Stony Places 7/23/17 The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

Genesis 28: 10-19a 

You’ve heard the expression, “You’ve made your bed, now lie in it.”  That could be perfectly applied to Jacob’s situation as we encounter him today in our reading from Genesis.  Jacob has made quite a bed for himself with acts of cunning and deception at home in Beer-sheba.  Being the 30 second or so younger brother of his twin, Esau, meant that Jacob was never going have the life he wanted.  All the perks would always go to the firstborn and that was something that Jacob found very hard to live with.  So taking matters into his own hands he cleverly cheats his brother out of his birthright and then goes on to trick his elderly, blind father, Isaac, into giving him the blessing that Esau was supposed to have.  With this stolen inheritance Jacob naturally thinks his life is set - comfy tents, flocks of sheep, servants waiting and ample land are all in his near future.  There’s one thing, though, that Jacob doesn’t envision and that is Esau’s fury.  Esau is so overcome with anger that he makes plans to kill his brother.  And when Jacob discovers that he’s a marked man he runs leaving his home striking out for his uncle’s house in a far off land called Haran.

And this is where we meet Jacob.  He’s left everything in the dust.  All plans of a secure and comfortable life now gone.  Jacob finds himself completely estranged from his family, abandoning all he knows and running for his life.  It certainly is a hard bed that Jacob has made for himself - so hard that even his pillow is a stone.   

Under these circumstances it’s remarkable that Jacob is able to find sleep, let alone dream.  But he does and in his dream he see a ladder with its base on earth extending up into heaven with angels going up and down.  And God is right there next to Jacob with words of promise and comfort.  Words of promise and comfort - for this scoundrel?  Yes - it’s quite amazing.  Despite Jacob’s very real flaws God cares for him and has a future for him.  “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac,” and in this dream comes promises of land and family and blessings ending with, “Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go.”

Upon awaking the first thing out of Jacob’s mouth is, “Surely the Lord is in this place - and I did not know it!”   Now nothing has really changed for Jacob.  He’s still pretty much in the middle of nowhere.  He’s still a hunted man with only a stone for a pillow, but his encounter with God has changed his perspective - his circumstances seem different - there is hope.  And with this new vision Jacob takes that rock hard pillow which just the night before had offered little to no comfort, turns it upright, consecrates it with oil and makes it into a type of altar marking that desolate place as holy for it is a place where Jacob encountered God.    

Yet as special as that piece of land was, what Jacob had yet to realize was that “this place” that he marked with the stone, “this place” is not so much a particular geographical spot as it is Jacob’s own life.  Surely God is in Jacob’s life and he did not know it!

And surely God is in your life and in my life - every day, every place, every moment.  But do we know it?  When things are going well, when life is meeting our expectations it may be relatively easy to feel assured that God is in our lives.  But what about those times when we find ourselves in a desolate place lying on a hard bed with only a stone for a pillow?  A bed, perhaps, of disappointment or loss or some kind of struggle - one we may have made for ourselves or one created by circumstances beyond our control.  Do we know then that surely God is in this type of place?  It’s a challenge - Jacob confesses that he did not know it.  And there are times where we don’t know it either.    Yet Jacob’s story reminds us of the very good news that yes, even in hard places with stones for pillows, even there God is that place for God is with us and in us.  And that means there is always hope.

That’s not to say God necessarily turns all hard stones into soft pillows.  It certainly wasn’t so for Jacob.  Even after his dream life was not cushy.  Upon arriving at his uncle’s place in Haran, Jacob worked long and hard to rebuild his life and faced an obstacle or two in the form of a cunning uncle who had his own tricks up his sleeve.    

Jacob struggled and his life didn’t go as he had originally planned, yet in the end God’s promises of land, descendants, and blessings did come to pass.  But more importantly, the reassuring words, “Know that I am with you and I will keep you wherever you go,” never failed for Jacob nor does it ever fail for us.  We all eventually experience difficult times - hard places full of stones.  Yet if we are willing and open to it even those places can be full of grace - where God is very near and present and, perhaps, taking those stones and using them to shape us as well as to reveal herself more fully to us.  Stones, that in time, may be set upright and consecrated marking times and places that we did indeed encounter the sacred and holy.  The miracle isn’t that God breaks into our lives at certain points.  That is always happening.  The miracle is that we recognize it especially in the stony places, places that we never expected nor wanted to be.  But when our eyes are open to see the reality - that God is with us and will keep us wherever we go - there is hope.  So let us wake up to the good news that is true in this moment and every moment - that God is in this place because surely God is in our lives: may we know it always. 

