21 Pentecost

October 25, 2009

Mark 10.46-52


This morning, in our Gospel, we find a little gem. This story at first seems to be leading us in one direction. We find Jesus at Jericho, which reminds us, of course, of the story from Joshua of the crumbling walls. We then find this strangely detailed story of Barthemaeus. It’s detailed in the sense that we not only have his name, but also the fact that he was the sons of Timaeus. And that he is blind. We know where this story is going. We know he’s going to be healed. We know he is going to see.

But the real gem of this story doesn’t have to do with Jericho, or the fact that we will never again hear about Bartimeus son of Timaeus. The real gem of this story is that little prayer Bartimaeus prays. There it is, huddled down within the Gospel like a wonderful little treasure.

“Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me!”

At first, it doesn’t seem like much. It’s so deceptively simple. But, obviously, according to the story, the prayer is important. Jesus does what he is asked. He has mercy on the man and heals him.

So why is this prayer so important? Well, for one thing, we get a glimpse of how to pray in this wonderfully simple little prayer. Jesus occasionally gives us advice in the gospels on how we should pray. The first one that probably comes to mind probably is the Lord’s Prayer. But here we find a prayer very different than the Lord’s Prayer. The Lord’s Prayer is very structured. It covers all the bases. We acknowledge and adore God, we acknowledge and ask forgiveness not only for our sins, but for the sins committed against us by others. And so on. You know the prayer.

The prayer we heard this morning cuts right to very heart not only of the Lord’s prayer but to every prayer we pray. It is a prayer that rises from within—from our very core. From our heart of hearts. The words of this prayer are the words of all those nameless, formless prayers we pray all the time—those prayers that we find ourselves longing to pray. Here it is, summed up for us. Here are the words we long to use in those prayers without words.

“Jesus, have mercy on me!”

Now this prayer sounds very familiar especially to those of who have prayed what is commonly called the “Jesus prayer.”

“Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

Or whatever other variations of that prayer one might use.

The prayer we heard this morning is essentially the same. The “Jesus Prayer” it is also called “the prayer of the heart.” That’s a perfect description of the prayer we heard in today’s Gospel. It is a prayer of the heart. If our lips could no longer pray, our heart would go on and this prayer would be the words of our heart. The fact that it is so simple is what makes the Jesus prayer so popular. Anyone can memorize it and anyone pray it with true meaning. It is a prayer we can repeat to ourselves over and over again. In fact, it is a prayer that demands to be repeated. It’s almost impossible not to repeat it.

When I was telling a friend of mine about this prayer once, she said to me, “Doesn’t Jesus say in Matthew that one shouldn’t be vainly repeating a prayer over and over again like the heathen do?”

Emily Gardner Neal, one of my favorite Episcopal writers, explains why this kind of prayer is all right to pray over and over again.

“The answer to this must be that the repetition in this prayer is not in vain,”[1] she says. The prayer of the heathen is a meaningless prayer and it is prayed simply to “wrack up points,” so to speak. Neal says that for the Christian, repeating this prayer is not meaningless, but rather by the repeating the prayer one “evokes and expresses the faith in [one’s] heart.”[2]

She goes on to say, “In each such repetition, the words may be the same, but never twice identical, for their meaning is inexhaustible. Your intent and your emphases shift and change.”[3]

So, no matter how many times we pray this prayer, we will never pray the same prayer twice. If it truly comes from our heart, then the prayer will be meaningful to us in that one moment.

Emily Gardner Neal goes on to say, “Perhaps because it contains the spirit and hence the power of all prayer, it not only limitless in its scope, but infinite in its use.”

What I find so interesting about that statement is that, limitless as this prayer might be, infinite in its use as it might be, it comes from and addresses our very own limitations. It is the prayer of absolute humility.

“Have mercy on me.”

We are humans, with all the limitations and shortcomings that entails. But rather than groaning about it and bewailing our misfortune, in this prayer we are able to acknowledge it and to simply offer it up. Like Bartimeaus, we can simply bring it before Jesus, release it, and then walk away healed. There is no room for haughtiness when praying this prayer. The person we are when we pray it is who we really are. When all our masks and all our defenses are gone, that is when this prayer comes in and takes over for us. This is the prayer we pray when, echoing Thomas Merton, we “present ourselves naked before our God.”

