Get Under the House: Reflection by Emily Rutledge

I would say as a whole Americans are pretty uneasy about the state of humanity.

Uneasy may not be the word you would use so here are a few that may speak to you...

concerned
anxious
distressed
disturbed
troubled
uptight
bothered
perturbed
upset
biting one's nails
butterflies in stomach
in a stew (my personal favorite)
on pins and needles

All of us are in a stew about the way things are right now.  What we individually believe is the root problem or solution or escape route differs radically but the feels that are going around seem to boil down to the same emotion.  Distressed.  It crosses socioeconomic status, party lines, gender, sexuality, religion, citizenship, and race... yet the affect that the current state of our country has on our daily lives is greatly determined by our own privilege.

I am a white, Christian, middle class, straight, college educated, cis woman.  I am showered in privilege.  Doors open easily for me.  I work in a privileged parish.  I minister to privileged teenagers. Our youth community is progressive and driven by a deep desire for social justice as it was taught to us by Jesus.  Yet, we each know, that for the most part the change we hope for will affect others far more than ourselves.

Last week 28 of us drove in a five minivan caravan to Martin, Kentucky.  We wore matching tie-dye t-shirts.  We ate snacks.  We listened to Spotify.   We were a big caravan of privilege.  While I was unsure of what we would do exactly while working with the Christian Appalachian Project I was sure of a few things:  we would be working with people who experience poverty in a way that none of us can truly understand, most of our political beliefs would differ from those we were serving, and the people of Martin's access to education, employment, nourishment, and basic health care would be limited.

While we can understand the systematic root of Martin's poverty: closed coal mines, a lack of educational opportunities, and a rural location... we can not conceive of the affect it has on an individual's life.

As my small group arrived at the home we would work on for the week we met the three wonderful women who lived there.  We heard stories of the childhoods lived within those walls and of the changes that had come and gone through their small town.

After meeting our family and getting the lay of the land, the first job assignment was offered up:  who would like to go under the house to tack up insulation?

Let me translate that:  Who would like to put on a marshmallow suit in the 90 degree heat, crawl into a small and confined space, battle whatever life may be living there, and staple up huge strips of plastic to hold in insulation that gravity is trying to pull down on you?

Two of our youngest students quickly volunteered.

Not only did they complete their task with another fearless adult leader (please do not be misled: I am NOT that leader) they did it with a song, literally, and joy.

There are a lot of things I do not love about short-term mission trips.  If organized as a week where one group of people go somewhere to 'save' or 'improve' another's life we only continue to deepen the divides between us.  If we assume our mere presence or unskilled labor is going to somehow make the life of a person living in poverty better we are sadly mistaken and frustratingly arrogant.  Short term mission trips teach us about the realities of the world in ways we can not understand without entering into them.  They are far more about changing the lives of those who go on them than those we serve.

The Episcopal Office of Evangelism & Reconciliation defines missional ministry as

a Christian community that crosses boundaries to embody and participate in God's mission- loving the world into wholeness- in all that we do: prayer, worship, preaching, teaching, loving service, and daily life.  

Mission is one thing... crossing the boundaries that separate us and loving the heck out of the people of God.  All of them.

Mission is getting under the house.  It's not letting the awkward, the hard, the uncomfortable get in the way of being present and hearing stories and getting mixed up in the complexity that is poverty and race and gender.  Mission is recognizing our privilege and seeing it for what it is: not a gift from God but rather a situation we were born into that allows us the basic human rights that are taken from others because of social inequality.  If you are privileged it is not because God wanted to give you something He didn't want others to have.   The God we love doesn't play that game.  We follow a God of equality and wholeness and inclusion.  We have created the structures that continue to break apart the Kingdom.  It's not a new problem, Jesus showed up 2,000 years ago to deal with it.  He taught us that there was no longer Gentile or Jew, man or woman, slave or free, but that we were all one in Him.  One.  Wholeness.  Social equality for all not a lucky few.

This is the mission of God and as Her followers it must be our mission as well.    We must allow the concern that is rumbling within our hearts and throughout our country be a call to action and not an invitation to hide.

Get under the house!

Love in the Fullest Possible Way 6/25/17 The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

Matthew 10:24-39.

Did you hear the gospel this morning?  It’s a continuation of last week’s reading.  Although Jesus is sending out his disciples into the world to share the good news, the bulk of what Jesus is saying today seems like pretty bad news.   All that talk about being maligned, fearing the One who can destroy both body and soul, coming not to bring peace, but a sword, and ending on the particularly cheery note of setting family members against one another.  So much for getting comfort from scripture for the week ahead! 

