Pentecost | Grace Episcopal Church (Sheldon, VT)

Easter 2A RCL April 23, 2017

Posted on April 23, 2017 by Beth Crane

Acts 2:14a, 22-32
Psalm 16
1 Peter 1:3-9
John 20:19-31

On most of the Sundays of the Church year, our first reading is taken from the Hebrew scriptures, also called the Old Testament. During the Great Fifty Days of Easter, our first reading comes from the Greek scriptures, or New Testament. This helps us to focus on the fact that we are an Easter people.

Our opening lesson takes place on the Day of Pentecost. Just prior to our reading from today, the Holy Spirit has filled the disciples with the gift of being able to speak the languages of the known world at that time. All the people who have come for the feast of Pentecost are able to hear the Good News in their native languages.

Our reading for today is Peter’s sermon preached to the people who had just experienced this amazing event. They were wondering what all of this could mean. Peter links the ministry of Jesus to the reign of the great King David, the most beloved and revered king of the Jewish people. That is to say, Peter does what any good preacher does. He presents his message in a context that the people will understand. He ends with some words which sum up the Good News, “This Jesus God raised up, and of this we are all witnesses.”

Our epistle comes much later in Peter’s life. Some scholars think that Peter dictated this letter to Silvanus just before he died in Rome. The letter is addressed to Christians who are suffering persecution in Asia Minor, what we would now call Turkey. The Church has grown. There are now congregations all around the Mediterranean Sea. But the Church is being persecuted because it believes in Jesus and refuses to worship earthly rulers. Answering Jesus’ call to be peacemakers, the early Christians refused to fight in the military. They also shared all things in common. For these and other reasons, the Church was considered by those in power to be subversive.

Peter once again focuses on the core of our belief in a beautiful hymn of praise. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.”

What a gift, the wondrous gift of new life in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Every year, our gospel for the Second Sunday of Easter is this inspiring and moving passage from the Gospel of John. Of our three readings, this is historically the earliest one.

It is the evening of the first Easter. Mary has gone to the tomb and found it empty. She has seen the risen Lord and has told the others. The first thing to keep clearly in mind is that they are full of fear. They are hiding behind locked doors for fear of the authorities. The powers that be were quick to clamp down on any insurgent movements. They had already killed Jesus. What would they do now?

Jesus comes right through the walls of their fear. He brings peace, not only peace in the usual sense, but also his vision of shalom, a peace that begins in our hearts and lives and spreads over the whole wide earth, a harmony that not only brings the end of war but unites all people and the whole creation in a way that brings well being to everyone. And our Lord confers on his followers, including us, the ministry of reconciliation.

Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary says that to reconcile is to “restore to friendship or harmony.” (p. 984). Because of their encounters with the risen Christ and the power of his love and healing, the followers of Jesus were able, with God’s grace, to create communities which lived these values. People were welcomed, no matter what their economic status or education, and they experienced our Lord’s love and healing through the faith and life of the community.

All of this began in that room where the disciples were gathered in fear. That changed when our Lord came to let them know that they had no reason to fear. He called them to go out into the world, go beyond those locked doors, and share his love with everyone they met.

Fear was transformed into faith, and that faith spread the Good News all around the Mediterranean and gave thousands and thousands of people new hope and a new purpose in life.

That is why we are here today. Because that faith means everything to us. It is our beacon in challenging times. We know that the love of God in Christ is the most powerful force in the world. It changes people’s lives. It has changed our lives.

Now, over two thousand years after that first Easter and that first Pentecost, we are called to carry out our Lord’s ministry of reconciliation, to help to build his shalom of peace and harmony.

Grace Church has been doing this for over two hundred years, Thanks be to God.

Gracious God, give us, we pray, the grace to be channels of your peace, your love, your joy, and your healing. Amen.

Filed under: Partners for Sacred Places, Sermons | Tagged: 1 Peter, Acts 2, Great Fifty Days, John 20, Pentecost, Psalm 16, Shalom | Leave a comment »

Pentecost 12 Proper 15B RCL August 16, 2015

Posted on August 16, 2015 by Beth Crane

1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14
Psalm 111
Ephesians 5:15-20
John 6:51-55

In our opening reading, King David has died, and his son, Solomon, is the new king. At this point in his life, Solomon is a young man. Scholars tell us he is about twenty. In this passage, Solomon has a dream of an encounter with God. He shows humility, admitting that he does not yet know how to perform the duties of a king, and he asks for the gift of wisdom. In the passage immediately following this one, Solomon does show wisdom when two women come to him claiming to be the mother of the same baby. When Solomon offers to decide the case by cutting the child in half and giving each of them a portion, the real mother, putting the baby’s welfare first, tells him that there is no way that she is going to let him do that, and he should simply give the baby to the other woman. Of course, Solomon gives the baby to her.

We know that Solomon built the great temple in Jerusalem. He also built himself a palace, and, toward the end of his life, he built shrines to the various gods of the many foreign ladies he married. All of this construction required workers, and he forced his subjects to do this labor. He also taxed the people heavily in order to afford all these projects plus the luxurious lifestyle of his large court. In short, he did not show proper respect and concern for the people. He also failed to respect the traditions of Israel. Soon after he died, the country split in two.

It was a good thing to ask God for the gift of wisdom, but Solomon did not follow through on the gift. In the beginning of this lesson, we read that Solomon loved the Lord, yet he worshipped at the high places and had gone to Gibeon to sacrifice to another deity. We have the beginning of a theme here, the conflict between wisdom and foolishness.

