proper 17 Church of the Advent Aug 29, 2021

 +For most of my life I’ve experienced chronic anxiety—and because of this I have a rule before I go someplace unfamiliar : I check out “google earth” before I go, so I know what the place looks like— I don’t like surprises. Following this self-imposed rule is a useful coping strategy for me.
For many of us, coming to a complete stop at a stop sign on a deserted street early in the morning when no one is around seems absurd. I dare say some of us, after looking both ways may roll through the stop sign.
 That’s what rules, expectations, guidelines do…. they help us to manage our behavior so that nothing gets out of hand. My checking out the lay of the land before I go to an unfamiliar place is a functional coping mechanism but, if I needed to do that sixteen times before feeling comfortable then this coping mechanism would go from functional to dysfunctional….or if the police had a camera recording whether everyone came to a full and complete stop in a deserted part of town on a Sunday morning at 5 am and sent out tickets to those who failed to completely stop…then there might be a bit of an uproar.
   It’s a matter of degrees.
So when the Pharisees in today’s Gospel get upset over the cleanliness practices of the disciples, they’re putting the cart of rules ahead of the horse of living. As Jesus says, if what comes out of your mouth is vile, then what goes into it doesn’t really matter. If your “coping mechanism” your “rule” your “guideline” get in the way of being a compassionate, loving, responsible, caring person, then what’s the point?
     Which brings us to our reading from the Epistle of James: “But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”
James is onto something here---don’t just spew commandment after commandment, rule after rule— rather allow these guidelines to lead you into living a good, a Godly life.
According to James all we do that is good, the big stuff--like helping the poor and the needy, standing up against injustice and caring for our environment-- to the small stuff like holding the door open for someone—all of these actions are us doing our very best to honor God, to be like Jesus….
Think about this: when you’re driving to work or to school and wave a car into the lane ahead of you; when you help a classmate or a co-worker with a problem, when you lend your Wegmans or Tops card to the person in front of you in line; when you thoughtfully choose the candidate to vote for based on what they say they will do for the needy of our community---every single good thing you do comes directly from God, directly from, as James’ puts it: above.
 We’re all INSTRUMENTS of God’s Love, God’s Grace, God’s Goodness.  In all we do. All the time. Wherever we find ourselves— work, school, volunteering, recreating, socializing, God is at work, through us.
 In all we do, God is there, USING us to further God’s purpose: to bring the entire world --all 7.64 billion of us-- within God’s Loving and enduring embrace. This is Jesus’s message to the Pharisees and it’s James’s message. -There are behaviors to avoid: not listening, being quick to lose our temper and lavishing in sordidness. And behaviors to embrace, to cultivate:
-- being quick to listen, slow to speak, and eager to care for those most vulnerable.
      James encourages us not just to think the faith, but to do it. To not just hear it on Sunday but live it Monday through Saturday. James is reminding us that Hearing the Word, learning the Word, proclaiming the Word as we do every Sunday should refresh and re-new us for living the Word, being do-ers of the word the rest of the week.
Jesus was telling the Temple authorities—-it doesn’t matter how much you follow the letter of the law, if you violate the reason for the law—- in this case making yourself pure in the sight of God—-then what is the point? What good is being a faithful church-goer if the rest of the week you forget God and treat others without dignity just because you don’t like their politics, their belief system, their identity?
       Rules aren’t bad things— they give us a certain order in our lives— but when rules become the thing we worship, then we have a problem.
Jesus and James ask us to do more than know what is right, they expect us to do what is right.   Amen.

Funeral Homily Duane Woodhouse 8/25/21

 
Begin with intro

Hear these holy words of scripture from the book of  Ecclesiastes 3:1-11

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to throw away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.


Beloved of God: The steadfast love of the Creator never ceases,
God’s mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is God’s faithfulness.
Though there is grief, God has compassion according to the abundance of steadfast Love;
where there is grief there is love.
Dwell in Love, grief will not prevail.