It may be tempting to hear this litany of hard sayings and dismiss it figuring that even the Son of God must get cranky once in a while.  But maybe, just maybe, that is not the case.  Could it be that today Jesus is pushing back on our notions that he is simply a harmless, predictable, do-gooder?  Sure sounds like it.  “Do not think,” he says, “that I have come to bring peace...but a sword.” 

But it’s not a literal sword.  In the garden of Gethsemane when Jesus is being arrested Peter takes out his sword to defend Jesus and Jesus commands him to put it away.  The sword, rather, that Jesus brings is God’s light of truth and love that cuts into the darkness of this world causing disruption and division.  For living and preaching the good news of God’s great love can actually be very dangerous and threatening to the powers that be.  And just like Jesus himself, the Kingdom of God work is more controversial than conventional kindness. 

So much so that it gets Jesus killed and puts those who seek to follow him, to love in the fullest possible way by serving others and seeking justice, at risk as well. So before Jesus sends his friends out he makes it clear that taking the path of being a disciple is not an easy one.  It can’t be done half-heartedly or slipped in between other commitments.  Discipleship demands all of who we are.  And in order to even begin to hope to live such a life God knows we need him.  That to be a disciple requires an intense bond and connection with none other than Jesus himself. 

And because of this Jesus declares, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”  Jesus is calling us to let go of whatever competes for our time, our energy, our loyalty and, ultimately, our love - he’s not interested in being part of any love triangle in our lives.

You know what a love triangle is.  Countless fictional as well as real-life dramas are fueled by them - one person stuck between two love interests who compete, knowingly or unknowingly, for the time, attention and love of the third.  This dynamic can go on for a while, but eventually there comes a time when every love triangle forces the question, “Who or what do you love the most?”

Jesus knows that what we need is to love him most - more than parents, more than children - more than anything else that seeks to compete whether it be other significant relationships or our own desires, our work life, material possessions, devotion to country...they’re all potential love triangles.  And no matter how lovely or honorable the competition may be, Jesus calls us to love him more.  Does that mean we are not supposed to love anyone or anything else in this world?  No.  Jesus is not demanding that he’s our only love, but that he is our primary one. 

Now that may be ok in church, but really is Jesus asking us to gaze into the eyes of those we love and whisper the sweet words, “I love Jesus more than you”?   That’s not going to go over so well.  But you know what?  As crazy as it sounds loving Jesus more than father, mother, son or daughter or anyone or anything else is not only for our sake, but for the sake of all those we love.

A wise woman once told her husband, “When you love God most you love me best.”  Think about that.  When we seek to love God most, we don’t cheat others out of being loved.  One the contrary, we are actually able to love others better because God, not ourselves, becomes the wellspring of our love.  And this completely changes the dynamic.  No longer is there a competition between loves.  The triangle is broken with no one left out or abandoned.  In fact everyone wins when we are open to and filled by God’s great love.  It is then that we are able to love not only family and friends more deeply and more fully, but the world at large.  Because, quite frankly I don’t know about you, but I don’t have it in me to love and follow and face the challenges that Jesus speaks of today.  My only hope is that as imperfectly as I seek to love God first that God’s love might empower me to meet whatever the world has in store.  Perhaps it is the same for you.  That even our feeble attempts to love God most allows God’s great love to flow through us enabling us to love more freely, more richly, more faithfully than we ourselves are able to do on our own. 

Still Jesus’ words are not to be tamed.  Indeed, they are meant to give us pause - I would imagine the disciples took a few gulps when they heard these cautionary words - yet they still went out preaching the gospel, sharing God’s love, bringing the Kingdom of God to a world that would fight against it, but desperately needs it nonetheless.  And today Jesus sends us out as well.  But we don’t do this on our own.  As we seek to love Jesus more and more we are filled and empowered by God’s love which makes us willing and able to go out into the world, take up our cross and follow - come what may.  For we are able to love best when we love God most.    

Mission - Sunday 6/18/17 The Rev. David M. Stoddart

Matthew 9:35-10:23.

No gold, silver, or copper, no extra tunics or sandals, and no staffs. It’s a good thing Jesus says nothing about jeans, work boots, and sunscreen, not to mention M&Ms, Chex Mix, and Gummy Bears: we have five vans loaded up with such supplies as we prepare to leave on our youth mission trip today. So we may not exactly imitate those first disciples, but then again, we’re not heading out into 1st century Palestine; we’re going into 21st century Kentucky. And besides which, getting bogged down in the details of travel packing misses the point of this Gospel passage. Set aside cultural and geographical concerns for a moment, and focus on the essential message. When Jesus sends his friends out, he makes it clear that they don’t need a lot of stuff to do great work. Actually, they just need two things, the two things he has: love and faith.

