Understanding the Kingdom of Heaven. July 30, 2023. The Reverend Kathleen Sturges

Romans 8:26-39, Matthew 13:31-33,44-52 

“Have you understood all this?” That’s the question Jesus asks at the end of his rapid fire parables about the kingdom of heaven. And the response he gets is a definitive “Yes.” But I question that certainty. Because parables are not by nature truth statements that you hear one time and all of a sudden “get it.” Instead they are stories that invite the listener to explore, to wonder, to see things from different perspectives. Given that, Jesus’ question seems like a bit of a set up. He even seems to goad his listeners into a knee-jerk affirmative answer by making his query on the heels of the rather alarming wrap up, “So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth…Have you understood all this?”

No pressure. There’s not that much riding on your understanding of the kingdom of heaven, only eternal torment. But if you are not sure that you belong among the righteous, feel free to admit it. Come on. Of course his listeners are going t0 claim understanding - they’re scared! And almost universally, when we get scared, what we do is we cling to certainty. Curiosity and learning are all well and good when we feel safe and comfortable, but when we feel threatened all of that goes out the window. We want security. We want to feel safe. We want certainty.

Which leads to all sorts of trouble in both our common and private lives. Take any hot-button issue of our time: climate, immigration, abortion, racism. Or think about issues in your own life that cause conflict. Dig deep and likely you’ll find a common theme: Fear. We get scared. Something is being threatened - our sense of order or safety or way of life or identity. Bottom line, when we feel threatened we don’t want thoughtful, nuanced dialogue. We don’t want parables that make us lean in and ponder, and consider things from a new point of view. We don’t want that because it feels like there is too much at stake, like it was for Jesus’ listeners. So we seek certainty. We grab onto whatever position lines up with our pre-existing notions, convince ourselves that we’ve been right all along and demand that it’s others who need to change. We hold onto certainty for all it’s worth because it feels safe, secure, familiar.

Surely Jesus knows this about us. Likely that’s the point of his question. He’s exposing our human tendency to latch on to baseless certainty in the face of fear. But as he does this he’s also challenging that very instinct through the parables he has just told.

Do you get the irony? All of the stories about what the kingdom of heaven is like are the opposite of certainty. They are all about surprise, hiddenness, and the violation of expectations. A mustard seed that is barely the size of a head of a pin grows into a massive bush. Yeast mixed in with flour isn’t noticed until it transforms the dough into something that can feed a multitude. The treasure hidden in a field has an unexpected twist of deception. The finder keeps the discovery quiet until he can buy the field for himself. And then there's the parable of the pearl. A jewel that is created by a shellfish, something God has declared unclean. And not only that, this thing of beauty starts out as an irritation. When we finally get to the parable of the fish perhaps we shouldn't be surprised about the net that gathers everything in its way - good and bad are all jumbled together.

That seems to be Jesus's understanding of the kingdom. It's messy. It's hidden. It's surprising. It may even include people we think don't belong. In other words, it's anything but predictable and certain. Jesus doesn't come to make us feel safe and secure. He doesn't come to proclaim a reign in which God organizes everything in its proper place and we get to understand all the “hows” and “whys" and never feel confused or shaken or out of our depth. When Jesus asks us if we understand we aren't supposed to say “Yes.” Instead we're supposed to practice the work of the scribes that Jesus references at the end of our reading. The “scribe who has been trained for the kingdom…who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”

New and old together is a metaphor of growth, of learning, of change. We value the old, the familiar, the things we already know. And God also calls us to value the new, the unexpected. To be open to what God is doing now which may be something different from before. This is hard for any of us to practice but especially when we feel scared, when what’s comfortable and familiar is threatened. Nonetheless, this is our call as followers of Christ and life in the kingdom of heaven.

Verna Dozier, a leading African American Episcopal theologian of the 2oth century put it this way, the “Kingdom of God…calls us to risk. We always see through a glass darkly and that is what faith is about. I will live by the best I can discern today. Tomorrow I may find out I was wrong. Since I do not live by being right, I am not destroyed by being wrong.”