To love one another as we ourselves are loved and wish to be loved, is generally known as The Golden Rule and this tenet is found throughout religious and spiritual literature:


From the Babylonian Talmud:
What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.
From the Quran
[God has many name]s:
Al-Raḥmān (the Merciful), Al-Wadūd (the Loving), Al-Ghafūr
(the Forgiving), Al-Ra’ūf (the Kind), Al-‘Adl (the Just), Al-Karīm (the Generous)
[God isn’t someone to simply worship, God and God’s ways must be our ways: Live thisway]
From Christian scripture
Behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested him, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?"
He said to him, "What is written in the law? How do you read it?"
He answered, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind; and love your neighbor as yourself."
He said to him, "You have answered correctly. Do this, and you will live."
Luke 10:25.[43]
Homily
“Do this and you will live.”?
I didn’t know Duane but I have heard a lot about him these past weeks and months since his illness and death. I asked Colleen and Tammy to describe him to me. What came out was clear—Duane was 100% human. He didn’t put on airs, he called it as he saw it. He kept his circle small and in many ways was the typical chef—-demanding, grumpy and particular. But while creating gorgeous and delicious food was a huge part of who he was, he was, above and beyond that, something infinitely more. While not an organized religion kind of guy, Duane got the thing that holds almost all world religions and philosophies together:
Love others as you yourself are loved. Love others as you yourself wish to be loved.
He loved his  people fiercely. What a gift to be loved that way, fiercely. Whether he knew it fully or not he was loved back by them. Fiercely. What a better place this world would be if we all, in all our doings, loved one another. Fiercely. Beyond all measure. Completely.
So why did he have to die? Why did he leave us so soon? Did God need another “angel?” NO. Ws it his time? Maybe….but I am not sure the Creator of heaven and earth has an excel spreadsheet about such things. No he died because we die. The one truth of life is that we all die and that we know not the time. Does that mean we should be ok with the fact that he left you all so soon? Nope, it just means that we all need to take what is given to us this day as all that there is and love it fiercely and fully and without restraint. Whether it’s blasting music, watching cat videos, driving in rush hour traffic, shopping for groceries or wondering if the Emergency squad will make it to Rampart on time, we are to take this day, gift that it is,  and live it with love, forgiveness, kindness and generosity because today is what we have. Live fully, love fiercely and do unto others as you would have done unto you because that is what Duane did and it is what you can still do in his name. Do this my friends and you will live.
Amen.
Let us pray:
O God of grace and glory, we remember before you this day our brother Duane. We thank you for giving him to us, his family and friends, to know and to love as a companion on our earthly pilgrimage. In your boundless compassion, console us who mourn. Give us quiet confidence that we may continue our course in this life, confident in the glorious life to come. Amen.
Creator and Sustainer of All, whose wisdom is beyond our understanding, deal graciously with Tammy, Paul, Colleen, Mary Lou and all who love Duane, in their grief. Surround them with your love, that they may not be overwhelmed by their loss, but have confidence in your goodness, and strength to meet the days to come; in all that is Good and Holy we pray,  Amen.
Into your hands, O God, we commend our brother, Duane. In your infinite goodness, wisdom, and power, work in him the merciful purpose of your perfect will, and bring us, at the last, into the company of all the saints in light, who, this day and forevermore, include your precious son, Duane. Amen and Alleluia.
We close now, holding our memories of Duane in our hearts, ready to live this life given to us in his memory which, for all time, will be a blessing to all who remember.

