The story of resurrection...if you have ever stood at a grave and wept like Mary & Martha you identify...
Rising again. What a concept. When my grandpa died in 1987 I prayed that he would rise out of that coffin until I heard they had already flushed his body fluids out and replaced them with formaldehyde. Only then did I think it was hopeless.
Imagine Mary & Martha who have been hopeless. His body stinketh already. And here comes Jesus saying "Roll away the stone."
One "Year A" I had just experienced the worst day of my life as I read this passage. My 20 month-old daughter had had a seizure and turned blue. I thought she was dead but she breathed again. I read this and started sobbing, sitting down to email a New Testament professor friend. If only I could find that email, but it is lost to cyberspace. I explained to him my experience of resurrection and sudden understanding of Mary & Martha.
Now, many of you may say, "But my child did not breathe again." I'm sure my response to the passage would have been different if that had been my case.
But at the bottom of the page I read, "I am the resurrection and the life, no one comes to the father except through me."
Our hope.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Lent 3A John 4:5-42 Come and see
In the summer of 1997 in OKC we went eight weeks without rain. I have never seen such a drought. The last time we mowed our grass was June. It just shriveled and died. We got to a point where the city banned all lawn watering. Then on the news, they warned home owners to water their foundations because they would crack without moisture.
We need water to live. Without it we will do more than crack, we will die. Jesus offered this woman living water, a spring of water gushing up to eternal life. She thought he meant ordinary everyday water, but she would find out that this water was more than she had ever imagined. She would also find out that a typical day at the well turned into the best day of her life.
Just an ordinary day…could anything be more ordinary than going to get water? But so many unordinary things happen. First of all a Jewish man asks her for a drink. Why is that so unusual? Why can’t you just ask for a drink if you are thirsty? Why must all these barriers get in the way?
Jesus using something very ordinary to break down barriers, to call this woman to believe in him.
She thinks he’s a Jew
She judges him based on his ethnic background, his religion. He takes her for what she is. Last week the lectionary talked about Jesus talking to Nicodemus, a ruler, a rich man, a prominent V.I.P. This week the Scripture describes conversation Jesus has with someone almost completely opposite of Nicodemus. A woman, no one would even speak to a woman in public. She is a nobody, of no importance to anyone. She is also a Samaritan, hated by the Jews. If you are from Oklahoma, she is from Texas. If you are from Michigan, she is from Ohio. If you are a white from 1960s Alabama, she is black.
She takes him literally when he offers her living water. She asks him if he’s better than Jacob.
Life is being offering to a Samaritan woman. John wants to show that Jesus did not come to just reach the rich and privileged, although the Gospel is open to them. Jesus offers this eternal life to the outcast. He then tells her to call her husband. But she has no husband. Do you notice that he doesn’t condemn her? He just states the fact of her lifestyle. She realizes he must be a prophet if he knows about her past. It sounds like she lives in Hollywood in today’s time, doesn’t it?
She thinks he’s a prophet
Then she draws him to a conversation about worship.
But he points out that the place doesn’t matter, that it’s the God being worshipped that matters. He draws the focus off of her and points her to God. She knows about the Messiah. He tells her he is the Messiah.
She thinks he’s the Messiah
The disciples come back but they know by now to keep their mouths shut when Jesus is doing something controversial even when he’s talking to a Samaritan woman. The woman leaves. She runs “Come see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah can he?”
WHOA! Do you realize the significance of what happens here? Jesus empowers a beaten down immoral outcast of a woman to be a PREACHER OF the gospel! These men listen to her and follow her leadership to Jesus! And many believed because of her testimony.
She knows he’s the Savior
IF YOU ONLY KNEW
What is this gift of God? (verse 10)
When is the last time you ran, not walked to someone with only the excitement that Jesus gives and said, “COME WITH ME TO SEE HIM!”
What makes the transformation in this woman’s life possible? What makes the transformation in our lives possible?
GRACE OF GOD provides the life offered by the Savior
What is the grace of God?
We have a hard time understanding GRACE why?
Because in our place and time we don’t understand how anyone can offer a gift with no strings attached. When we receive something we wonder what is expected of us. When you receive a Christmas card you think OH I didn’t send them one.. When you receive a birthday gift you think oh you didn’t get them one….and on and on.
God offers us a free gift: his love. His life. No strings attached: oh but you say God Expects me to do such and such at church. I OWE him.
That is not what grace is about. It’s not about owing. Now you do respond to his grace but you don’t owe him anything. That would make it an obligatory gift and God doesn’t give to us with strings attached.
Let me relate this to the celebration of the LORD’s supper. It’s a feast. When you give a feast it costs money, etc., but you don’t lose anything because you gain so much by eating with the others (fellowship)
Is this why God created us?
Is this what Jesus offers this outcast, this adulterous woman? He offers her a free gift, with a new life thrown in! What changes her? HE DOES. Only an experience with Jesus Christ can truly change you.
Jesus moves from a dialogue about spiritual water to a conversation about spiritual worship. He goes from offering this woman living water to directing her to true worship, pointing away from herself to God. That is where salvation lies. Getting our focus off of ourselves and pointed to God in true worship. This is not worship just every Sunday morning: but every living breathing moment of our lives.