That’s what makes the prayer of the heart—the Jesus prayer—such a popular prayer for so many. There is a wonderful book from the Russian Orthodox tradition called The Way of the Pilgrim. It is the story of a man who travels about Russia, visiting churches and holy places. As he goes, he prays the Jesus prayer repeatedly and meets others who are also praying the prayer. As he travels, he observes how this kind of praying has transformed the lives of these people. When all else fails in their lives, they were able to remain steadfast in their faith by reciting the prayer. He also discovers that the prayer is especially useful in those dry moments in our spiritual lives. When it seems that God is absent or simply not listening, being faithful in the praying of the Jesus prayer somehow gets us through. Certainly, I find this kind of praying helpful in my own life. When I have suffered with various illnesses, both physical and otherwise, in those moments when I just can’t quite articulate exactly what to pray for, I have found a huge comfort in praying the Jesus prayer. While the rest of my life sometimes seems to crumble into chaos, I am often able to find a calm oasis in the middle of it all by praying the Jesus prayer quietly to myself. To be honest, sometimes it all that I can pray. All I am sometimes capable of in some of those difficult moments is repeating to myself, Lord Jesus, have mercy on me.

I have heard other stories as well of people for whom the Jesus prayer has made all the difference in the world. It has also been helpful in praying for others as well. How easy it is to simply pray:

Jesus, have mercy on her, or him, or them.

It’s wonderful isn’t how those simple words can pack such a wallop. We don’t have to be profound or eloquent in the words we address to God. We don’t need to go on and on beseeching and petitioning God. We simply need to open our hearts to God and the words will come. No doubt those words will be very similar to the words of the Jesus prayer.

So, like Bartemeaus, let us pray what is in our heart—let us open ourselves completely and humbly to Jesus. And when we do we will find the blindness’s of our own lives—that spiritual blindness that causes us to grope about aimlessly—taken from us and, with a clear spiritual vision granted to us, we too will follow him on the way.







[1] Neal, Emily Gardner. In the Midst of Life. 1963. Morehouse-Barlow. New York.
[2] ibid
[3] ibid.

20 Pentecost

Jubilee Sunday
October 18, 2009

Mark 10:35-45


We’ve all known people like them, haven’t we? We have all had our own Jameses and Johns. We’ve all had them as co-workers, or fellow students, or simply fellow parishioners. They are the ones who—while we quietly labor, quietly do our duties—they sort of weasel their way up the ladder. They are the ones who try to get a better place in line. They are the ones who drive us—who work and sacrifice and try to do the good thing—they drive us crazy.

Or maybe…and maybe none of us want to admit it …maybe, they are the ones that we relate to the most in this morning’s Gospel. Maybe we are ourselves at times are the James and the Johns. Maybe we ourselves are the Sons or Daughters of Thunder.

Whatever the case may be, the fact is James and John are really missing out. Like some of the other apostles, they just don’t get it. They don’t quite understand what Jesus is getting at when he is talking about the last being first. They don’t understand him when he says that we are called to serve and not be served. They just don’t understand that simple virtue of humility. Their view of Christianity—their view of where they stand in relation to Jesus—is a constant jockeying for position. And many of us to this day feel the same way in our own lives, in our work and in our faith lives.

But what today’s Gospel shows us is that Jesus is calling us to something much bigger than we probably fully understand. I think a lot of us—even those of us who come to church every Sunday—sometimes look at Christianity as a somewhat quaint, peace-loving religion. We dress up, we come to church on Sunday, we sing hymns, we hear about God’s love, and then we go home and…and we don’t think about it again until the next week.

But the Christianity of Jesus is not just a whitewashed, quaint religion. The Christianity of Jesus, as we hopefully have all figured out here at St. Stephen’s, is a radical faith. It is a faith that challenges—that makes us uncomfortable when we get comfortable, that riles us when we have become complacent. It is a faith that works well here in church, on Sunday morning, but also should motivate us to get up from these pews and go out into the world and live out the faith we have learned here.

And it is this fact that many of us might find a bit frightening. Like James and John, we all want to gain heaven. We want a nice place beside Jesus in that world-to-come. But few of us want to live out our faith in all that do and say. And even fewer of us are ready to be servants—to be slaves for others.