Ephesus was a port city, full of all kinds of temples to various gods and goddesses, full of many temptations and worldly distractions. By the time Paul was writing this letter, most followers of Jesus were expecting the Lord to return very soon. They felt that their time was limited. He might come any day. So Paul is calling them and us to make the most of the time we have. The Greek word used here for time is kairos. Kairos is kingdom time, the quality of time that we experience when we are living in the new life, as opposed to chronos, or clock time.

Paul calls us not to be foolish, but to seek the will of the Lord. That is what it means to be in Christ. We ask our Lord what he wants us to be doing. We don’t simply do what we want to do. We let him guide our actions and our thoughts.

We are called not to get drunk on wine. Then as now, people used to get drunk because they thought it let them have a quick way to have an ecstatic experience of God. Obviously, getting drunk is not an experience of God. Paul calls us to allow ourselves to be filled with the Holy Spirit. That happens from giving every moment of our lives to God, and asking God to lead us and guide us in our choices so that we are living in the Spirit and filled with the Spirit.

We are called to praise God, to sing psalms and hymns to God. When we sing praise to God, especially when we sing and pray together, something happens within us. Praising God allows us to open ourselves to God’s love and grace.

We are called to “thank God at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” That is a tall order sometimes. Do we thank God that Elizabeth is going to have to have more surgery and chemo and radiation therapy? I find it impossible to do that, but we can thank God for the love and faith of her family and for the skill of her medical team, who are doing everything possible. We can thank God for the gifts of faith and hope, and we can pray for and with everyone who is praying for Elizabeth.

“Be careful then how you live,” Paul writes. Thank God that we know that there is another set of standards that go beyond the values of this world, and that we are trying, with God’s help, to live by those standards and to become new in Christ.

In today’s gospel, Jesus is actually asking us to eat his flesh and to drink his blood. In the early days of the Christian community, some people thought that we Christians were cannibals. As we study this reading, we think of Eucharist. “This is my Body,” our Lord says, “This is my blood.” Jesus is with us. He is the host at this Thanksgiving Dinner. Remember, Eucharist means “thanksgiving.”

No, we are not cannibals, but our Lord is giving us Himself in a way that goes beyond our understanding. Centuries after he walked the earth with healing and love, he is able to be more present at every point on this planet and throughout the universe because he has risen.

Every time we gather, he is here, and he feeds us with food and drink that transforms us into his likeness and welcomes us into a new way of living, a way that is very different from the values of this world. We are not just spectators at this feast. We are participants. We are joined with him in something that can transform us and transform the world.

Once again, the religious authorities are caught in the literal, the earth-bound. Jesus is inviting us into the heavenly realms that transcend those earthly prisons, and thanks be to our Lord we are able to follow him. At the center of our life in Christ is the cross. Living in wisdom and love requires sacrifice and discipline.

When he was young, Solomon asked for wisdom, but he did not have the spiritual stamina to sustain that gift. Paul calls the Ephesians and us to use every day and every moment to choose the way of compassion, maintain the spiritual focus to follow our Lord. Jesus comes to us, having suffered every horror, even the horror Elizabeth and Keith and Sara and Chris and Jack and Teddy are now enduring, and he gives us the food of himself so that we can walk into a new dimension of life and eternal life with him. Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: 1 Kings 2, Ephesians 5, Eucharist, John 6, King David, Pentecost, Psalm 111 | Leave a comment »

The Day of Pentecost Year B RCL May 24, 2015

Posted on May 24, 2015 by Beth Crane

Acts 2:1-21
Psalm 104:25-35, 37b
Romans 8:22-27
John 15:26-27, 16:4b-15

Today is the end of the Great Fifty Days of Easter. This is the Feast of Pentecost, the day when the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles, giving them the gift to share the good news about Jesus in a way that could be understood by people from all over the known world. The power of this event is almost overwhelming. So, let us take a look backward and approach it with prayer and thought.

In today’s gospel, Jesus is talking with the apostles. He is trying to tell them everything they will ever need to know in order to carry on his mission. He has told them that he is the Vine and they are the branches, and that his commandment is that they love one another. He has also talked about how he and they will be persecuted. Now he is telling them that he is going to the Father, and that he will send the Holy Spirit. Jesus says that the Spirit “will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment.” Charles Cousar writes of this passage,”The world has its own judgments of sin, justice, and judgment. It constantly rewards those who measure up to its standards and norms and punishes those who transgress them. Jesus defied the reigning structures and ended up as one of those punished. The Spirit will expose the world’s ways of doing things.”

Jesus tells us that the Spirit will lead us into all truth. This is not a black-and-white truth, but a truth deeply rooted in God’s compassion and justice. As Christians, we seek to know God’s truth in the context of community, prayer, and responsible scholarship.

Jesus tells the disciples and us that he has to go away in order that the Spirit may come to us. When he ascends to be with the Father, the disciples feel abandoned and confused. He has told them to stay together and to pray, and they faithfully follow his direction. But that time was a crisis for the Church. If they had not kept the faith and remained together in prayer in the face of Jesus’ departure, we would not be here.

This is something that is important for us to remember in this post-Christendom era. Christianity is not the center of people’s lives at this point in history. Attendance is dwindling in all the major denominations. In the past, we would look for programs to bring people in. Now we are called to be missional, to go out into the world to do mission, to meet people where they are. Like the original disciples, we are called to be faithful in our time.