True worship is not “What I get out of it” It’s putting my focus completely on God. As Arleta has reminded the children in this church what prayer is: putting everything else out of your mind.
Jesus directs this woman away from her troubled life to God himself. She trusted him enough to do it. To get a glimpse of this LIFE he offered. She became so excited she had to run and tell.
If you only knew
If you only knew the gift of God
who is talking to you
you would ask me
If you only knew today what life is like fully trusting in the Messiah you wouldn’t refuse him. You would ask him into your life and he would tell you every thing you ever did.
"He knew everything about me he knew where I’d been and what I’d done come with me come with me to see the holy one." from "He knew everything about me" by Candy Hemphill
We need water to live. Without it we will do more than crack, we will die. Jesus offered this woman living water, a spring of water gushing up to eternal life. She thought he meant ordinary everyday water, but she would find out that this water was more than she had ever imagined. She would also find out that a typical day at the well turned into the best day of her life.
Just an ordinary day…could anything be more ordinary than going to get water? But so many unordinary things happen. First of all a Jewish man asks her for a drink. Why is that so unusual? Why can’t you just ask for a drink if you are thirsty? Why must all these barriers get in the way?
Jesus using something very ordinary to break down barriers, to call this woman to believe in him.
She thinks he’s a Jew
She judges him based on his ethnic background, his religion. He takes her for what she is. Last week the lectionary talked about Jesus talking to Nicodemus, a ruler, a rich man, a prominent V.I.P. This week the Scripture describes conversation Jesus has with someone almost completely opposite of Nicodemus. A woman, no one would even speak to a woman in public. She is a nobody, of no importance to anyone. She is also a Samaritan, hated by the Jews. If you are from Oklahoma, she is from Texas. If you are from Michigan, she is from Ohio. If you are a white from 1960s Alabama, she is black.
She takes him literally when he offers her living water. She asks him if he’s better than Jacob.
Life is being offering to a Samaritan woman. John wants to show that Jesus did not come to just reach the rich and privileged, although the Gospel is open to them. Jesus offers this eternal life to the outcast. He then tells her to call her husband. But she has no husband. Do you notice that he doesn’t condemn her? He just states the fact of her lifestyle. She realizes he must be a prophet if he knows about her past. It sounds like she lives in Hollywood in today’s time, doesn’t it?
She thinks he’s a prophet
Then she draws him to a conversation about worship.
But he points out that the place doesn’t matter, that it’s the God being worshipped that matters. He draws the focus off of her and points her to God. She knows about the Messiah. He tells her he is the Messiah.
She thinks he’s the Messiah
The disciples come back but they know by now to keep their mouths shut when Jesus is doing something controversial even when he’s talking to a Samaritan woman. The woman leaves. She runs “Come see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah can he?”
WHOA! Do you realize the significance of what happens here? Jesus empowers a beaten down immoral outcast of a woman to be a PREACHER OF the gospel! These men listen to her and follow her leadership to Jesus! And many believed because of her testimony.
She knows he’s the Savior
IF YOU ONLY KNEW
What is this gift of God? (verse 10)
When is the last time you ran, not walked to someone with only the excitement that Jesus gives and said, “COME WITH ME TO SEE HIM!”
What makes the transformation in this woman’s life possible? What makes the transformation in our lives possible?
GRACE OF GOD provides the life offered by the Savior
What is the grace of God?
We have a hard time understanding GRACE why?
Because in our place and time we don’t understand how anyone can offer a gift with no strings attached. When we receive something we wonder what is expected of us. When you receive a Christmas card you think OH I didn’t send them one.. When you receive a birthday gift you think oh you didn’t get them one….and on and on.
God offers us a free gift: his love. His life. No strings attached: oh but you say God Expects me to do such and such at church. I OWE him.
That is not what grace is about. It’s not about owing. Now you do respond to his grace but you don’t owe him anything. That would make it an obligatory gift and God doesn’t give to us with strings attached.
Let me relate this to the celebration of the LORD’s supper. It’s a feast. When you give a feast it costs money, etc., but you don’t lose anything because you gain so much by eating with the others (fellowship)
Is this why God created us?
Is this what Jesus offers this outcast, this adulterous woman? He offers her a free gift, with a new life thrown in! What changes her? HE DOES. Only an experience with Jesus Christ can truly change you.
Jesus moves from a dialogue about spiritual water to a conversation about spiritual worship. He goes from offering this woman living water to directing her to true worship, pointing away from herself to God. That is where salvation lies. Getting our focus off of ourselves and pointed to God in true worship. This is not worship just every Sunday morning: but every living breathing moment of our lives.
True worship is not “What I get out of it” It’s putting my focus completely on God. As Arleta has reminded the children in this church what prayer is: putting everything else out of your mind.
Jesus directs this woman away from her troubled life to God himself. She trusted him enough to do it. To get a glimpse of this LIFE he offered. She became so excited she had to run and tell.
