The Three Sisters

Second Sunday of Easter

April 15, 2012

Acts 4:32-35

In today’s reading from the fourth chapter of Acts, verses thirty-two to thirty-five we have a very specific statement of how the resurrection community organized itself to be a witness to the resurrection of the “Lord Jesus”.

“Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common.”

“With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.”

“There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold”

“They laid it at the apostles feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.’

If this is what it looks like to be resurrected, then why don’t you people look more resurrected?

William H. Willimon writes:  “The most eloquent testimony to the reality of the resurrection is not an empty tomb or a well-orchestrated pageant on Easter Sunday but rather a group of people whose life together is so radically different, completely changed from the way the world builds a community, that there can be no explanation other than that something decisive has happened in history. “

The truth is that our life does not look radically different from the life of any one else living in this culture.  Each of us drove or rode to church this morning in a vehicle privately owned, having spent the evening resting in our privately owned homes.  We ate and clothed ourselves according to our privately held means.  All of this we derived from our personal capacity to generate debt and wealth in the money economy and not from the sharing of common goods.  Each of us in various degrees of success and failure participates in the money economy of our culture, an economy and culture that thrives on the corruption of our passions and desires.

You and I participate in, and are invested in a culture that is controlled by a kind of economic determinism.  In the life of our culture it is Money that makes the world go round.  And in order to ensure that this economic determinism is sustainable and all encompassing the culture has moved from a culture of need to a culture of wants.

In our culture people are valued and classed according to their ability to gain and control personal and private wealth.  Our culture is filled with symbols that make it easy for individuals and institutions to make value judgments base on the size and quality of an individual’s private property, whether it be a business, an investment portfolio, a house, an automobile, or the clothes hanging in a closet.

In this country we have moved from an agrarian culture to a manufacturing culture and from a manufacturing culture to a consumer culture.  People making choices that are driven by wants rather than needs is the engine that drives our whole economic system and the culture that is built around it.  If people were to suddenly buy only what they needed rather than what they wanted the whole economy and the cultural base feeding it would collapse.  The companies that control this system spend millions of dollars to bombard you every way they can think of with the propaganda necessary to keep this system running.  If you watch TV, go online, drive down the road, listen to the radio, and walk into any retail shop anywhere in this country you will be confronted with testimony after testimony about what you need.

Of course this is a deception!  When corporate America speaks to your needs they are really speaking to your wants, your desires, your passions, and your addictions.  The American consumer economy is not fueled by meeting your needs but by fueling your wants.  Calling our wants needs is just another way our culture controls our lives and the profit margin of corporate America and its shareholders.  Sadly, you and I are by virtue of living in this culture deeply implicated in this process.

The tragedy of this is while those with the means buy and throw away tons of things purchased to feed their addiction of want, a growing number of people are forced into poverty where their basic needs go unmet.  And at the same time, in our grief over something lost, we turn our attention away from our neighbor's needs to licking our wounds through more and more consumption of those things that feed our passions and desires.  It is this ever-growing reality that the passage from Acts challenges today.

But I am not arguing for some Marxist form of redistribution of wealth.  I am not suggesting you sell everything you own and lay the money at the feet of your pastor or even the church finance committee. 

I believe there is something much deeper and much more radical than the redistribution of wealth taking place in this passage from Acts.

What Acts is teaching, in the words of Willimon, is that “The church is called to be an alternative community, a sign, a signal to the world that Christ had made possible a way of life together unlike anything the world had seen.”   Or in the words of Paul: 

Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

"The resurrection life makes possible true generosity and bold living."  (Willimon)  It is a life that in its very living is a powerful testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. The resurrected life is a witness to an alternative life that values needs met.

So again I ask:  “Why don’t you people look more resurrected?”

I am not talking about some supernatural or heroic act of martyrdom.  I am not even talking about sacrificial giving.  What I am talking about is a radical return to the way creation works, an economy as old as creation itself.  As Christians we are called to return to a culture, an economy, that creates life, both individually, and in community--that in its very essence is a witness to the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

What I am suggesting here is not something new to this land.  When the Pilgrims first landed on Plymouth Rock it was for the purpose of building a resurrection community that would be a “beacon on a hill”, a community that in the way it lived its life together would be a witness to those ensnared in the Anglo/European culture back home.

And they almost starved to death!  If it had not been for the community of native peoples already living on this continent they never would have survived.  The Anglo-European people built their homes in neat rows, and planted their gardens in singular monocultures of plants, building a life in the same way as they had known in their native home.  Without even realizing it they were putting in place old habits that were systematically flawed.  They were using old tools in an attempt to build something new.

I am reminded of  “Audre Lorde’s well-known declaration that “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.”  What the New England colonist ended up doing, in spite of their best intentions, was to continue to use the tools of the life they knew from the old world.  The consequence was that the City on a Hill, that was to be a Beacon of Hope to the old world, ended up looking in to many ways just like the world they had left behind.  And in this way they ultimately failed.

But fortunately for them, the community of native peoples came to their rescue with food and knowledge of how to farm this new land that brought salvation to the colony and what we have come to know as the iconic Thanksgiving Feast which we celebrate each November. 

