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Sermons Listen to the latest Worship Service The Rev. Dr. Cynthia Cearley The Rev. Bill Calhoun January 28, 2007 • Living Hand to Mouth April 8, 2007 • How Alive Can We Be?
A
Second Look
These doctors knew, of course, what a bad heart sounded like, so at first, everyone was a little nervous - worried that they might hear something they would rather not. But then, she writes, "we moved past all that and heard something steadfast in the midst of our lives that had been there always. Our lives and all other lives depended on it. It was a profound and ineffable encounter with the mysterious…We had diagnosed hearts for years, but none of us had ever experienced this before. In that moment we had glimpsed something beyond our habitual way of seeing and hearing and knew that what we work with every day is life itself." (pg. 72) After the experiment, one of the doctors said it reminded him of a prayer he knew and began to recite it. This prayer has become a kind of Easter Prayer for me. And so listen to it now as you reflect, as those doctors did, on the miracle of your own beating heart: "Days pass and the years vanish and we…walk sightless among miracles. Lord, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing. Let there be moments when your presence, like lightening, illumines the darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the bush burns unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for holiness and exclaim in wonder, "How filled with awe is this place and we did not know it. Amen." "How filled with awe is this place and we did not know it." Now I said that this has become a kind of Easter prayer for me, so let me explain. Easter, of course, is the day we celebrate that death does not get the final word. That God in Jesus Christ, had something else to say. The attention of Easter is, understandably, not on this life, but on the hope we have for new life after our journey here is done. But I have often wondered if we do not disappoint God when we place so much concern on life in the hereafter, while we so often seem to be barely alive in this one. The resurrection of Jesus that we celebrate today is, for me, first about my faith that even death cannot separate me from God. This is a mystery at the very core of our faith. But the resurrection is, for me, also a profound challenge to how I will go about this life. When Jesus says, "I have come to bring life and life abundant" he's not just talking about when we die. When he says, "I have come to set the captives free." He's not just talking about after the captives die. He's talking about you and me, right now, captive to a world in which we may be living, but in which we often do not feel alive. We walk like the living dead through our days, unaware that we are on holy ground. "The days pass and the years vanish, and we…walk sightless among miracles." Rather than feel this world to be miraculous and filled with awe, too often we experience life as a series of things to check off on the great 'To Do' list that is our life. Or worse, we see the world as a threatening place and life is something to be managed, controlled, kept at bay or at least kept on top of. And in the pressure and stress of doing it all, we have lost a sense of wonder and imagination. We can no longer see the true nature of things - How filled with awe is this place and we did not know it. But even when we do want to see miracles, it is not always so easy. It is, at least for me, a daily struggle to remember how precious these moments are. In this life that can seem so ordinary and plain, so difficult, so stressful, how do we remember that we are standing on holy ground; that God is all around us? This morning's scripture reading tells the story of what happened on that first Easter morning. And every time I read it, I am struck by one line. Mary Magdalene is standing at the empty tomb weeping and Jesus appears beside her. But the scriptures say that she doesn't recognize him and instead she: 'supposes him to be the gardener'. It is such an intriguing line! Here is the first sighting of the Risen Christ in all his glory. Surely the trumpets will sound and a host of heavenly angels will sing - or better still, the Montview Presbyterian Church Choir! But on this first Easter, there was no fanfare, there was no triumphant procession. There was just a simple woman weeping for her Lord, and standing before her what appeared to be the most common thing in the world - a gardener. Mary says to the gardener, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him." And then Jesus calls her name, "Mary." And she turns to look again at this gardener…and she sees him. "Teacher!" she cries. And in the midst of the ordinary, Mary discovers something so very extraordinary. In the midst of what seems so commonplace, she finds a holy place. We can almost hear her say, "How filled with awe is this place and I did not know it." In the midst of this life that can seem so ordinary, how do we see the miracles all around us? We must do what Mary does… we must look again. At first glance, Mary believes the Risen Christ is just a common gardener. But then she looks again. And we must do the same. Now I know that encouraging you to 'look again' doesn't sound like much - perhaps you were hoping for something a little more on Easter morning? But stick with me a little longer. For I am convinced that one of the most powerful ways for us to enter into the new life that the Risen Christ calls us to is to look again - to look again at the ordinary things of life: at the small things, the simple things, and the discarded things that we so easily overlook. A few weeks ago we celebrated my daughter Anna's birthday. She's 3 now, and as part of her