If you only knew
If you only knew the gift of God
who is talking to you
you would ask me
If you only knew today what life is like fully trusting in the Messiah you wouldn’t refuse him. You would ask him into your life and he would tell you every thing you ever did.
"He knew everything about me he knew where I’d been and what I’d done come with me come with me to see the holy one." from "He knew everything about me" by Candy Hemphill
Lent 2A John 3:1-17 Ask a question and get a sermon
Dontcha love it when you ask a question and get a sermon?
Nicodemus was probably coming to talk theology with another rabbi. Instead of a nice intellectually stimulating theological conversation he gets a challenge to live a changed life.
He finds that Jesus is more than a teacher and Nicodemus needed to believe in more than signs and more than his religion. You see the Pharisees had constructed a system so precise that one didn’t really need God. He just needed to follow the laws, the rules, in order to be religious slash righteous. The Pharisees formed about 400 years before the opening of the NT. They decided that they need to make this Jewish religion something that could be practiced without a Jewish country or king since they lost all of that. So they constructed a system that could be followed whereever a Jew lived. They also accepted the prophetic writings as Scripture, something their Sadducee counterparts did not. The Pharisees are actually the open-minded ones of the day. They believed in miracles, angels, resurrection. The Sadduccees believed in none of the above, only the law, the first five books of the Bible.
Nicodemus has been living this lifestyle all of his life. He is so righteous, so squeaky clean, no one could find a thing wrong in his past to use against him. He could have run for president. He has worked hard to get to be where he is: one of the leading teachers of the Jews…and hear he finds this guy who has come from no where (Nazareth) and has flocks of followers and performs miracles! It’s like if you were a famous concert pianist and had worked all of your life to be the best and ran into a guy from the back woods who could play and charm audiences with no music training at all. How would you feel?
Nicodemus tells Jesus there is no way he could do what he does without God. A good observation…but see Nicodemus thinks Jesus is just a fine teacher. He doesn’t realize he’s sitting there talking to God himself. It didn’t even cross his mind.
Signs become quite the negative issue in John. Those who seek after signs have a serious lack of faith.
we think we have all the pieces put together and then we find someone like Jesus. He is unlearned, untrained and we have studied all of our lives to know the answers. How in the world does God use someone like him? And what about me?
If Nicodemus is not good enough for the kingdom of God, then who is?
It’s not enough. Then what is?
All of my righteousness is as filthy rags. It’s being born again. What in the world is that? You ask, like Nicodemus did. How can a person enter his mother’s womb and be born? Wesley said this of being born again, “Inwardly being changed from all sinfulness to all holiness.”
Nicodemus was probably coming to talk theology with another rabbi. Instead of a nice intellectually stimulating theological conversation he gets a challenge to live a changed life.
He finds that Jesus is more than a teacher and Nicodemus needed to believe in more than signs and more than his religion. You see the Pharisees had constructed a system so precise that one didn’t really need God. He just needed to follow the laws, the rules, in order to be religious slash righteous. The Pharisees formed about 400 years before the opening of the NT. They decided that they need to make this Jewish religion something that could be practiced without a Jewish country or king since they lost all of that. So they constructed a system that could be followed whereever a Jew lived. They also accepted the prophetic writings as Scripture, something their Sadducee counterparts did not. The Pharisees are actually the open-minded ones of the day. They believed in miracles, angels, resurrection. The Sadduccees believed in none of the above, only the law, the first five books of the Bible.
Nicodemus has been living this lifestyle all of his life. He is so righteous, so squeaky clean, no one could find a thing wrong in his past to use against him. He could have run for president. He has worked hard to get to be where he is: one of the leading teachers of the Jews…and hear he finds this guy who has come from no where (Nazareth) and has flocks of followers and performs miracles! It’s like if you were a famous concert pianist and had worked all of your life to be the best and ran into a guy from the back woods who could play and charm audiences with no music training at all. How would you feel?
Nicodemus tells Jesus there is no way he could do what he does without God. A good observation…but see Nicodemus thinks Jesus is just a fine teacher. He doesn’t realize he’s sitting there talking to God himself. It didn’t even cross his mind.
Signs become quite the negative issue in John. Those who seek after signs have a serious lack of faith.
we think we have all the pieces put together and then we find someone like Jesus. He is unlearned, untrained and we have studied all of our lives to know the answers. How in the world does God use someone like him? And what about me?
If Nicodemus is not good enough for the kingdom of God, then who is?
It’s not enough. Then what is?
All of my righteousness is as filthy rags. It’s being born again. What in the world is that? You ask, like Nicodemus did. How can a person enter his mother’s womb and be born? Wesley said this of being born again, “Inwardly being changed from all sinfulness to all holiness.”
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Easter 3C John 21 What Jesus does with failure
That night of arrest started out well for Peter. He cut off the guard's ear in defense of Jesus and then followed at a distance even after the others went away. But when he got to the courtyard where the soldiers were abusing his friend, he lost his nerve. When questioned about his association with this alleged criminal, in the heat of the moment, he chose the answers that would save his skin. According to the Gospel of John, this story is the 3rd appearance Jesus had to his disciples. Peter has seen Jesus. Yet obviously Jesus thinks Peter needs some reassurance that he is forgiven. So Jesus comes to meet Peter where he had first met him. On the shore of the lake.