We don’t always want to serve the lowliest among us. We don’t want to suffer like Jesus suffered. We don’t want to taste from the same cup of anguish that Jesus drank from on the night before he was murdered. And we sure don’t want to be humble sometimes.

I will admit, I am in this boat sometimes. I sometimes don’t want to be a servant or slave to others. I don’t want to suffer like Jesus suffered. And although I might try—and not always that hard—I am not so good at being humble sometimes. But we all, I think, at least here at St. Stephen’s, are trying. We all making the effort in some way.

Today of course is Jubilee Sunday. On this Sunday we are reminded that we as Christians are called truly to be servants to each other and especially tot hose who need to be served. We are asked on this Sunday to do something uncomfortable. We are to asked to take a long, hard look at the world around us and to recognize the fact that there are people living in poverty in our midst.

That’s not easy to do. Most of us are comfortable in our lives. We have worked long and hard to build up financial security for ourselves and our families. Which is a very good thing to do. But in our comfortable lives, it is important that we look around us and realize not everyone has had the same breaks we have had. Not everyone has had the privilege of being born in a country where we have what we have. Not everyone lives in the same comfortable ways we do. But to remain silent in the face of that reality is say we are not followers of Jesus.

Now I’ll be honest: I don’t want to think about the outstanding poverty that exists in this world. When I do, I realize how overwhelming it is. I realize how frightening it is. And, probably most importantly, I realize how powerless I am in the face of that poverty. When I ignore those in need, when I don’t serve, when I don’t stand up against injustice—I am made very aware that in that moment, I am not following Jesus. If I don’t do those things, but I still stand up here and call myself a Christian, then I have truly become a “Son of Thunder.”

And, for most of us, that is exactly what it sounds like when we want the benefits of our faith, without making the sacrifices of our faith.

In those instances, we truly do sound like a low, distant thunder. We cannot bulldoze our way into heaven by riding roughshod over those we should be serving along the way. We seem to have forgotten this virtue of humility in our Church and in our society. We rarely hear anyone preaching about it. Certainly we don’t hear humility mentioned in the mass media, nor do we see our movie stars, our politicians or our church leaders speaking of it, much less living it out in their own lives.

But Jesus, especially in today’s Gospel, pays much attention to it. After all, who could give a better example of humility than Jesus? In a very clear way, he was the purest example of humility. When we call him the Lamb of God, we are not using this title as a sweet, comforting symbol nor are using it as victorious symbol of triumph. Jesus as Lamb of God is a symbol of absolute humility—one who willingly came to us and laid down his life—like a quiet humble lamb—as a sacrifice.

Now, of course, when we talk about humility, we need to be clear: we are not talking about humiliation. Jesus is not expecting us to be humiliated or to humiliate ourselves. We don’t have to beat ourselves raw if we fail or do something wrong.

He is simply saying to us, love God and love your neighbor as yourself—and when we do, in our lives, in our work, in the way we perceive the world around us, then a natural humility will come over us. In those moments, we will recognize that God is in control. Not us. What is more humbling than that realization in our lives?

Again, here is another example of this radical Christianity. It carries through in how we serve each other. Christians are not expected to bring anyone to Christ through an arrogant attitude. We are not expected to come charging into people’s lives, making them tremble before us in fear. We are not expected to thump our Bibles and wave the Words of Jesus before people in a desperate attempt to win souls for Christ. We aren’t forcing Christ on anyone, nor should we. In doing so, we dominate people. We coerce them into believing.

But if we simply serve those Christ calls us to serve, with love and charity and humility, sometimes that says more than any Sunday sermon or curbside rant. Think of the words Jesus could use. He could use, “power” to mean “dominance,” or “oppression” or “force.” But he doesn’t. Rather, Jesus uses the words “serve” and “servant”

Certainly we are given plenty of “power” as Christians. In our baptism, we are given power—but this power we are given is the power to die in Christ and to be raised into a new life with Christ. That is what we celebrate every time we renew our baptismal vows. That is what we celebrate when we think back to what happened at our own baptisms. We celebrate and we live out in our lives this power—this power that we are dead to our former selves and alive—alive in a powerful and amazing way—with Christ. Baptism empowers us—it makes us something more than we were before—but not in the way we think of empowering. It empowers us by making us true servants to each other.

