Proper 9B 2024

 It’s rare for me to struggle with a sermon like I did this week. Perhaps it’s my lingering illness which has rendered the very basics of daily life a challenge, perhaps it’s this liminal place I find myself personally and professionally as I strive to navigate the betwixt and between for our diocesan partnership, perhaps it’s the slower summer pace, but this week I wasn’t feeling it. I mean, I could preach about David’s second reign as King and what perhaps he had learned from his first kingship that he could bring to his second. Perhaps I could relate that to two presidents, one current and one former, vying for the highest office in the land. But that didn't speak to me.
Or perhaps I could speak about the effect of “you can’t go home again,” as Jesus experienced in today’s Gospel. But again, that wasn’t appealing.
So using the process I encourage others to use when struggling with preaching I asked my self, “what’s been laid upon my heart?”
And what’s there is this: Are we, here at St James, in the GRI ion the Partnership Dioceses, saving lives? Have we saved your life? If yes, how? If no, what did we miss? More specifically:
Why is your faith/being an Episcopalian/being a member of St James important to you?
How does St James fit into your life? How are you fed by your faith, by your presence here?
Remember your answer. Email, text or snail mail it to me, ok? I really want to know.
In that same vein, let me tell you how my faith saved me:
I’m a priest because the church in general, but The Episcopal Church of the Holy Nativity in Clarendon Hills, Illinois specifically, saved my life when I was a kid. I didn't fit in anywhere— I was the outcasts outcast. My parents were, by the time I came around, dealing with their own demons (which I’m happy to say they both defeated later in life.)
My sisters did their very best to “big sister” me,  but by the late 1960’s early 1970’s it was every kid for themselves. We were just trying to get by.
So there I was, a little kid carrying a lot of family garbage on my heart and soul. Now no one really knew what a mess our home was, we still went to church every week, and my parents were absolute pillars of the church community. Which was lucky for me because, within that community I encountered adults who took an interest in me, who didn’t need me to be anyone but who I was, and who strove to make sure I knew that I was loved and that I was safe. I developed a relationship with God through Jesus that gave me a moral compass, a confidence and a hope that my parents professed, but really couldn’t live into.
Through my faith in God I have endured things I never thought possible, achieved things I never thought possible, I have dreamed dreams and strived to have them reach fruition.
And I want this diocese, this regional ministry and this parish church of St James to be a version of that for all those who encounter us. Because isn’t that what really matters? That we save lives.
Has your experience in this faith community saved you? Has it harmed you? Or don’t you think of it that way ? How are you fed here? I REALLY want to know.
Because here’s the deal—Jesus wants us to save one another—-and if we are, great, and if we aren’t, how can we fix that? Because if we’re doing things that aren’t helpful I believe we should shake the dust of that behavior off and move on. And if we are being helpful, if we are feeding each other, saving each other, then we need to know and do MORE of it.
How are you fed?
How are you saved?
Amen.