One lesson they learned is known as the Three Sisters which is a radically different approach to farming than what the colonist had known in the old world.  The Three Sisters are the three main agricultural crops of various Native American groups in North America: squash, maize, and climbing beans.  In what today we call companion planting the three crops are planted close together.  Flat-topped mounds of soil are built for each community of crops.  Each mound is about 12 inches high and 20 inches wide, and several maize seeds are planted together in the center of each mound.  In parts of the Atlantic Northeast, rotten fish or eels are buried in the mound with the maize seeds, to act as additional fertilizer where the soil is poor.  When the maize is 6 inches tall, beans and squash are planted around the maize, alternating between the two kinds of seeds.

The three crops benefit from each other.  The maize provides a structure for the beans to climb, eliminating the need for poles.  The beans provide the nitrogen to the soil that the other plants utilize, and the squash spreads along the ground, blocking the sunlight, helping prevent establishment of weeds.  The squash leaves also act as a living mulch, creating a microclimate to retain moisture in the soil, and the prickly hairs of the vine deter pests.  Nutritionists now know that the combination of corn, beans, and squash create a complete protein and thereby have a superior nutrition component when eaten together providing the human body with what is needed to live.  How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity.  (Psalms 133:1)

The Three Sisters is more than a metaphor for the life as described in the passage from Acts 4.  It is a witness to the way God‘s creation works interdependently, how in nature nothing is wasted in life or death.  And, how the needs of each member of creation is met, not independent from one another, but in an interdependent relationship with one another.  In other words, we as a resurrection community are called to meet one another’s needs.

So how do we start to look resurrected?  How do we go about reordering the way we live that we might be in Willemon’s words “a group of people whose life together is so radically different, completely changed from the way the world builds a community, ….”

It is a task that is daunting, if not impossible.  It is a task that requires that we become one people, heart and soul, which is of course a big reason this task seems daunting and impossible.  Consequently, it will require great power, and great grace.  And while it may seem daunting, even impossible, we can find confidence in our faith in the Son of God, who loved us and gave himself for us, along with his ever-present Spirit that promises to nurture, guide, and sustain us.

So how do we start?  How do we extricate ourselves from this culture in which we live? How do we get off the grid-to borrow a popular phrase.  And once we are off the grid, partially or completely, how do we order our life together so that we become a living testimony of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Ultimately the answer must come from you, but let me suggest some possible starting points.

1.    Turn off the TV.  Box it up.  Get rid of it, so that it is not a temptation.  The television is the number one tool in this culture working to corrupt our passions and desires.  Remember, the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.

2.    Grow your own food.  Do so in community whenever possible, but also at home that you might be a witness to your neighbors and neighborhood.  In growing your own food become a producer and not just a consumer.  Give your excess to the needy.  In all this tend the soil with the intention to increase the health of the soil and all the life that makes their living from the soil.  These creatures too are your neighbors.

3.    Do a personal inventory of how you spend your money.   Divide this inventory into two categories making a distinction between wants and needs.  Work to make every choice one of need and not of want.  Do not beat yourself up when you fail, but do not give up.  This is a life process that takes a lifetime to accomplish.  Be constant in your endeavors to live a life of need and not want, working constantly to reduce the purchase of those things that only feed your addictions, passions and desires.  Give everything you can of what is left over to tend to the needs of others.

4.    Participate in your neighborhood and community.  This will be easier without having the TV.   Especially tend to those organizations and gatherings that work to meet the needs of your neighbors and the larger community.  Beyond that, find ways to share your life with others.  Pull a chair onto the porch so you can observe and converse with your neighbors.  If you do not know your neighbors, how will you know their need?  And, if you do not know your neighbor’s needs, how will you be available to them in their need?

5.    Finally, as a member of the resurrected community, remember to pass the peace with such words as “The peace of Christ be with you”, and to sing the doxology. 

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;

Praise God; all creatures here below;

Praise God for all that love has done;

Creator, Christ, and Spirit, One.

Amen.

So people, are you ready to start looking more resurrected? 

With God’s help, may it be so!

The First Deacon

LESSONS ABOUT HOSPITALITY IN OLD JERUSALEM

On Pentecost Sunday in 1993 I found myself walking the streets of the Old city of Jerusalem.  I had arrived in Jerusalem by way of being selected as one of five students from Candler School of Theology to participate in a travel seminar to the Middle East exploring the historical and archeological sites of Syria, Jordan, the Sinai, and Israel.  Our group was joined by similar groups of five students selected from two other seminaries, Presbyterian and Baptist, along with a group of lay people, a business owner, a dentist, a lawyer, and the wife of a former governor of the State of Georgia.  The leader of the group was Max Miller, a specialist in biblical archaeology who taught biblical history at Emory University.  Max completed the group of twenty that lived and traveled together for three weeks in the Middle East.

We had spent the previous two weeks traveling by bus to various ruins of the numerous attempts at political, economic, and military empire in Syria and Jordan.  Crossing the Red Sea in the middle of the night we arrived early in the morning only to begin the long hike up Mt Sinai in the dark so that we could watch the sun rise over the desert from the heights where scripture tells us God came near to have a conversation with Moses.  That same morning with little or no sleep we began the two-day journey north into Israel arriving in Jerusalem the night before the Jewish Sabbath on Pentecost weekend. 

On the Jewish Sabbath, we again boarded our bus to travel south, this time to visit the Gaza Strip.  In Gaza for the first time we were not touring the ancient ruins of ancient empires but current ruins a result of the current struggle between two peoples both claiming Abraham as their ancestral father.