big day we went to the Museum of Nature and Science to look at the scenes of animals from around the world. As we wandered the halls, we passed life-size replications of moose and muskoxen, wolves and wolverines, all in scenes depicting their natural habitat. The size of the animals made me grateful they were just replicas. But whenever I looked down at Anna to see what was impressing her, more often than not, what had her attention was not the enormous musk ox, but the replica of a tiny butterfly they had placed on a flower in the corner of the musk ox display. Perhaps it is because she is so small herself…or perhaps it is because she has not yet learned that everything is better when it is super-sized. Whatever the reason, I have noticed again and again that my daughter pays attention to little, common things that I so often overlook. And sure enough, when I took the time to bend down to look at the butterfly with her, I saw the extraordinary detail and care that had been put into it. One of the gifts that children give us is that they have not yet lost this ability to 'look again' at things - to see them with fresh eyes. They do not yet feel the need to approach the world as something they already know everything about. For them it is still a place of wonder and mystery and awe. I had assumed we were looking at a display of a musk ox that happened to have a butterfly in it. But after looking again, maybe it was a display of a butterfly, that happened to have a musk ox in it. In my reflections on this idea of 'looking again', I was interested to discover that the word 'Respect' actually means to look again. And so those things that we re-spect are the things we choose to give more than a casual glance. Or turn it around and we could say those things we choose to pay attention to, well those must be the things that we respect. And so we can claim, for example, that one of our values is a respect for all people. But unless we are willing to 'look again' at the person before us, can we really say we respect them? To truly respect someone, it just will not do to ignore them as they wait on your table at brunch today. To truly respect someone, you can't grab the receipt from them as they bag your groceries - while your mind is a thousand miles away. To re-spect someone requires that we take the time to look again. We will have to slow down. Something on our To Do list may have to wait. Some priorities may have to change. But if the scripture this morning holds a lesson for us, we will find that when we do look again, we may be surprised by what we see. A few days ago I was coming off of I-25 at the Yale exit with all of these thoughts spinning in my head. As I came to a stop at the bottom of the off-ramp, there was a man standing at the intersection with a sign that read "Anything will help." At first I barely noticed him. I was busy, after all, thinking about how God calls us to pay attention to those around us. As I waited for the light to change, I looked back in his direction - and this time I saw him. I really saw him. Then I remembered that I had a couple of Clementine oranges sitting in the passenger seat of my car. I rolled down the window and asked him if he would like to have them. "Sure, they'll go great with my cornbread!" he said as he pointed to a square of aluminum foil at his feet. Now I can't say that this man was suddenly transformed into the incarnation of God before my eyes (although I thought later that his beard was perfect). And I certainly can't say that I did very much to help him. But I can say that as the light turned green and we waved to each other as I drove by, we exchanged a look that probably would not have been there had I not made this connection with him - it was a look that one might be tempted to call a 'look of respect'. The Risen Christ calls us to follow him into new life; not just in the next life, but in this one too. And given the current state of our world, the question for us may be how long can we afford not to follow? Until we take the time to look again and see the world in all of its wonder and mystery, we will continue to mistake God for the gardener. We will continue to believe this holy place is simply commonplace. Until we look again into the eyes of those who seem so different from us and see them as blessed gifts of God, we will continue to draw battle lines between US and THEM. Until we look again at those with different political views, or different theology, different sexual orientation or a different tax bracket and see them as holy in the eyes of God, we will continue to believe we can dehumanize them simply because they are different from us. Until we look again at the men and women from Mexico who build our homes and clean our bathrooms and see them as Children of the Most High, we will continue to see immigration solely as an economic issue, not a human one. Until we look again at the material things that make our life so wonderful and see them too as part of God's creation - holy in their own right - the earth will continue to groan as its belly fills with the discards of our one-look-only society. And until we look again - at the sunlight falling across the kitchen table, at the fresh snow blanketing the front range, at the singular beauty of a drop of rain on a blade of grass, we will continue to walk as the living dead…checking off our To-Do list, hurrying and scurrying, managing and optimizing our life. And once in a while, we may stop to wonder to ourselves: "Where is God in all of this?" … And of course the answer is: he's been standing right beside us all along - he's the one with the gardening gloves on. "Days pass and the years vanish and we…walk sightless among
miracles. Lord, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing.