Seven of the disciples have traveled the 2 day journey back home…back to Galilee, back to familiar faces and familiar smells of the sea. Peter says, "Let's go fishing." I don't know if any of you have ever been criticized for going fishing, but poor Peter and six have been torn apart for that fishing trip for 2000 years. Poor guys. Probably they just wanted the familiar…after the worst week of their life, why should they not do something to keep busy? But many, many people have said this is a sign those 7 gave up after Jesus died. He told them to fish for people but instead they go back to the fish. But really, I think it is ok, Peter, it's ok that you wanted to go fishing. Don't grief counselors advise that we return to our comforting routines after loss? It's ok. Go fishing. Even if they were trying to run from their assignment to do Jesus' work, guess what? Jesus found them where they were.
When we return to the familiar after living so long at the forefront of life…Jesus will find us there.
When are you going to stop looking at your failures and look at me instead? When are you going to feed my sheep?
When are you going to stop looking around at what the others are doing and do what I ask you, Peter?
So what did Peter do?
1. Preached message at Pentecost
2. Went to jail for healing a crippled man and was flogged
3. Arrested again and rescued by an angel
4. Baptized the first non-Jewish believers.
5. Led the council at Jerusalem where it was decided that we didn't need to be Jewish to be Christian.
6. Wrote 2 New Testament books
7. Is credited with being the "rock" of the church.
Jesus sits across the table from you. You have failed. Whether it was simply a test or a serious sin or betrayal, his response will always e the same as that of the one he gave Peter. Feed my sheep. Get back to work. It's not over. You are not going back to what you did before. I have called you. I have given you a purpose greater than you ever dreamed possible. You are valued, skilled, and you are just what I need for this task. You will put aside your insecurities and go forward, doing my work and you will be remembered as one who did not let their failure stop them.
When I was a senior, I encountered my most difficult class to date. Church History Raise your hand if you have taken that class. I studied until my eyes were about to drop out of my head for the crazy tests and would make a barely passing D. After making A's and B's in all of my classes until I reached this one, my self esteem began to suffer and I began to question whether I was cut out for this thing we call college. Yet one day one of my other professors said, "We don't hold it personally against you when you make low grades." I had realized I was ashamed of my low grades…and I was trying…but I kept going and even though I never brought that grade up as high as I wanted it, I kept going.
Jesus wants us to give people the same chances he gives to them. We don't want to do this, usually, until we experience failure ourselves and want forgiveness.
I used to judge people who claimed depression and their reason for not working. A friend of mine lost his job and became seriously depressed to the point he would spend days doing nothing. In my counseling with him, I encouraged him to keep trying and to feel better….but in my heart of hearts I judge saying, why don't you get off your backside and go find another job?
Until one day depression struck me. I found myself on the floor in a fetal position unable to work. I had managed to get 2 college degrees by the age of 23, become ordained at 24, married, had 2 children, and was pastoring a church. I was superwoman. Yet I could not work. I felt I had failed. I hated myself and what I had become. I tried a long time to simply hide it. I only broke down when alone. And I remembered judging someone else for the same thing and I did not want to be judged. I sat in front of my therapist and told her the same. She said you are in school to learn how to respond to people who feel the same way you do.
And as I walked along the shore of Galilee with Jesus after eating that fish and bread in the cool morning fog, I heard him say, do you love me?
Yes
"Feed my sheep."
But I have failed you, Jesus.
I am not worthy of feeding your sheep or anyone else's.
Do you love me?Yes, of course.
Feed my sheep.
I have failed.
Do you love Jesus?Only you know the answer to the question.
Jesus asks DO YOU LOVE ME? DO YOU LOVE ME? DO YOU LOVE ME?
If your heart is crying out right now YES
Then he is asking you to move forward. Keep going. Finish the semester. Finish the year. Finish the course. Keep the faith. Leave behind the failure. Think of it only as a bump in the road that drew you closer to him. Get to work.
On April 21, 2004, Jennifer Hudson stood before the judges and world on American Idol. She saw the score and realized she was voted off the show, finishing seventh out of twelve. I don't know how she felt but I can only imagine how her heart sank all the way to her shoes and she may have wondered if she would ever face success.
But most of you know but to Jennifer Hudson that was a small bump in the road. In December 2005 she landed the role of Effie White the smash hit movie Dreamgirls and recorded the famous song "And I'm telling you I'm not going, which hit the top 20." She received 29 awards for that role including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe.
I can hear Peter singing to the disciples after that conversation with Jesus.
"And I'm telling you I'm not going."
But Peter let's go fishing
"And I'm telling you I’m not going"
But Peter let's forget about this discipleship stuff. It may get us killed.
"And I'm telling you I'm not going."
I'm staying in this faith. I'm staying as a disciple
. I'm staying in relationship with this Jesus I betrayed.
He could only say this to that group that knew what he had done in the courtyard when faced with the question did he know Jesus?