Jesus looks around at those crowds, and he feels compassion for them: he loves those people and sees their needs. And he believes, he trusts, that his heavenly Father will work through him and his followers to bless those people. And that’s it: he doesn’t need loads of supplies, and neither do his friends. They don’t need advanced theological training. They don’t need gimmicks. They just need to love — and believe that God’s love and power will flow through them. If they have those two essentials, Jesus assures them, they will change the world . . . because the world desperately needs what they have to offer.

Do you believe that? The other day I was walking through the downtown mall, and apparently I looked happy because a woman with big glasses and long dreadlocks approached me and said, “I hope you’re smiling because you’re praying for me.” And I said, “No, but I can.” She told me she would like that, so I stopped, asked what her name was, laid my hands on her and there, in front of the Nook and the Taproom, I prayed that God’s love would flow through her that very day and bless her as she needed to be blessed. I finished by saying “I hope you have a great day,” and she replied, “I will now.” It brought to mind a visit I had in the hospital. I was anointing and praying for a parishioner, but I noticed that his roommate kept looking at me. So, when I was done, I asked him, “Would you like me to pray for you?” And he said, “I’m an atheist.” And I said, “Great. Would you like me to pray for you?” And he said, “Yes, I really would” and I did. That kind of thing happens frequently, and that’s my point: everyone wants to be loved. Everyone wants to experience the touch of a loving God who really knows them and cares about them. Everyone. The harvest is plentiful.

But let me be clear: that plentiful harvest is always and only about love. Everyone does not want more angry believers walking around and telling people why they stink. The world does not need more self-righteous prigs preaching that you better do these 356 things and you better do them right and you better do them as members of this or that particular church or you’re going to hell because God is really ticked off at you. Look at this Gospel. Do you hear any talk of hell or damnation? Do you hear any talk of God hating anyone? There is none. Even the passing reference to judgment refers only to regret, to missing out on an opportunity to experience love. Here are Jesus’s instructions: Proclaim the good news . . . Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons . . . as you enter a house, let your peace come upon it. Go out and love these people. For God’s sake, love them. That’s the message and that’s why we’re here. The church is not a club for the righteous, not a self-improvement society that, as an act of charity, has decided to let some other people in on the secret. No, the church only exists — we, Church of Our Saviour, only exist — to share the good news of God’s love as we have experienced it through Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit.

That is our sole reason for being; it is our mission. Our parish mission statement says it clearly: Growing a community in Christ and sharing Christ’s love with the world. To be in Christ means to do just that. Fun fact: do you know what the actual legal name of the Episcopal Church is? I’ll give you a hint: it’s not “The Episcopal Church.” Our official, legal name is “The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.” If you belong to this church, you belong The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society. To be a Christian is to be on mission always, to share God’s love always.

And, Lord knows, the world needs it. Yet another senseless attack in Alexandria this past week just adds to the ongoing toll of hatred, division, and violence that causes so much misery and suffering, both here and around the world. When Jesus says the harvest is plentiful, he’s not kidding. And he is also not being a Pollyanna: he knows he is sending his followers out like sheep into the midst of wolves, as lovers into a world that hates all too easily. But, of course, that’s precisely why the world needs his followers so badly. That’s why the world needs us to proclaim the Good News and demonstrate by our words and our actions that God is love.

And to do that, we need only what those first disciples needed. Our youth community is heading out to Kentucky with supplies for the week, but all we really require are compassionate hearts and faith that God will use us in some positive way. And that is true for all of us, whether we go on a mission trip or not. When I walk into a hospital room or talk to someone in my office or encounter someone on the downtown mall, I may put my talents to work, but all I ultimately have to offer is love for others and faith that God will work through me. When you leave here today, whatever gifts and resources you may possess, what you ultimately have to offer is your love and faith. So use them. The harvest is plentiful . . . but the laborers are few. The Risen Christ continually calls new workers into the harvest and we don’t have to look far to see who he’s calling. It’s not the folks at the church down the street from us; it’s not the person sitting down the pew from us. Christ is calling you and me. If we love others even a little bit, if we believe that God will work through us even a little bit, and if we act on that love and that faith, then one person at a time, one event at a time, you and I will change the world.

The Things We Can't Control : Reflection from Emily Rutledge

In less than 3 days I will be in a van full of teenagers on the road to Kentucky for our annual high school mission trip.  While it is always my favorite activity of the year it is also my most tedious.  My to-do list has looked like this the past week:

• Buy car snacks with Juniors
• Check in with chaperones
• Make van assignments
• Make group assignments
• Have other eyes look at assignments to see if I missed anything
• Confirm vans
• Confirm direction
• Find gluten-free food options near site
• EZ Passes, do we need them (and with the answer being yes)
• Find 5 EZ passes

Each to-do brings with it's own list of other to-dos that spawn from it and the web gets more and more tangled... along with my brain.  I am an alarmist which means my preparations go far beyond what any reasonable human would prepare for.  I have a first aid kit that could assist with the birth of a child and enough extra toothbrushes that an entire team could forget theirs and be covered.  