Let there be moments when your presence, like lightening, illumines the
darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the
bush burns unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for
holiness and exclaim in wonder, "How filled with awe is this place
and we did not know it."
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"Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end. Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." If ever there was a time in Montview's life when those words were so poignantly true, it is now.
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A Big Enough God I have a young friend whose favorite quote reads: "Every new beginning
comes from some other beginning's end. Every new beginning comes from
some other beginning's end." If ever there was a time in Montview's
life when those words were so poignantly true, it is now. Having just
celebrated 100 years and kicked off the next 100, we are all too aware
of beginnings and endings. One of you (an "older" member of
the congregation -- I'll let you decide what that might mean!) shared
your thoughts in a note to us about last weekend: Dear John, Cindy, Bill
and Dusty, Tomorrow's promise was so beautifully and poignantly celebrated by our children's voices singing from the altar: Holy, Holy, Holy! In response to magnificent Te Deum." Thanks be to God! She, along with so many of us grasped the beginning - the ending - and the new beginning so present in our days of celebration. Now, as we move toward Advent, we also prepare to say good-bye to Dusty Taylor, whose ministry and faith have brightened and led Montview lives for 22 years. We are keenly aware of this ending and its sadness, but we also know that for Dusty it is a new beginning as she and Tem move to Florida to begin their "retired" life. I hope Florida is ready for the burst of life and energy they are about to receive! Of necessity, it will be a beginning for us here as well as we say hello to an interim and then later to a new installed co-pastor. The quote comes most directly from a pop song, but it may have older roots. I think my friend likes it because, as a young person beginning to find her own way in the world, she is realizing the beginnings and endings that come so often. She also understands the wholeness to its meaning…as it acknowledges the powerful relationship between beginnings and endings. Life is so much lived in the middle territory, but the beginnings and endings lend definition and boundary and direction like the heavy lines of a drawing. Beginnings and endings are turning points; chances to re-evaluate and re-establish and re-new the lives we live. Without losing the past, beginnings help us step to a different time and drum to a fresh beat. The quote is simply true…it is the way things are… "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end"…and knowing that truth helps us get through the times of change that never feel as easy in real life as they look on paper some time later. Because this is how life is, an interconnected tapestry of beginnings and endings, we also know that life is complex. In circular fashion, like the quote, there is little linear about living life. It was not in the past and is not now a simple or straight-line affair. There are simple joys we experience, there are clear and present experiences of meaning and goodness, but life as we live it, is not linear, or easy or clear. Why do I bring up the obvious? Especially in Church - where many of us would rather come to escape the stress and tension of life, remember the simplicity of faith and renew ourselves for the next days ahead? I bring it up because I believe we must get in the habit of asking complex and difficult questions of our faith…because a faith that cannot take the heat of life's difficult questions will not hold up under fire. I believe, as well that we must get into the habit of asking amazing things of our faith…because if it does not inspire us to do amazing things, it is just one more good idea to place on the shelves of our mind with all the other good ideas that never came to life in us. And I believe we must get into the habit of believing that our faith
is big enough to contain all our doubts and worries and momentary lapses
of certainty…because if it cannot hold these things, it cannot hold
us….for we are human and we are made with doubts and worries and
momentary lapses of certainty. You heard me use this phrase before…it comes in part from the book by the same title "A Big Enough God" by Sarah Maitland. She is a scientist and a theologian who has written wonderfully about the truth at hand. Writing about the cosmological worldview of the Church in the early 1600's