Understanding the Parables Anew 7/16/17 The Rev. David M. Stoddart

Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

You can see quite a construction in our church today: rockets, robots, lights, tools, and ladders. We left them up so that you could see we just finished a week of Summer Celebration. And it was a great week. But while I could tell you about it, I’m not sure you’d fully understand it. I could shout “Wow God!” to you and tell you about Ian Victor and his crazy invention. I could even ask our music leaders Tom Dixon and Emma Stoddart to show you some dance steps. You might be interested; you might be glad it happened; you might be glad you weren’t there. But you wouldn’t really get it because you didn’t live it; if you weren’t part of it, you are not in on the secret.

For reasons that are unclear to me, the lectionary leaves out a crucial portion of this Gospel. After telling them this parable, the disciples, feeling baffled,  ask Jesus: Why do you teach in parables? And tells them that he speaks in parables precisely so that people will not get it. And what in the world is that about? Doesn’t that just contradict everything Jesus stands for, like  proclaiming Good News to all people and welcoming everyone into God’s kingdom? How can we square that Jesus with this one today, who says: Seeing they do not perceive, and hearing they do not listen. Well, I think Jesus offers us the answer to that conundrum with this whole idea of being in on the secret. He tells his disciples: To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven. The Greek word used there for secrets is musteria, “mysteries.” The disciples have entered into the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, so they can get what Jesus is saying. Other people outside the kingdom will never get it, and Jesus doesn’t want them to get it because he doesn’t want them to be outsiders: he wants them to come into the kingdom. Please follow me carefully here because this is really important: there is deliberately no way to fully grasp the parables of Jesus unless you are in the kingdom. They are impossible to understand from the outside. So every time he utters a parable, people face a choice: they can shrug it off, they scratch their heads — “Huh?” Or they can enter into the mystery, into the secrets of the kingdom and, as we heard this week in Summer Celebration, have their minds blown! Because that’s what Jesus is trying to do: he’s trying to get us to hear these stories from the inside so that he can, in fact, blow our minds.

Let’s use this parable of the sower as an example. If we listen to it as outsiders, then we can easily dismiss it as weird or quaint. Or we could settle for some superficial understanding of it: Yes, there’s this farmer, and he throws lots of seeds around and squanders lots of seeds: many of them don’t ever produce anything because they fall on bad soil. But some fall on good soil and bear fruit. And then we could discuss the inefficiency of this farmer or enter into a facile and fruitless (pun intended) exercise of trying to determine what kind of soil other people are or maybe what kind of soil we are. Is that what this parable is about? NO! But if we hear it as outsiders, as people not living in the mystery of the kingdom, we might reach just that conclusion.

But now hear the story from within the kingdom, from within the very heart of the mystery. If we are hearing this as insiders, that means kingdom seeds are already bearing fruit in us and we can see that reality is not what we thought it was. Outside the mystery, we could say that lots of seeds get wasted and many people don’t have faith. From within the mystery, we can experience instead the extravagant abundance of God, who is sowing seeds of the kingdom every minute, every second. They’re within us and they’re all around us. God is relentless in her love: every opportunity is seized, every inch of soil is covered. And God is infinite and eternal: this sower never gets tired. Ever. It doesn’t matter, for example, how many hundreds of times we may have heard this story and not really understood it or even cared to: right now God is sowing seeds in our hearts and hoping they sprout. And if we don’t get it this time, there is always next time: God never gives up. And that is true about all of life within the kingdom. It doesn’t matter how many times we’ve failed. It doesn’t matter how many times we’ve screwed up. I’m sure God has sown thousands of seeds in my life that have gone to waste and produced nothing, but — incredibly, unbelievably — God still keeps throwing seeds at me and some of them take root and bear fruit. I know that. I see that. I can count on that. And so can you. God will not stop until we are all bearing fruit, until each one of us is a gorgeous garden, fruitful and beautiful beyond our wildest dreams, yielding thirtyfold, sixtyfold, a hundredfold! That is what it means to hear this parable from within the kingdom, from within the mystery.

And hearing it from within also changes the way we serve God. After all, why hold back? God doesn’t. We sowed tons of seeds this week at Summer Celebration, and I’m sure lots of them were wasted — but not all of them. One child who participated,  not a member of this parish, proved to be a bit of a handful. He was constantly talking, constantly misbehaving, and seemed to never pay attention. Then one day at the Bible lesson, the leader, Aidan, asked why anyone would ever want to kill Jesus. The other kids were quiet, but that boy piped up: “Because he loved people they didn’t want him to love.” And, boom, in an instant, a kingdom seed bears fruit. That kid was right on. If there is a way to reach us, God will find it. Doesn’t matter how many millions of seeds are wasted: this sower never runs out of seeds — or patience. With any of us. And we can live and minister accordingly.

