Looking Ahead to May 1, 2022 -- 3rd Sunday of Easter

 This being the first Sunday of May we will be celebrating the sacrament of Communion.

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Deuteronomy 5:11-22
• Psalm 78:1-7
• Romans 13:8-10

The Sermon title is Law, Love, Life

Early Thoughts: In the list of gifts we have been given by God lies a number of rules (or laws, or commandments). That is right, the Law is a gift, rules are a gift, limits on behaviour are a gift.

They are a gift because they enrich our lives. They are a gift because they help us show love for each other.

Christians sometimes get it wrong. Sometimes we read Paul and think he is denigrating the Law. Sometimes we think Grace and Gospel do away with Law (and then create new law to replace it). Sometimes Christians think the Law is about works righteousness, about behaving properly so that we are worthy of the gift of Grace and are justified with God. But still the Law, Torah, is a gift.

It may sometimes be a complicated gift. But it is still a gift. God loves the people so much, God has such hope for what the people could be, that God gives them a way to structure their lives and relationships with God and with each other. God give boundaries because God knows, as Robert Frost also knew, that "good fences make good neighbours". Boundaries help us love each other -- sometimes in the keeping and sometimes in the breaking of the fence.

After lunch to day I read this week's edition of Life is a Sacred Text by Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg. AS is true every week there are a lot of wonderful things in there. But I want to share this piece:

Without a spiritual practice, without connection with the Holy, we will be toast. We will burn out. We will lose sight of the big picture. We will forget that the reason this all matters is because each of us was created sacred and irreplaceable, in the image of the divine, and that our showing up is to take care of anyone we might be able to help, to change systems to try to take care of all of us. The work is going to be hard and we have to find our way to the wellspring.
Malbim says we must cultivate our ways of being in the world that are concordant with our values.
And the Sfat Emet says it is about drawing our deeds to follow the light—that our actions in the world are the result of choices of light, not of darkness. That what we do in the world follows and brings more light. Even if it doesn’t change everything. Even if it can’t singlehandedly fix all of the problems.
Your actions just need to bring more light.

Reminding ourselves of the rules, the laws that lead to love, are part of what leads us to actions that bring more light. And when we bring more light life becomes more abundant. When life becomes more abundant love flourishes. Which leads to more light and more abundant life and the spiral continues to build.

The essence of the Law is love. Jesus said so. Paul said so. Deuteronomy and Leviticus say so (in passages used by Jesus referring to loving God and loving neighbour). 

Law is gift. Boundaries and rules help us love each other. Love leads to life.

I close with these words about the Law, about the gift from God, from Psalm 1:

Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers;
but their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night.
They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither. In all that they do, they prosper. 

 May we all be like trees planted by the water. May the water of life keep our leaves from withering in the heat and storms of life. It can be hard to follow rules. It can be hard to know which boundaries need to be kept. Still, God calls us to meditate on the Law and discern how best shall we live.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to April 24, 2022 -- 2nd Sunday of Easter

 The Scripture Readings this week are: 

• Acts 1:3-5, 12-14
• John 20:19-31

The Sermon title is Now? Later? When?

Image Source

Early Thoughts: In the Gospel of John, in the chapters leading up to his arrest (chapter 14 to be precise), Jesus promises his followers that he will not leave them orphaned. He promises that God will send them the Advocate.  Here is the exact promise: 

"I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you...”I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid" (John 14: 18, 25-27)

 But when exactly is that gift given? In our readings this week we have two very different possibilities.

According to Luke-Acts Jesus appears to his disciples repeatedly over a 40 day period then ascends into heaven (Luke actually tells the Ascension story twice-- once at the end of the gospel and again in the verses omitted from this Acts 1 passage). Then 10 days after Jesus has ascended the Holy Spirit descends upon the community in the story of Pentecost. So in this version the Advocate comes 50 days after Easter (this is why the Easter Season is 7 weeks long leading into Pentecost Sunday).