Since we, as followers of Christ, do not live by being right or certain or having everything figured out, we are not destroyed by being wrong or surprised or unsure. In fact, when we do get it wrong, when life feels insecure, we when we are scared we can take that as our cue to turn to the only thing that is ultimately safe and sure and true as promised to us in our reading from the book of Romans.

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The love of God is our security. The love of God is our certainty. When that is certain we do not need to claim perfect understanding. Instead, we can be open to the surprises, the hiddenness, the upending of expectations that is a part of God’s kingdom. Because not even death, nor rulers, nor threats of the uncertain can do us any real harm. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. Of that we can be certain.

Tending Your Garden. July 23, 2023. The Reverend David M. Stoddart.

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

I am confronted by this parable every time I walk outside my house. I live in a small cul-de-sac, and at the entrance of the cul-de-sac are two houses, right across the street from each other. They both have three big, rectangular raised beds in the front yard. The ones on the left look immaculate: I have no idea what the plants are, but they’re beautiful and well-maintained. The ones on the right are completely overgrown and unkempt. I enjoy looking at the gardens on the left. The owner obviously weeds them. But then I look at the wild ones on the right and wonder: maybe God likes those better. For while God has the wisdom and the wherewithal to weed properly, according to Jesus, God prefers not to weed at all.

Now of course, today's Gospel is not about plants. It is a provocative parable that hits hard on several different levels, but central to all of them is this metaphor of weeding. In the story, the workers are eager to weed the fields. But the Master is not. And if we let that idea of weeding sink in a bit, we can see why the Master might want to avoid it. In our long history as human beings, we have not always been good at weeding. For one thing, we often have trouble identifying what is a weed and what is not: often a weed has just been anything or anyone we don’t like. And when we decide we are going to weed out what we don’t like, what we deem bad or undesirable, the results often range from the hurtful to the horrific. There are social groups, cliques, and clubs that try to drive out those who don’t “fit in.” In fact, whole societies can do that by targeting minorities that the majority either dislikes or distrusts. This impulse to weed has led to such atrocities as  ethnic cleansing in the Balkans, genocide in Rwanda, and, of course, the Holocaust. And, sadly, there are voices out there in our own nation which speak the language of weeding people out in reference to immigrants, Muslims, political opponents, and others. Just last week, for example, the founder of the America First Movement spoke at a rally in Florida and said – this is a direct quotation – these words about Jews: “They will go down. We have God on our side and they will go down with their Satanic master. They have no future in America. The enemies of Christ have no future in this world.” 

That is truly terrible and needs to be acknowledged as such. But I wonder if this parable can help us to dig deep and look at the roots of the problem. So often the brokenness in the world around us reflects the brokenness inside of us. And the reality is that each one of us is a mixed field, with both wheat and weeds growing. And people can be pretty ruthless about weeding out the things about themselves they don’t like – or at least, trying to weed them out. And these are not necessarily sins at all. How many people, for example, go to great lengths to rid themselves of what they see as physical defects, even to the point of damaging their bodies and their health? I have listened to some gay people describe to me how they tried to uproot their sexuality because they feared that God or their families or their society would not accept it. But in trying to uproot it, they just inflicted tremendous emotional harm on themselves. And even when we talk about things that are sinful, this urge to weed them out can become destructive. If someone with an anger problem, for example, just gets angry at herself for being angry and tries to forcefully suppress or eliminate that anger, the result is often guilt, self-loathing – and even more anger. The Master in this parable has the wisdom to see that trying to weed out parts of ourselves that we don’t like for whatever reason often causes more harm than good. And it doesn’t take profound psychological insight to see that when people cannot love and accept themselves as they are, they all too easily project that lack of love and acceptance out into the world around them. Viciously trying to weed out the undesirable within us can quickly lead to viciously trying to weed out the undesirable around us.