In our brief passage from his Letter to the Romans, St. Paul tells us that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains up to this point and that everyone who is trying to follow Christ has also been struggling to give birth to something new. We and the creation are struggling toward the time when we will reach our full identity in Christ and the time when our Lord’s shalom will be complete.

Meanwhile, we gather as the disciples did so many years ago, and we try to “Pray the prayer of Christ, learn the mind of Christ, and do the deeds of Christ.” We try to live as our Lord wants us to live. This takes a great deal of prayer, and it requires grace from God. And here, St. Paul gives us one of the greatest gifts in the Bible.

Have you ever gotten to the point where you could not find the words to pray? The point where you did not know what to pray for? I certainly have. St. Paul tells us that, when we get to that point, the Spirit prays for us. He says, “The Spirit intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words.” So, when we reach those points when we just can’t find words to pray, we can let the Spirit take over and pray for us.

Now we arrive at Pentecost. All the people are gathered in Jerusalem because this is fifty days after Passover. It is the feast of weeks, the end of the celebration of the spring harvest. The followers of Jesus are all together in one place. They have hung together. They are praying. They have no idea what will happen. Jesus said that he would send the Spirit, but the disciples are not at all sure what that means. Some of them are still in profound grief because Jesus has left them. I think that some of them had their doubts about what would happen next. The important thing is that they were doing what he had asked them to do, no matter how they felt, no matter how grief-stricken they were, no matter how much fear they were feeling about the future. They were together, and they were praying.

What happens is far beyond anything they could have imagined. There is a violent wind. Tongues of fire dance over their heads. They are filled with the Spirit and they speak in all the known languages of the world. Something new is coming to birth in the world. They had been gathered in that house, probably with quite a bit of fear and apprehension. Now, they are empowered by the Spirit and sent out into the world to tell everyone about Jesus.

Some people think the disciples are drunk. But Peter tells them, No, it’s only nine o’clock in the morning. This is a new dawn. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

We call this the birthday of the Church because the Spirit has come to give the followers of Jesus the power to speak of Jesus’ love and healing in a way that can be deeply understood, heart to heart, by every person on earth.

Jesus is not physically present in the way that he was when he was walking the face of the earth with his followers. Because he has sent the Holy Spirit, he can now be everywhere in the creation. All around the world, faithful people are his hands reaching out to heal, his lips speaking forgiveness, his eyes seeing into the depths of people’s needs. We are his Body, and we are empowered by the Spirit just as his disciples were two thousand years ago.

May we go forth in the power of the Spirit to share Christ’s love, healing, and forgiveness with the people we meet every day, and to build the shalom of Christ. Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: Acts 2, John 15, Pentecost, Psalm 104, Romans 8 | Leave a comment »

Pentecost 4A RCL July 6, 2014

Posted on July 6, 2014 by Beth Crane

Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
Psalm 45”11-18
Romans 7:15-25a
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

Our first reading today is one we have seen only once before, in 2011. It is a new addition in the Revised Common Lectionary. Sarah has died. Isaac is now grown up. Abraham is getting old. Abraham wants Isaac to have a proper wife from their own extended family. So he sends his trusted servant on a special mission. Scholars think this is his beloved servant Eliezer, who has been with him for years. God is going to guide every step of this journey, and, if Eliezer does not find a suitable wife for Isaac, he is to come home.

As it turns out, Eliezer goes to the well, the social center of the village, and he finds a wonderful young woman, Rebekah, who extends consummate hospitality. Not only does she give Eliezar a drink; she waters all of his camels. This is an outstanding virtue.

In those days, women and children were treated as chattel—objects, possessions. The father could hand over his daughter to be married. But this does not happen in our passage. Rebekah’s family asks her whether she wants to go and marry Isaac. She has a voice. Her opinion is respected. Her new husband, Isaac, does not treat her as an object. He truly loves her.

This story is a touching and human expression of at least two important themes: asking God for guidance and following that guidance, and showing respect for all human beings.

Our epistle shows Paul at his most human and compelling level. All of us can identify with this passage. Paul writes, “I do not do what I want, but I do the thing I hate.” We are called to practice the life of prayer, to seek God’s will and, with God’s grace, do God’s will. But it is not always easy. We all fall short. No one is perfect. When we do something we know we shouldn’t do, or do not do something we know we should do, we can acknowledge these sins of commission and omission in our review of our life at the end of the day and ask God’s forgiveness. Usually, slowly but surely, we make progress.

But sometimes there are patterns that defeat us. No matter how hard we try and how devoutly we pray, we just keep doing the same thing over and over again. Addiction is indeed a disease. But it is my best example of sin as well. We know that we are drinking too much these days. We shouldn’t take that drink or that drug, but we do it over and over again. We have no power over it. We are powerless. It could be the sin of ira, wrath. We lose our temper. We pray for help, but we don’t have any control over it. It could be any one of those seven root sins—pride, wrath, greed, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth. We feel we don’t have enough money or things. We envy someone his or her success. We fail to be grateful for the blessings God has bestowed on us. Whatever the sin is, when we realize that we have no control over it, we also realize that we are powerless. We need God’s help. We must ask for that help and depend totally upon God to get us out of this mire of sin. And, if we trust God, and Jesus, and the Spirit, we can be freed from that endless bondage of sin.