In Gaza we were confronted with the brutal aftermath of the first intifada where Palestinian children with slings filled with stones had taken on the military might of the Israeli Defense Force with their guns, rubber bullets, tear gas, and tanks, a modern day twist on the story of David and Goliath.  We were introduced to many of these children who showed us the scars of their wounds from broken bones, punctures, and smashed heads to amputated arms and legs.  For those who chose to look closely we could see the broken childhood in their far off gaze revealing their all too recent memories of violence and bloodshed.

The refugee camp was a tragic sight of families struggling to survive.  Families had created rectangle yards fenced with brush and debris.  At one end the brush would support salvaged sheet iron or tarps, which served as shelter for the family that lived there.  In the middle would be the part of the yard where children and farm animals played.  On the opposite end was the open latrine where the extended family relieved itself.  This open latrine drained into what was a soccer field.  On one end was the open cesspool on the other a soccer game was still being played.  We visited the destroyed homes of whole Palestinian families who had promptly moved back into the ruins of their home seeking shelter amidst the destruction and rubble.  We visited the hospital with its graffiti covered walls and its dirt floor room where amputated limbs were temporarily placed before being buried in a common grave before nightfall.

The last stop on our visit to Gaza was to visit the office of a Palestinian lawyer who had chosen to stay even though his status and passport would have allowed him to flee.  When the American lawyer in our group heard him say that he had never been successful in getting a single one of his Palestinian clients released with only a very few receiving reduced sentences, the American lawyer asked why this Palestinian lawyer continued to stay and work in a legal environment that had proven to be so futile.  The lawyer responded that God had called him as a witness.  He hoped that by taking these cases to court he was helping to document for the future the injustices taking place in his homeland.  His hope was that at some future point in time when those who sought peace both Palestinian and Israeli were able to end the conflict that these court records would be used to testify to what had happened and would in turn, bring some measure of healing and justice to those who had fallen victim to a brutal family feud.

Everyone in the group had been shaken by what we had seen.  That day the ruins were not ancient and the faces of the people who lived in them were all too real.  When we arrived back at the hotel across from the ancient walls of old Jerusalem we gathered in the courtyard café to talk about what we had seen and to try to make some kind of sense of it all.  Few of us slept soundly that night.

The next day I was still greatly troubled by what I had seen and heard, the day before in Gaza, so instead of joining the group who were headed to tour the Garden at Gethsemane I asked to have some time to enter the old city of Jerusalem to be alone, to think about what I had experienced, to try to come to grips with the confusion I was feeling.

As I was walking I found myself on the Via de la Rosa. The Via de la Rosa is the route tradition says Jesus took from his prison cell to the site of his execution on the city trash heap, Golgotha.  Along the route the modern Christian religious leaders of the city have put numbered plaques on the wall like street signs naming the Stations of the Cross for those faithful who walk the route as part of a pilgrimage or ritual devotion.  I happened to notice, as I paused to catch my breath, that I was at the sixth station.  The traditional form of the Stations of the Cross has this as the place where Veronica wipes Jesus’ face with her veil.  In the alternate form this is where Jesus falls under the weight of the cross.  In the scriptural form, station six is where Jesus is scourged and crowned with thorns.  In 1993, station six is where the Palestinian Amahd was open for business, selling ceramics to neighbors and tourists alike.

As I entered his shop, Amahd the owner greeted me and asked me my name.  Calling me by name, he asked if I would mind if his son fixed us tea.  He explained he was teaching his son the ancient ritual of hospitality.  I assured him that it would be fine but asked him to tell me about this ritual.  Amahd explained that in the old days when the land was filled with large nomadic families that the people would move from watering place to watering place as they moved their flocks in search of fresh grazing.  Whoever arrived at the water source first would set up their tents and camp life would begin to take on a semi settled routine.

Camp life consisted of the women tending to the camp, the cooking, the laundry, and the childcare.  The older boys would be tending to the flocks.  Meanwhile, the men watched over both, watching for any threat that might challenge the well being of the gathered people. 

Eventually, predictably, another nomadic group would be seen approaching, they in their own turn looking for water and grazing for their families and flocks.  With warning from the elders, the boys would gather the flocks close to camp while the women would gather the young children in the tents.  Meanwhile, the men would prepare to meet the newcomers not knowing whether they were going to be friend or foe.

It is out of this very situation that the ritual of hospitality evolved.  A strong young man would be selected to ride out to meet the newcomers.  He would invite their elders to come into camp to have tea and conversation with the elders of his camp.  It was during this time of tea that each side would be sizing the other up, trying to determine whether they were to be enemies or friends, whether they would share camp or shed blood.  If things went well the two families would share the campsite staying until the grazing sheep and goats had eaten all available grass.  Then the families would pack up camp and go their separate ways.  Perhaps leaving behind a daughter, married off to a young man from the other tribe.

This tradition has been carried over into modern times.  For those who still hold to the traditions of old, before they will do business, they first offer tea and ask the potential customer about their family and their life.  You only do business with people you know and trust.  This is the tradition that Amahd was teaching his son as his father and I talked.

Ahmad’s son brought the tea and Amahd began to reminisce about the old days and lamented the changes he had experienced in his lifetime in the New Jerusalem.  I learned that Amahd had grown up playing in the streets around the ancient western wall of the temple mount.  Before the Israelis had captured the city in the six-day war the wall had been barely visible with all of the homes built against it.  Amahd began to tell stories of his childhood playing in the streets of Jerusalem in a time when Muslims, Christians, and Jews interacted as neighbors and friends instead of mortal enemies.