Right this moment, the Risen Christ is sowing seeds in all of us. He doesn’t want us to hear about the kingdom as outsiders because being outsiders won’t change us at all. Jesus wants us to live the kingdom as insiders. Every time we hear a parable, all of us are invited into the heart of the mystery, into the heart of God. Everyone is welcome to it, but you have to come in to get it. Be in on the secret, and let your mind be blown and your heart expanded by the amazing love of God — available right here, right now.

Carrying Heavy Burdens 7/9/17 The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

Matthew 11:16-19

Upon returning from some time away from Washington D.C., Abraham Lincoln was asked if he was able to get any rest.  It is said that he replied, “It was a great relief to get away from Washington and the politicians...but nothing touches the tired spot.”  Now we don’t have the weight of a Civil War upon our shoulders, but we do know what he’s talking about, don't we?  The tired spot?  A place deep within us that can become so weary and burdened that no change of pace or scenery is able to reach let alone relieve.   

Which makes Jesus’s words like a balm to us. “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, 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."

Now we already know that Jesus is not offering us an easy and carefree life, a life that is not touched by grief or pain or guilt or sickness and all the like. What is Jesus offering us though, what he is inviting us to live and to know is a rest for the “tired spot,” a peace for our souls in the midst of all that life can be.  For when we come to Jesus - and that’s not just a one-time event, it’s a daily call and for some, depending on what’s going on in life, it may be a moment to  moment need -  but whenever we come to Jesus he offers our souls a rest that is like no other.  A rest that is not tied to the external circumstances that are always bound to change.  But a rest that is found in connection to God whose very being is always peace and love and wholeness, and rest. 

Jesus wants all of that for us and more - a renewed spirit that does not turn away from the labors of life.  “Take my yoke upon you,” he says.  Now a yoke is a wooden crosspiece that is fastened over the necks of two animals and then attached to something that needs to be pulled.  It is a tool for work, hard work even.   And there’s two things I’d like to highlight about this yoke image that Jesus offers.  First, a yoke is a symbol of partnership and connection.  That means that whatever we do in this life and whatever burdens that we might experience we are never alone for we are yoked with Christ.  So God then is not just a passive presence in the midst of struggle, instead Jesus is actively engaged in shouldering the load with us and sometimes even for us while also being at work to bring God’s healing power to bear in any situation. 

The second thing to notice is that a yoke is a symbol of control - or lack thereof.  Those who are yoked are not the ones who get to be in charge.  Being willing to take on Jesus’s yoke means that we surrender control.  It is God then who directs us, God who sets the pace for us (which often seems to be a bit too slow for our liking), and God who guides us in the work that needs to be done together with Jesus – the Kingdom work calls upon all that we are to love and serve.  And by doing through the power of the Holy Spirit we are taught a new way, a lighter way of carrying life.

But don’t think that coming to Jesus, taking on his yoke and finding rest is intended to be done in isolation.  We are to come to Jesus with others in community.  That’s why we have church.  Being connected to God means being connected to God’s people.  We need one another just as much as we need God.  For there are times when we can become so weary and heavy laden that it seems almost impossible to come to Jesus on our own.  Remember the story about the man who was paralyzed?  Jesus was in town healing people, but obviously this man couldn’t come to Jesus on his own.  So his friends brought him, carrying him on a bed.  But when they arrived at the house it was packed with people and there seemed to be no way to get in.  However, these were very good friends indeed and their mission was not to be thwarted.  If they couldn’t get the paralyzed man through the door, well then, they’d go through the roof.  So after pulling back the tiles these friends lower the paralyzed man to the floor so he too could come to Jesus and receive rest and healing for his soul.

 As God’s people we are to bear one another’s burdens and sometimes that means bringing another before Jesus when for one reason or another they just can’t do it on their own.  I know I’ve done that for others and I am grateful that others have done that for me.  It’s part of being yoked with Jesus and doing the work of the Kingdom of God.  And as we come to Jesus with God’s people we know a rest that is able to touch any of our tired spots.

So today hear the good news that Jesus is speaking to you, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, 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."

Entering Fully into the Terror 7/2/17 The Rev. David M. Stoddart

Genesis 22:1-14.  