In our gospel, Jesus is commenting on the fickleness of human nature. Sometimes we are impossible to please. John the Baptist leads the life of an ascetic prophet, fasting and drinking only water, and people find fault with him. Jesus associates with all kinds of people, and eats and drinks and people think he is a drunkard and a glutton. Jesus seems a but frustrated with all of this, and this simply reminds us that he was fully human, and sometimes he had to learn things about us that were not easy to deal with, and sometimes he got frustrated.

Jesus says a little prayer thanking God for giving wisdom to those who try not to complicate things. And then he says that thing which has been such a comfort to us humans over the centuries: “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Whenever I think about this passage, I remember that, back in Jesus’ time, a skilled woodworker would make the yoke for each ox. The woodworker would measure the ox’s neck and shoulders and chest and would note every lump and bump on those contours and would exactly mold that yoke to fit that animal. When we decide to follow Jesus—and we make that decision new every day, we ask him to lead us and guide us in every action we take and in everything we say. He knows us and he loves us. He knows all the lumps and bumps and contours of our spirits. And when the going gets tough, he gives us the grace we need to carry the load and to make the journey. As time goes by, and as we more and more naturally, through prayer and grace, follow his will and walk in his way, a task that used to seem impossible is actually pretty doable. Our spiritual muscles are strengthened. And, as unlikely as it may seem, when we are called upon to do something we would have thought impossible, with his help, it becomes as easy and natural as breathing, because he is now living in us. His grace is carrying us through.

“My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Dear Lord, thank you for your amazing grace. Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: Eliezer, Genesis 24, hospitality, Matthew 11, Pentecost, Psalm 45, Rebekah, Romans 7 | Leave a comment »

Pentecost 3A RCL June 29, 2014

Posted on June 29, 2014 by Beth Crane

Genesis 22:1-14

Psalm 13

Romans 6:12-23

Matthew 10:40-42

Our first reading this morning, the story of Abraham’s possible sacrifice of Isaac, is agonizing and shocking. It is also one of those portions of the lectionary which illustrates how important it is to pay attention to the context of a lesson from the Bible.

Scholars tell us that this passage was written by the Elohist writer, who worked around 750 B. C. But the story itself comes from a much earlier time, around 1600 B. C., when Abraham came into the land of Canaan.

At that time, some of the people of that region believed that the gods they worshipped demanded human sacrifice, including the sacrifice of children. This seems truly horrible to us, but these kinds of beliefs have been held around the world over the years. Some scholars have wondered whether Abraham, coming into this new land, thought his God might be calling him to sacrifice his son Isaac, and have theorized that that idea is the reason for this story.

The story is poignant and wrenching. Would God ever ask us to sacrifice our children? Would God have let Abraham kill Isaac? The answer is No. God does not want us to sacrifice children. God calls us to protect children.

Biblical scholar Thomas Troeger writes, “ If we consider the story from the perspective of ancient society, then we may be freed to glimpse its redemptive meaning. The story rejects the sacrifice of children. In the middle of the story, Abraham says that God will provide a lamb for the offering, and God later instructs Abraham, ‘Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him.’” (22:12) (New Proclamation, Series A, 1999, p. 129.)

Our understanding of God has evolved over the centuries. At one time, people were terrified of God, probably because they were so aware of God’s power and so accustomed to the use of power to dominate and control and instill fear. Over the centuries, and especially because we now know our Lord Jesus Christ, we have been able to realize that God loves us and wants us to offer, not human beings or animals, but our hearts and lives to be renewed and transformed. Throughout this whole journey up the mountain, Abraham has the faith that God will provide the offering.

This passage applies to some complicated and disturbing events that are going on in our own area right now. We have seen the deaths of three young children, and all three had been under the supervision of our Department of Children and Families. This reading about Abraham and Isaac lets us know that God wants us to make sure that all children are nurtured and kept safe. This is going to be a complex and challenging task.

In our epistle for today, we have another example of a cultural context which is different from our society. In St. Paul’s time, slavery was common all over the Roman Empire. It was a fact of life. If you were a slave, you had to do whatever your master said to do. If you were free, you were not under such constraints. Paul is telling us that freedom in Christ does not mean that we can do anything we please. Freedom in Christ is choosing to ask him what he would have us do, and then, with his grace, walking in his footsteps and doing his will. We are called to give our lives to our Lord. so that he can lead us and guide us.

Today’s gospel is the closing section of Jesus’ instructions to his disciples. He is sending them out into the world. They will be depending on the hospitality of others. Scholars tell us that the term “little ones” does not necessarily mean children. Jesus referred to his followers as “little ones” and children. He called us to become as children. Children are open and trusting. That is how we are called to be in relationship to God.

So the context here is that Jesus’ followers are going out to share the good news. How will they be received? We know that some were treated very badly. Some were persecuted. Some were killed. They were scorned and ridiculed, ignored, told to go away.

Sometimes they were welcomed with open arms and invited to stay with a family for days, even weeks at a time. A new family was being formed by these ties as the disciples traveled around. That family now spans the globe and crosses every race and country and culture. That family is the communion of saints, the big family of God. When we read this very brief but meaningful gospel, we usually focus on the hospitality we are called to offer in the name of Jesus. And, yes, we are called to treat everyone as if he or she were our Lord.