We who share in the Body and Blood of Christ here at this altar are given a strength unlike any other in the world. But it not a strength that overpowers others. It is a strength rather that empowers us to serve each other and God. The cup and the bread we share here at the altar strengthens us to be true servants in the world. It strengthens us to bear the anguish and despair of this life. It strengthens us to persevere and to live our lives fully in Christ.

In all of this, Jesus is telling us that we are to be servants—servants not only to God, but to each other as well. I, as a priest, who stands here at this altar at each celebration of the Eucharist —I am not the only called to be a minister of God. We are all called to be ministers of God. By our very baptism, by the Eucharist we share at this altar each Sunday, we are called by God to serve each other.

We are not here on Sunday morning to be served—to be waited upon, to be lavished with gifts. We are here to serve. And it is this sense of service that we must take with us out of here into the world.

James and John eventually figured this out. They went on from that day and served Christ in the world. Eventually , they would both die for Christ as martyrs—as very witnesses to Christ by their deaths.

So, for those of us who get angry at the sons of thunder in our lives—be patient. For those of who recognize ourselves as a son or daughter of thunder—relax. Christ finds a way to break through our barriers. It is this breaking through, after all, that makes our Christianity so radical. So, serve God. Serve each other in whatever ways God leads you to serve.

Today, after this Eucharist, at coffee hour, Stand up. Take a stand against poverty. And in doing so, remember that you are empowered in ways in which you might not even have been fully aware. By the very fact that you are baptized and fed with Christ’s Body and Blood, live out your service in the world. And when you do, you just may find that the thunder you hear is the thunder not of arrogance or pride, but rather the thunder of the kingdom of God breaking through into our midst.

19 Pentecost

October 11, 2009

Mark 10.17-31
Did you listen closely to this morning’s Gospel? Were you as uncomfortable as I was hearing it? You should be uncomfortable. We all should be uncomfortable when we hear it. Because Jesus is, quite plainly, pulling out the stops for all of us. Jesus is, quite simply, telling it like it is. It is a disturbing message—at least, on the surface. I stress that: on the surface. He makes three hard-hitting points.

First, he tells the rich man who calls Jesus “good” to sell everything he has and give the money to the poor. Second, he compares wealthy people getting into heaven to a camel going through the eye of a needle—a great image really when you think about it. Finally, he tells his disciples that only those who give up their families and their possessions will gain heaven, summarizing it in that all-too-famous maxim: “the first will be last and the last will be first.”

For those who have—who have possessions, who have loved ones, who have nice cars and houses and bank accounts and investments,--these words of Jesus should disturb us and should make us look long and hard at what we have and,
more importantly, why we have them. But what does it mean? Does it mean that we should rid ourselves of those things? Should we really sell our cars and our houses, empty out our bank accounts and our savings and give all of that money to the poor? Does it mean, we should turn our backs on our families, on our spouses and partners, on our children and our parents? If it does, it gives a whole new meaning to “Christian Family Values” does it? Does it mean that we should go poor and naked into the world?

The fact is, I don’t think Jesus is telling us to do any of that. What Jesus is talking about here is attachment. Or more specifically, unhealthy attachments. Having “things” in and of themselves are, for the most part, fine, as long as we are not attached to them in an unhealthy way. Jesus knew full well that we need certain things to help us live our lives. But being attached to those “things” is a problem. It is our attachments in this life that bind us—that tie us down and prevent us from growing, from moving closer to God. Unhealthy attachments are what Jesus is getting at here. And this is why we should be disturbed. Let’s face, at times, we’re all attached to those things we have. We are attached to our cars and our homes. We are attached to our televisions and computers and our telephones.

And, even in our relationships, we have formed unhealthy attachments as well. We often hear about co-dependence in relationships—that unhealthy kind of attachment that develops between people. We see co-dependent in relationships that are violent or abusive. People, in a sense, become attached to each other and simply cannot see what life can be like outside of that relationship. And as much as we love our children, we all know that there comes a point when we have to let them go.