and those who would take issue with it, she says: Maitland asks us to remember playing with mercury when you were in grade school? You could bring a small pill bottle to school with a few drops of liquid mercury swimming around in the bottom. During the duller parts of class, you could empty the contents of your bottle into the little craters on the desks that were designed to hold pencils. While the teacher droned on, you could amuse yourself by taking the point of your pencil and dividing the large, single mercury bead into dozens of tiny little balls that shimmered and skittered on the desktop. Most amazing of all was that simply by rolling the small drops back to touch each other, they were all reabsorbed back to re-create the one large, silver ball. The liquid mercury existed both as those separate beads and as that unified mass. When considered as one, it was seamless and whole, perfectly round and stable. But it also existed as those separate identities, themselves completely independent and with their own character. A little hint into the workings of the Triune God? God is whole, fully formed and circle-perfect; not some piecemeal work that is stuck together with divine duct tape. But as a Trinitarian reality -- Father, Son and Holy Spirit -- the divine is also known in seamless separateness. Not lopped-off parts that look incomplete, but individual beads of divinity that shimmer with their own purpose and power. Yet the whole is recalled at a touch, the three wholly part of the one. All of this is to remind us, that God is not the old man who sits in heaven…an adult, but even older and bigger. God is not just a projection of the personal wish of our narcissism. God is not a cosmic policeman or a personal nanny. God is not a cosmic vending machine or a weak-kneed watchmaker who leaves the world to tick away on its own time. These are the smaller Gods we have known and outgrown. All of this is to remind us of the big enough God that is both present and far away, intimate and awesome. God does not need our protection from difficult truth or devastating realities. When we engage in such things, it is usually to protect ourselves from re-thinking God, than really protecting God from our lack of understanding. One preacher wrote: A God who is Big Enough takes into account all of creation, form quasars and supernovas to the dimple on a baby's cheek. If we think we have to leave anything out of the picture to make sense of God, then our God is, in some way, too small. A big enough God takes account of all the pain and suffering in the world as well as the deep mystery and ecstatic joy. A big enough God is a part of 9-11 as surely as the birth of the Christ. Gail Godwin writes in her novel an exchange between herself, a priest and a "non-believer" who has, inadvertently, enlarged her own understanding of God in a moment of human relationship. This night is far too large for us to rattle around in on our won. It's a perfect fit for God, but we need our containers. We need one another for God to work through us. That's something I experience every day. The concept of God is way too big for me to get my mind around, but, despite that, maybe even because of it, the relationship keeps growing and changing. Sometimes it grows so slowly it seems it's stopped. Or gone into reverse. Then, when I least expect it, it takes a big leap forward. In fact, it's done that since I've been with you. Sara Maitland has asked difficult questions and found a big enough God to hold them. As faithful Christians it is our turn. What would God have us do with Sadam Hussein? What is a wise course of action for our nation with regard to Iraq? What have we learned of God from 9-11? Why are we so selfish in our living? What charities deserve our support? How much should I really worry about my children? When is it time for a new beginning for me? Why do I prefer to argue and find fault instead of hold joy and teach compassion? Why do we yet exclude brothers and sisters of a homosexual orientation in our churches? Precisely because our words and images will always fall short of the reality of God, we will always need new words and images and ideas as we move beyond our earlier understandings. This is not at threat, but God's gift to us. Is our God big enough for the next 100 years? Yes, God is. Amen. (1)
Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC (New York: Harper
& Row, 1973), 93.