Funeral homily for Deniis Netzel 9/4/21

 I wish I could stand here this afternoon and explain why it is that Denis died so young, leaving behind his children, wife, mother and others who loved him. I wish I could make sense of this sudden and seemingly senseless death. I can’t. I dare say no one can. This is why those of us with faith in God hold hard and fast to that faith in these times. But even faith can seem hollow when wracked with so much grief and so many questions. But as it says on the front of this service leaflet, the liturgy we offer today is an Easter liturgy which finds all its meaning in the resurrection. Jesus suffered and died. We suffer and die. Jesus was raised from the dead. As all of us here will be. As Denis has been. Nothing—nothing-separates Denis from the glories of heaven, the unending light and love of God as given to us through Jesus Christ. This day and forevermore, Denis resides in paradise—any pain from this life has been wiped away, any regrets from this life have been redeemed for Denis, any mistakes he made, hurt he caused, hurts he felt, losses he suffered, questions he had---all has been answered.     This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t grieve. To love another leads us to grieve their dying. Tears are not wrong, they are human. The comfort of our faith is knowing that for all the pain we feel this day and the days to come, is the pain that comes from love and that love, in its purest form, is God. Today Denis resides in that full and perfect love and though we grieve, question and perhaps even rage in anger that doesn’t mean we haven’t loved. And it doesn’t mean we aren’t still loved. For now and forever you will miss Denis and yet he remains with you. It is a mystery how this all works.
    For those who mourn so much this day I hope you remember that as it is written “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
The very love we have for each other brings great sorrow when parted by death. Jesus himself wept at the grave of his friend Lazarus. So, while we rejoice that Denis has entered into the nearer presence of our Lord, we sorrow that his physical presence is gone. So as best you can, be grateful for his ascension into heaven and be kind to yourselves as you mourn; for mourning is sacred, mourning is normal. For we do not mourn if we have not loved. May God comfort each of you. Amen.

Forgiving isn’t erasing the fact, forgiving is releasing the pain. Proper 19 a September 13, 2020

 Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.

From the prayer that Jesus taught us, to the the gospel reading for today: 

Forgiveness is fundamental.

Many of us are like Peter in today’s Gospel, we know that forgiveness is important, that it’s something we should do as often as we can but are a little off put by Jesus’ directive to forgive not seven times but 77 …to forgive always.

Why?

Because that’s exactly what God does for us.

God forgives us our trespasses, our sins every single day, every single time, always.

Forgiveness is Fundamental.

To God and to us.

We must forgive all the betrayals and hurts of our lives. All of them…  from the most heinious of crimes to the most biting of slights.

Not just the ones we know we SHOULD forgive.

Not just the ones we want to forgive.

Not just the ones anyone would forgive.

But all of them.

I know…

how in the world can a rape victim forgive her rapist;

How in the world can any person of color forgive the generations of abuse heaped upon them by people like many of you and me—white and privileged.

How in the world can those who lost loved ones in the twin towers, forgive Al Quaeda;

how in the world can a child forgive the abuse of a parent;

how in the world can a spouse forgive infidelity;

how in the world can we forgive an institution like the church when it fails to live as it teaches?

How in the world can we, let alone God, forgive such things?

For me it’s important to remember this:

forgiving is not condoning a horrid act…

Forgiving is not endorsing abuse

Forgiving is not excusing hate.

Forgiving isn’t erasing the fact, forgiving is releasing the pain.

Because the pain of not forgiving is what holds us back.

Releasing the pain, the betrayal and the horror is what sets us free to live as God intended..

Now, just because it’s good for us, doesn’t mean it comes easily to us. Sometimes it feels impossible to forgive and if it feels that way to you today, that’s ok…because this forgiving thing, it’s a process

But what our faith teaches us, what our God models for us is this:

Forgiveness is possible, it is necessary and it is healing.

Author Sheila Cassidy puts it this way:

I would never say to you ‘you must forgive’. I can only say: ‘However much you have been wronged, however justified [your] hatred [may feel], if you cherish it, it will poison you……[therefore] We must pray for the power to forgive, for it is in forgiving that we are healed.

When we hold onto our hurts, our betrayals and our pain, we poison ourselves. Clinging to the resentments, bitterness and rage doesn’t hurt the one who betrayed us, it hurts US.

It doesn’t keep the other person from living a full, happy and free life, it keeps us from living a full happy and free life.