We have to break whatever attachments we have to them so they can live their lives fully. It is seems to be part of our nature to form unhealthy relationships with others at times. Especially in this day and age, we hear so often of people who are afraid to be alone. So many people are out there looking for that “the right one”—as though this one person is going to bring unending happiness and contentment to one’s life. Some people might even be attached to the idea of a relationship, rather than the relationship itself. We’ve all known people like that—people who are afraid because they are getting too old to settle down and still haven’t found that right person in their lives.

It seems almost as though their lives revolve around finding this ideal person when, in fact, no one can live up that ideal. See, attachments start taking on the feeling of a heavy baggage after so long. They do get in the way. They weigh us down and they ultimately make our life a burden.

For several years in my twenties, I studied Zen Buddhism. It was a fascinating religion to study because in many ways, it is very similar to our own. What was especially interesting was how closely related some of the sayings by the Zen Masters were to the sayings of Jesus. One of the most important aspects of Zen Buddhism is its emphasis on ridding oneself of attachments—of cutting ties in one’s life. Attachments in Zen are viewed as one of the roots of unhappiness. After all, attachments bind us and, in some ways, control us. In Zen, the image one should use is that of a cloud—floating around without any attachments. That image is the ideal for Zen Buddhism, because it is the image of true freedom—freedom to practice Zen mediation and freedom, when the times comes, to die without attachments. As wonderful as that may sound to some of us, it isn’t very plausible.

The question we need to ask ourselves in response to this morning’s Gospel is this: if Jesus came to us today and told us to abandon everything we have right here and right now, and follow him, would we? If Jesus asked us to abandon our families, our friends, our cars, our bank accounts, the way of life we have become accustomed to—would we? Or more importantly, could we?

The fact is, Jesus isn’t going to call us in such a way. But what the Gospel for today hopefully shows us that we need to be aware of our attachments. We need to be aware that, one day, Jesus, will in fact, call us to himself.

One day, Jesus will take us to himself. And on that day, we will ultimately break all of our unhealthy attachments, whether we want to or not. And this is what Jesus, I think, is preparing us for. Jesus is preparing us for the Kingdom of Heaven, for that place in which everything we hold dear here on earth—along with all our sorrows and fears and frustrations—simply pass away.

The message is clear—don’t allow your unhealthy attachments to come between God and you. Don’t allow anything to come between God and you. If Jesus came to us here and now and asked us to give away everything and follow him, most of us couldn’t to do it. I don’t think I could do it. And when we realize that, we suddenly realize how hard it is to gain heaven. It truly is like a camel passing through the eye of the needle. But the day will come when everything we have will pass from us.

We all know the old saying, “we can’t take it with us.” And we can’t. That money we saved over the years isn’t coming with us when Jesus calls us. That car, that house, that bank account is staying here when we finally shed everything and moved into the nearer presence of God. Even these bodies that we obsess over, that we stress over, that we despair over when they start growing old and start aching—even the attachment we have to this body will be broken.

For us, in this moment, this might be a reason to despair. But the fact is, how else can we come before God? How else can we truly and wholly appear before God, except naked and poor, trusting completely in the God who gave us all that we had in the first place. When we get to where we’re going, we go with a trust like we have never known before. We go with that trust that God will give us more than we could even ask for in that new life with God.

This is what Jesus is getting at in today’s Gospel. So, enjoy those “things” you have. Take pleasure in them. But recognize them for what they are. They are only temporary joys. They come into in your life and they will go out of your life, sort of like that Zen cloud. All those things you hold dear, will pass away from you. Cling instead, to God and to the healthy bonds that you’ve formed with God and with your loved ones—with your spouse or partner, your children, your family and your friends. Make the attempt to see that what you have is temporary. Be prepared to shed every attachment you have if you need to. And when the day comes when Jesus calls you by your name, you can simply run to him and follow him wherever he leads you.

17 Pentecost

September 27, 2009

Mark 9:38-50

This coming Thursday marks a big day in my life. October 1st is my one year anniversary as the Priest-in-Charge of St. Stephen’s. And I can say that, for me anyway, it has been a GREAT year! And since my contract is being renewed, I think most of you are all right with me as well. But for me, this year at St. Stephen’s has been a exciting. And as I’ve gotten to know this wonderfully eclectic congregation called St. Stephen’s, I realize I am very lucky to be serving such a congregation. I have personally have learned much in my time here—namely, what it means to service fully and completely in Jesus’ Name.