This is not the way of Christ. We certainly want to protect ourselves and others from getting harmed. But the Gospel calls us to take a different approach than weeding. Jesus’ way of loving begins by accepting people where they are and as they are. And we have a great example of this in the apostle Paul. Paul has plenty of weeds in his field. One of them is particularly hard for him: he calls it a thorn in his flesh. We have no idea what this is. It could be a personality trait, it could be a bad habit, it could be a moral failing, it could be a physical condition – we just don’t know. What we do know is that Paul wants to get rid of it, and asks God to root it out. And God says no: God won’t do that kind of weeding. Instead God calls Paul to peace and acceptance, assuring him that my power is made perfect in weakness. Maybe God knows that rooting this weed out from Paul’s life would hurt him too much. Or maybe God in her wisdom knows that this thorn is not a weed at all, but something that will ultimately help Paul grow in love. Whatever it may be, God’s approach to it is loving and merciful.

This is one of the things I have always admired about 12 step programs. Addiction is awful and destructive, but those programs do not try to weed out addiction. Their approach is rather one of acceptance and surrender: acceptance that they are addicts, and surrender to God’s love. That love working through that program can lead to freedom from the power of addiction, but it doesn’t get rid of the addiction itself. I have spoken with people who have been in the program for decades and they will say, “I’m in recovery, I’m sober, I’m clean — but I’m still an addict.” 

That is the way of Christ: not violently trying to uproot what we perceive to be weeds, but allowing the love of God to do what God knows is best. That doesn’t give us quick, easy fixes, and it may not eliminate things we wish were not there, but it does help us avoid hurting ourselves or others in a puritanical quest to get rid of anything we don’t like. So when we feel the need to weed, maybe we can take it out on our plants and limit it to our gardens. And we can let God do the ultimate weeding which only God has the wisdom and the wherewithal to do right.

Delight in the Sowing of Seeds. July 16, 2023. The Reverend Kathleen M. Sturges

 

Isaiah 55:10-13, Matthew 13:1-9,18-23

This past week at our Summer Celebration Vacation Bible School kids and adults alike had an amazing time celebrating how stellar and out of this world Jesus’ light is in our lives. But today’s gospel reading brings us back down to earth as Jesus tells us a story about a sower who went out to sow and ended up throwing seeds rather recklessly on all types of ground. Some seeds fell on hard-trodden pathways, others ended up on rocky terrain, still others amongst the thorns, while some actually landed on fertile soil. The story is popularly known as The Parable of the Sower even though I think we naturally tend to hear it not as the parable of the sower at all, but as the parable of the judgment of the soil - because that’s where our focus usually goes. We slide into judgment mode oh so easily as we determine what soil is good and what soil is bad. And of course, we don’t just judge when it comes to this story but in ways too numerous to count. In fact, my guess is that since the time you awoke this morning you’ve made countless judgements. Maybe you judged that the milk in the refrigerator had gone bad so you threw it out instead of pouring it on your cereal. Or maybe you judged that a driver on the way to church today made a bad move. Or perhaps you judged that it would be a good idea to bring a wrap with you this morning because the a/c in the church can be rather cold. We are predisposed to judge which is not necessarily a bad thing. In so many ways it helps us survive and thrive. However, sometimes our judging tendencies don’t serve us so well.

Take Jesus’ story, for example. Maybe it’s not about judgment but about joy. Since again and again in the midst of this thorny and rocky and good world of ours the sower is still sowing seeds. Every day God scatters the word of the kingdom, as Jesus calls it, recklessly, indiscriminately out into all the nooks and crannies of our lives. No one, no place, no situation goes lacking. God’s Word goes everywhere - because the Word is not something just found in church. It’s not something that is locked up in a spiritual ivory tower. I believe the Word of the Lord is anything that brings good news to the poor and comfort to those who mourn. The Word of the Lord is whatever heals the brokenhearted. Whatever opens prison doors. Whatever proclaims the pure goodness and radical love of God.

Surely God’s Word is scattered all around us, joyfully scrawled throughout the world. That good Word was certainly revealed in the faces of the kids who were here at Summer Celebration as well as in the lives that were served by our food pantry. But way beyond that, the life-giving Word of the Lord can equally be experienced in the kindness of strangers, the generosity of others, in the sacrifices people make to work for justice and peace. The Word of the Lord is written on the broken tablets of our hearts. It is falling like rain in the tears of the forgiven. It is harnessed in the laughter of children. God’s Word is everything and anything that brings hope, healing, life.