Not forgiving sickens us.

Forgiving heals us.

And yet….

I’ve held onto a hurt I experienced almost three years ago. I kept trying to get other people to hold onto the hurt, anger, and the resentment with me. No one would. Finally, about 6 months ago someone said to me, very gently, who is this anger hurting? I desperately wanted it to hurt the one who had so badly hurt me, but the truth is, it was only hurting me. And so I began the process of letting go, not excusing the actions of the other, but letting go of the intense feelings I have about it. 

And you know what? Even though I am not finished with this work, beginning the process has relieved me more than I can say. That hate imprisoned me. Letting it go has been liberating. Holding onto hurts, hurts.

So, what can we do to shake free of that which blocks our way to forgiveness?

First, we have to acknowledge that forgiveness is possible. At times I may not know how to forgive those who’ve hurt me deeply, but I sure as heck know that forgiveness is possible. After all, I'm forgiven every single day of my life through the love of God. A love that, when I ask for it, forgives and absolves me. Frees me.

By accepting the forgiveness granted to us by God, we learn how to forgive others.

To fully forgive I must admit my mistakes, my errors, my sins to God and then let myself be washed through and through with forgiveness.

Only in being forgiven can we forgive others. Let yourself be forgiven. Bring it all to God, lay yourself bare before God and be washed. Then—and only then—-will you be able to forgive others. And only after forgiving ourselves and forgiving others, only then will we be truly free. 

Thanks be to God, we are forgiven. 

How many times? More than you can count. 

So how many times must we forgive? More times than we can count. 

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

The Roots of our Faith Take Hold Proper 12a 2020

+The Parable of the Mustard Seed gives us hope that even if our faith is TINY, it’s enough...no heavy lifting,  our wavering puny faith can carry the day. 

Ok,  so it is true that with even a morsel of faith, God CAN do marvelous things.But don’t forget that the mustard plant was a huge threat to farmers, for from that tiny seed grew an invasive weed, transforming the carefully planted fields of a 1st century farmer into a morass of weed. 

The mustard seed, once released cannot be easily tamed. 

Which is exactly Jesus’ point.

    The kingdom Jesus proclaims is something that, once sprouted in a community, takes over, upsets and transforms. The kingdom Jesus speaks of comes to upset the very fabric of this world, the very kingdoms that rule our daily lives. The kingdoms of us vs. them, the kingdoms of science be dammed, the kingdoms of hate unleashed upon the those who don’t look like us, pray like us love like us or vote like us. Kingdoms where love of self outweighs love of neighbor.  

   The good news is that those of us gathered across the Zoom-a-verse believe in and can imagine something greater than those Human-made kingdoms. We can imagine a world where the humble are exalted, the hungry fed, the naked clothed, the illiterate read, the unemployed work , the fearful, encouraged, the lonely embraced and the lost found. A world where a black man can be pulled over for a traffic stop and live to tell about it. A world where I wear a mask to protect you and you wear one to protect me, a world that leaves no one behind. 

I know that we’re people who understand that the mustard seed faith Jesus speaks of has its roots in hope. I also know that this hope isn’t just platitudes. I know that the hope found in faith prods and pokes us into taking action. Because once that seed sprouts and those roots take hold, our faith, just like the mustard plant, spreads like crazy.

    Once the roots of our faith take hold, this faith of ours stops being a noun and starts being a verb.

Which is just what God intends. 

Like a planted seed needs sunlight and water to root and grow, God takes the initiative—-plants the seed—-but it’s our nurturing response that brings those  Divine Dreams to life. And once those dreams are realized, more dreams sprout, grow, and spread. 

     God has a vision and through God’s call and our response, amazing things happen: a mustard seed grows into an immense plant, a shepherd boy is chosen as king, and a small child from Nazareth grows into the Christ. (Bruce Epperly)

      By virtue of our baptisms we are called to work on behalf of God to topple the world of intolerance, fear and violence. You and me. Regular folk with at times unremarkable faith are called to this work.

