20 Pentecost

 

October 26, 2025

 

Psalm 84; Luke 18.9-14

+ Well, we have a new bishop.

 

A bishop we have been praying for every Sunday and every Wednesday for the last several months.

 

And here we are.

 

I, for one, am very happy.

 

I think Shay Craig is just exactly what this diocese needs at this time.

 

And as I shared with our delegates yesterday at Prairie Knights at Standing Rock:

 

This is a new era in our diocese.

 

A much anticipated era for us Progressive Christians in this diocese.

 

Shay, I hope, is the answer to the prayer many of us have been praying for.

 

For 36 years our Diocese has been known as a very conservative diocese.

 

And for those of us who labored here, who endured policies and not-so-wonderful treatment for our convictions, for our beliefs and foresight, those 36 years were hard ones.

 

This December it will be 10 years since St. Stephen’s sought Delegated Episcopal Pastoral Oversight (or DEPO)  so that we could make sure all people—especially our LGBTQ loved ones—were able to have the marriage rites of the Church.

 

As many of us know, the days that followed were often dark days.

 

We felt, at times, alone in this Diocese

 

We endured being the odd ducks for our stance.

 

We endured shunning and downright negativeness for that stand we made.

 

In those dark days, many of us hoped and longed for a time when what we stood for would be the norm.

 

In fact, there were times when the Psalm for today spoke directly to us:

 

Those who go through the desolate valley will find it a place of springs, *
for the early rains have covered it with pools of water.

They will climb from height to height, *
and the God of gods will be revealed in Zion.

 

Thanks to our provisional bishops and now with the election of Shay, that

hope, I believe, is being realized.

 

In fact, it warmed my heart and the hearts of many of us at Convention that in Bishop-elect Craig’s first address to the Diocese, she began by expressing her appreciation for St. Stephen’s and all we stand for.

 

I don’t know about you, but I felt that all we have stood for and spoke out for and fought for was most definitely validated in some way with those words.

 

We have much to rejoice about today and in these coming months.

 

Now, I know you have heard me expound mightily from this pulpit in the past about my frustrations with the diocese.

 

In fact, as most of you know, for several years I simply stepped back from diocesan involvement.

 

Not only was I frustrated but I was realizing that my frustration was making me into a toxic element in this diocese.

 

As can often happen, especially when we express our anger at things instead of keeping quiet, but then just live in that anger.  

 

There were times, as many of you heard, when I felt that our efforts in this diocese were for naught.

 

I believe the phrase I used was: “I feel like we’re rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.”

 

And I wasn’t alone.

 

I was talking to another priest of this diocese at convention who expressed that same feeling to me.

 

But over these last several months, I have stepped back into diocesan involvement.

 

As you know, I was a part of the Nominating Committee (along with Dan Rice).

 

I was part of the Transition Committee (along with John Baird).

 

And on Friday I was elected to a three-year term to the Standing Committee.

 

I will say in all honesty that I am excited to once again be serving in the diocese.

 

The future is looking more brighter than it did before—at least in this moment.

 

And I truly do believe and hope that things can be done to revitalize and renew our diocese.

 

Of course, if we think a new bishop can magically do that for us, we will be disappointed.

 

It is not the new Bishop’s sole job to do that anymore than it is the Rector’s sole job to do that in a parish.

 

It is out job. Together.

 

And an innovative, committed leader can help lead us to do that work.

 

But with the energy that a new visionary bishop brings to the diocese, we can be rejuvenated and well.

 

We can be motivated to step up and help.

 

We can actually do some of the things that we have been hoping to do before this and simply could not.

 

As I said, this is the dawn of a new era in our diocese.

 

And we should celebrate that fact.

 

But that change begins with us.

 

Each of us.

 

For me, it began when I recognized my own toxicity and worked hard to move beyond it.

 

 

It also helped that I made a real and true effort to actually started praying for the diocese in a concentrated way.

 

Prayer is the key.

 

Not controlling prayer.

 

Rather, prayer that allows us to surrender to God’s will.

 

Prayer that allows God’s Spirit to truly work in our midst.

 

Prayer that opens ourselves up so that the Spirit can actually work through us.

 

That’s essentially what’s happening in today’s Gospel reading.

 

In our story we find the Pharisee.

 

A Pharisee, as you probably can guess, was a very righteous person.

 

They belonged to an ultra-orthodox sect of Judaism that placed utmost importance on a strict observance of the Law of Moses—the Torah.

 

The Pharisee is not praying for any change in himself.

 

He arrogantly brags to God about how wonderful and great he is in comparison to others.