Today, according to Amahd, all of the Muslim children are being taught that Jerusalem is theirs, given as a gift of God, and that the faithful must fight to get rid of the Jewish and Christian infidels.

Likewise, the Jewish children are being taught that Jerusalem is theirs, given as a gift of God, and that the faithful must fight to get rid of the Muslim and Christian infidels.

God knows what the Christian children are being taught?

As for Amahd, he was hoping that somehow by teaching his son the ancient ritual of hospitality that he might be able to pass on the memory of a very different time when all the people of Jerusalem, Muslim, Jew, and Christian, lived together as neighbor and friend.

THE FIRST DEACON (Mark 1:29–39)

It had been a long time since she had felt like going to synagogue.  In fact it had been a long time since she had felt like doing anything.  The fever seemed to drain any energy she might have gained from those precious moments when she was able to doze off and sleep.  On this morning she could hear the excited sounds coming from the streets below.  Something new, something different must have happened at synagogue that day.  Lately, synagogue had become rather sparsely attended, some might even say boring.  After all, there were now alternatives for the citizens of Capernaum since the Romans had come to the land bringing their multicultural traditions of religion and entertainment.  Now on any given Sabbath the rabbi’s and scribes would have to compete with itinerate holy men wandering in and out of town with their new teachings, their miracle cures, all claiming to have authority.  The life of the town had become chaotic and somewhat divisive as people sought to convince their neighbors that the new guy in town was the real deal.

In the old days when she was a young woman she use to love to go to synagogue.  Life seemed simpler then.  The hymns of praise and the reading from the Torah had thrilled her spirit and reminded her of how she was connected to her ancestors all the way back to father Abraham and mother Sarah.  And when the Rabbi told the stories of how they had been saved by YHWH from exile only to wanderer lost in the great wilderness she could almost imagine herself there among them.  She was filled with pride and a sense of belonging when the stories of Saul, David, and Solomon where told.  Stories about how God had favored the children of Abraham and Isaac with a Kingdom unlike all others.

But these days seemed different somehow.  Maybe she was just too tired to care anymore.  Maybe it was time for the next generation to tell a new story, to create a story that better reflected the reality in which they lived.  Yet she longed somehow to be connected, to feel that somehow her story and the story of this generation were connected.  For the most part life was just too confusing.  She felt old.  She felt the world had left her behind.  So she lay in bed suffering from the fevers that racked her body and mind.

In her fevered mind she was still, somehow aware, when the boys came home.  She recognized the sounds of her son in law Simon.  And that was definitely Andrew, James and John.  She could recognize the raucous laughter of these boys anywhere.  She could tell by the sounds of their voices that they were excited.  Something must have happened at synagogue.  She hoped they would come up and tell her all about it.  Suddenly she realized that they were talking about her.  They had brought home a guest and there was no one to greet him.  Who was going to brew the tea?  She was embarrassed and somewhat perturbed, didn’t they know she was sick in bed.  What were they thinking bringing a guest home from synagogue?

Then she heard his footsteps on the stairs and knew that he was coming to see her.  A stranger entering her room, her private space, to weak to get out of bed, sick with fever, God help her, there was nothing she could do to stop what was about to happen.  What were the neighbors going to think?  She longed to cry out, “go away, leave me alone, can’t you see I am sick?”

He gently entered the room.  She was surprised to see he was a young man, about the same age as Simon.  Unlike Simon he was rather quiet.  He smiled at her and came over and sat by her bed.  He didn’t say anything; he just reached out and patted her hand.  Well that was a relief.  At least he wasn’t like so many others in the presence of the sick and dying who think themselves of such experience and authority that they can tell the sick and the dying what it is like to be sick and dying.  No, this one was different.  He seemed to know that this was not a time for words.  He just sat with her, gently holding her hand. 

She began to realize that there was something reassuring in his presence.  The old confusions that had been troubling her all morning left her as if this man had lifted her up from all despair and anxiety that only moments before had consumed her body and mind. 

Suddenly, she knew what was needed.  She could feel the sense of purpose returning, pushing the tired old fevers right out of her.  She felt alive again.  She knew what to do.  She knew she belonged.  She knew she was connected.  She knew she was needed.  So she got up, sent the man downstairs with the rest of the boys.  She began to wash her face and to get dressed.  Then with one last glimpse at her room, she turned and went through the door, made her way down the stairs, into the kitchen, and began to prepare the tea. 

It is in this way we remember Simon’s mother-in-law as the first Deacon of the church.

PROCLAMATION

Once again we have gathered in this place to be the Church, you and I, one people, undivided by ancestry, age, gender, or station in life.  The stories have been told.  Perhaps a lesson or two have been learned.  By God’s grace, hopefully we have heard the Holy Spirit whispering the gospel in our ears.  We are now left with only these words…

The Kingdom of God has come near.

Jesus is still healing!

The whole city is outside these doors.

Does anyone remember how to prepare the tea?

Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope

Jarring Words

Hearing words such as prisoner, captive, or slave may sound rather jarring to our modern ears, especially on a weekend when we in this country are gathering to celebrate our freedom, and our declaration of independence from the rule of a King and an Empire.  But these are the words designated for us this day.  Perhaps some context for these words will help.