Listen closely and we'’ll hear God’s cries in the lament of people of color, pinned under the foot of the oppressor; listen closely and we’ll hear God’s cries in the exhausted medical personnel, grieving family members and desperate patients begging us to wear our masks, wash our hands and stay home, listen closely and we’ll hear God’s cries in the children with nothing to eat, nowhere safe to play and schools too overburdened to give them quality education.

 Listen and hear the cries of God's people and then get to work. 

     With the Holy Spirit interceding for us with those glorious and sacred sighs, we can, even with faith the size of a mustard seed,  get this world moving in the direction of Love. 

And when we do that, the Kingdom of Heaven will indeed sprout and spread  all around us. Amen. +

Sometimes We're Wheat, Sometimes We're Weeds Proper 11 Yr A St James, Titusville Holloway Chapel, Holloway by the Bay Canada

+Some days we're wheat, some days we're weeds.

Today our Gospel is the Parable of the Wheat and the Weeds.

Parables are confusing because they often don’t mean what they appear to say. If we just stay on the surface of the story we won’t really “get it”-- and I don’t know about you but I don’t want to stay on the top of this parable! On the surface, it suggests there’s an “in group” and an “out group,” that God would take God’s own beloved children and banish them to eternal damnation and hellfire.

I can’t believe that. It doesn’t gibe with how I experience God. This parable definitely requires some turning of the soil...for only in digging can we reach the richness of the dark and fertile soil that makes up this story.

     Jesus seems to be saying that we are divided into two camps—the good and the evil. The in and the out. The wheat and the weed. But it’s not that cut and dry. As anyone who’s tried to weed a garden can attest, weeds can look like flowers and flowers can look like weeds. At first glance, it’s really difficult to know what you’re looking at: Is it a flowerI? Or is it a weed?

Do you know that hostas, those ubiquitous plants of hearty character and wide variety, were originally considered a weed? But over time and through some intentional taming, we now consider it a viable garden plant.  Which is wheat and which is weed? It’s hard to tell. Today’s weed just may be tomorrow’s wheat. (or hosta!)

    We all have weeds. We all have wheat. We all have both and are both. Some days our garden is full of weeds, other days, the flowers—-the wheat—-rules. Some days we’re who we want to be, other days we aren’t.

   This is because the Evil One, the sower of weeds, lurks within each of us-- it’s an inside job making us unwilling to love neighbor as self, unwilling to work for justice for all forever. 

Working to live into the fullness of God means that we need to lose the old ways of decay and death, and embrace the new way of growth and life.

We can hold on to the old ways or we can let them go. It’s up to us. We can stay as a weed or we can grow into wheat. 

Weeds are easy—they grow fast, need virtually no tilling, no fertilizing, no encouragement to grow. Wheat—-Gorgeous flower gardens, rows of crops are trickier—they need attention, nurture, and care.

   The theologian Karl Rahner says that in all we do we’re either moving toward God or away from God. When we’re moving toward God, we’re letting the light of Christ nurture us and care for us; when we move toward God we are tilling our souls with faith, belief and hope.

When we’re moving away from God we let the darkness of doubt, the uneasiness of disbelief and the decay of despair rule. This is the stuff of weeds, the stuff of Not-God—-blocking us from the fullness of God.

    Sometimes we’re wheat…and sometimes we’re weeds. Sometimes we do the work of God—-feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, speaking out against hate and sowing love…and sometimes the work of the evil one wins and we serve ourselves instead of our neighbor, passing by the lost, dismissing the downtrodden, failing to respect the dignity of every human being, regardless of the color of their skin, the creed they follow or the political party they support.

     Do not fear, for when the weeds are everywhere, when our choices lead us astray, don’t give up on the harvest— focus on the good: the wheat, the flowers, the stuff of God in your life.