Let's just say there are lots of rubber totes that join us on our journey.

And, with all of that preparation, this year began to feel more like a burden than a blessing. Something I never wanted my ministry to feel like.  I'm not a minister because of my organizational talents or ability to color-code anything (although I find this comes in handy often), I am a minister because I believe in this whole crazy Jesus thing and I am called to share the ways that each of us are beloved, accepted, and affirmed in God's love.  

As much as I know that to be my truth... I forget it... often.

I get stuck in the details of things.  I get laser focused on what I can control so that I don't think about all the things I can't control:

• Will students have a meaningful interaction with the Living God on this trip?
• Will that one student who feels alone find a friend?
• Will my chaperones feel this was worth giving up a week of work and family for?
• Will someone get sick?
• Will we come back better than we left?

Sitting in the unknown and honoring it is much more humbling and difficult than dealing with all the little things we can control.  When we allow ourselves time and space to feel all the things we need to feel and pray all the things we need to pray we quickly recognize our own powerlessness and vulnerability.  Those two things: powerlessness and vulnerability are what we are conditioned to avoid as humans.  It's how we survived as a species.  It is also the place that God often finds space to reveal Herself to us.  

The to-do lists, the phones, the activities, the endless stream of GO that we create for ourselves allows us to shut out the very questions and answers that make for a fulfilling life.

• Am I loving like I should?
• What is the next step for our family?
• Will I survive this illness?
• What college will make me my best self and not just look good on a sweatshirt?
• Why are my children acting out?
• What is God calling me to?

I've duped myself into believing that completed to-do lists and a full schedule make for a fulfilling life.  The reality is that it makes for a FULL life that can be anything but fulfilling.  

So where do we find fulfillment?  I'm not sure (super helpful, right?!).  For each of us that is going to be different.  I do know this one thing: having 15 extra toothbrushes is not making for a more meaningful mission trip.  An empty inbox isn't making a fulfilling job.  A clean house isn't making a happy family.  Straight A's are not making a well-adjusted young adult.

There is something more.  I call it God, this something more.  It's the Holy that finds it's way into our lives even when we try to edge it out.  It's in the relationships and the questions and the conversations and the ah-has and the birth and the death.  It's in the space between the tasks. 

As I embark on a trip with 26 other beautiful people I pray that I can find space to BE instead of DO, that my own agenda does not usurp the things God has in store for me.  I basically need to get out of my own way.

May you do the same things week.  

Divine Community of Love. Sunday 6/11/17 The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

Matthew 28:16-20. 

God is hard to figure out: even so we make our attempts.  One young boy was overheard trying to explain God to his sister by saying, “You don’t have to be afraid of the Holy Ghost.  It’s just God with a sheet over his head.”  The Church takes its stab at it too with the doctrine of the Trinity.  And here I offer you the Trinity in a nutshell: God is One who is known to us in three persons: Father, Son and Spirit.  Here’s where it gets tricky: the Father is fully God, Jesus the Son is fully God, the Holy Spirit is fully God and at the same time they are all one God.   It’s hard to get your mind around it.

But here’s a fun fact for you to take home today.   You know the Nicene Creed?  What we stand and proclaim together after every sermon?  Well, that Creed was born out of a big controversy about the Trinity back in the 4th century.  In trying to figure out God, some were teaching that Jesus did not have full God status because God the Father, at some point in time, had created Jesus and, therefore, Jesus, was less than the Father.  The powers that be called this heresy and meetings were held - which they called councils.  What came out of those councils was the Nicene Creed explicitly affirming the Trinity, and in particular that Jesus the Son has always existed and is just as much God as the Father is.  Hence the language: 

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
    the only Son of God,
    eternally begotten of the Father,
    God from God, Light from Light,
    true God from true God,
    begotten, not made,
    of one Being with the Father.

So the next time you’re lacking for conversation all you’ll need to say is, “Let me tell you about the origins of the Nicene Creed” and, no doubt, you’ll be the life of the party!  But really, so what?  What does to it matter to us in our daily lives with all the concerns or burdens we carry that the Church proclaims that God is Trinity, Triune, three persons yet one God?