Judean Context

We know Zechariah as a prophet but he was also a priest.  In the Hebrew tradition he is known for his work to rekindle the peoples hope after their liberation and return from Babylonian exile.  His vision of hope was uniquely connected to his insistence that they immediately rebuild the house of God.

While a large portion of the countries ruling elite were in exile in Babylon the temple on Mount Zion continued to lay in ruins ever since its destruction at the hands of the Babylonians in 586 BCE.  Enemies from without and apathy from within had brought the religious and political authority centered on the temple mount to a sorry state.

Zechariah understood that the rebuilding of the temple was a necessary precursor to what would be known as the messianic age.  Yahweh was about to establish his kingdom.  His ancient dwelling place in Zion must be restored to its former glory, so that Yahweh might once again be enthroned among his people and from there achieve his divine purpose for all nations and all peoples.

The night visions described in the first eight chapters of the book of Zechariah, supposedly taking place on a single night sometime in February or March of the year 519 BCE, have as their general theme the reassurance of the people that despite all appearances to the contrary, the messianic age is about to begin.

The eighth and final vision (6:1-8) sees the culmination of the messianic age to be the bringing of peace to the whole world once again, but this time under the control of Yahweh.  This new emerging community will find life in obedience to Yahweh and will live in unity with one another.  The New Jerusalem will mean peace and prosperity for old and young.  Joy and gladness will drive out the memory of past injustices and distress.  Yahweh’s people, gathered from near and far, will be joined in Yahweh’s holy city by the Gentiles, who will have been led to know the truth by the faithful witness of the Jews, and together, Jew and Gentile, will share in the blessings of a new golden age.

Unlike other prophetic writers, Zechariah rejects the formalism of the priestly cult and emphasizes instead the individual’s need for personal commitment and obedience.  There is an emergent realization that the consummation of God’s purpose cannot consist merely in the destruction of evil but must include the transformation of evil to good.  But the culmination of this personal commitment and obedience to Yahweh is Zechariah’s basic vision of a world at peace, with Jew and Gentile gathered together in a worshiping community centered on the Temple.

Yahweh will encircle the temple with his protecting presence, and the messianic king will enter Jerusalem in triumph to inaugurate the reign of peace.  The earth is transformed by the rule of Yahweh.

We can find in the  prophecy of Zechariah various levels of thought, which characterized a people who saw little outward evidence of the fulfillment of prophetic promises, yet, they remained a people who never relinquished their invincible hope in the vindication of Yahweh and his people.

This is the context behind the words that the Christian witness proclaims to be fulfilled by Jesus of Nazareth:

Lo, your king comes to you;

            Triumphant and victorious is he,

Humble and riding on an ass,

            On a colt the foal of an ass.

These familiar words seldom read outside of the celebrations of Palm Sunday are imbued with a hope that reaches beyond all understanding or any rational evidence in the world in which people lived in 519 BCE.  We understand that Jesus of Nazareth is that humble King who came to reclaim the world as God’s peaceable Kingdom.  This faith that God in Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit is about the work of building something new is the stronghold of our hope.

Times they are a changing

So as Christians we believe that we are living in this new age ushered in by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus the Christ (messiah).  Christ becomes for us the personification of our hope that a new age is emerging in which all of the peoples and nations of this world, indeed all of creation, will live in peace under the reign of God.  This is the hope we express when we pray ‘thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” 

But in order to truly understand the source of our hope we must first recognize some hard truths about our church.

The Constantinian compromise that aligned Christianity with the established political and social institutions of the Roman Empire and all subsequent empires of Western Civilization is long past.  Further, the Protestant Reformation is over, it is finished, it is done.  The postmodern church is no longer seeking to reform the Church institutions it has inherited. 

The sad truth is that the Church of those of us born before 1962 is fast moving into a state of irrelevance for those who have come after us.  We can witness this reality in the scarcity of young adults taking active roles in the church today.  It is not that this new generation is a faithless generation.  It would be a terrible mistake in judgment to think so.  Rather, it is a fact that those sometimes called generation x’rs no longer see the traditional institutional church as a valid or authentic expression of their faith.

And, honestly, their judgment upon the church is for the most part valid.  We have too long relegated faith to one or two hours of archaic traditions and forms that have become far removed from the every day realities of life in the post modern world.  There are just as many, if not more, opportunities to serve the community in real and tangible works of charity, compassion, and justice from organizations outside of the institutional church as there are from within.  And the language of moral obligation has been co-opted by corporations seeking to capitalize on the longing of its workers to be a part of something that makes a real and tangible difference in the lives of their neighbors, their communities.  And, of course, for the corporation, this makes for good advertising.

For those of us who grew up finding comfort, meaning, and purpose in the church of our youth this is a painful transformation that is leaving many among us feeling lost and exiled from the church we grew up with.  And, there are those among us that, no matter what, will not be able to let go of the structures, the forms, the familiar way of doing things as church for some time to come.  Change always has its winners and its losers when it comes to issues of position, power, and control.  Never the less, it is critically important that we honor these faithful sisters and brothers among us.  For they have carried us through joyous and difficult times faithfully.  We must find ways to learn from them, for their wisdom and experience are an important treasure for both the church of today and the church of tomorrow.  The reality that the church they inherited and served faithfully is quickly going away should never diminish or devalue their sacred service that continues today and into the future.

