my life. Today though I want to tell you about one such son of encouragement.

In the spring of 2005 I oddly decided to join the Track and Field team after having run zero competitive races in high school. At first, I was horrible. A few Sundays ago I told the story of being lost in the woods because I could not keep up with others. While I would like to say that being abandoned in the forest stood out as the low point on my running journey, but sadly it does not! After I started making progress as a runner I got injured. I had to train by myself in the pool because I could not put pressure on my calf. For a month or two I spent more time on the training table than on the track. Eventually though I healed, but then came the crushing reality: I was a bad runner.

Well, I thought I was a bad runner. In practice I could keep up with some other subpar individuals, but when it came to the race I finished dead last every time. Mostly I ran the 800 meters, which requires a runner to circle round the track twice at almost an all-out sprint. Consistently I ran 2:20 for that race, which is good for a bad high school freshman. I could not break through even though I knew I was much faster. Enter Ian Edward Pulaski Turner.

Now Ian Turner was a 6’1” freshman, as skinny as a rail and with a mop of curly hair on his head. Eventually he would become an all-conference and all-region runner in Cross-Country. He exuded a type of cool that was rare among distance men. Ian was not alone in his words of encouragement; however, for some reason his words sunk deeper within my soul than others.

After a very trying season for me our team traveled to the penultimate meet of the season, the Rhodes Invitational in Memphis, TN. I was slated to run in the slowest heat of the 800 meter race. Before the run Ian took me aside and spoke words that I will never forget. He said, “It’s a two lap race, but it’s an all out sprint. Go after on the first lap, then make the second lap crazy.” While these words seem silly the way in which he said them changed how I viewed myself. He saw in me something I could not see on my own. He knew that I had more in me than I had shown, so when the gun went off so did I!

I went through the first 200 in 27 seconds, which was flying for me. I rounded the first lap in first place as the timer rang the bell for the final lap. I pushed as hard as I could. Even though I felt like I was falling apart I heard Ian yell at me, “Make it crazy!” Other teammates chimed in and I fed off of their energy. I surged through the 600 meter mark in first place and as I tightened up on the home stretch I barely held off the other competitors. When I crossed the finish line I realized I had broken my previous best by 15 seconds—a huge personal record for such a short race. Without Ian and others I would have never been able to see that greatness within me.

Today we celebrate in the Church another son of encouragement. Joseph was a Levite born in Cyprus. He sold his own field and brought the money to hand over to the Apostles. This was the first mention of this man that we know as Barnabas. Barnabas literally translates as son of encouragement.

Barnabas encouraged his fellow disciples in more way than just financially. When Paul (formerly known as Saul) came to Jerusalem to meet with the Apostles, they would have nothing to do with him because of his previous behavior of persecuting Christians. Barnabas went to meet with Paul, then brought him to the others, even convincing them to accept them as a fellow disciple. Later, when Paul and Barnabas took Mark on a journey that caused Mark to turn back midway, Paul wanted to keep Mark from missionary work. Barnabas again gave a second chance, this time to Mark whom he took on a successful mission.

We live in a world that so readily pushes us to tear one another down. We exist in a society that seeks vengeance instead of forgiveness. We see all around us the belief that people do not deserve a second chance; however, Barnabas exemplified the truth of God’s way. God’s way always leads to forgiveness. God’s way always gives us another chance to receive the unconditional love that creates, redeems, and sustains the universe through Christ. God’s way always encourages us. Sometimes it will be through a son of encouragement named Barnabas or Ian other times we will receive that encouragement within us, from our church, or from the work we do in this world.

Where do you find support and encouragement? How will you encourage others like Ian and Barnabas? God bids us to lift each other up to persevere in running the race set before us.

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Target Audience

When I first entered seminary I remember trying to figure out the “right” way to do everything. My hope was that if I understood the correct way of doing things, then I would one day be a good priest. Quickly though, I found myself completely overwhelmed with great options and best practices of ordained ministry within the Episcopal Church. So then I wondered, “How do I discern what is best for me?” Eventually, a more helpful way of approaching this discernment arose.

In a theology class taught by Dr. Tony Baker we discussed fit. As in, does this characteristic fit with how we view God according to Scripture, Church teachings, Tradition, our experience, and reason? Instead of saying this is the right way of expressing a belief we went in the opposite direction using theology of the negative to describe the many attributes that do not accurately depict God according to the guidelines of our faith. Eventually though, we whittled our perspective down to things we could hold true, descriptions of God that really fit. This practice was awfully exciting, but I do not believe it only works with talking about God—it also helps in discerning how I might and how we might best use our finite time, talent, and treasures.

Jesus apparently understood this innately. Strangely the infinite One—who came to dwell on earth as Emmanuel, or God with us—grasped how to most fittingly utilize the gifts and talents of those around him. This was in full display in this passage from Matthew’s Gospel account that we will read this coming Sunday. As Jesus commissioned the twelve disciples, he comprehended that he could not at that moment send them everywhere, but instead he focused on a target audience, namely those in God’s chosen people of Israel who appeared lost and without a shepherd.

Before going further, it feels fittingly prudent to quell a false belief that Jesus aimed for his disciples to squash Judaism. As Jesus himself was a Jewish person, I believe he yearned to fulfill the law, prophet, and wisdom of his people. However, like all religions when mixed with power and political agendas, the essence of the spiritual tool that is religion can get hijacked for personal gain. Jesus yearned for those who were lost to be found, those who were sick to be healed, and those who were hungry to be fed. So, he sent his disciples to a specific group of people, the lost sheep of the house of Israel to cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, and cast out demons. His mission for them was specific and strategic, so that they could be good stewards of the resources they possessed. Strangely, we in the contemporary Church may hear Jesus calling us to a similar mission today.

Those who study the trajectory of the Church can easily point to numbers that may be terrifying for those of us who love our churches: declining membership, lack of new young families, and an overwhelming number of alternatives on Sunday mornings (sports, vacation, rest, brunch, etc.). And yet, those churches who focus on a target audience and like Jesus’ own ministry those who share a clear message of God’s unconditional love, God’s healing power, and God’s life-transforming Good News are not declining, but growing. I believe those who clearly articulate and follow the vision of Christ are growing because many in the world and even in parts of the Church are still lost, sick, and hungry. I mean aren't we all at times?

We have at our fingertips the greatest opportunity within the Church since before the Church was the Church! Are we going to seize upon this great moment to share hope in the face of doom? Will we run towards those who are in trouble and need assistance? Will we be part of bringing new life and resurrection to those who are seemingly dead? Can we hear God calling us and guiding us out into the world not to provide condemnation or judgment, but to be bearers of God’s healing power? Jesus sends us out into the world to share his Good News of unconditional love. Will you go where Jesus sends you?