Because, when we focus on the Good, the “not of God” stuff will be overcome, overwrought and overthrown by a power greater than any weed, a force stronger than any evil, a Love bigger than any Doubt.

“Let anyone with ears listen:” God doesn’t toss any of us into an unquenchable fire.

We may be weeds a lot more often that we wish. We may move away from God more frequently than we care to admit, but once we settle into the promise of our faith, once we till the soil of our souls, once we dig deep enough into our desire for the Good, we’ll discover that God has always and will always be there, deep within us, ready to toss away the chaff of fear and the weeds of doubt, freeing us to bloom into the bouquet of Love which is God. +

Proper 8A Here I Am St Philip's Bflo Online June 28, 2020

Here I Am. These are the three words of hope I find in this very disturbing story from Genesis.
Let me get a couple of things said right off the bat—- if this reading is deeply troubling to you and you don’t feel you can bear to listen to me discuss it, log off now—- it’s really ok. Log back on in six minutes and I’ll be finished.
Secondly did God really ask Abraham to perform this sacrifice?. Or is this story a bridge that served to transition the Hebrew people from the horrific pagan act of child sacrifice to still disturbing but not so horrific to our sensibilities, animal sacrifice?
We don’t know which is true and that is uncomfortable and troubling…why in the world would God ask such a thing from anyone? We get this reading after a couple of weeks of hearing Jesus warn us of the cost of Following Him.
Jesus says we must be willing to undergo much stress and heartache as we do the work of the gospel. He’s told us that we must speak up for the voiceless, and stand against those doing the silencing. He says we must hold our love of Him above all else— even love for mother and father, brother and sister son and daughter.
Tough sentiment, a challenging way to live. And, in my opinion, the only way to live. It is what we are called to do—-
presenting ourselves to God each and every day. Raising our heads and opening our souls to say: ‘Here I Am.
Use me, make me an instrument of your peace, send me out to do the work that you need done.
Here. I. Am.”
It’s a statement of total trust, complete willingness.
 Here I am.
It’s what Abraham said to God when God called him to move from his home in Ur to a new land—the land of Canaan where God promised him descendants more numerous than the stars in the sky; when God took a very old couple and gave them a son.
Here I Am.
And it’s what Abraham said on this day when God has seemingly gone mad by asking Abraham to sacrifice his only remaining son (because remember last week Abraham banished Hagar and Ishmael). Abraham replies, “Here I am”
How? How could Abraham agree?
But, if he truly loved God, how could he not?
I don’t know what Abraham was thinking, but what I do know is that he obeyed.
He obeyed a God who had uprooted him from the only home he knew, the God who gave he and Sarah a child long past the time they should have been able to conceive, and he obeyed the God who is asking the unthinkable, the horrific, the sickening.
Now, obedience can only be earned in two ways—-through trust or through fear. Abraham may have had a healthy fear of God but clearly, he also had a great deal of trust in God.
Here I Am.
Isaac says to Abraham: “ Father?”  “Here I am” replies Abraham.
“Where’s the animal for the sacrifice?” “God will provide,” replies Abraham.
And just as it seems Abraham’s trust in God will go so far as murder and Isaac’s trust in Abraham will go as far as death, an angel calls out to Abraham and he replies: “Here I am.” And the whole nightmare ends.
Was God testing Abraham? Is God testing us? I don’t think that’s really the point. I think the point of this story is finding the balance between blind trust, blind faith and fully aware trust, fully aware faith. What Jesus has been preaching for weeks now and what we read in our lesson from Genesis is this: God loves us so much that God will do anything for us. The question is:
Will we do the same for God? Will we, knowing that the journey will be difficult that standing up and speaking out may cause irreparable rifts among family and friends, will we do the same for God. When God says to us, “Here I am,” how will we respond?
My friends we are called, each and every day, to present ourselves to God and say Here I am, Here I am. When we do that, we become full and complete instruments of God’s love for the world. I urge us all to pick up our crosses, and to follow him.
Here I am Lord, Here I am. Amen.