 

 The tax collector—someone who was ritually unclean according the Law of Moses— however, prays that wonderful, pure prayer

 

“God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

 

It’s not eloquent.

 

It’s not fancy.

 

But it’s honest.

 

And it cuts right to heart of it all.

 

To me, in my humble opinion, that is the most perfect prayer any of us can pray.

 

“God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

 

It’s a prayer I have held very, very dear for so long.

 

And it is a prayer that had never let me down once.

 

Prayers for mercy are probably one of the purest and most honest prayers we can make.

 

And what I love even more about this parable is the fact that the prayer of the Pharisee isn’t even necessarily a bad prayer in and of itself.

 

I mean, there’s an honesty in it as well.

 

The Pharisee is the religious one, after all.

 

He is the one who is doing right according to organized religion.  

 

He is doing what Pharisees do; he is doing the “right” thing; he is filling his prayer with thanksgiving to God.  

 

In fact, every morning, the Pharisee, like all orthodox Jewish men even to this day, prayed a series of “morning blessings.”

 

These morning blessings include petitions like

 

“Blessed are you, Lord God, King of the Universe, who made me a son of Israel.”

 

“Blessed are you, Lord God, King of the Universe, who did not make me a slave.”

 

And this petition:

 

“Blessed are you, Lord God, King of the Universe, who did not make me a woman.”

 

So, this prayer we hear the Pharisee pray in our story this morning is very much in line with the prayers he would’ve prayed each morning.

 

Again, we should be clear: we should all thank God for all the good things God grants us.

 

The problem arises in the fact that the prayer is so horribly self-righteous and self-indulgent that it manages to cancel out the rightness of the prayer.

 

The arrogance of the prayer essentially renders it null and void.

 

The tax collector’s prayer however is so pure.

 

It is simple and straight-to-the-point.

 

This is the kind of prayer Jesus again and again holds up as an ideal form of prayer.

 

And sometimes it’s just enough of a prayer that it can actually kill off a bit of that toxicity we have allowed to fester within us.

 

Sometimes it’s enough of a prayer that it can soften our hearts and open our spirits to God’s love and lights.

 

Sometimes it’s enough of a prayer that it can actually change us in a positive way to do the work God is calling us to do.

 

As we being this new era in the Diocese together, let us do just that.

 

Let us do the work God is calling us to do with our hearts and our minds open.

 

Truly open.

 

God, have mercy on all of us

 

Let us look forward to a potentially bright future with true hope and true joy.

 

And let us be willing and able to work hard alongside our new bishop to make this potentially bright future the reality we have be longing for and praying for.

 

May God bless and have mercy on the Diocese of North Dakota as we being this new era.

 

May God bless and have mercy on Bishop-elect Shay Craig as she leads us forward into this new era.

 

May God bless and have mercy on St. Stephen’s as we continue to live out our visionary ministry.   

 

And may God bless and have mercy on each of us as we heed our calling from God’s Holy Spirit to do the work we need to do to renew and revive our diocese today and in the days to come.

 

May we truly rejoice to find the desolate valley renewed into a place of springs as we climb from height to height, finding that God is being revealed to us here in our midst.

 

Amen.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

19 Pentecost

October 18, 2025

 

Genesis 32.22-31; Luke 18.1-8

+ Last week in my sermon, I mentioned a word.

 

Ekphrasis.

 

Ekphrasis was a word I recently heard about from a colleague of mine Concordia College in which an artist responds artistically to a piece of visual art.

 

For example writing a poem about a painting or a photograph.

 

That is ekphrasis.

 

Well, we’re going to use another form of ekphrasis today, in which we are going to look at this.

 

This very famous piece of art.

 

This of course is Dore’s very famous etching of Jacob wrestling with the angel—the same story we just heard in our reading from the Hebrew scriptures.  

 

Most of us know this well.

 

We have seen this countless times.

 

And for most of us, THIS is the image we have in our heads when we think of Jacob wrestling with the angel

 

It’s compelling for us because it is detailed.

 

And, it’s compelling because we can relate.

 

When we see this, we see ourselves in it.

 

It is a story we often personalize.

 

More importantly, it’s a story we know.

 

Let’s face it.

 

We’ve been there.

 

We have done it.

 

We too have wrestled with God.

 

We too have struggled with God.

 

We have too have had those late night shouting matches with the angel.

 

And in almost every situation when we have done it, we have come way limping.

 

There’s a similar midrashic story you have heard me share many times.

 

But I love this story as much as I love the story of Jacob and the angel.

 

I’m sharing it again this morning, because it sorts of echoes our reading from Genesis today, which is another story I love.