Only because of what Jesus had said to him that day at dawn by the Sea of Galilee and what he says to us.
(From And I'm telling you I'm not going Written by Tom Eyen and Music by Henry Krieger)
And I'm telling you
Jesus will never give up on you.
Seven of the disciples have traveled the 2 day journey back home…back to Galilee, back to familiar faces and familiar smells of the sea. Peter says, "Let's go fishing." I don't know if any of you have ever been criticized for going fishing, but poor Peter and six have been torn apart for that fishing trip for 2000 years. Poor guys. Probably they just wanted the familiar…after the worst week of their life, why should they not do something to keep busy? But many, many people have said this is a sign those 7 gave up after Jesus died. He told them to fish for people but instead they go back to the fish. But really, I think it is ok, Peter, it's ok that you wanted to go fishing. Don't grief counselors advise that we return to our comforting routines after loss? It's ok. Go fishing. Even if they were trying to run from their assignment to do Jesus' work, guess what? Jesus found them where they were.
When we return to the familiar after living so long at the forefront of life…Jesus will find us there.
When are you going to stop looking at your failures and look at me instead? When are you going to feed my sheep?
When are you going to stop looking around at what the others are doing and do what I ask you, Peter?
So what did Peter do?
1. Preached message at Pentecost
2. Went to jail for healing a crippled man and was flogged
3. Arrested again and rescued by an angel
4. Baptized the first non-Jewish believers.
5. Led the council at Jerusalem where it was decided that we didn't need to be Jewish to be Christian.
6. Wrote 2 New Testament books
7. Is credited with being the "rock" of the church.
Jesus sits across the table from you. You have failed. Whether it was simply a test or a serious sin or betrayal, his response will always e the same as that of the one he gave Peter. Feed my sheep. Get back to work. It's not over. You are not going back to what you did before. I have called you. I have given you a purpose greater than you ever dreamed possible. You are valued, skilled, and you are just what I need for this task. You will put aside your insecurities and go forward, doing my work and you will be remembered as one who did not let their failure stop them.
When I was a senior, I encountered my most difficult class to date. Church History Raise your hand if you have taken that class. I studied until my eyes were about to drop out of my head for the crazy tests and would make a barely passing D. After making A's and B's in all of my classes until I reached this one, my self esteem began to suffer and I began to question whether I was cut out for this thing we call college. Yet one day one of my other professors said, "We don't hold it personally against you when you make low grades." I had realized I was ashamed of my low grades…and I was trying…but I kept going and even though I never brought that grade up as high as I wanted it, I kept going.
Jesus wants us to give people the same chances he gives to them. We don't want to do this, usually, until we experience failure ourselves and want forgiveness.
I used to judge people who claimed depression and their reason for not working. A friend of mine lost his job and became seriously depressed to the point he would spend days doing nothing. In my counseling with him, I encouraged him to keep trying and to feel better….but in my heart of hearts I judge saying, why don't you get off your backside and go find another job?
Until one day depression struck me. I found myself on the floor in a fetal position unable to work. I had managed to get 2 college degrees by the age of 23, become ordained at 24, married, had 2 children, and was pastoring a church. I was superwoman. Yet I could not work. I felt I had failed. I hated myself and what I had become. I tried a long time to simply hide it. I only broke down when alone. And I remembered judging someone else for the same thing and I did not want to be judged. I sat in front of my therapist and told her the same. She said you are in school to learn how to respond to people who feel the same way you do.
And as I walked along the shore of Galilee with Jesus after eating that fish and bread in the cool morning fog, I heard him say, do you love me?
Yes
"Feed my sheep."
But I have failed you, Jesus.
I am not worthy of feeding your sheep or anyone else's.
Do you love me?Yes, of course.
Feed my sheep.
I have failed.
Do you love Jesus?Only you know the answer to the question.
Jesus asks DO YOU LOVE ME? DO YOU LOVE ME? DO YOU LOVE ME?
If your heart is crying out right now YES
Then he is asking you to move forward. Keep going. Finish the semester. Finish the year. Finish the course. Keep the faith. Leave behind the failure. Think of it only as a bump in the road that drew you closer to him. Get to work.
On April 21, 2004, Jennifer Hudson stood before the judges and world on American Idol. She saw the score and realized she was voted off the show, finishing seventh out of twelve. I don't know how she felt but I can only imagine how her heart sank all the way to her shoes and she may have wondered if she would ever face success.
But most of you know but to Jennifer Hudson that was a small bump in the road. In December 2005 she landed the role of Effie White the smash hit movie Dreamgirls and recorded the famous song "And I'm telling you I'm not going, which hit the top 20." She received 29 awards for that role including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe.
I can hear Peter singing to the disciples after that conversation with Jesus.
"And I'm telling you I'm not going."
But Peter let's go fishing
"And I'm telling you I’m not going"
But Peter let's forget about this discipleship stuff. It may get us killed.
"And I'm telling you I'm not going."
I'm staying in this faith. I'm staying as a disciple
. I'm staying in relationship with this Jesus I betrayed.
He could only say this to that group that knew what he had done in the courtyard when faced with the question did he know Jesus?