And, as from time eternal, there are plenty of zealots seeking to stop the emergence of a new church, proclaiming the new emergent church to be heretical, unfaithful, and unchristian.  It is important that we hear those critics who speak in love that we might learn from them and better understand the differences that reconciliation and peace require of us.  The church in whatever form it emerges must reach out to those of our brothers and sisters who mourn this end times with compassion and charity.

Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope

But change is happening, and it is happening now. But friends, do not despair.  Lift up your hearts sisters and brothers for we are living in exciting times.  It is not every generation that gets to go about the rebuilding of the church.  Let us remember the vision of Zechariah.  It is time to step out of the ruins of those outward forces that have sought to destroy the house of God.  It is time to awaken from our apathy and reclaim the vision of a still speaking God who commands peace of the nations, who is at work transforming evil into good, and re-establishing a time when all of creation co-exists in mutual sustainable praise to the life God created.  This is the stronghold of our faith.  Let us return to our stronghold, as prisoners of hope.

So what might this new house of God look like? 

While there are many possibilities I think this list I have borrowed from a recent  “Darkwood Blog” by Eric Elnes http://www.onfaithonline.tv/darkwoodbrew/the-inaugural-wild-goose-festival-recovering-something-lost/ provides us with a good initial summery:

(1) Christians are letting go of the notion that their particular faith is the only legitimate one on the planet, even as they fully embrace the Christian path as their own.  They understand that God is greater than our imagination can comprehend and thus may speak within other faiths.

(2) Christians are letting go of literal and inerrant interpretations of their sacred texts.  They are embracing a more ancient, prayerful, non-literal approach to these same texts, and finding new sacred texts as well.

(3) Christians are letting go of the notion that people of faith are called to dominate nature.  They are embracing a more organic understanding of human relationship with the earth.

(4) Christians are letting go of empty worship conventions and creeds.  They are embracing more diverse, creative, engaging approaches, often making strong use of the arts.

(5) Christians are letting go of a narrow definition of appropriate sexual orientation and gender identity.  They are embracing with increasing confidence an understanding that affirms the dignity and worth of all people.

(6) Christians are letting go of an understanding that people of faith should only interest themselves in the “spiritual” well being of people.  They are embracing a more holistic understanding that physical and spiritual well-being are related.

(7) Christians are letting go of the desire to impose their particular vision of faith on the wider society.  They are embracing the notion that their purpose is to make themselves more faithful adherents of their vision of faith.

(8) Christians are letting go of the old rivalries between “liberal, moderate, and conservative” branches of their faith.  They are embracing a faith that transcends these very definitions.

 (9) Christians are letting go of notions of the afterlife that are dominated by judgment of “unbelievers.”  They are embracing an understanding that God never gives up on any of us, even after we die, and that all people are loved far more than we can comprehend.

(10) Christians are letting go of the notion that faith and science are incompatible.  They are embracing the notion that faith and science can serve as allies in the pursuit of truth, and that God values our minds as well as our hearts.

(11) Christians are letting go of the notion that one’s work and one’s spiritual path are unrelated.  They are embracing an understanding that rest and recreation, prayer and reflection, are as important as work, and that our work is a “calling” and expression of what some call our “sweet spot.”

(12) Christians are letting go of old hierarchies that privilege religious leaders over laypeople.  They are embracing an understanding that all people have a mission and purpose in life in response to the Spirit’s call. It’s no longer about who wears the robes but who lives the life.

While none of us have any way of knowing what the church will look like by the end of our appointed life span.  We can say with confidence that it will look much different than it does today.  But, let us not despair.  Instead, let’s get excited, let hope captivate us.  It is time to rebuild God’s house.

Community of Hope

Now we come to a time when we must say goodbye.  Wednesday, Cathy and I will be loading a Uhaul truck with all of our belongings that will fit.  We are on our way to Conway, Arkansas to do our part in this new creation.  We are in the midst of planting a new church in Conway we have named Community of Hope.  It will be based in large part on the radical hospitality and inclusive love we have experienced here at First Central.  But we will also be incorporating some of the current ideas and forms coming out of the Progressive and Emergent Church communities.  We will be sharing this exploration with those who choose to physically gather with us in Conway, and with those who gather by way of our Internet presence, what it means to be a part of this new church God is creating in this new post modern age.  For those of you interested you can find the community of hope on Facebook www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_150555224991585&ap=1.  You are welcome to follow along as passive observers, or if you feel so led, to join as an active participant in this new mission by way of the Internet.

Cathy and I will remain members of First Central.  The Church Council has voted to extend to me an indefinite leave of absence.  This means that my call to ministry remains with you, and my standing as an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ continues to be held by the Living Waters Association, of the Nebraska Conference.

But please know this truth, that it is more than membership and standing that you hold.  You hold in sacred trust our hearts, our love, and our gratitude for having allowed us to be your friends in this life we share together as First Central.  Leaving this church is the single most difficult decision that Cathy and I have ever had to make.  We look forward to returning from time to time to visit Cathy’s family in Council Bluffs and to visit and worship with you here.  We also look forward to continuing our participation in the life of this church through the new technologies of email, Facebook, and twitter.

So with affection and gratitude let me simply say,


May the Peace of Christ be with you and sustain you, no matter what God has in store for you, O prisoners of hope!

Amen!


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To the glory of God, and the people of First Central Congregational United Church of Christ, Omaha, Nebraska.  Delivered during morning worship on Sunday, July 3, 2011.  First Reading:  Romans 7;13-25a.  Second Reading: Zechariah 9:9-12a.