Actually it matters a lot.  Because how we relate to God is shaped by our understanding of who God is.  If you believe in a God who is not Trinity, rather a Solitary One, that leads to a relationship that is fundamentally different than if you have faith in a self-giving, self-sacrificing God who exists in a community of oneness.  If transcendence - being beyond this world - and power and perfection are the core attributes of God, then such a solitary God is much more concerned about performance, not relationships, obedience, not intimacy.  Connection with that God is centered around keeping the rules, behaving correctly, and getting things right. That’s a totally different relationship than the one offered by a God who is Triune - a God whose very essence is a divine community of love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

Scripture tells us that God is love.  But a solitary God of One cannot be Love.  Such a God can be loving, but can’t be Love itself because love requires an object, something or someone to love. Love is not able to exist without relationship.  Our God is Love and from before time the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit have been in community, in relationship, being Love itself.  That reality is not a riddle to be figured out, but a life-giving truth be lived.   

And here’s why all of this really matters.  The love that the Trinity is not a closed system.  We are not just spectators of that magnificent love.  On the contrary – we  are invited, more than invited, desperately wanted to be part of and participants in that mutual sharing of love, of life, of joy.  God is communion inviting us into that same communion. We are loved by God with the same holy, passionate love that the Trinity has for one another.   Believing and trusting in such a God means that our relationship in not rooted in a code of conduct or checking boxes - I went to church today, check.  I was nice to someone, check.  I gave some money away, check.  Therefore, I am accepted and loved by God.  Or, sometimes it goes in the other direction. God gave me a good job, check. God blessed me with good health, check. God gave me what I hoped for, check.  Now I love God.   That’s not love.  That’s some kind of twisted relationship based on performance and conditions.  God does not operate like that. God does not seek relationships like that.  That is not our triune God.

God is Love and Love loves.  Period. No matter what.  Recognizing that we live and move and have our being in God, in Love itself, allows that holy Trinity love to flow in us and through us. And that’s when growth and change, surrender and service, healing and wholeness happen. 

This goodness, this fullness is what the Triune God whom we confess in the words of the Nicene Creed wants for all of us.  So much so that this is what Jesus communicates at the very end of the gospel of Matthew.  Go, he says, go and make disciples.  Share this good news with everyone.  Invite them into the most meaningful relationship they will ever have.  A relationship of love that will hold in any storm, that will never fail, that will never end.  Go and invite everyone into the holy and life-giving embrace of God, baptizing them in the love and in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.  For it is this Trinity God of Love who seeks us and knows us and speaks into each one of our lives, “Remember, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”  And ultimately, that is the only thing that truly matters. 

"Oh, yes, please!" A Reflection by Fr. David

One woman, sitting in her wheelchair with her head on the table, seemed fast asleep. When I gently laid my hand on her shoulder to ask her if she would like to be anointed, she raised her head, beamed a huge smile, and said, "Oh, yes, please!" One man could barely talk, but when it came time to receive Communion, he opened his mouth wide. One woman thanked me; another burst into tears. It was just another service at the Cedars Nursing Home.

Once a month Mother Kathleen or I celebrate the Holy Eucharist and offer anointing to the residents there. It is part of the wonderful Nursing Homes Swing ministry started by Jackie and Bob Hostage some years ago. (After every service, local musicians play jazz or other favorites for those present.) The first Wednesday of the month always comes around fast, and sometimes it feels like a challenge fitting this service in, but I am always glad I went, because I am always reminded of God's love and grace in remarkable ways.

Most of the 20 or so people who come to the Eucharist are not very responsive; some of them seem to sleep through the whole thing. I offer a brief homily each time, and each time wonder if anyone actually heard it. But always the sacramental presence of God moves me: the residents want to be anointed and prayed for; they want to receive the Body of Christ. And when it happens, I see God in these people whose bodies are frail and whose minds are dimming. Part of this speaks to the power of liturgy: words prayed over a lifetime sink deep into our souls. On any given month, maybe a handful of people will offer the written responses, but then almost everyone will join in for the Lord's Prayer: it's like that prayer has become ingrained in them and one with them. And part of this speaks to the power of touch: when I anoint people and lay my hands on them, they so often respond with warmth and gratitude. All of us, after all, crave loving touch, no matter how old or diseased or confused we might be.

But what makes the biggest impression on me is the sense of the Holy Spirit living in these people. That Spirit clearly moves deep within them, animating their own spirits and making them fully human even when their bodies and minds are incapacitated. It is too easy in our society to dismiss or ignore the elderly or infirm, too easy to view those with Alzheimer's or dementia as somehow less than human. But every time I go to the Cedars, God reminds me of just how human we all are, and how connected to God we all are, always.

I need to remember that. And I confess that part of my motivation is selfish: I hope that if and when I find myself in a wheelchair someday, unable to care for myself or even remember my name, that someone will come and touch me with holy oil and feed me Christ and remind the spirit deep within me that I am still God's beloved — and precious in his sight.