Only because of what Jesus had said to him that day at dawn by the Sea of Galilee and what he says to us.
Tear down the mountains,Yell, scream and shout.You can say what you want,I'm not
walkin' out.Stop all the rivers,Push, strike, and kill.I'm not gonna leave
you,There's no way I will.
(From And I'm telling you I'm not going Written by Tom Eyen and Music by Henry Krieger)
And I'm telling you
Jesus will never give up on you.
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Ordinary 28C Episcopal Reading Ruth 1:1-18 For the love of a Mother-in-Law
Naomi & Her husband Ed moved to Austin, TX, from Norman, OK, in the 1980s because of the oil bust. They bought a house near Austin but they never lost their ties to Oklahoma. Especially Oklahoma Sooners football. Every year they cheered for Oklahoma. They wore red and white when everyone around them wore an ugly color of orange. They were saddened when their two sons, Mark & Charles decided to attend University of Texas instead of University of Oklahoma, but they could do nothing about it. What hurt them more was when their sons married Longhorns. Mark married a University of Texas cheerleader. Ruth did not even own anything red and white. Her car was orange, her shoes were orange, even her apartment was painted orange.
Time passed and Ed had a heart attack and died. Mark & Charles took good care of their mother, along with their wives Orpah and Ruth. One awful day Mark & Charles were driving home from a Red River Shootout game and were hit by a drunk driver. Naomi, Orpah, and Ruth were devastated. Naomi decide she would return to Norman, OK. She managed to sell her home in TX and buy her old family farm outside of Norman. She offered a home to Orpah and Ruth. They are packing the U-Haul when Naomi turns to them both and says, Orpah, dear, Ruth, darling, you don’t have to come with me. Go back to UT get your master’s degrees or maybe meet another man and remarry. Orpah gets in her orange pickup and drives away. Ruth says to Naomi,
"I will go with you to Norman. I will buy a Sooner T shirt. I will learn to listen to Boomer Sooner without choking. I will wave an OU flag. I will paint my car red. I will leave behind my loyalties to Texas and embrace Oklahoma because I love you and want to take care of you."
Ruth. Identity. Who is she now that her husband is dead and she is a foreigner? Will those labels haunt her? Foreign poor widow woman? Yet she loves Naomi. Is love enough to give us identity? Last fall I experienced one of the longest illnesses I have ever had (next to depression anyway). I was diagnosed with mono. Yes, I’ve heard all the jokes, and the only people I kiss were not sick (my husband & 2 daughters) and they never caught it.
Anyway, for a few days I did nothing but sleep. I got up to take my kids to school and pick them up, grab a bite to eat from the fridge, and fell back in bed. I missed so many weekends with my daughters as their daddy took them to the state fair, etc, while I lay at home on the couch with swollen glands, sore throat, and extreme fatigue. Walking from the car to the house wore me out. Walking for 20 minutes put me in bed for 2 hours for months afterward. At one point I look at the ceiling and asked God if I would ever recover. He answered what if you don’t? Then I ask what good am I to my family if all I can do is lay here? A question I’m sure many of the ill ask. God told me all I had to do was love. Loving my husband and daughters was enough. Yes, I did recover. A year later I can finally walk 3 miles at a time without having to sleep for days. I can do aerobics again and stay awake all day (most of the time)…but I find myself much more sensitive to the ill.
Ruth loves Naomi. She lets that define her. The cruel labels of poor foreign widow do not.
We glimpse the Kingdom of God and we find out God’s world is just the opposite of ours. The women have power and baby boys become king.
“What you see around you are people unable to love each other.”Ruth teaches us to love. She left everything to love an old mother-in-law. That is the true loves story here. It is not a young attractive woman finds young attractive man, fall in love, get married & have a baby. It is a cursed foreigner (here I ask you to insert whatever slang term you have heard for foreigners in our land. I won’t say them aloud) the only home she knew and the only god she knew for the love of an old woman and her mother-in-law to boot. God took that and turned it into this story about the ancestor of King David.
An old woman and a cursed foreigner took a huge risk and called a powerful man to use his power to save them. They risked everything. If Boaz would have called upon his servants to kill her, no one in power would have ever missed a foreigner. If Boaz would have refused to listen to her and simply assumed she was there why most women came to the threshing floor, to take advantage of the men’s drunken state in hope of making a few bucks. If he had even called the men’s attention to her by speaking loudly…her reputation would have been ruined forever.
They called up on him to follow the law of God and save them. Reminds me of a group of people that called upon a president to sign a certain bill. JFK signing the civil rights bill. Reminds me of a group of religious leaders who rose up to protest their gov’t’s doubling the gas prices and oppress the people. Reminds me of a group who asked congress to call a mass killing of a certain race what it is: genocide
Many times this asking of people in power to change doesn’t turn out so well. For Ruth it did, but it doesn’t for everyone. Some people--including one of her descendents--end up on the cross when they challenge the powers that be.