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Palm Sunday 2008 On that first Palm Sunday, Jesus chose to ride a donkey into Jerusalem. To have ridden a strong, spirited, handsome horse would have said -- I am important…I have prestige, power, glory.…self-help words…media feed…Roman Empire glory. As we gather this day in Jesus’ name, on the first day of the most telling week of the Christian faith story, we listen into his choice…we listen into our own choices. In choosing the donkey, Jesus makes a statement. A statement born of his Hebrew Bible. A clue to the alternative way is in the humility of the donkey. This humility is not of the old religious way of humiliation or the cultural warfare of humiliation. This humility is the compassionate move from every me to every you. This humility invites us to choose love and caring over advantage and defensiveness. This humility invites us in our culture that worships upward mobility to choose the alternative way of downward mobility…..to live a life for others…to give others a hand-up….particularly those who are not like us…and certainly beginning with those closest to us in home and neighborhood, choosing life together rather than rivalry for position and prestige. The spirit of the donkey invites you and me to explore a life of humility, of simplicity on the other side of life’s complexity, a life that leads us to sustainability, a life that is not about me but about us together….as difficult and bruising as that is….A life that trusts that in God’s world there is enough so that you and I can be enough for others. The choice of this humility makes no sense unless it is a practice of our faith. And a life that practices our faith is critical as our society desperately seeks to find itself in the seemingly glory of a dominant culture and as the church in our nation grows more marginal in its slumbering comfort. The reality of the Palm Sunday story moves from the ride on the donkey to the walk through this week….funny that we call it holy…but we do because of the way of the cross. The way of the cross is that humility lived out. …a sharing the suffering of human life…a taking it on in togetherness rather than the alternative way of us versus them defensive posture…The way of the cross is not so much about Jesus dying on the cross for our salvation as each of us in him giving ourselves to each other in the pain and struggle that is the human way of getting along. In the larger picture of being church, this calls us to give ourselves to the poor, the oppressed, the least. And if we do, then we begin by listening more deeply to those on our pew, in our homes, those nearest us….listening into their hearts until we really understand their struggles, their growth points, their pain, their potential……and we individually and together become servant people…..such a scandalous word in our time and such a descriptive word of the way of the cross. The way of the cross is not first Jesus died for me. The way of the cross is first how hard and human and harrowing human conflict and violence really is. The way of the cross is about life being hard….if we put down for a moment our cover of affluence and our dreams that disguise reality. The palm branches with which Jesus was greeted said we need your help. And those who followed Jesus from that moment on found that our help was in helping him help others. In doing so we were saved…in the real meaning of salvation….moving from ourselves to living for others and finding in living for others the strength and courage we need to be ourselves, our true selves. Bill Coffin wrote that the biggest problem the church has is it is afraid to love….its love is inadequate…..a love that walks with the poor and the left out…makes room for all to be welcome and works tirelessly to find a sensible health care system and public education and inclusiveness and a tax policy that is about us rather than me…..move from warfare to getting to know each other….. If the church chooses to ride the donkey, what might this look like? Living life a different way…taking on the dominant empire because the heart of God’s love hangs with those whom the empire excludes….starting with our own children…but staying with this outreach theme to the end. But if the church chooses the donkey, it might look like this.
so that we can share what we do have with others.
when some of us have ideas that may not line up with your ideas.
When Jesus rode into the city of Jerusalem, he invites us to engage the city with open eyes, to face the reality of the human battle….not to join the battle but to take up an alternative way. Something to think about…an alternative world…a way of the cross lived out…as we walk away from here this morning….