In this morning’s Gospel, we find the followers of Jesus coming to him and complaining about someone—an outsider, not one of the inner circle of Jesus’ followers—who is casting out demons in Jesus’ name. We don’t know who this person was—we never hear anything more about him. Possibly it was one of those many multitudes of people who were following him around, observing all that he had done. Possibly it was someone who was trying to be like Jesus. More likely it was a genuine follower of Jesus who simply had not—for whatever reasons—made it into the inner circle of Jesus’ followers. However, the apostles do not like it. They are threatened by this person—this outsider. And because he is an outsider, they want it stopped. So, thinking he will put an end to it, they go to Jesus. You can almost hear them as they whine and complain to him about this supposedly pretentious person.

But Jesus—once again—does not do what they think he will do. Jesus tells them two things: first “for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me.” And the big one—the most obvious one (you would think)—
“Whoever is not against us is for us.”
You would think that we—the Church—would have learned from this story. You think we would have been able to have heard this story and realized that, if we are all working together for the same goal—for the furthering of the Kingdom of God in our midst—then, we are all working together in Jesus’ name.

But the fact is, we have not quite “got it.” Over the recent history of the church, we have seen that the Church has at times acted like the disciples in today’s Gospel. Now, when I’m talking about the Church—capital C—I am talking about the human-run organization of the Church. As such, let’s face it, it is an imperfect structure. It has the same faults and failings of all human-run organizations—no matter how blessed it claims to be by God.
I will admit one thing to you—and for those of you who have come to know me in this last year at St. Stephen’s, this comes as no great surprise—but, I have a love-hate relationship with the organized Church.

I truly love the Church. I love serving God’s people within the structure of the Episcopal Church and I love serving here at St. Stephen’s. I also love serving the Diocese of North Dakota as the Bishop’s Executive Assistant. I love the Church’s traditions. I love its liturgy. As I’ve mentioned many times here before you, I love being a priest. And, on really good days, I am so keenly aware that the Church truly is a family. We are a family that might not always get along with each other, but when it comes right down to it, we do love each other . And I have never seen that more keenly than here at St. Stephen’s. Certainly, we here, at St. Stephen’s, are very much a family.

Now I know St. Stephen’s has a reputation. It has a reputation, rightly so, of being the first on many issues. It has been the first in women serving fully and completely. And it has been a first in gay and lesbian serving fully and completely. And I love to be serving in a church that has been the first in both of these issues.

But even so, I will be just as honest that there are many days in which I find being a member of the Church—capital C— a burden. The Church—as most of us know—can be a fickle place to be at times. It can be a place where people are more interested in rules and dogmas than a place that furthers the love of God and of each other. It can be a place where people are so caught up in doing right, that they run rough-shod over people who truly need the Church and who truly long for God.

When I was ordained a deacon, I remember a colleague of mine—someone who knew about my love-hate relationship with the Church—saying to me that they found it amazing that I—of all people—was putting on the “uniform” of the organized Church. I remember being shocked by that statement. For some reason I hadn’t even considered the fact that I would now be a representative of something that I wasn’t certain I wanted to represent.

In the years since my ordinations, I have found that, yes, I am a representative of the Church in ways others might not be. The collar I wear instantly labels me and there have been many people who have come up to me, because of the collar I wear, and have made assumptions about where I must stand on certain issues in the Church. Sometimes, they are shocked to find that I don’t hold the opinions they think I should. And sometimes, people are downright offended that I don’t. Sometimes people are especially shocked to hear that I—an ordained priest—would even dare profess the hate side of my love-hate relationship with the Church. But not being honest about it only helps perpetuate the hypocrisy the Church so often is accused of.

When I look at the Church as it is right now—with all its wrangling and arguing—I can honestly and clearly hear the voices of those disciples of Jesus in this morning’s Gospel. I can hear their statement as one of anger and one of frustration and one of jealousy. People in the Church on all sides of the issues are condemning each other, bashing each other and demeaning each other in the name of the Church as we speak. People—because of their differences—are not acting like they love each other. They are not acting like a family.

I see the Church, at times, as making a real solid effort to be what Jesus wanted it to be. If I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t be here in the Church. One aspect of the Church that I have always loved is the belief—and the fact— that there is room here for everyone in the Church—no matter who they are. I feel there is room for people who have differing views in the Church. Not everyone has to agree. But we all do have to make room for each other here. The Church however doesn’t always see itself in such a way.