Let us for a moment look at this from the point of view of a disciple, traveling from town to town. It is hot and dusty and your feet are sore, and every bone in your body aches. You go to the door and someone offers you a drink of cold water. This means that they know how hot and tired and dusty you are. This is true caring. They may not say much of anything, but you know they care. These caring actions are the core of our ministry. When a disciple went to a home and was welcomed in this way, that was often the first step in a strong and deep friendship in Christ.

What are these lessons telling us? Our first lesson reminds us that God calls us to cherish children, nurture them, keep them safe from harm, and help them grow in every way. Like Abraham, we are called to trust that God will provide. We are partners with God and we must do our part, but God’s grace and generosity are amazing.

Our epistle reminds us that, as the Collect for Peace says, to serve God is “perfect freedom.” Following Jesus leads us to paths we would not have dreamed of. And our gospel teaches us that prayer and closeness to our Lord lead to loving action and service to others.

Dear Lord, help us to care for your children. Help us to put our lives in your hands so that we may follow you and help others in your name. Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: Abraham and Isaac, Genesis 22, Matthew 10, Pentecost, Psalm 13, Romans 6, Thomas Troeger | Leave a comment »

Pentecost 2 Proper 4C RCL June 2, 2013

Posted on June 2, 2013 by Beth Crane

1 Kings 18:20-
Psalm 96
Galatians 1:1-12
Luke 7:7-10

Our first reading this morning is a crucial moment in the history of God’s people. We are in the Northern Kingdom of Israel about the year 970 B. C. Many of the people of God have turned to the worship of the fertility god, Baal. Many of the practices of Baal worship we would consider to be immoral.. At this point, Baal has 450 prophets, and the Lord God has one prophet, the faithful and courageous Elijah.

In order to show which one is the true God, Elijah proposes that two burnt offerings be set up, but no fire kindled on either offering. He generously offers to the prophets of Baal that they go first, calling on their god to set fire to the offering. Nothing happens.

Then Elijah calls the people closer to him. First, he repairs the altar of God which had been torn down. Then Elijah builds a new altar. This is so important. Elijah puts God first.

Elijah makes a trench around the altar. Then he builds the burnt offering.

Now the offering is prepared. What does Elijah do? He has the people fill huge jars with water and drench the offering. The water is flowing into the moat around the altar. The odds against this offering ever bursting into flame are extremely high. Then Elijah prays to God. God is God and Elijah is God’s servant doing God’s will. All of this is to call the people back to God. The fire falls and consumes not only the offering, but all the water. And the people see that God is indeed God.

In our epistle, we see that Paul is the midst of conflict. The first problem is that some people feel that, in order to join the community, people had to follow the law, which meant that they had to be circumcised.

The second issue is whether Paul is a true apostle. There are many voices, many teachers. Then as now, there were teachers who tended to tell people what they wanted to hear. Paul starts out by telling the people that he is “….sent neither by human commission nor from human authorities but through Jesus Christ and God the Father.” Paul reminds us that God raised Jesus from the dead, in other words, that Paul is preaching from the power of the resurrection, and he is surrounded by members of a community of faith.

Paul gives his usual greeting, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” but then he adds a profound thought, “and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to set us free from the present evil age.” What does this mean? Is everything about our present age evil? No. There are many goods things happening. But there are some things that don’t fit with centering our lives in God and Christ and the Spirit. There are many things in our culture which can distract us from following Jesus. By his life, death, and rising again, he has freed us to follow him and given us the grace to walk that journey in faith. One thing from which he has freed us is being bound by the Mosaic law in a literal way.

Paul tells us that he is not interested in pleasing people, but in pleasing God. People pleasing can be a big distraction. Paul is not into building an empire for himself. He is not trying to keep everyone happy; he is trying to be a faithful servant of Christ. Sometimes we have to make decisions that may not bring us great wealth or great popularity, or great power, but those are not the values by which we are called to live.

Today’s gospel is a wonderful story of healing that tells us so much about Jesus and about this centurion. Herbert O’Driscoll tells us that those who served in the Roman military could be sent to a far away outpost and spend their whole lives there, reporting to a headquarters at a great distance. When this happened, they often made friends where they were serving and became part of the community. This centurion has done exactly that. His slave becomes deathly ill. Probably this slave is a highly educated Greek person who teaches the centurion’s children. The slave is a beloved member of the family. The centurion and his slave are both Gentiles.

O’Driscoll points out that the centurion knows that Jesus has just come into Capernaum and that Jesus is a healer and a Jew. If the centurion asks Jesus to help his beloved slave, this could cause problems for Jesus. Helping the slave of an occupier of the country could alienate the Jewish community. So the centurion calls upon some of his Jewish friends to ask for Jesus’ help. They “appeal to Jesus earnestly.” They tell Jesus what a good person the centurion is.

Jesus goes with them. But now, O’Driscoll tells us, the centurion, “shows his decency and his sensitivity. He knows that it is technically a defilement for a Jew to come under his foreign Gentile roof. So the message comes to Jesus. It avoids the ugly truth about defilement. Instead it pays a compliment. It says, very graciously, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. Therefore I did not presume to come to you.’ Then in a single sentence, it expresses what the Roman has sensed in Jesus of Nazareth—an immense natural authority: ‘Only speak the word and let my servant be healed.’”

“In all this, Jesus had missed nothing. He had become aware of the special kind of human being he was dealing with. The trust shown in him by this man astonished our Lord, and so perhaps he was moved to say a potentially dangerous thing: ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’ The fact that those who surrounded him were friends of the centurion probably prevented an angry reaction. It is quite possible, however, that someone in the crowd duly noted what Jesus had said, and subsequently quietly reported it to those who were interested in gathering evidence about this man from Nazareth. This danger was never far away.”