Living Hand to Mouth I often quote Frederick Buechner who in looking back over his life said I wish that I had spoken less and thought less and written less and watched and listened more. I hang on to this thought for I am more and more called to make my life journey one of watching and listening to what God is up to and what God’s people are up to. This morning I invite you to do a lot of watching and listening. I would like you not to listen too much to me but to listen to what you see around you and within you. Take a look around you. At the windows, yes. Their beauty. At the vastness, yes. A vastness that leads us to that which is more than ourselves. But more so today – look at the people sitting here together. This gathering of individuals with different personalities, different histories, different stories, of human brokenness, of grace known, of faith lived. This gathering of people, this community of faith that is the church…. Look around. You will see people who greet each other in this building with a warmth that brings life. People sitting around you who listen until a sense of self-worth happens in others. You will see people who serve and serve and serve because they care. You will see people who sing, who teach, who sit here after the service and listen, bringing those they listen to to life. People around you are mentoring neighboring elementary students, working with the urban poor, doing compassion work on Colfax in old Aurora, building Habitat affordable housing, coaching youth soccer teams, representing the people in the state legislature and the Congress. Making a difference in corporate America. This is the Body of Christ. Over lunch with Don Brown this week, he spoke of the church this way: “Oh that we might provide an environment so that the church might be a bit more like Jesus.” This gathered group of people do little things day by day that the church might be a bit more like Jesus. In their listening, their love brings new life. In lifting a load for another, they raise what feels dead in others. In touching lives with care, a critical healing of gaps happens. Jim, Christine, Karen, Steve and several others are working almost full time right now to nudge both Congress and the state legislature to act to reduce the number of Colorado children that have no health care. A move towards healing and health that is a bit more like Jesus. This community of human lives hosts in our building the Denver Gay Men’s Chorus, AA, PFLAG, tutoring, education, community service and community organization groups in order to represent the hospitality of Jesus, to be a bit more like Jesus. The group that went two weeks ago to New Orleans for Katrina relief joined other church and private groups that go week after week to help. Our group gutted a different home Monday and Tuesday, ripping through the dust and dirt and mold of sheet rock and paneling down to the studs – so the two home owners we met might quality for financial help to start rebuilding…and built a Habitat home two other days. This effort keep carrying the sense of helping to raise the dead, at least to raise lives out of despair, devastation, destruction. These efforts are a bit more like Jesus. Others are building relationships of healing and emotional support that build up lives across the world: in Africa and Nepal and India and Mexico. Their efforts is a little bit more like Jesus. In January each year, I particularly have church on my mind. With the annual meeting and the new boards starting up and the extra administrative matters, I think about how we are doing church….together. I hope you do the same. You are a congregation of good minds. And the church is at its best when [as one of you said this week] we move from the gut to the heart to the mind. When we do church with energy, intelligence, imagination and love. The first time I was in this pulpit, I quoted an Iowa elder who feels that the church has to be going somewhere. If this is true, as I believe it is, then where are we going….together? Think about who the church is called to be and what the church is called to do. Now I know that some of you can’t even deal with this church business. You simply need a quiet moment in this place of beauty, some remarkably moving music, Greg’s special presence and Cindy’s laughing joy, a couple good friends and a break from the routine that gives you strength to live your days. But it is also true that we who are baptized into Jesus Christ and confirmed in his name belong to him. We are called to be together a bit more like Jesus in the world. In our baptism, a hand is laid upon us that says: this is who you, called to be a bit more like Jesus. To build up human lives in listening and love; to make peace between warring groups and creeds and classes; to heal those who are broken; to bring alive those who are numb to life’s aliveness. Three weeks ago this morning, we ordained new elders and deacons in an age old ritual of laying on hands in prayer. The weight of those hands upon each person carries a sense of calling the church be a bit more like Jesus – as if the hand of this Jesus is upon us to do this. Look at this gathered