Let It Flow Through Us - Sunday 6/4/17 The Rev. David M. Stoddart

Acts 2:1-21; John 20:19-23 - Pentecost Day

  

I know it’s Pentecost, but let me take you to Christmas for just one moment, in particular to “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” As you may recall, Charlie Brown is the director of the Christmas pageant, in which Pig-Pen has the role of the innkeeper, and Frieda plays the innkeeper’s wife. But Frieda is not happy: she feels like all the dust around Pig-Pen is taking the curl out of her naturally curly hair. And so Charlie Brown says, “Don’t think of it as dust. Think of it as maybe the soil of some great past civilization. Maybe the soil of ancient Babylon. It staggers the imagination. He may be carrying soil that was trod upon by Solomon, or even Nebuchadnezzar.” Pig-Pen is impressed, and says, “Sort of makes you want to treat me with more respect, doesn’t it?” Frieda doesn’t buy it, but you know, it does sort of stagger the imagination. The laws governing the conservation of mass and energy make that scenario entirely possible: Pig-Pen could be carrying around molecules that were once part of the soil of Babylon. Right now, some of us could be breathing in the same oxygen atoms that Jesus breathed on his disciples. But beyond such physical speculations, we most assuredly have the same Spirit moving through us right now that Jesus breathed on his friends, the same Holy Spirit that fell like fire on those disciples that first Pentecost day.

But I don’t want what I just said to go in one ear and out the other. Consider with me what that actually means. It means that the same Spirit of power that hovered over the waters of creation, the same Spirit at work in the creation of 100 billion galaxies, is at work in each one of us this very moment. The same Spirit of love that flowed through Jesus, that inspired his teaching and energized his healing and gave him the strength to die on a cross is flowing through each one of us this very second. In other words, nothing less than the Holy Spirit of God is moving through us, a Spirit of unlimited power and love. That alone should stagger our imaginations, but it doesn’t stop there: there is more. Look at these readings. After the Spirit descends with awesome power, Peter preaches to the crowds, quoting the prophet Joel, through whom God proclaims, “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.” Think about what that says: it is the very nature of God to give away the Spirit. The prophets testify to that, but Jesus demonstrates it. Jesus gives the Spirit away in his teaching and healing and loving and dying; and in this passage today, the Risen Christ gives the Spirit away by breathing the Spirit on his followers. This is what God does. But because that is true, because it is the Spirit of God living and flowing through us right now and because God holds nothing back, that means that we can never actually have the Spirit at all — not even God has the Spirit. God is forever giving the Spirit away. The only way we can say that we “have” the Spirit is by giving the Spirit away as well. And that really does blow my mind and it makes me think of my whole life differently.

We are natural hoarders: we so easily fall into the habit of acquiring things for ourselves: money, possessions, power, status. But we can’t do that with the Holy Spirit: we cannot catch her or trap her or use her for our own ends. Rather, the Spirit makes us like Christ, the Spirit makes us like God, and that means we can only give the Spirit away, or maybe a better way of putting is that we can only let the Spirit pass through us. In that story from Acts, those people don’t possess the Spirit — they can’t even hold onto her — but instantly go out into the streets, proclaiming the Good News, as the Spirit flows through them to bless others. In the Gospel, the disciples aren’t given the Spirit as a static possession: the Spirit is like breath, like the wind, that will blow through them to offer God’s forgiveness to everyone. As a result, we have to be careful about our language: we say it a lot, but we really can’t be “filled” with the Holy Spirit, we cannot have “more” of the Holy Spirit because it just doesn’t work that way. We are not receptacles: we are channels. We cannot hold on to anything: we can only let it flow through us. In that way, the Spirit truly is love: the only way we can “have” love is by giving it away.

And when I said that this makes me think of my whole life differently, I meant that: I no longer think about spiritual gifts as possessions, as “talents” God has given me. I no longer imagine building up reserves of spiritual energy. I no longer think about having anything. The only thing that matters is the flow of God’s Spirit, the flow of God’s love and power, rushing through me. My job and my joy is to let that happen. If a sermon or a forum or a visit blesses anyone, that is only because the Spirit has moved through me — and I have just cooperated with that divine flow. And that is true for each and every one of us. I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, says the Lord. Jesus breathes that Spirit on all of us — no exceptions. We can never think, “Well, that just doesn’t apply to me.” We cannot come here and receive absolution for our sins and consume the Body and Blood of Christ and then leave here thinking that the Spirit is somehow safely confined within these walls or assigned to other people. Every moment of every day the Spirit is being poured out on all of us; every moment of every day that Spirit is trying to move through you and me. And God never grows tired. The outpouring of God’s love and power through the Holy Spirit is endless. God blessed and changed the world by flowing through those flawed and fallible disciples; God wants to bless and change the world by flowing through each one of us: in our homes, our workplaces, our community, our relationships.