The Sounds of Silence, a sixties hit by Simon and Garfunkel, describes people as afraid to love and afraid to hope because of their disconnect with each other. When I preached this sermon on Oct. 14, 2007, I ended with a video of Simon & Garfunkel singing this song...let their words inspire us to love each other in order to change the world: as Ruth did. Click the link to watch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZGWQauQOAQ
Time passed and Ed had a heart attack and died. Mark & Charles took good care of their mother, along with their wives Orpah and Ruth. One awful day Mark & Charles were driving home from a Red River Shootout game and were hit by a drunk driver. Naomi, Orpah, and Ruth were devastated. Naomi decide she would return to Norman, OK. She managed to sell her home in TX and buy her old family farm outside of Norman. She offered a home to Orpah and Ruth. They are packing the U-Haul when Naomi turns to them both and says, Orpah, dear, Ruth, darling, you don’t have to come with me. Go back to UT get your master’s degrees or maybe meet another man and remarry. Orpah gets in her orange pickup and drives away. Ruth says to Naomi,
"I will go with you to Norman. I will buy a Sooner T shirt. I will learn to listen to Boomer Sooner without choking. I will wave an OU flag. I will paint my car red. I will leave behind my loyalties to Texas and embrace Oklahoma because I love you and want to take care of you."
Ruth. Identity. Who is she now that her husband is dead and she is a foreigner? Will those labels haunt her? Foreign poor widow woman? Yet she loves Naomi. Is love enough to give us identity? Last fall I experienced one of the longest illnesses I have ever had (next to depression anyway). I was diagnosed with mono. Yes, I’ve heard all the jokes, and the only people I kiss were not sick (my husband & 2 daughters) and they never caught it.
Anyway, for a few days I did nothing but sleep. I got up to take my kids to school and pick them up, grab a bite to eat from the fridge, and fell back in bed. I missed so many weekends with my daughters as their daddy took them to the state fair, etc, while I lay at home on the couch with swollen glands, sore throat, and extreme fatigue. Walking from the car to the house wore me out. Walking for 20 minutes put me in bed for 2 hours for months afterward. At one point I look at the ceiling and asked God if I would ever recover. He answered what if you don’t? Then I ask what good am I to my family if all I can do is lay here? A question I’m sure many of the ill ask. God told me all I had to do was love. Loving my husband and daughters was enough. Yes, I did recover. A year later I can finally walk 3 miles at a time without having to sleep for days. I can do aerobics again and stay awake all day (most of the time)…but I find myself much more sensitive to the ill.
Ruth loves Naomi. She lets that define her. The cruel labels of poor foreign widow do not.
We glimpse the Kingdom of God and we find out God’s world is just the opposite of ours. The women have power and baby boys become king.
“What you see around you are people unable to love each other.”Ruth teaches us to love. She left everything to love an old mother-in-law. That is the true loves story here. It is not a young attractive woman finds young attractive man, fall in love, get married & have a baby. It is a cursed foreigner (here I ask you to insert whatever slang term you have heard for foreigners in our land. I won’t say them aloud) the only home she knew and the only god she knew for the love of an old woman and her mother-in-law to boot. God took that and turned it into this story about the ancestor of King David.
An old woman and a cursed foreigner took a huge risk and called a powerful man to use his power to save them. They risked everything. If Boaz would have called upon his servants to kill her, no one in power would have ever missed a foreigner. If Boaz would have refused to listen to her and simply assumed she was there why most women came to the threshing floor, to take advantage of the men’s drunken state in hope of making a few bucks. If he had even called the men’s attention to her by speaking loudly…her reputation would have been ruined forever.
They called up on him to follow the law of God and save them. Reminds me of a group of people that called upon a president to sign a certain bill. JFK signing the civil rights bill. Reminds me of a group of religious leaders who rose up to protest their gov’t’s doubling the gas prices and oppress the people. Reminds me of a group who asked congress to call a mass killing of a certain race what it is: genocide
Many times this asking of people in power to change doesn’t turn out so well. For Ruth it did, but it doesn’t for everyone. Some people--including one of her descendents--end up on the cross when they challenge the powers that be.
The Sounds of Silence, a sixties hit by Simon and Garfunkel, describes people as afraid to love and afraid to hope because of their disconnect with each other. When I preached this sermon on Oct. 14, 2007, I ended with a video of Simon & Garfunkel singing this song...let their words inspire us to love each other in order to change the world: as Ruth did. Click the link to watch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZGWQauQOAQ
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Ordinary 15C Luke 10: 25-37 Small Town Social Justice
Monday, Sept. 24, my 2 daughters & I took a road trip to a state park. After we swam for a while, we drove to a small SW OK town where I went to high school. I only lived there 2 years, but graduated from HS there....had not been back for over 10 years and neither one of my children had ever been there. It is a town of less than 2000, so there is not much site-seeing to be done...