John has a different understanding. For John Jesus bestows (or rather blows) the Holy Spirit on his followers on the evening of Resurrection Day. This fulfills the promise made in chapter 14. No waiting for 7 weeks, the Holy Spirit comes as a part of the experience of Resurrection. 

So what do we do with these stories? When is/was the Spirit poured out on the community of the faithful? When is is poured out on us?

I suspect the the Spirit has been poured out on us, and also is being poured out on us, and also will be poured out on us. I don't think it is a "one and done" type of thing. Sometimes we may need to wait for the opportune time (whatever that may mean) to feel the Spirit at work within, among, and around us. Sometimes it is there in the midst of our shock and grief. Sometimes it is a blustery, almost violent experience (such as in Acts 2). Sometimes, as in this passage from John, it is a calming comforting thing, coming with words and assurance of peace.

And then comes the next question... how do we know if the Spirit has been poured out on us? How can others tell if we are living as people upon whom the Spirit has been poured out? What difference does it make in our lives, in how we are in the world?

What is your experience of the Holy Spirit?
--Gord

Where Has Life Won This Year? -- Newspaper Column

 “The strife is o’er, the battle done; the victory of life is won,” Those are the opening words to an Easter hymn first written in Latin in the 17^th century. Whatever other meanings one may find in th Easter story I think they all tie back to this sentiment. When God raises Christ from death God breaks the power of death. As Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”

I sit to write this on Easter Monday. Yesterday morning I, and millions of other Christians around the globe, joined our hearts and souls and voices to celebrate the great mystery of an empty tomb and a Risen Christ. We gathered to proclaim the wonderful news that life has won. Even after the powers of Rome had done all they could to try and squelch the rabble-rouser from Galilee, even after they had executed him as a threat to the Pax Romana, they had still lost. God had played the final trump card, God had, as the saying goes, the last laugh. Life proved to be more powerful than death, hope more powerful than despair, peace more powerful than violence, and love more powerful than fear.

Can we believe that? To be honest there are days when I look at the last sentence of that paragraph and I have to wonder if those things are really true. After all a quick recap of the news headlines at any time in my life might easily suggest that death, despair, violence, and fear are more powerful and more prevalent than love, peace, hope, and life. As we celebrate Easter and the victory of life over death where do we see signs of that victory?

I think part of the problem in answering that question is that so much of the time we aren’t directed to look for the signs that life is winning. I know that I spend too much time looking for the problems in the world. We look for threats to our sense of well-being. I know that in the name of self-protection I often try to figure out all the things that could possibly go wrong. Too often the end result of that is that I can be led to despair and fear instead of love and hope. That is the path toward the victory of death.

In Luke’s Gospel the messengers from God speak to the women who were brave enough to go to the tomb and ask “Why do you look for the living among the dead?”. Where we look and what we look for matters – it largely determines what we will find. In a world full of reasons to believe in the power of death and despair, fear and violence let us commit ourselves to look for signs that peace and love, hope and life are truly more powerful. If we look for signs of life that wins we will find it. If we don’t look it may get washed away in the flood of other stuff.

So when we read or watch stories about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, let’s also look for stories about weddings in the midst of the war or other signs of hope in the midst of the disaster. Read another story about high inflation, then read two stories about people pooling resources to help those most vulnerable to higher prices. Watch a video about the opioid crisis then watch a video about harm reduction and addiction treatment programs where people are helping others make it through. Let’s look for and retell and highlight the stories that bring us hope and remind us that life is breaking forth all around us.

Then let us live into that promise of new life. As Easter people we need to embody the victory of life and hope, peace and love in the world. What are the ways you can bring more hope, more love, more peace, more life into the world around you? What are the ways you, hopefully unintentionally or unknowingly, take those things away from the world around you? Jesus proclaimed that the Reign of God was real and alive in our midst. Jesus challenges us to live by different rules than the empires of power. In raising Jesus from the dead God shows us that the way of Jesus, the way of the Reign of God, is the way of LIFE. If we believe in the resurrection we have no choice, we have to strive to live by the rules, to follow The Way Jesus laid out.