 

In this story, there was once a very wealthy king.

 

He was a good king, who loved God dearly.

 

One evening, he was walking in his beautiful garden, admiring the trees and the flowers and the plants.

 

And as he did so, as the joy and beauty of it all came upon him, he found himself singing psalms to God.

 

The psalms just seemed to well up from within him.

 

Suddenly, an angel appeared to him.

 

It was a mighty, beautiful angel and the King was amazed.

 

He was so excited that an angel of all things appeared to him!

 

Just as he was about to exclaim his joy at the angel, the angel raised its hand and struck him hard across the face.

 

It actually knocked the King off his feet and threw him into the dirt and mud.

 

The King was shocked.

 

He had never been struck before!

 

And he was confused.

 

As he looked up from the mud, his clothes torn, the angel’s hand-print on his  face, wracked with pain, he cried, “Angel, why did you strike me? What did I do wrong? Here I was singing God’s praises in this beautiful garden and then you struck me! Why would you do such a thing?”

 

The angel replied, “Of course, you can sing God’s praises as you wander about in your beautiful garden, dressed in fine clothes, with joy and happiness in your heart. That’s easy. But now, try. Try to sing God’s praises after you’ve been struck across the face by an angel.”

 

We’ve been there too.

 

We know what it feels like to be struck down when we have been most happy.

 

I am of the opinion that we haven’t earned our stripes as believers in God and followers of Jesus unless we have the limp, or the hand print of the angel upon our cheeks.

 

Unless we’ve emerged from that struggle, bleeding and limping, we still live in some kind of halcyon understanding of God.

 

Because what this struggle is really about is about deconstruction.

 

It is about facing God for who God really is and not the God we have created for ourselves.

 

Our wrestling with the angel is about being forced to see that God is not that sweet bearded man in the sky on a throne giving good things to good people who do good and meting out pain and punishment on bad people who do bad.

 

God, as you have heard me say a million times, is NOT Santa Claus in the sky not is God a genie granting us wishes.

 

Let me tell you, wrestling with God and being slapped by God quickly destroys those human-made images of God quickly.

 

The God we know and struggle with and come way from limping is so much more than any of that.

 

And sometimes the realization of that is what truly causes us to limp and bleed.

 

As you have heard me say a million times, God answers all prayer.

 

But the answer is one of three things.

 

Whata re they?

 

Yes

 

No 

 

Or not yet.

 

And often our struggle with God involves accepting whatever the answer is to that prayer.

 

 And in our limping away from our struggle we realize that maybe we have been praying about the wrong thing.

 

Our Gospel reading is a prime example of that.

 

What does the widow in Jesus’ parable pray?

 

“Grant me justice against my opponent,” she prays.

 

This also a truly interesting story.

 

This widow, who would not take no for an answer, persisted.

 

She too struggled with the angel.

 

This widow, who, in that time and place without a man in her life was in bad shape, was demanded to be heard.

 

This widow who had been taken advantage of (someone cheated her of her rightful inheritance) did not let discouragement stop her.

 

This widow prayed day and night.

 

She struggled.

 

She wrestled.

 

She lashed out and shook her fists at God and others.

 

And what happened?

 

God heard her and answered her.

 

And the answer was “yes.”

 

God turned the hearts of the unjust.

 

That, definitely, speaks to us right now.

 

That is what we should be praying for right now in this country.

 

See, God is definitely speaking loudly here to us through this scripture.

 

We could pray that those we despise are destroyed and burned to ash.

 

We could pray that destruction is brought upon those we fight against.

 

But the answer is usually (hopefully) no.

 

However, maybe what we should be praying for is justice, not only against our opponents.

 

We should be praying for justice in all things.

 

In all ways.

 

We definitely should be praying for justice in this country and this world.

 

Please, God, turn the hearts of the unjust! And grant us justice!

 

The scriptural definition of “justice” is “to make right.”

 

So, to seek justice from God means that something went wrong in the process, and we long for “rightness.”

 

We too need to be praying hard, over and over again, for justice.

 

We too need to keep struggling.

 

We need to keep wrestling with God in the garden.

 

We need to shake our fists and stop believing in a god made in our own image, with our own limitations and biases.

 

Because the fact is, God—the real God, the living God—loves us.

 

Even when we are wrestling with God.

 

Even in those moments of engagement, just like in the Dore painting, God loves us.

 

And knows us.

 

And knows our very prayers before we ask.

 

The struggle, if we notice, is about us.

 

The angel could end that battle at any moment.

 

But chooses not to.

 

The struggle itself is important.

 

It is vital.