After a brief hike cut short by the sound of a rattler in the grass, we got in the car and drove the 10 miles to M------. If you have never driven in SW Oklahoma or West Texas you cannot imagine what it is like to drive where the land is flat, flat, flat, and you see so much sky you wonder why God made hills. We are about to M----- with the music cranked as high as it will go and my 7-year-old says, "Mommy, I just heard a pop." I said, "So." She said, "Mommy the car is shaking." I still didn't notice anything...then I heard this awful sound...and well, turned off the radio. Blowout. We are in the middle of NOWHERE. M---- is about 2 miles away...so I drove at 25 with blinkers on until we got to town. Pulled off in a parking lot and got out to look at my shredded tire. I started digging in the back of the station wagon for the jack and spare. A loud, old 68 Ford pickup with 2 guys in the truckbed rattles by. I see them turn around. The 2 guys in back jump out before the truck stops. They almost have the tire off the car before the hit the ground.
"Need some help?"
"Sure. But my jack is sorely lacking."
"Don't worry. We can lift the car if we can't get the jack to work. We ain't afraid of work."
The two guys bent over the tire are 20-somethings...wiry, tall, heads shaved, wearing nothing but boots and jeans. Tattoos cover their heads, faces, backs, chests, arms, hands....Their dad and older brother stood back and watched If this had been the city I might have been scared, but I figure if I started talking we'd figure out we went to high school together.
"I'm Kelly."
"We're the _______." They say in unison. I vaguely remember the family name. I ask them if the remember my brother.
The guy behind the truck. "Yeah I remember him."
They have the tire changed by now, and tell me where I can get a decent used tire for a fair price. They jump back in the pickup and tell me to follow them to the tire shop. So I do. Tattoed arms waving, they point to a tiny auto shop.
I don't know how you remember high school, but there are certain families that are labeled in small towns as losers. I don't know how it started with this family, but they had a certain label. It may have been something their great-grandpa did...but teachers and kids at school have a certain idea of a kid with a certain last name. Sometimes the kid chooses to live up to it, sometimes they try hard to overcome it.
Here I am in a tiny farming town in southwest Oklahoma living inside the parable of the Good Samaritan. Believe me, no one would have guessed the dust covered 90 Ford Taurus I drive is the car of a college professor. At the moment I looked like an Okie (I do say it proud, Vince Gill, but I did look like one). My station wagon is loaded down with junk cause we have been on a day trip at the lake. My 2 kids & I have just been swimming and digging clay. I had my hatch up and junk spread around on the gravel, just trying to dig for the spare tire. Did cars drive by and see my distress? Oh yes. Who was it that stopped? The guys that got beat up in school because their family was labeled. I have never seen myself in the parable as the one on the side of the road....
After a brief hike cut short by the sound of a rattler in the grass, we got in the car and drove the 10 miles to M------. If you have never driven in SW Oklahoma or West Texas you cannot imagine what it is like to drive where the land is flat, flat, flat, and you see so much sky you wonder why God made hills. We are about to M----- with the music cranked as high as it will go and my 7-year-old says, "Mommy, I just heard a pop." I said, "So." She said, "Mommy the car is shaking." I still didn't notice anything...then I heard this awful sound...and well, turned off the radio. Blowout. We are in the middle of NOWHERE. M---- is about 2 miles away...so I drove at 25 with blinkers on until we got to town. Pulled off in a parking lot and got out to look at my shredded tire. I started digging in the back of the station wagon for the jack and spare. A loud, old 68 Ford pickup with 2 guys in the truckbed rattles by. I see them turn around. The 2 guys in back jump out before the truck stops. They almost have the tire off the car before the hit the ground.
"Need some help?"
"Sure. But my jack is sorely lacking."
"Don't worry. We can lift the car if we can't get the jack to work. We ain't afraid of work."
The two guys bent over the tire are 20-somethings...wiry, tall, heads shaved, wearing nothing but boots and jeans. Tattoos cover their heads, faces, backs, chests, arms, hands....Their dad and older brother stood back and watched If this had been the city I might have been scared, but I figure if I started talking we'd figure out we went to high school together.
"I'm Kelly."
"We're the _______." They say in unison. I vaguely remember the family name. I ask them if the remember my brother.
The guy behind the truck. "Yeah I remember him."
They have the tire changed by now, and tell me where I can get a decent used tire for a fair price. They jump back in the pickup and tell me to follow them to the tire shop. So I do. Tattoed arms waving, they point to a tiny auto shop.
I don't know how you remember high school, but there are certain families that are labeled in small towns as losers. I don't know how it started with this family, but they had a certain label. It may have been something their great-grandpa did...but teachers and kids at school have a certain idea of a kid with a certain last name. Sometimes the kid chooses to live up to it, sometimes they try hard to overcome it.
Here I am in a tiny farming town in southwest Oklahoma living inside the parable of the Good Samaritan. Believe me, no one would have guessed the dust covered 90 Ford Taurus I drive is the car of a college professor. At the moment I looked like an Okie (I do say it proud, Vince Gill, but I did look like one). My station wagon is loaded down with junk cause we have been on a day trip at the lake. My 2 kids & I have just been swimming and digging clay. I had my hatch up and junk spread around on the gravel, just trying to dig for the spare tire. Did cars drive by and see my distress? Oh yes. Who was it that stopped? The guys that got beat up in school because their family was labeled. I have never seen myself in the parable as the one on the side of the road....
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