O’Driscoll illuminates the deep connection between Jesus and this centurion. Both were under authority, Jesus under the authority of God and the centurion under the authority of the emperor of Rome. Barriers are broken and the slave is healed.

Elijah is one prophet against 450 false prophets. Paul calls us to follow the spirit rather than the letter of the law. Jesus and the centurion break through barriers to heal this beloved slave. Following the way of God and Jesus and the Spirit is not always easy. It can be lonely, as it was for Elijah. It can be unpopular, as it was for Paul, It can be extremely complicated and dangerous as it was for all our heroes today. But the clarity, the rootedness, the grace, the healing, and the joy are there for us to see and for us to experience in our own lives. May we follow these holy examples in our own lives. Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: 1 Kings 18, Galatians 1, Herbert O'Driscoll, Luke 7, Pentecost, Psalm 96 | Leave a comment »

The Day of Pentecost

Posted on May 19, 2013 by Beth Crane

Acts 2:1-21
Psalm 104: 24-34, 35b
Romans 8: 14-17
John 14: 8-17 (25-27)

Jesus has told the disciples that he will send an Advocate, the Holy Spirit, to lead them jnto all truth. They are in Jerusalem. It is the Jewish feast of Pentecost, fifty days after the Passover. People are gathered from all around the Mediterranean Sea, from all the known world.

The disciples are waiting, praying, open, expectant. The Spirit comes to them as a mighty wind, like the desert ruach, which molds and shapes the sand. Flames dance over the disciples’ heads That is why we wear red today. Suddenly these Galileans burst out with all the languages of the world, speaking heart to heart, dissolving all differences, sharing the Good News about Jesus in languages each member of the multitude gathered for the feast can understand.

Some people are deeply touched. Others are dubious. They think the disciples are drunk. Peter preaches an amazing sermon, telling them that God is pouring out God’s spirit on all flesh, as the prophet Joel foretold.

This year, we have been focusing on God’s family, the whole human family—how God breaks through humanly constructed barriers and makes us one. The Feast of Pentecost is the birthday of the Church, and we are all called to extend God’s love to all the world.

In his Letter to the Romans, St. Paul writes, “All who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.” So many religious systems have presented God as someone very scary, someone who is keeping track of all our sins and errors, who is, as David Brown says, “out to gunch us.”

This is not the God we worship. We are beloved children of God. We can call God “Abba,” Daddy, or Mommy, Papa or Mom. Remember how our gospel for last week told us how God loves us as much as God loves God’s son, Jesus? God is a God of love, not a God of fear or hatred. Let us hope and pray that religious leaders will stop preaching fear of a God who is out to punish us. God’s family includes everyone. That’s what the Feast of Pentecost is all about.

In our gospel, we are privileged to be with the disciples and Jesus in the Upper Room. Jesus has washed their feet. Judas has left to carry out the betrayal. Time is growing short.

Perhaps Philip senses this. Sometimes when we are looking into the face of God, we sense that we are confronting a great mystery, something that we can never hope to fully understand, because it is so big and so deep and so complex, and our minds are not large enough to grasp some things. Which one of us can grasp the depth and breadth of God’s love? This may be what Philip is feeling. He’s trying to get Jesus to boil everything down to something simple and clear. So he says, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”

Jesus says, “If you have seen me, you have seen God. God is with you now. Look at my life, all the things I have done while we have been together.” And I imagine they reflect on this, his teaching, and healing, and preaching—the love, the patience, the gentleness, the courage, everything. I think they and we can see that Jesus is God walking the face of the earth, living a human life. And now Jesus is saying that he wants us to do the same things that he has done. He is saying to us and them, “Live as I live, do as I do.” And he says that the disciples and we will do even greater things than he has done because he is going to send the Spirit to help us. And then Jesus gives us his peace, not the fleeting peace that the world can sometimes give, but his shalom, his vision of the wholeness and the healing of creation, the shalom that he is calling us to build. Where everyone has enough food and water, has decent shelter, clothing, medical care and good work to do, the shalom in which we honor and heal the creation that God has entrusted to our care.

God’s Holy Spirit is God at work in us and in the world. The Holy Spirit gives us the gifts and tools we need to share God’s love with the world, to speak God’s love heart to heart, and remember, the heart in Judeo-Christian thought is not only the emotions, but the will, the mind, the ethical center in each of us.

As wonderful as it was to have Jesus here on earth as a human being, he had to leave and send us the Spirit. When he was on earth, he traveled around a very small area. True, he touched hearts and lives everywhere he went. But the Feast Of Pentecost tells us that now he is everywhere. Wherever two or three gather in his name, he is there. Sometimes sharing God’s love doesn’t mean speaking in verbal languages, as happened on the first Pentecost. Sometimes sharing God’s love means listening. Sometimes it means tending to someone’s wounds, either physical or emotional or spiritual. Sometimes it’s planting a garden or building a school or helping a group of women turn their weaving into a business. Whatever it may be that we are called to do, today is the day we celebrate God’s giving us all the gifts we need to do it.

Pentecost didn’t happen just once, It’s happening all the time, as we realize that we have gifts we didn’t even know we had, and as we use those gifts.