 

It is what sometimes needs to happen for us to realize we have created expectations for ourselves that are not God’s expectations.

 

We sometimes need to struggle to realize that we not in control of anything.

 

Sometimes we need the struggle—and the limp, and the slap—to remind ourselves that there is something planned far beyond our understanding.

 

Sometimes we need to stop trying to control the situation and the world.

 

And God.

 

Because we’re not going to win on that one.

 

And sometimes we have to simply believe that God does know us.

 

That God knows best for us, even when it seems like God does not.

 

Sometimes we simply have to lean into God’s love instead of fighting it and controlling it.

 

 

Maybe then, our struggles will be seen as less of a battle.

 

Maybe we will see it less as a fight, head to head.

 

Rather, maybe we can see all of this as something so much more.

 

Maybe we can see it instead as . . .

 

…an embrace. 

 

Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

18 Pentecost

 

October 12, 2025

Luke 17:11-19

 + Do you ever find yourself obsessing over a word.

 Sometimes, it seems, there are certain words that just get stuck in your brain.  

 Maybe it’s just me.

 Maybe it’s just a poet thing.

 But, I do find myself obsessing over words on occasion.

 Often there are words I find myself examining like a little jewel, turning it around and weighing it and considering it like it’s a brand new word.

 A few weeks ago, Cathy McMullen and I gave a talk at the NDSU Memorial Union at the display for the 75^th anniversary for the Institute for Regional Studies.

 One of our colleagues from Concordia College, Scott Olsen, was there, and during the question and answer period, Scott brought up a word that I had never heard before.

 The word was ekphrasis.

 A beautiful Greek word.

 Ekphrasis.

 Ek meaning “out” (or we could say “recourse”)

 Phrasis meaning “tell”

 To tell out essentially.

 Ekphrasis is then a literary device used to describe in a written way visual art.

 In other words, it is what we do when we write a poem or an essay or a story about a visual piece of art like a panting or a photograph or a sculpture.

 In other words, it means writing about visual art in a literary way.

 As in writing a poem about a visual piece of art.

 It was a great word.

 And it has been jumbling around in my head ever since.

 Another one of those words I’ve recently enjoyed re-examining is the word “Mercy.”

 It’s a beautiful word!

 It flows!

 And I love the fact that, in French, the word for “Thank you” is “merci.”

 Mercy is something we tend to overlook.

 Certainly in regard to others.

 But let me tell you, it is not something we overlook when it comes to us.

 To be on the receiving end of mercy is a wonderful thing!

 Mercy is like a fresh wonderful breeze on our face, especially if it is something we are being granted after a hardship in our lives.

 Mercy is not something we think of too often in our lives, certainly not on a daily basis.

 But for Jesus and those Jewish people of his time, mercy was an important part of their understanding of the world and their relationship with God.

 Tomorrow, at sundown, the week-long Jewish feast of Sukkot ends

 Sukkot is an important feast in Judaism.

 It is also called “The feast of Booths,” which refers to the tents the Israelites lived in during their 40 years in the desert.

 In fact, in some Jewish homes, a tent is often set up during this high holy day as a commemoration of the feast.

 On the Feast of Sukkot, the “Great Hallel” is prayed.

 Hallel means “praise,” and refers to the group of psalms recited at the time of the new moon, as well on feasts like Sukkot, which commemorates the period of time the Tribe of Israel spent in the desert on their way to the Promised Land.

 “Hallel” is the refrain from Psalm 136 that says,

“for God’s mercy endures forever.”

 It is believed that Jesus himself would have sang the Great Hallael with his disciples when they went to the Mount of Olives after the Last Supper on the night before his death.

 Now, mercy in this context, means more than just forgiveness or some kind of reprieve

 Mercy also means, in a Jewish understanding of the word, such things as God’s enduring love for Israel and the mercy that goes with that love.

 Mercy also means, in this context, behaving in a particular way.

 It means being ethical and being faithful to God’s will.

 Mercy.

 It’s an incredible word.

 And it is so packed with meaning and substance!

 And it’s one that I think sums up so many of the prayers we pray.

Certainly, the prayers I pray.

In those moments in which I am overwhelmed or exhausted or anxious or simply don’t know what to pray, I often find myself just praying, Please, God, have mercy on me, or on the person for whom I’m praying.

Today, in our Gospel reading, we find that word, Mercy, in a very prevalent place.

In fact the petition the leper makes to Jesus is a powerful one.

“Jesus, Master, have mercy on me!”

And what does Jesus do?

He does just that.

He has mercy on him. 

And, by doing so, Jesus sets the tone for us as well.