Fidelity--The Stoning of Stephen

Fidelity can be a terrible temptation. Fidelity can be a terrible judge. I know, because I was there the day we stoned Stephen. The vision of my coat lying at the feet of Saul haunts me even to this day. I am here to tell you, fidelity is a terrible temptation. For the right beliefs, … for the right sacrifice, …the whole world will lay their coats at your feet.


Let me explain…
I was born and raised in the great city of Jerusalem; I lived near the gates of the great temple. I made my home on Mt Zion. As a child I lived and played in and around the great market place that had emerged around the walls of the temple, where pilgrims attending the great festivals and feasts did their shopping.  If need be, pilgrims could have their monies changed into the local currency, buy gifts, even purchase a sacrificial lamb. I can remember days when the sweat smell of the sacrificial blood, the smell of spices and ointments, mingled with the incense flowing from the temple, saturating the air I breathed. To this day that particular combination of smells reminds me of Jerusalem, it reminds me of home.  But the smells filling my nostrils was only a fortaste of the exotic pagentry that filled my eyes. The streets leading in and out of the temple gates were filled with sights of the exotic and the ordained.  The faithful pilgrims, children of Abraham, Moses, and David traveled from far and near to come to the Temple on Mount Zion, where they comingled with the priests and Levites, dressed in their finest ecclesiastical and liturgical adornments.

Vision of the High Priest
If you were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the High Priest you know that sacrificial blood never touched his hands, never splattered his garments. He had an army of ordinary priests to take care of the daily slaughter of the innocent lambs.

I guess we really had come to a point in our history when we worshiped the High Priest.  We placed all of our hopes in him and his office to protect the way of life that had been handed down to us by our ancestors.  Once the Romans seized control of the government and the economy, dismantling the dynasty of David and Solomon, our only true leader was the High Priest, who kept our religious and cultural heritage safe from the encroachment of the infidels. On occasion, while hanging out around the temple, I would get a glimpse of the High Priest decked out in his vestments. If you have ever seen the High Priests dressed in his ecclesiastical vestments you know what I am talking about, it was a sight to behold.

His vestments consisted of a blue woven robe. And on the hem there were golden bells alternating with blue, purple, and scarlet pomegranates. Over the robe the High Priest wore this embroidered, apron like vestment. This apron was made of blue, purple and scarlet material of fine linen interwoven with threads of gold, with each of its two shoulder clasps carrying a precious stone each engraved with the names of six of the twelve tribes of Israel. The straps helped secure a square breast piece made of the same material. The breast piece had four rows of three precious stones each, on which the names of the twelve tribes were inscribed. To finish it off, the High Priest wore a linen turban to which a golden crown was attached with a plate inscribed “Holy to Yahweh.” No one ever doubted, no one ever questioned, his worthiness of our fidelity.

Perhaps now you can understand why we were so angry that day when Stephen, in all his righteous indignation, challenged the very fidelity of the High Priest and the authority of the Temple hierarchy. I mean, who did he think he was? Here is this young Hellenist Jew, a follower of that radical rabbi Jesus, who dares to walk into the very courts surrounding the sanctuary of God and accuse the High priest, the entire hierarchy of the priesthood of infidelity to God. He dares to quote Holy Scripture to support his charges against us. It is a wonder he did not start a riot right then and there within the walls of the city.

I am sure the High Priest had thought he had put an end to this Jesus movement when he arranged to have the Rabbi crucified. But instead a full-blown movement began to emerge claiming that the one we thought crucified, God had raised from the dead. It had not taken long before there was no place you could go in Jerusalem where you didn’t find these disciples teaching and preaching there good news, gathering together in each others homes to worship, sharing common meals and a common purse, creating programs of charity for the widowed, the orphaned, and the poor, proclaiming a new covenant with God as if the old covenant was no longer sufficient for the salvation of God's chosen people.

So on that fateful day, when Stephen came into the courtyards of the temple and began to preach, challenging the fidelity of all of us gathered, accusing us of worshiping the Temple like a golden calf -- it was more than we could take. Our anger consumed us. But as angry as we were we knew the law. Proving our fidelity to the law, we took the time to seize Stephen and drag him outside the city walls, where we proceeded to do exactly what the law required we do to blasphemers, heretics, to any one who dared to challenge the authority and dignity of the Temple and the High Priest. No one questioned that Stephen was guilty. The great prosecutor Saul looked on with approval as we vented our righteous indignation. We reach down into the dust of the street, picked up the stones from the ground, we closed in on him, and we stoned him! I know what the cracking of his skull sounded like as a stone found its target.  I know the smell of Stephen's sacrificial blood. I was there, I was a witness, I laid my coat at the feet of Saul. And I felt a righteous satisfaction in what we did that day. It was only later that I realized that we were not the good guys in this story of fidelity.

Yes, I am haunted by the events of that day. It shames me when I remember how Stephen responded to our hatred, and the stones hurled at his mortality. How he pleaded with God to forgive us. And even though I covered my ears with all my might, and rushed with the others to stop his witness, I could not help but hear the joy and wonder in his voice as he proclaimed a vision of Jesus standing at the right hand of God! There was a way in which Stephen died that was hauntingly similar to the stories of the death of Jesus. In the end it was the way Stephen died that witnessed to his fidelity.