On this wonderful feast day, may we thank God for all the love and all the gifts which God is constantly pouring out. Thank you, Lord, for making us your Body here on earth and for giving us the gifts to share your love, healing, and forgiveness.

Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: Acts 2, John 14, Pentecost, Psalm 104, Romans 8 | Leave a comment »

Pentecost 3 Proper 9 July 3, 2011

Posted on August 22, 2011 by Beth Crane

Pentecost 3 Proper 9A RCL July 3, 2011

Genesis 24: 34-38. 42-49. 58-67
Psalm 45: 11-18
Romans 7: 15-25a
Matthew 11: 16-19, 25-30

Our reading from the Hebrew scriptures today tells the story of how Abraham finds a wife for his beloved son, Isaac. The psalm is a song for a royal wedding. Our passage from Romans is Paul’s honest and insightful account of the struggles of the spiritual journey. We want to do God’s will, but, in spite of our best efforts, we do fail. Sometimes we get into recurring patterns of doing what we do not want to do and not doing what we know is right. At such times especially, God’s grace is the only thing that can break the chain and get us back on track. In our gospel, Jesus tells us that he is here to help us carry our burdens. It is a yoke for two oxen, a double yoke. We don’t have to do it alone.

This morning I want to try to shed some light on the first lesson. This passage has not appeared in our lectionary until the development of the Revised Common Lectionary which we adopted for use only in 2008.

If we read the part of Genesis which precedes this passage, and we look at the part right after God has spared Abraham from sacrificing Isaac we learn that Abraham has found out that, back in Haran, Abraham and Sarah’s home, Abraham’s brother, Nahor, has married a woman named Milcah, and they have had several children. One of these children, Bethuel, has become the father of a young woman named Rebekah.

Then Sarah dies, and Abraham arranges for her burial. Abraham is now old. God has richly blessed him, and he wants to be sure that God’s promise of descendants as numerous as the stars will come true.

So he asks his most trusted servant, who is not named but we think it is his servant Eliezer, to go back to Haran and pick a wife for Isaac from their home tribe and family. He does not want Isaac to marry one of the Canaanite women because they do not believe in Abraham’s God. Abraham also does not want Isaac to go back to Haran. He wants Isaac to stay in the promised land, so he tells Eliezer that an angel of the Lord will go with him and guide him on this mission. Abraham tells his servant that he should, with God’s guidance, pick out a woman to be Isaac’s wife, but, if the woman does not want to come back to Canaan with Eliezer, he should abort the mission. And he will be free from the oath he is about to take. Eliezer takes a solemn oath to carry out his master’s wishes.

So Eliezer takes ten of his master’s camels and all kinds of choice gifts from his master, and he sets out for the town of Nahor, which is near Haran. When he arrives, he makes the camels kneel outside the city near the well. It is toward evening, and the young women will come to draw water. Eliezer prays to God, and he says, “Let the girl to whom I shall say, ‘Please offer me your jar, so that I may drink,’ and she shall say,’Drink, and I shall water your camels’—let her be the one whom you have appointed for your servant Isaac.”

Along comes Rebekah, with her water jar upon her shoulder, and the scripture says that she is very fair to look upon. She fills up her jar, and Eliezer asks her for a drink, and, sure enough, she offers him a drink and says she will water his camels, and the scripture says, Eliezer “gazed upon her in silence to learn whether or not the Lord had made his journey successful.” (Gen. 24:21.)

As you can see from the passage which Lori has read, everything went according to plan, and we need to remember that Eliezer is trusting in God’s guidance every step of the way. This is the next step in carrying out God’s promise—to find the wife God intends for Isaac.

Rebekah has extended hospitality to Eliezer on behalf of her father, Bethuel, and now Eliezer has come to their home and is asking for Rebekah’s hand in marriage on behalf of his masters, Abraham and Isaac. Here we have to add a note about courtship in 1600 B.C. E. As one scholar puts it, the well is the singles bar in each town. The young men go to the well. The young women are drawing water. The young man, of course, usually knows the young woman and what family she comes from; he asks her to marry him, gives her some appropriate gifts, and goes to her father’s house, whereupon the father would usually, if he feels this young man is a good match, just hand over his daughter to be married.

This is not the case in our story, Rebekah is given the privilege of choosing whether she wants to marry Isaac. She is given a great deal of power in this account. She chooses to go to Canaan and sets out with her retinue.

They finally come upon Isaac in the Negeb. He is walking in the field in the cool of the evening. Rebekah sees him and asks who the man is. Eliezer says that it is his master. Isaac has become his master. The leadership is passing from one generation to the next. Isaac and Rebekah do not actually run across the field into each other’s arms, but they might well have done so. Eliezer tells Isaac the details of the journey, and all is well. Isaac brings Rebekah into his mother Sarah’s tent, and the rest, as they say, is history. And there is another very important point. This is not just another arranged marriage, as was the custom in those days. The text says of Isaac, “He loved her.”

As with the story of Abraham and Isaac, this story points out an increased level of understanding of several things. First, this marriage comes about as a result of God’s guidance. Eliezer, the faithful servant, is praying throughout the journey and seeking God’s will. Secondly, Rebekah is respected. Her father asks her what her wishes are. Her husband loves her. She has a voice. She is a woman of substance.

But the major point is that every step in this story is taken with the guidance of God. What a wonderful example for us to follow. What a faithful servant of God and of his master Eliezer proves himself to be.