Just as Jesus showed mercy, so should we show mercy again and again in our own lives.

We see, in our Gospel reading today, mercy in action.

And it is a truly wonderful thing! 

These lepers are healed.

But, before we lose track of this story, let’s take a little deeper look at what is exactly happening.

Now, first of all, we need to be clear about who lepers were in that day.

Lepers, as we all know, were unclean.

But they were worse than that.

They were contagiously unclean.

And their disease was considered a very severe punishment for something.

Sin of course.

But whose sin?

Their own sin?

Or the sins of their parents?

Or grandparents?

Probably all of it together.

So, to even engage these lepers was a huge deal.

It meant that to engage them meant to engage their sin in some way.

But, the real interesting aspect of this story is one that you might not have noticed.

The lepers themselves are interesting.

There are, of course, ten of them.

Nine lepers who were, it seems, children of Israel.

And one Samaritan leper.

Now a Samaritan, for good Jews like Jesus, would have been a double curse.

It was bad enough being a leper.

But to be a Samaritan leper was much worse.

Samaritans, as we also know, were also considered unclean enemies.

They didn’t worship God in the same way that good, orthodox Jews worshipped God.

Good, orthodox Jews worshipped God in the Temple in Jerusalem.

Samaritans however had turned away from the Temple in Jerusalem.

And they didn’t follow the Judaic Law that Jews of Jesus’ time strived to follow.

But the lepers, knowing who they are and what they are, do the “right” thing (according to Judaic law).

Again and again, throughout the story they do the right thing.

They first of all stand far off from Jesus and the others.

That’s what contagious (unclean) people do.

And when they are healed, the nine again do the right thing.

They heed Jesus’ words and, like good Jews, they head off to the priest to be declared clean.

According to the Law, it was the priest who would examine them and declare them “clean” by Judaic Law.

But they do one “wrong” thing before they do so.

Did you notice what thing they didn’t do?

Before heading off to the priest, they don’t first thank Jesus.

Only the Samaritan stays.

And the reason he stays is because, as a Samaritan, he wouldn’t need to approach the Jewish priest.

So, he turns back.

And he engages this Jesus who healed him.

He comes back, praising God and bowing down in gratitude before Jesus.

After all, it is through Jesus that God has worked this amazing miracle!

But Jesus does not care about this homage.

He is irritated by the fact the others did not come back.

Still, despite his irritation, if you notice, his mercy remained.

Those ungrateful lepers—along with the Samaritan—remain healed.

Despite their ingratitude, they are still healed.

That is how mercy works.

The interesting thing for us is, we are not always so good at mercy.

We are good as being vindictive, especially to those who have wronged us.

We are very good as seeking to make others’ lives as miserable as our lives are at times.

If someone wrongs us, what do we want to do?

We want to get revenge.

We want to “show them.”

After all, THAT is what they deserve, we rationalize.

But, that is not the way of Jesus.

If we follow Jesus, revenge and vindictive behavior is not the way to act.

If we are followers of Jesus, the only option we have toward those who have wronged us is…mercy.

Still, even then, we are not so good at mercy, especially mercy to those who have turned away from us and walked away after we have done something good for them.

 It hurts when someone is an ingrate to us.

 It hurts when people snub us or ignore us or return our goodness with indifference.

 In those cases, the last thing in the world we are thinking of is mercy for them.

 Of course, none of us are Jesus.

 Because Jesus was—and is—a master at mercy.

 And because he is, we, as followers of Jesus, are challenged.

 If the one we follow shows mercy, we know it is our job to do so as well.

 No matter what.

 No matter if those to whom we show mercy ignore us and walk away from us.

 No matter if they show no gratitude to us.

 No matter if they snub us or turn their backs to us or ignore us.

 Our job is not to concern ourselves with such things.

 Our job, as followers of Jesus, is simply to show mercy again and again and again.

 And to seek mercy again and again and again.

 Have mercy on me, we should pray to God on a regular basis.

 God, have mercy on me.

 Please, God,  have mercy on me.

 Please, God, have mercy on my loved ones.

 Please, God, have mercy on St. Stephen’s.

 Please, God, have mercy on our country. 

 Please, God, have mercy on our planet.

 This is our deepest prayer.

 This is the prayer of our heart.

 This is the prayer we pray when  our voices and our minds no longer function perfectly.

 This is the prayer that keeps on praying with every heartbeat within us.

 And by praying this prayer, by living this prayer, by reflecting this prayer to others, we will know.

 We will know—beyond a shadow of doubt—that we too can get up.

 We too can go our way.

 We too can know that, yes, truly our faith has made us well.

 Amen.