And as Isaiah, in our first reading, tells us God’s Word does what it intends to do without even the slightest bit of soil management on our part. Amazing, isn’t it? Because, again, Jesus’ story is a parable not about the judgment of the soil but rather The Parable of the Sower. So perhaps to focus on the rich and rather silly image of how God extravagantly sows the Word of the kingdom is to experience this parable with joy instead of judgment.

Because isn’t life too short, too sacred, and too important to skimp on joy? Isn’t the world just too precarious to turn our backs on joy? I think so. And Isaiah backs me up on this because the Hebrew word that is commonly interpreted as “purpose” in his prophecy can also be translated as “delight.” So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth, says Isaish speaking for God, it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I DELIGHT.

It seems to me that the word “delight" might be more accurate given the playful imagery that follows. For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. What a fantastical, joy-filled, playful image that is. It’s like a biblical Cirque du Soleil. Imagine the delight of God seen in the singing hills and the clapping trees.

Yet we live in such serious times. Some would even say fearful times - times of political unrest, of rising violence, of climate disasters and the like. With all that going on in our world we might wonder what place is there for joy? And I imagine that there were some in the time of Isaiah who felt the same way, who judged this singing-hills-and-clapping-trees business as lacking in decorum. Especially since this prophecy was originally directed toward a people who were eking out an existence as exiles in Babylon - a displaced people who had lost everything they had ever known. I wonder if these whimsical verses seemed like sending a circus clown into a refugee camp?

But it’s not like Isaiah didn’t get the gravity of the situation. It’s not that Isaiah couldn’t judge right from wrong - he was a prophet, after all. But sometimes the job of a prophet is not to judge but to point God’s people to joy. To remind us that our God delights in us.

Which makes me wonder…what would it be like rather than judging the supposed imperfections of our lives to instead experience the joy of being blessed with life itself and made in the image of God? What would it be like rather than judging the person standing at the side of the road with a cardboard sign to instead experience the joy of seeing Christ’s own face in theirs? What would it be like rather than judging the political leanings of every person and organization to instead experience the joy of God’s kingdom imperfectly and unevenly breaking in on us all? Honestly, I don’t know for sure but I’m willing to give it a try. Because, I don’t know about you, but I want to choose joy - and leave the business of judgment, in whatever form that may take, up to God and God alone. For today is the day that the sower is scattering the healing, hopeful, life-giving Word onto every terrain this world has to offer. And that Word will surely accomplish all in which God delights and not return empty.

The Lessons of Experience. July 09, 2023. The Reverend David M. Stoddart

 

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 

When Mo. Kathleen began her sermon last week by asking how many people like taking tests, I was tempted to raise my hand and say. “Ooh! Ooh! Me!” Not because I enjoy taking tests per se, but because I love doing well on tests. During my school days, if I aced an exam, it made me feel accomplished, as if I had actually mastered the subject I was studying. But what if the subject is God? I spent years in college and in seminary studying God, or rather, studying things that are at least somehow related to God. I took many classes in religion, theology, Scripture, and church history. I did well on many exams. I mastered the material: I even earned a “Master of Divinity” degree. Think about that for a second: Master of Divinity. As if! I came away from my formal education with a lot of knowledge, and knowledge is a good thing. But as much as I loved learning it, it left me hungry. There was something elusive in my studies, something that always seemed to escape me. I knew a lot about what other people said about God. I knew a lot about what other people thought about Jesus. But knowing about someone is not the same as knowing someone. And there is only one way to know God.

I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. As a young adult, I slowly came to understand what countless people have long understood, what anyone, even the most uneducated person can understand: we can only know God by experiencing God’s love. No amount of education, no degrees, fancy titles, or honors can substitute for simply realizing that we are held in God’s love, unconditionally and forever. I am reminded of St. Thomas Aquinas, perhaps the most influential theologian in Christian history. He authored many books, commentaries, and treatises, including tomes of theology so vast in scope that they were called Summas – they summed up everything. But Aquinas had a powerful and personal experience of God towards the end of his life, an epiphany that led him to stop writing completely. When asked why he refused to take up the pen again, he said simply, “All that I have written now seems like straw to me.” You have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants.