As Paul eloquently describes it, our journey is sometimes a struggle. Thanks be to God for the gift of grace. With God’s grace, following in the footsteps of our Lord can be, and often is, a journey of joy.

May we seek God’s guidance as faithfully as did Eliezer; may we seek and do God’s will with God’s grace. May we let our Lord Jesus be our partner in the shared yoke of obedience.

Amen

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: Abraham, Genesis, Isaac, Matthew, Pentecost, Pentecost 3, Psalm 45, Rebekah, Romans, Sarah | Leave a comment »

Pentecost 2 Proper 8 June 26, 2011

Posted on August 22, 2011 by Beth Crane

Pentecost 2 Proper 8A June 26, 2011

Genesis 22: 1-14
Psalm 13
Romans 6: 12-23
Matthew 10: 40-42

Our first lesson this morning can be shocking, to say the least. Why would a loving God ask Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, his beloved son? Why would Abraham have to go through the torture of taking Isaac up the mountain to make this sacrifice? The poignant moment when Isaac asks his father, “Where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” almost tears our hearts out. Abraham answers that God will provide the lamb. And just at the crucial moment when Abraham is reaching for the knife to kill his son, the angel of the Lord tells him to stop and Abraham sees a ram caught in the thicket by its horns. God has indeed provided, but what a wrenching story. One scholar says that, for those who want to scoff at Christianity, this is prime ammunition.

The context for this story is that, at the time of Abraham, around 1600 B.C.E., the people of Canaan and surrounding areas were still making human sacrifices. In fact, they were sacrificing their children to their gods. This story, together with many words of the prophets, including Hosea, who wrote, speaking on behalf of God, “”For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” (Hosea 6:6). God wants us to open our hearts and lives to transformation, God does not want us to be sacrificing animals, much less our own beloved children. But this was a new idea when this story was first written by the Elohist scholar around 750 B.C.E.

Jesus was very clear about the role of children. He welcomed and cherished children. He told us that we need to become like children, open, trusting, willing to allow him into our lives. Children are to be nurtured and protected.

In approaching our epistle for today, we are coming into the middle of Paul’s letter to the Romans, In the ending to the preceding section, Paul has written, “We know that Christ being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. The death that he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”

Some of Paul’s language can cause problems for us. When he talks about presenting our members to sin as instruments of wickedness, scholars tell us he is talking about the commitments we make with our whole selves. Do we devote ourselves to climbing the ladder of success at any cost, or do we devote ourselves to helping others? Paul talks in terms of slavery, which his listeners would have underatood. But this tends to put us off.

What Paul is talking about is, what is the direction of our lives? What is governing our lives? Are we rooted and grounded in God? Do we accept God’s love for us, and do we share that love with others? The term ”righteousness” does not mean a holier than thou attitude. It means right relationship with God. If we are in right relationship with God, we are deeply aware of God’s love for us and for all people.

My definition of sin is separation from God and from other people and from our true self. Paul is talking about sin as a way of life, not as distinct choices. Am I centered in God and God’s compassion? Or am I centered in something else? It could be money, power, acquiring things without regard for those in need. But it’s a whole approach to life, an approach that leads away from God and away from love and compassion for others. It is easy to get caught up in this, and Paul is telling us that, because of our baptism in Jesus, our lives can go in a new direction and we can grow closer and closer to God. Recently, my daughter asked me what my bucket list is, and I said I really hadn’t thought about it. After thinking for a while, I realized it is just that—to grow closer and closer to God and more and more compassionate to other people.

In our gospel for today, Jesus is instructing the apostles on how to go out into the world and spread the Good News. They were going to have to depend on people’s hospitality. They were going to have to travel light. And Jesus says that whoever welcomes one of them welcomes him. Whoever gives a cup of water to someone gives it to him.

Here these twelve people were, being entrusted with this message, this good news, this way of life. And whenever someone welcomed them, they would go in to that home and share the love and joy of new life in Christ, and often those people would be baptized. And as the apostles went around the Mediterranean basin, that good news spread, and the communities of followers of the Way were formed and grew.

But it all depended on the gift of hospitality. Because of hospitality, a new family was formed, the family of followers of Jesus.

What does this mean for us? During our journey in faith, we may have to make sacrifices. Working with kids in an inner city doesn’t pay as much as some other things, but it may be what we are called to. Working with kids anywhere is a vocation which is close to the heart of God. But we are not called to sacrifice our kids or our families.

Jesus has freed us from slavery to sin and brokenness and has welcomed us into a dimension of life we had not dreamed possible. Because of our baptism, we are committed to his shalom; we are partners with him in bringing in his kingdom.

Hospitality is so important. When someone knocks on the door, we are called to welcome them as though they were our Lord. God loves us and calls us to make the choice to love God in return and to love others as God loves them. God wants us to open our hearts to God’s love so that God can lead us into a new dimension of living and a new level of community, here and over all the earth.

And it’sall summed up in something as simple as welcoming folks and giving them something to eat and drink.

What does all this mean for us today? First, God created us good. Jesis told us that the Spirit is within us. We have the ability to choose to be creative or destructive; to be living or unloving, to be compassionate or uncaring. God wants us to choose to love God back and to love other people as God loves them. God wants us to open our hearts to God’s love so that God can lead us into a new dimension of living and a new level of community here and all over the earth.

And it’s all summed up in welcoming folks and giving them something to eat and drink.

Amen

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: Genesis, Matthew, Pentecost, Psalm 13, Romans | Leave a comment »

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