In Hebrew Scripture, God usually communicates with human beings through angels. We see it at the end of this passage from Genesis today, when it is an angel who tells Abraham not to slay Isaac but to sacrifice the ram instead. But in this story, the order to kill Isaac does not come through an angel: it comes directly from God.  There is a Yiddish folktale about this very thing. In that tale, there is no angel because the angels refuse to go along with it. They say to God, “If you’re going to command Abraham to kill his own son, then you tell him. We’re not doing it!” This is a terrible story. And I’m with the angels on this one. I want to go on strike and tell God, “If you want this story preached in worship, then you come and preach it! I refuse!” But apparently I have less clout than the angels. So here I am, and this story will not be ignored. For one thing, it looms large in Israel’s history. Christians tend to refer to it as the sacrifice of Isaac, but not Jews: they call it the akedah, the binding of Isaac. And according to 2 Chronicles 3:1, the mountain of the akedah is the very place where the Temple is built centuries later; tradition holds that the altar of the Temple was located on the exact spot where Abraham built his altar and bound his son. But the story is inescapable for a more primal reason than that: it’s horrifying. Would the God we worship really ask anyone to murder their own child?

The answer to that seems clear: other ancient religions practiced human sacrifice, but the law of Israel strictly forbade it. Human sacrifice in general, and the sacrifice of children in particular, was deemed an abomination (Lev. 18:21; Jer. 7:30-34). Actually, our very notion of hell comes from it. The word translated as hell in the New Testament is Gehenna, which refers to the Valley of Hinnom outside of Jerusalem that served as a dump where people burned garbage. Why there? Because it was in that place centuries before Christ that the Israelites committed their worst apostasy: they worshiped the god Molech by burning their children alive as an offering to him. And so the place was held accursed forever, a symbol of everything evil. So the Old Testament itself makes it clear that God would never desire such a sacrifice, and our experience of God’s love in Jesus can only confirm that.

And yet we are left with this story. One approach to understanding it, quite common in rabbinic circles, is to say that Abraham flat-out got it wrong: God doesn’t want him to sacrifice Isaac; Abraham just misunderstands. And certainly the Bible is filled with stories of people who get it wrong. Or we could also hold that this is a one-of-a-kind test, something which only Abraham would ever undergo as the father of our faith. In that case, it could be like the event it obviously prefigures, the sacrifice of Jesus, God’s only Son, on the cross, which is also a once-in-eternity event. There is something to be said for these interpretations, but they have one basic flaw: they keep this story at a comfortable distance. Whether Abraham is just mistaken or unique, that means this awful story doesn’t apply to us, and we can quickly skip over it.

But that won’t work. The one thing this story can offer us can only be absorbed by entering into the terror of it and not avoiding it. Abraham has no good choice here: he can give up his son or he can give up the one thing that gives meaning to his life and his son’s life. It doesn’t matter existentially whether God is doing this to him or just it allowing it to happen; this is what Abraham is experiencing. Every option is bad, and what seems “right” to him, is unbearable. And if you are an adult and have never been in that same kind of situation, I don’t know how you’ve avoided it. To be a person of faith — no scratch that, to be a human being — means experiencing moments when every way forward is darkness, when the very goodness of God seems absent and pain is our only companion.

I have sat with people while they watched their child die. Do you surrender your precious child’s life, trusting in the loving providence of God or do you curse God in bitterness and heartbreak? No option is easy, even and especially the “right” one. I have listened to recovering alcoholics and addicts who are frantic: staying clean and sober feels impossible, but returning to alcohol or drug abuse will only destroy them. People have cried in my office as they have confronted devastating problems in their families that left them with no good course of action. I have had sleepless nights when I knew how terrible the next day would be, that no matter what I did, it was going to hurt me and cause pain to others. Pretending that such moments don’t happen is not faith: it’s denial. Authentic faith, Christ faith, means entering fully into the terror and darkness of such moments, like Jesus did in Gethsemane and on the cross.

Because only then do we discover the truth, which is embodied in one of the most powerful phrases in the Hebrew Bible, the one we heard today (Genesis 22:14): יהךה יראה — The LORD will provide. It’s easy to say that when life is good and there’s money in the bank, food in the fridge, and loved ones in good health. But we don’t really discover what it means until our day or our world implodes. I think I have shared with you one of the most moving pastoral conversations I have ever had, which took place after a Compassionate Friends memorial service. A married couple were telling me about the death of their son some years before, which was awful beyond words. But then they described the various ways they had experienced God’s grace and redemption since that time, and then the father said, “I miss my son every day, but, you know, I don’t think I would change anything.” How can you get to that point after such a tragedy? How can a bishop dying from a brain tumor proclaim the love of God, as a dear friend of mine did? How can a dead body hanging on a cross lead to life? There is no way to answer such questions academically: our creed and our catechism won’t suffice. Like Abraham, we can only live them and experience the answer ourselves.

I don’t wish for you any bleak moments this week or ever. But when they come, my charge to you is simple: don’t avoid them. Don’t think that faith means denying them. Faith means walking forward into the darkness with whatever trust we can muster, with open hands and open hearts, willing to discover the truth for ourselves: יהךה יראה — The LORD will provide.