When we do that we continue to proclaim that life, hope, peace and love will win in the end. Christ is Risen! Hallelujah!

Looking ahead to April 17, 2022 -- Easter Sunday

 All are welcome to join in our Easter Celebration this Sunday at 10:00.  You can join us in person or via YouTube. The Handbell Choir will be playing before and during the service.

Our Scripture Readings this Easter Sunday are:

• Psalm 18:2-11, 16-19
• Matthew 28:1-10

The Sermon title is Staying Alive

Early Thoughts: Jesus was dead. That much was clear. The women had seen him die. They had watched his body laid in a tomb. Now it was time to grieve and weep and mourn.

The powers and principalities of the world were sure they had dealt with this pesky little troublemaker from Galilee.After all, empires had done so many many times in the past. Execution and death are pretty sure ways to get rid of troublesome challenges to imperial power.

But there was another card yet to be played. God had something else in mind.

The women got to  the tomb, they had come to weep and to mourn and found a terrible surprise. The body was gone!

But this was no new horror. This was victory. Death had been defeated, its power was broken. Christ had been raised. And so life wins. Jesus who was dead was now alive, and would stay alive forevermore.

Easter is the day we celebrate the surprising truth that life wins. Easter is the day we proclaim that death has been defeated. It is news that is both wonderful and terrible. Matthew tells us that the women left the tomb with both fear and great joy.

This Easter we again remember that just when the empire thinks it has won a great reversal is possible. The women at the tomb were not only told what had happened. there were told to go out and tell the others. AS we are told about the possibility of life that defeats death may we also go out to tell the world the Good News.

When your heart is broken
new hope is being woken
Resurrection’s real, Jesus is alive
Feel the earth a-shakin’
The hold of death is breakin’
Jesus is alive and stayin’ alive
Ah Ah Ah Ah stayin’ alive stayin’ alive
ah ah ah ah stayin’ alive!

Easter has come now. We celebrate life.
Sing alleluia
Jesus is Risen! Sing Alleluia
Stayin’ alive

 Happy Easter!  Christ is Risen Indeed!
--Gord

Looking Ahead to April 15, 2022 -- Good Friday

Our Good Friday service this year will be an evening service at 7:00. Folk can attend in person or via YouTube

This Year we will hear the story of Christ's Passion as told in the Gospel of Mark. The Scripture Readings are:

•  Psalm 22
• Mark 14:32-15:47

The Meditation is titled Empire Strikes Back

Early Thoughts: Just a few days earlier Jesus had entered the city to great excitement and cheering. In the days afterward Jesus has been spending much time in the Temple precincts, teaching and engaging with those who were around.  But then things took a turn.

By the nature of his teaching and preaching Jesus was sure to cause controversy. Jesus encouraged folk to pledge allegiance in word and action to the Reign of God. Jesus challenged the authorities (Jewish and Roman) because they were not properly supporting the weakest and marginalized in society. Jesus told people that priorities needed to change.

These are not things to teach if you want to make nice with Imperial Rome or their local governors.

Eventually it was bound to happen. Jesus has in fact warned his friend on multiple occasions that it was going to happen. The authorities were going to react, and react with violence. After a week of teaching and preaching and challenging (which included not only the street theater of Palm Sunday but also the causing of a minor riot in the temple precinct as he tossed the tables) the time had come.

The Empire, backed by some Jewish leaders who felt it was best to make nice with Empire, was going to strike back. As Andrew Lloyd Webber put it in his musical Jesus Christ Superstar "This Jesus must die".

Afterward people would try to find meaning and theology behind the death of Jesus. Theological arguments would arise that Jesus was a sacrificial lamb of some sort. The death would be seen to have some role in the restoring of right-relationship between God and humanity. And that has great meaning to many of us. But it does not change the fact that on the ground, in the midst of it all, Jesus' death has a lot to do with politics as well as theology.