people, with a hand upon them in baptism and ordination, to be a bit more like Jesus. Now, take a look within yourself….through the encounter with the Old Testament lesson for this day. “The Lord put out his hand and touched my mouth.” In a nutshell, Jeremiah the prophet, has a personal experience that out of his imagination and points of poetry he recounts as the hand of God upon him that gives him a word to speak with his mouth. Hand of the Lord and a word not so much to speak as to live out with our lives! A hand that with its weight upon us calls for our attention. And a Word that names a truth that calls to us to share with others. That’s the Jeremiah moment. I find in Jeremiah a life that lives from hand to mouth! If you and I do scripture literally, every word means exactly what it says, that we have here God with a hand like ours. I don’t buy that. That literalism was not the way the Hebrew and Christian scriptures where written in the first place. The stories recounted and told as a way to share the encounter with God were born of the help of the human imagination and points of poetry. The human imagination and points of poetry helped thinking people point to what came from beyond the rational mind. So when Jeremiah experiences what his personhood felt was the experience or presence of God, the experience was found to be adequately described as if the weight of the hand of God was upon him. A group went to New Orleans because one Montview member, Priscilla Linsley, found the weight upon her was to go to New Orleans and help. She listened to that Word and it became a word that said: go, serve, help! So she gathered some folks and off they went. I remember the day that The Gathering Place email came from a Montview member suggesting that we host the Gathering Place. I was ready to hit delete because there is a lot going on. But there was a weight there which demanded attention and spoke of other possibilities . The Session had a similar experience. The Session was ready to hit delete. But there was a weight upon the elders that invited them to think a little more until a word came forth that was the word – welcome. I love to get up in the morning and watch for how things come together for good – grace moments. And when you get good at practicing it, you see a whole bunch of grace moments every day. And those grace moments become a weight, like a hand upon one, until a word breaks forth that says….trust…thanks. The Jeremiah moment is a way to live from hand to mouth! Under God’s nudge that leads to a word to live out! So the real work of the sermon is for you to look around and within yourself and find what is heavy, weighing on you. Some of it is heavy. Some of it is exciting. But if you listen to what weighs upon you, and using poetry points and active imagination, it can feel like a hand upon you. I think you will always find a word that is given for you to live through and out of. A word of comfort. Of calling. You use your good minds to think your way into its truth and then you think your way into trusting that word. For you and I serve God with energy, intelligence, imagination and love. My father is one of the great Christ figures in my life. I can remember as a boy watching him treat other people very kindly. Particularly the people that did not have the power that he had. And watching that became a weight upon me, like a hand upon me, until a word has come to me that says…….love.
How Alive Can We Be?
What makes the water holy? This question came from a six year old, in her living room, as we talked about her next day’s baptism. She and her sister had brought a cup of water from the kitchen to help us talk about baptism. To touch the water. To move from the word to action. She really wanted to know. What makes the water holy? Her mind -- curious. Her whole being -- wondering. She was fully alive to the moment, free to listen deeply into the meaning. My answer was brief …. her family’s love for her, our thanking God for her being born, God’s loving her. These things begin to make the water holy. I moved beyond the meaning….. captivated by her aliveness to the moment. Her wondering about life, noticing this life moment …. This wondering…. This noticing ….. is the practice of Easter – Going deep with life and meeting there our living God. Engaging life, as alive to life and to the moment as we can be. Asking questions. Listening for answers. Feeling water. Seeing colors. Moved by music. Held by love. Easter and this Resurrection begs you and begs me to come alive. More than we generally do. To come alive in this moment. To come alive in each moment that we are given. When we say: Christ has Risen…..we meet a new dimension of our lives, our days, our now! We read that when Mary came to the tomb, she saw the stone was rolled away. She ran to tell the disciples -- with all the implications of grave robbery and what all. The group returned together. Saw the empty place. The guys went home, nervous. Mary cried, confused. Through her tears she experienced …. angels. In her anger, she was gruff with a gardener. In the moment that was coming alive by the minute, she heard her name ….. it was