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| When given the chance to compare himself to anything Jesus chose a mother hen! |
©2025 The Rev. Seth Olson
This sermon was inspired by the above readings and was preached on the Second Sunday in Lent at the Episcopal Church of the Holy Apostles in Hoover, AL.
Holy God, may my words be your words, and when my words are not your words, may your people be wise enough to know the same. Amen.
Speaking of words, words are clumsy things.
Each week, I try to use them to describe the indescribable, to frame the infinite, to map the contours of a mystery far beyond us, yet infinitely near.
One of my favorite comedians, states that priests and preachers weekly (or is it weakly—W-E-A-K-L-Y) get up to give a book report they’ve had 2,000 years to prepare. He’s not wrong. The words we have, and I use, for God—Lord, Rock, Shepherd, King, Redeemer, etc.—are like arrows launched toward something greater, but often they never quite land where I was aiming. Still, I try… we try… to wrap words around the Great Mystery that is the Divine intermingling with us humans. Like how we see the sacred and the mundane interweaving in today’s readings:
Abram sees a vision in the night, and God speaks of descendants as countless as the stars. But have you ever tried counting the stars, really? It’s nearly impossible! So, how does one measure a promise that vast?
The Psalmist declares, The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom then shall I fear? But fear so often pervades our lives—lurking in shadows, whispering lies. What does it mean to trust in a God we cannot see, to believe in safety beneath wings we cannot touch with our hands?
Paul invites us to citizenship in heaven, but our feet are planted on earth. Do we get a dual passport—one from the nations of earth and one from the Kingdom of God?
And then there’s Jesus standing in the streets of Jerusalem, lamenting over the city, reaching for an image—something, anything—that might convey his longing, his love. And so, the Son of God reaches into his bag of analogies and calls himself… a mother hen.
A hen. Not a lion or an eagle or a mighty warrior, but a small, vulnerable creature with open wings, yearning to gather her children home.
If ever there were proof that we need poetry to speak of God, here it is.
So today, instead of my ordinary attempts at explanation—my grasping at theological coherence, my striving to box the Word of God into something neat and orderly, like Peter wanting to build booths on the Mount of the Transfiguration to house Jesus, Moses, and Elijah—instead of this, let us lean into the poetic.
Let us take these scriptures, these visions, these laments, and listen for something deeper.
Let us set aside our need to explain God, and instead simple experience God in the beauty of metaphor.
“Under The Wings Of Love”
The night sky swells with promise,
a sea of stars stretching beyond Abram’s weary sight.
He stands, old and childless,
heart aching with unanswered prayers,
palms empty with waiting.
And yet, God whispers—
Look up.
Count the stars, if you can.
Count the impossibilities I make possible.
Count the barren places I fill with life.
Count the moments when you thought I was absent,
but I was nearer than your own breath.
Beloved of God,
do you trust this promise?
Can you see the light when the night is deep?
Can you hold fast when all around you shakes?
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem—
the city of holy longing,
the city of prophets and blood,
the city that cannot recognize Love
even when LOVE stands before them, arms wide.
How often I have wanted to gather you,
like a mother hen, wings outstretched,
a fierce, sheltering love.
Yet you would not come.
Would you?
Would you?
Would you let yourself be gathered?
Would you nestle beneath the shadow of holy wings?
Would you let go of all the ways you’ve tried to save yourself—
your striving, your sorrow, your self-sufficiency—
and simply be held?
There is a road that leads to Jerusalem,
a road that winds through wilderness and weeping,
through betrayal and brokenness,
to a cross upon which Love will hang.
But this is not a road of defeat.
This is the road of love unfurling,
of a mother’s wings opening wider,
of a Love so vast, so wild, so tender,
that not even death can suppress it.
The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom then shall I fear?
Not the foxes of this world, scheming in the shadows.
Not the doubts that creep in when the night stretches long.
Not the wounds of rejection,
nor the ache of longing unanswered.
For we are citizens of another kingdom,
children of a greater promise,
nestled beneath wings that will not fail us.
So come, beloved.
Come beneath the wings of Christ.
Come with your weary bones,
your unanswered prayers,
your faltering faith.
Come and be gathered.
Come and be held.
Come and trust the Love that will not let you go.
And when the morning comes,
when the third day dawns,
when the tomb stands alone—
then you will know,
here you’ve always been home.
Amen.
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