As we strive to follow The Way of Jesus are we willing to challenge the imperial mindsets and powers of our day? Are we willing to admit the times we have been complicit with imperial power? Are we willing to risk a cross on a hill in case the empire strikes back at those who challenge it? After all that is what empires do, power tends to fight back when it is threatened.

Jesus challenged his friends, and challenges us, to take up a cross and join in his passion for God's Kingdom. Such a choice comes at a risk. Are we ready and willing?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to April 10, 2022 -- Palm Sunday

 The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Psalm 118:19-29
• Matthew 21:1-11
• Isaiah 49:5-16

The Sermon title is A Different King

Picture Credit

Early Thoughts: Is this a coronation procession? Is the king about to take the throne? Perhaps.

Or maybe not.

Jesus is, after all, a very different kind of king. In fact that may have been part of the problem. The people who were suffering under the heavy thumb of the Roman Empire wanted relief, freedom, liberation. Some of them saw in Jesus the possibility that this was about to be made reality. I wonder if some of those people in the crowd along the road to Jerusalem thought finally the day had come.

If so they were going to be disappointed.

Jesus, in the end, is a king and slave. Jesus is the one who the Apostle Paul will later talk about saying:

"who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross" (Philippians 2:6-8)

The relief, freedom, and liberation that is promised in the Jesus moment is not shown by driving the Empire away with swords and clubs. It does not result in a new all-powerful monarch sitting on the throne of David. A revolution begins with Jesus, but not a rebellion.

The Psalm this week talks about the rejected stone that has become the cornerstone. For centuries Christians have looked the the story of Jesus and applied this image to him. If Palm Sunday is a possible coronation procession the throne seems to have been blocked and the claimant rejected. But for thousands of million of faithful over 2000 years that rejected claimant has now become the cornerstone of their understanding of God and how God interacts with the world. A different type of kingship, a different understanding of power.

The Matthew passage tells the story of the Palm Processional, a story many of us have heard many many times over the years. Interesting thing about how Matthew tells the story... Matthew uses a passage from Zechariah to show that this event was foretold (Matthew likes to link the Jesus story to the Hebrew Scriptures). However the Zechariah passage uses poetic parallelism and Matthew seems to miss that literary device, writing the story as if Jesus is riding two animals at once (take a look at verses 5-7). As the story is told it certainly looks like a grand procession, though we have no idea what "large crowd" means in relation to the number of people in and around Jerusalem that day. But then it ends with people asking "who is that?". An underground coronation at best.

Traditionally Palm Sunday is a transitional day. It marks the joyous parade and it starts the final road that will lead to arrest, trail, torture and death.  The Isaiah passage is chosen to help us into that transition. I find hope in these verses, but it is not the wild exuberant hope of the entry into the city. It is a more muted hope in the midst of darkness and struggle. Yet in the end it promises that God will never leave God's people, that God could no more do that than a mother could leave her child. That, to me, is the ope of the coming of this different king. Some of the expected trappings may be missing. Some of the pomp and power and majesty are hard to see. But there is promise, there is relief, there is freedom and liberation. To those who are the most vulnerable, the most beat down the king comes. And that is a cause for hope and joy.

Is Isaiah talking about Jesus? When the words were first written or for Jewish believers today? Almost certainly no. For Christians reading the story with eyes and hearts that have experienced the life death and resurrection of Christ? Almost certainly yes. Texts have a life in their original context and a life beyond that original context.

What do we commemorate on Palm Sunday? Is it the coming of a King to take the throne? Is it, as John Crossan and Marcus Borg suggest in their book The Last Week, a carefully choreographed piece of street theater? Is it the first (and last) hurrah of a doomed rebellion? Maybe it is all those things and more. Because Jesus is a different type of revolutionary. Jesus calls us to determine where our loyalties are (or where they should/could be). Jesus challenges us to see the possibilities of the world differently. And since we are still talking about it 2000 years later, it seems to have worked.

--Gord