Here’s your homework and your delight: pay attention this week, today. How does the Spirit flow through you? How does God move in your life to bless others? Recognize it. Rejoice in it. Don’t resist it or dam up the stream. And if you honestly have no idea how the Holy Spirit is moving through you, then, people, it is time to get an idea. There is no life in Christ without it. Pentecost is a one day celebration but it is an everyday reality. The same God who created the universe and took on human form in Jesus is pouring his Spirit into you and me right now — and looking to pour out of us in acts of love and mercy. For Christ’s sake, let the Spirit flow!

How do we wait? Sunday 5/28/17 The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

Acts 1:1-11.

“Are we there yet?... Are we there yet?... Are we there yet?”  Anyone who has taken a long trip with children has no doubt suffered through some variation of this question.  And for those who have lived a charmed life and been spared of this experience, perhaps it was you who tortured a well-meaning adult with that incessant refrain. 

The big road trip when I was a child was a 400 mile drive from northern California to Disneyland.  And I don’t care what Google maps says, it takes way longer than six hours to make that trip.  In my memory it felt like that trip took FOREVER.  “Are we there yet?” was asked over and over again in our car.  Until finally, the excruciating wait was mercifully over and we reached our destination.

It’s not just children who struggle with waiting.  No matter one’s age, waiting for something that you want - school to end, a baby to be born, a job to come through, healing for someone you love, a sign from God, peace in the world - waiting for something important is at the very least challenging and often quite a difficult thing to do.  Nonetheless, it’s part of life and I would venture to say that it’s very likely that almost every person here is in the state of waiting for something.   The disciples certainly were.  Today we celebrate Jesus’ ascension into heaven.  And right before Jesus leaves he gives his disciples these clear instructions: wait.  “Stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high,” reads the gospel of Luke.  In the Book of Acts, Jesus orders them to “wait [in Jerusalem] for the promise of the Father.” 

Given that waiting is unavoidable, here’s the challenge and the choice for those disciples and for us - how do we wait?  There’s really two ways to do it - passively and actively.  Passive waiting is about killing time.  My go-to strategy to shorten my wait time on the road to Disneyland was sleeping.  If I was lucky I could burn through an hour or two with a nap, no problem.  But this kind of waiting leads to impatience, hence the insistent, “Are we there yet?” Or with more important things, the big hopes and dreams of life, passively waiting can easily lead to complaining, bitterness and pessimism.  It’s a type of slow-acting, soul-killing poison.  The anecdote?  Active waiting - as people of faith, it’s a holy act of waiting.  Scripture tells us that following Jesus’ ascension the disciples went back to the temple in Jerusalem to worship and praise God, devoting themselves to prayer.  For them waiting for the promise of the Father, the coming of the Holy Spirit was not about killing time or doing nothing, but was a confident, expectant, active enterprise.  In staying connected to God and one another with hopeful joy they were cultivating a readiness to receive whatever God had in store.  Because really, they had no idea what was coming.  Lucky for them their wait for the Holy Spirit, which we will celebrate next Sunday on Pentecost, only lasted ten days. 

Often, however, we find ourselves waiting much longer than that.  And here’s a truth that can be hard to hear, active waiting - staying connected with God and God’s people, remaining hopeful and expectant while witnessing to the love of God - isn’t a special formula that we do so that we get what we want.  The holy act of waiting is not about the end - like arriving at Disneyland.  Rather, the holy act of waiting is about the process of shaping us into the people God wants.  And in doing so we make ourselves to ready to receive whatever God has in store. 

That’s the witness the disciples offer us today.  They waited really well and yet they didn’t get exactly what they wanted.  Their final question to Jesus reveals their deepest hope, what they’ve been waiting for.   “Lord,” they ask, “is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”  It’s really a variation on the question, “Are we there yet?”  The restoration of the kingdom to Israel is the disciples’ Disneyland destination.  They’ve been waiting for the time to finally arrive.  But Jesus replies, “It is not for you to know the times or the periods that the Father has set….”  It is not for the disciples or any of us to know the details or the timing of God’s plan.  Rather, it’s to be enough to know that the God who is Love is at work.   For what God does in us and through us while we wait is just as important as what we are waiting for.  

Giving God the benefit of the doubt is the only way to go.  Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Jesuit priest and philosopher, put it this way “Above all, trust in the slow work of God.”  He goes on,

We are quite naturally impatient in everything

to reach the end without delay.

We should like to skip the intermediate stages.

We are impatient of being on the way

to something unknown, something new....