Now, I am a big proponent of education. We are continually called to learn more about the ways of God, ourselves, and the world we live in. As faithful people, we should be rigorous thinkers who use our minds to the best of our abilities. But all of that will only make sense when we are grounded firmly in the experiential knowledge of God. The starting point must be the experience of God’s love, mercy, and grace. When we are not anchored in that experience, when we become focused instead on ideas, concepts, doctrines, traditions, and rules, then a troubling thing happens: we become less concerned about being loving, and more concerned about being right. And when Christians become more focused on being right than on being loving, we get into lots of problems.

For example, the need to be right has for centuries caused Christians to twist themselves into pretzels trying to explain why a God of love would damn to eternal torment anyone who is not a baptized church member. The very idea of that is obscene, and the thinking behind it is preposterous, but people have advocated for it because we have to be right and that means other people have to be wrong. That has not only poisoned our relationships with people who belong to other religions or to no religion: it has poisoned our relationship with each other, as our long history of condemning and excommunicating each other demonstrates. And this need to be right also impacts the way we interact with the society around us. Just recently, we have all seen in the news that some of our fellow believers have decided that, in the name of Jesus, the One who loves and welcomes everyone, they will refuse service to gay customers just because they’re gay.

And then we read this Gospel passage today, and I hear Jesus saying, “Stop! Just stop! You’re so focused on proving that you’re right, so intent on finding ways of hurting each other. Enough.” It’s a heavy burden always trying to prove that we’re right, a heavy burden always trying to justify ourselves. And it is so unnecessary. And so Jesus says today, 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.

Those heavy burdens he is referring to are religious burdens, all the stuff we feel like we have to do, all the things we feel like we have to believe, to get it right and be okay with God. He says to drop all that and take on a light burden instead: know that God will forever love us and show mercy to us, and then be set free to love and show mercy in return. We don’t need to earn degrees in theology, we don’t need to be heroes of virtue. We just need to be humble enough, open enough, to receive the love God so freely pours out on every single one of us.

And Jesus will help us do that. It’s his yoke that we are called to take up. And a yoke by definition links us with another. His yoke is easy because he is our yoke partner and he’s shouldering the load with us. When we need help loving, he’ll help us. When we fail to love, he will forgive us. When we need to feel love, he will shower love on us. How do we know? Well, we can read about it in books or listen to other people tell us about it, but that’s all just second-hand knowledge. The only way to really know it is to experience it ourselves. And everyone here can. If we have already experienced that love, we can know it even more deeply. And if we’ve never experienced it, we can taste it for the first time. All we need to do is ask for it, ask for it sincerely, letting go of our pride and our ego and our need to be right. And then wait for Christ to come. Christ may come through another person; through a sudden inspiration; through an inward warming of our hearts; in any number of ways. But Christ will come to us, yoke himself to us, and lead us on the path that begins and ends in love. This is how we will not know about him, but know him — the only way to know him — through letting him love us.

Passing the Test. July 2, 2023. The Reverend Kathleen M. Sturges

 Genesis 22:1-14, Matthew 10:40-42

Who loves taking tests? Perhaps, if you have a history of doing well on them, you do, but most of us would rather avoid them if possible. In fact, I consider one of the major perks that comes with adulthood is that school and tests are behind you. Or if they’re not it’s because we choose to gain more education and take the necessary tests for some greater benefit.

Although Abraham, in our reading from Genesis, is way past his school years at the ripe age of 100+ years old it turns out that tests are not behind him - at least when it comes to God. Our reading begins by declaring that, “God tested Abraham.” But this test is not one that involves paper and pencil. It’s much more horrifying than that. “Take your son…Isaac,” says God, “and offer him…as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I shall show you.” And as we hear, Abraham is willing to do just that. He ties up his son, puts him on top of a wood pile, and takes a knife into his hand. Only then does an angel of the Lord call out to stop.