Like the disciples in today’s Gospel, the governments of the Church like to claim that only they know who can and who cannot do God’s work in the world. When an upstart—when a person marginalized by society—comes along and tries to do God’s work in Jesus’ name, the Church very often tries to put an end to it.

Look at our recent history in the church. Thirty years ago, the issue was women. Can women be priests? A lot of people said, “absolutely not.” And people on both sides of the issue were ugly and mean and vicious and hateful to each other about it. One side said, “if we ordain women, the Church will fall apart.” The other side said, “If we don’t ordain women the church will fall apart.” Well, the Church hasn’t fallen apart. We’re still here and, I personally can’t help but believe we’re a much better place for allowing women to serve us as priests. When I think of what the church would be like without women priests, or gay and lesbian priests, I think it is a bleak and ugly place.

As Anglicans, I have loved the fact that there has always been room for everyone. But we also have to make for room for people we might label as “conservative.” There is also room for people we might not agree with 100%. There is room for people who challenge us and provoke us and jar us out of what can very easily devolve into self-righteous complacency.

As Scot McKnight says in his delightful book, Embraced by Grace:

“In God’s equality, difference is maintained and loved.”

Who are we to judge who God calls to serve? God decides these things. Our job as Christians is simply this: we must love in Jesus’ Name.

As Jesus says in today’s in Gospel, “Whoever is not against us is for us.” For those people who throw up their hands and say, “This doesn’t have anything to do with me.” I say, “Yes, it does.” We are all family. We are all in this together. And we need to love each other, in Jesus’ name. This Church that I love is a wonderful place to be at times. And I think it is a place from which everyone can benefit. Like those disciples, none of us is perfect. All of us are fractured, sinful people at times. Because we are fractured sinful people, isn’t it wonderful that we have a place to come to even when we’re fractured and sinful, a place where we are not judged, a place where we are welcomed for who and what we are. This is the ideal of the Church. This is the place Jesus intended it be.

The Name of Jesus puts all of us on common ground. The Name of Jesus makes us all equal. The Name of Jesus eliminates those fringes of society, those marginalized places and makes us all part of the inner circle. We—all of us—are the inner circle of Jesus’ followers, no matter who we are.

So remember, the Church is not an exclusive club. It is not a club for everyone who believes exactly the same thing. Following Jesus means making room for the person we might not agree with. Following Jesus means walking alongside someone whom no one else loves or cares for. Following Jesus means, as he tells us this morning, being at peace with each other. Following Jesus means loving each other—no matter who or what we are.

This is what, I think we are doing here at St. Stephen’s. All of us, in our own ways, are attempting to follow Jesus here. That is why I am very happy to be here, with you. Together, here, we are serving each other, we are serving those who need to be served, we are reaching out in love, in Jesus Name. So, let us, together, continue to do just that. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

16 Pentecost

September 20, 2009

Psalm 54

Now, for those of you who know me, I know this is very hard to believe, so bear with me. I—sweet, humble Father Jamie—have a bit of an ego. I know, it’s hard to wrap your minds around. I know that you can’t imagine that I—of all people—would have an ago. But I do. In fact, we all do.

The center of our universe is none other than our very own selves. As much as we try to ignore that fact or deny it—it’s true. And as a result, we often find that our egos sometimes take a beating. We often find ourselves threatened or jealous or angry at someone simply because they are who they are. Or, worse yet, we oftentimes find people who, for some reason we might not fully understand, simply don’t like us. In those moments when our egos take a licking, we find ourselves lashing out at them. Sometimes we are petty to them. Sometimes we mean to them. Sometimes we are do cruel things to them, because we think it will make our egos feel better.

Sometimes, this lashing out at our enemies happens right in the Bible. Occasionally, in the Psalms, we do come across language that we might find uncomfortable. Often in the Lectionary of the Church—the assigned readings from the Bible that we share each Sunday morning—some of those phrases that some people might find offensive are found bracketed. In those cases, we have the option to not use such language. The language, after all, is violent often. It is not the language good Christian people should use. After all, we’ve been taught to pray for our enemies. We been taught to love our enemies. We have been taught that if we have enemies who strike at us, we should turn the other cheek. But today, we get his little tidbit:

“render evil to those who spy on me;
in your faithfulness destroy them.”