Give our Lord the benefit of believing

that his hand is leading you,

and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself

in suspense and incomplete.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

We leave the disciples this more in the act of holy waiting.  Next week we celebrate the coming of  the Holy Spirit for them, but God’s Spirit has already been poured out into our lives at baptism.  And that Holy Spirit is loving us, healing and forgiving us, empowering us and all of creation to live into the fullness of all that God desires for us.  Know that.  Believe that.  And trust in the slow work of God. 

The Other Side of Perfect: Reflection from Emily Rutledge

Six years ago I was very pregnant and very organized.  I was finishing up my second year of ministry at Church of Our Saviour and expecting our first child.  I had lists and plans and lots and lots of expectations.

I had begun the work of setting everything up for my maternity leave so that the transition would be smooth. I had an entire folder on my desk labeled ‘BABY PLAN’.  I had systems in place.  I had safety nets hung.  Sometime right before I had this over-planned for baby I met with Fr. David, my boss and mentor, and he asked me how I was.

My response was a long monologue regarding all the things I had done.  The plan. My well thought out map of how I would keep all the balls in the air.

He is a patient man, he listened, knowing better than to interrupt a very pregnant person, and when I took a breath he asked again, how ARE you?

I answered; prepared (insert laughter of parents everywhere) but anxious about my return to work.  I didn’t think I would be able to do all the things I had done before.  I went to gazillions of games and performances and was available for everyone at a moment’s notice. I thought I would let everyone down. With a baby I didn’t see how my ministry would be possible.  I was anxious that I wouldn’t be the minister I had been.  

David assured me I wouldn’t be.  

Here is where my heart drops and my stomach hurts…

I had hung my hat on being that minister.  I had found validation and worth through my work and as the looming birth of my little girl drew closer I felt my ability to be all the things to all the people slip away.  The ability to be close to perfect was deteriorating.  My whole life I had striven for perfection and I wasn’t sure who I was if I couldn’t get close to that goal.

Suddenly here I was.  The one thing I knew I was good at was going to change and the one thing I had no idea about (parenthood) was knocking on the door.  I saw them as enemies in competition for my achievement.

To be a good mom I would be a bad minister.

To be a good minister I would be a bad mom.

So here we are… six years later.  I am out of the forest of having small babies.  I’m the mom of two awesome humans, ages five and three, and I’m a full time minister to the youth and families of our middle and high school students. And David was right… I am NOT the minister I was.  Were you hoping for a different outcome? Were you hoping I could do it all?  Did you think I had the secret to parenthood and working full-time and not losing your mind and failing all the time?  Sorry… not my truth!

Perfect has moved so far out of my vocabulary my phone auto-corrects it to pizza.  I don’t see nearly as many games and performances as I want to and I miss more bedtimes and baths with my little people than I ever thought I would.  My phone goes silent at 10 pm and texts go unanswered until morning.  My children sometimes spend sick days in my office when there are meetings I can’t miss.

And… not one person is worse off for it.  Not my students or their parents or my own children.  Isn’t that just the worst?

See, apparently the whole world does not begin and end with my ability to do it all.  I don’t, in fact, improve the life of my family and my parish by being perfect.  It seems, in reality, that God is still God in spite of me.  It seems that perfection is not a requirement for doing a good job.  It turns out healthy boundaries, self-care, and trusting that others are as good at (or even better!) at some tasks than we are makes for a fuller life.  

For much of my existence I felt that striving for perfection was a holy act.  I thought that ringing out every ounce of my gifts and time for others meant I was serving God to the best of my ability.  I believed that anything less was selfish and lazy.  I didn’t accept that I couldn’t work for God’s grace or earn a spot as God’s beloved.  I also didn’t like that God could do plenty without me.

This parenthood thing has taught me lots but above all it has taught me that perfection does not equal success and weakness does not equal failure.  

Parenthood has made it so my plate can no longer hold all my things.  

Things fall off.

I put things on other people’s plates.

Things get traded.

Things get left to the side for too long.

It gets messy.  

One of the joys of my job is the simple act of presence.  Where many things have taken a backseat in my ministry presence holds a strong spot on my plate.  Being present in the lives of teenagers is a daily reminder that the bar of perfection is crushing.  It’s also moving.  When we continue to strive for perfect we not only get duped into believing there is such a thing but we find ourselves thinking others have achieved it and we have not. We buy into the lie the world sells that perfection brings fulfillment and joy.

The day that my boss informed me that after having a baby I would not be the minister I was before... I thought it was a death sentence.  Instead, when it came to fruition, it was an emancipation from perfection.  

I was free to not even try to do it all.  Be it all.  Achieve it all.  When perfection was no longer on the table I was free to do what we are told in Micah are the only things God requires of us, “do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.”  

In invite you to join me on the other side of perfect… I kind of like it here.