The way this story has traditionally been interpreted is that God is testing Abraham’s faith. But does the end really justify the means? Is there no other way that God could have tested Abraham except in this perverse and sadistic way? Both Jewish and Christian theologians throughout the ages have wrestled with this because it’s so disturbing. We are disturbed because at a gut level we know it’s wrong. We know that because we are made in the image of God, a God who is love.

And in addition to that inner knowing, it’s confirmed by the full witness of scripture that tells us that the kind of trust and obedience that God is looking for is not the kind of blind faith that leads us to do awful things. Just the opposite, over and over and over again God tells us and shows us that what pleases God the most and what ultimately matters is that we care for one another, we look after one another, we love one another. Abraham plans to kill his son because God told him to in no way fits that bill. 

So maybe there is another way to think about this story. Yes, it begins by telling us that God tested Abraham, but notice we’re not told exactly what it is that God is testing. What if the test isn’t about to what violent extreme Abraham is willing to go to obey God? What if the test is really about finding out if Abraham truly understands who God is? What if Abraham, in his blind obedience to sacrifice his son, actually failed the test? What if he, and we, are actually called by God to say no to inflicting harm on anyone, let alone those who are in our specific care, no matter who is telling us to do so? Maybe this test is to see if Abraham gets that the god he worships is not like the other gods of his time - the pagan gods who did require from their followers human sacrifice - but instead that the God whom Abraham worships is a god of a very different nature. That Abraham’s God, our God, is a God of love. A God of radical, self-giving love that puts a premium value on all people, especially the most vulnerable, the ones considered by society to be the most insignificant, the “little ones” as Jesus calls them in the gospel of Matthew.

Some would say that it’s not Abraham’s place to argue with God. Kind of along the lines of the cringe-worthy bumper sticker that reads, “God said it, I believe it, that settles it!” As if God desires mindless followers. Or that what God “says” in the Bible speaks with one unified voice - which it doesn’t. But even so, it’s remarkable how often what God “says” totally agrees with the person who puts such a bummer sticker on their car...but I digress. My point is that God welcomes our thoughts, our questions, even our push back if something doesn’t sound right. That’s certainly the case earlier in Abraham’s story when one day God tells him that the city of Sodom and all its inhabitants are going to be destroyed. Abraham doesn’t just nod his head and think, “God, said it, I believe it, that settles it!” No, he resists by calling on God’s nature of loving-kindness and then negotiates a better deal for the people of Sodom.

Which begs the question, why didn’t Abraham respond in like manner when it came to his son, Isaac? We will never know. Nor will we ever know for sure what God was testing or why. But we do know enough. As we look at the entire witness of scripture, the example of Jesus’ life, and, specifically, his words in our reading from Matthew, we can know that whatever God calls us to do it is always guided by the principle of love - like welcoming a prophet or a righteous person. But it’s not just the esteemed that we are called to receive, Jesus also includes the “little ones” to his list - which is anyone, young or old, who is seen as insignificant, unimportant or powerless. It is especially to them that we are to welcome and serve and love. 

Now I don't believe that God regularly goes around testing people, but I do believe that regular life offers God plenty of fodder not for tests, per se, but let’s call them “learning opportunities.” You know, all those challenging people and situations we wrestle with? If we are willing and open, God can use them to help us grow in our capacity to both give and receive love. Perhaps, even now, you can bring something to mind. A life challenge, some situation that you find difficult to deal with, something that is putting you to the test. Now think about how God might use it to stretch you so that you might learn to love more even in the midst of the struggle? But don’t just think about it, lift the whole thing up in prayer. Offer it to God and offer yourself to God. Let God know that you are willing to grow, to learn, to become more like the person God created you to be.

Like I said at the beginning, one of the perks of being an adult is that we get to choose to enroll in further education. It’s not forced upon us. And neither are life’s “learning opportunities.” We always have the option in the face of challenges to grit our teeth, suffer through, and refuse to grow and change. Or we can willingly participate, to enroll if you like, in the school of life and let God use it for our good. So why not give it a try? The next time you face a trial in life here’s, perhaps, a new way to face it. Say to yourself, “School is in session; here's my chance to learn more about love.” And who knows, with God’s help, you may even pass with flying colors!