Jesus. Christ is Risen. The resurrection of Jesus is about these alive moments of meeting when a living God meets us – in creation, in aliveness, in what the moment becomes, a moment that tastes of love, speaks of love, feels of closeness, of life, of aliveness. When life comes alive, whether as we face death or struggle with life, is when God most often shows up. The practice of Easter always moves from death to life. And we become more alive than we were the moment before. When Mary realizes it was the Risen Lord, the one who points to the living God, she moves from the numbness of his death to the nimbleness of his presence. On that first Easter Day, the missing body leads to the present Lord. If you and I engage Easter, take it seriously, you and I will live these days as some of the most alive people on the earth. We will not get bogged down on a search for intellectually certainty. We will be raised up by beauty, grace, music, friendships, the gift of life. By the aliveness of the moment we are in. This is the practice of Easter. Our daughter in law Dana died in November after a long battle with brain cancer. For many months before she died, after our talks, she would pause and then say to me: go with God. She would say go with God with a confident, commanding, assertive voice – go with God. As if she was…and I should too. This was no formula ‘God bless you.’ This was always a marching order, prayer, the practice of Easter. And with this curious aliveness, engaging life with a child’s freedom to stop, look, listen, you and I will find the Christian faith to be a living force – a ‘count me in’ people of faith, of the power of a love not our own, an aliveness that children invite and life succeeds with. Today’s Epistle lesson is right on: All will be made alive in Christ. Easter is not about heaven. Easter is about being alive, here, and now! Christ is Risen! The daffodils are rising from their winter graves, so pert (until the snow), so bright, so alive, so yellow. I try the practice of Easter by stopping before those daffodils, squatting down close to see how deeply I can look into the yellow, how closely I can spot the jagged edges of each flower’s cup. Could I stop long enough…….this ancient spiritual practice of loosing oneself in the beauty and wonder of life? To see and think about creation, the gift and wonder and fragility of life? Could I be this alive? This aliveness puts before us a new future, no matter how difficult or empty our life situation. Do you hear that? A new future that reworks our old habits. A new future to trust. A new future that is a gift … rather than something we must get. A gift that shows up as surprise as it was for Mary that first Easter Day. This aliveness begins as we connect with God in worship, we connect with each other in caring (like Mary and Jesus reconnecting). Then connected in these ways, we go out these doors as a connecting and caring people. We do acts of compassion in our homes and neighborhoods, across Denver and across the world. Resurrection is our work together -- the mission of the church. To come alive together and then raise those dead parts of the world around us as we touch others with aliveness….as Jesus did in meeting Mary. Resurrection calls each of us beyond every boundary that we know and into every new future we are created to trust and live out. Here you and I sit as the church, the Body of the Risen Christ, the One who keeps showing up, the Alive One. Here you and I sit as human and imperfect and struggling as ever. If the church depended on human nature, it would have died in the first weeks. What will you do with Easter? Bill Coffin writes that “if we don’t know what is beyond the grave, we do know who is beyond the grave. God has done God’s part. Now it is up to us.” So let me stop for a moment and let you sit here and look around. Listen into the rest, see beauty, sense that we meet God here. Just sit a minute and rest… do the work of the practice of Easter…….coming alive. As we walk, as we look, as we sit, as we talk. As we listen. We live for live moments. This morning I am telling stories of my recent time. On purpose. Because the practice of Easter is right before our eyes, on the leading edges of our minds, in the breathing and feeling waves of our moments. This week I sat holding an eight month old. His eyes invited me to play. He arched his back as if to soar. I munched his check and he giggled, then his eyes watched for the next giggle opportunity. This gift, this fragile goodness, this aliveness, this life. What I saw in his eyes was what Mary saw in the Garden. I saw the one who is alive. Yes, I know I am holding an eight month old. But I am also holding the place where God keeps showing up. I saw the Lord. The Jesus who is so alive, so loving, so (I believe) listening, seeing, safe, long-suffering. When Mary says: I have seen the Lord, she is saying that she is alive to what she knew in him and still finds in him. And you and me? Not so sure? Neither were the others when they went to the tomb…..and yet here I stand, watching the resurrection ……. at work… in you.
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