Vision Lost
Then it was over! The Romans put an end to it all. The order and security we had come to know in the ‘50s gave way to the revolts of the ‘60s with its great cultural cataclysms and assassinations. Everywhere one looked there was rioting in the streets. The jails were being filled. Homes and businesses were being burned to the ground. The land of David and Solomon was quickly sinking once again into civil war. Then in the year 70, the Romans finally had enough. With the terrible power and might of its modern army, with all of its deadly technology and brute force it systematically began to destroy everything and everyone that got in its way. There was little or no regard as to whether they were killing a sinner or the righteous. Everything, and just about everyone, in the path of the Roman army was destroyed. Then the impossible, the unthinkable, the great Temple, the house of God, was torn down to the ground, not one stone was left standing on top of another. The great treasures of the Temple, all of its instruments of sacrifice and worship were looted, carried off to parts unknown, by the conquering armies of the empire. What had been was now no more. Those of us who survived--fled.

A Refugee – And you welcomed me
For years I wandered from place to place, trying to find meaning to a life without the Temple. What I understood to have been the center of the earth, God’s home on earth, had been destroyed. Having grown up in a time when everyone knew their place in the hierarchy of life, a time when religious institutions seemed a sanctuary from the encroachment of the secular enticements of modern life, reality as I now experienced it, was very much a wilderness experience. I spent years wandering from place to place looking for something worthy to attach my faith. I wandered searching for a new home, a refugee of fidelity.

Then by the Grace of God, I found my way to this place. And you welcomed me. I mean you really welcomed ME! It did not seem to matter who I was, where I had come from, or where I was on life’s journey. I was truly welcomed. For the first time I began to understand the power and glory of God’s radical hospitality. From the passing of the Peace of Christ, to the sharing of the Feast at Christ’s table I have found myself to be a part of a new community: a community of love, a community with a new vision of fidelity. For the first time I came to realize that we refugees of faith are like newborn infants, longing for something pure, spiritual milk, and with this spiritual sustenance, the hope we might grow into our salvation. Here with you, I found a home: a place to rest, a place to heal, a place to learn and to serve.

New Vision -- We are building a New Temple
Over the past seven years as I shared my life with you, here in this place, and you have shared your life with me, a new vision of fidelity has emerged, replacing the vision of old. This emergent vision is not of this great building. And, this is a great building, but it is not a temple. This emergent vision is not of great hierarchies of authority, for here we are each equal members of the priesthood of all believers. This emerging vision is about how our ordinary sacred lives of fellowship, community, and service are contributing to the building of a new kind of temple. Not a temple made of stones and mortar, but a temple of living stones. When we gather together in this place, we gather as living stones, stones that are being shaped and formed into a new temple, a spiritual temple. And this spiritual temple has proven worthy of our fidelity.

When we come together and hear Stephen play the organ, the choir sing, Scott preach, when we give of ourselves in prayer and offering, we are in each sacred moment being shaped and formed into something new. When we nurture our children in worship and in Grand Central Stations, we are doing the work of building a Spiritual house. Every time we gather in this place, the hard edges of our lives are gradually being chipped away through radical acts of hospitality, fellowship, and service. But it is not just here in this place that we are being formed.

When we give of ourselves to the work of the Parrish Alternative School, when we get involved with the Amnesty International Freedom Writers, when we join with others in the building of a Habitat for Humanity home, we are in these acts of compassion and justice being shaped and formed by the Spirit into living stones, into a spiritual temple.

When we reach out to minister to those in prison and their families through CrossOver Prison Ministries, or when we look to the needs of our neighbors by providing personal and household goods at an affordable price through the Evergreen Thrift Shop, or when we provide for the faithful at the Siena/Francis House, in these acts of compassion and justice we are being shaped and formed by the Spirit into living stones, into a spiritual temple.

When we reach out to the homeless poor, cooking for them and offering fellowship through the Neighbors United Team, when our youth and their leaders travel north to work among our brothers and sisters living on the reservations of the Dakotas, we are in these acts of compassion and justice being shaped and formed by the Spirit into living stones, into a spiritual temple.

In these ways, and in so many other ways that I have not named, we are witnesses to the reality that God has chosen us to be a spiritual house, that we are indeed precious in God’s sight, and that Christ can still be seen not only standing at the right hand of God, but actively working with us and within us, here and now.

Yes, I am still haunted by the vision of my coat, sitting at the feet of the great prosecutor Saul. I am still saddened over the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. But I have come to know that God heard Stephen’s plea and that I am forgiven. For the first time in a very long time I am hopeful again. But this time, my hope is not in great buildings, rituals, or religious institutions with their ecclesiastical hierarchies and granduer. This time my hope is in the promise that from the beginning to the end of each day it is God’s fidelity that will prove to be the salvation for which the world is longing.  It is to God's fidelity that we hymn our prayers.

Be Thou My Vision
So now, when I go to bed, and when I wake, I find myself hymning this prayer to the still speaking God …

Be Thou My Vision

Lord of my heart

Naught be all else to me

Save that thou art

Thou my best thought

By day or by night

Waking or sleeping

Thy presence my light

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To the glory of God, and the people of First Central Congregational United Church of Christ, Omaha, Nebraska.  Delivered during morning worship on Sunday, May 22, 2011. 

First Reading:  1 Peter 2:2-10.  Second Reading: Acts 7:54--8:1.