This verse is not bracketed—it’s actually fairly minor in tone compared to some of the bracketed verses in other Psalms. But for many us, as we sing it, it might give us pause. This is not the kind of prayer we have been taught to pray. As I said, we have been taught to pray for our enemies, not pray against them. None of us would ever even think of praying to God to destroy anyone. It’s just not the kind of prayers good, God-fearing pray.

But the fact is, although we find it hard to admit at times, we do actually think and feel this way. Even if we might not actually say it, we sometimes secretly wish the worse for those people who have wronged us in whatever way. I like to think that, rather than this being negative or wrong, that we should, in fact, be honest about it. We sometimes get angry at people. We sometimes don’t like people. And sometimes we might just hate people. It’s a fact of life—not one wants to readily admit to, but it is there. Sometimes it is hard to love our enemies. Sometimes it is probably the hardest thing in the world to pray for people who have hurt us or wronged us.

So, what do we do in those moments when we can’t pray for our enemies—when we can’t forgive? Well, most of us just simply close up. We put up a wall and we swallow that anger and we let it fester inside us. Especially those of us who come from good Scandinavian stock. We simply don’t wail and complain about our anger or our losses. We tend to deny it.

But what about that anger in relationship to God? Well, again, we probably don’t recognize our anger before God nor do we bring it before God. And that is where Psalms of this sort come in. It is in those moments when we don’t bring our anger and our frustration before God, that we need those verses like the one we encounter in today’s Psalm. When we look at those poets who wrote this Psalm—when we recognize her or him as a Jew in a time of war or famine—we realize that for the poet—for the Psalmist—it was natural to bring everything before God. It didn’t matter what it was. And I think this is the best lesson we can learn from the Psalmist than anything else.

We can not hide that “shadow side” of ourselves from God. And we all have one. We all have that dark side of ourselves—that part of ourselves that dwells on the fringes—in the dark recesses of our lives and our existence. It is that dark self that makes itself known when our egos are wronged. This is the self maybe no one else has ever seen—not even our spouse or partner. Maybe it is a side of ourselves we have not even acknowledged to ourselves. It is this part of ourselves that fosters anger and pride and lust. It is this side of ourselves that may be secretly violent or mean or gossipy. It is the side ourselves that fosters what St. Benedict calls in his Rule, “grumbling.”

Sometimes it will never make an appearance. It stays in the shadows and lingers there. Sometimes it actually does make itself known. Sometimes it comes plowing into our lives when we neither expect it nor want it. But as much we try to deny it or ignore it or hide it, the fact is; we can never hide it from God.

It’s incredible really when you think about it: that God, who knows even that shadow side of us—that side of us we might not even fully know ourselves—God who knows us even that completely still loves us and is with us.

Few of us lay that shadow self before God. But the Psalmist does, in fact bring it out before God. The Psalmist wails and complains to God and lays bare that shadow side of him or herself. The Psalmist is blatantly honest before God.

The fact is: sometimes we do secretly wish bad things on our enemies. Sometimes we do wish God would render evil on those who are evil to us. Sometimes we do hope that God will completely wipe away those people who hurt us form our lives. Sometimes we do grumble and complain about others. It is in those moments, that it is all right to pray to God in such a way. It is all right to wish bad things on our enemies to God. It all right to say to God, “God, wipe away my enemies.” It is all right to grumble and complain before God.

Because the fact is—as we’ve all learned by now—just because we pray for it doesn’t mean God is going to grant it. God knows what to grant in prayer and why. The important thing here is not what we are praying for. It is not important that in this Psalm we are praying for God to destroy our enemies. It is important that, even in our anger, even in our frustration and our pain, even grumbling and complaining, we have come to God. We have come before God as imperfect people. We have come to God with our big, giant egos. We have come to God with a long dark shadow trailing us.

I have heard people say that we shouldn’t pray these difficult passages of the Psalms because they are “bad theology” or “bad psychology.” They are neither. They are actually good theology and good psychology. Take what it is that is hurting you and bothering you and release it. Let it out before God. Be honest with God. Even if your anger is directed at God for whatever reason, be honest with God. Rail and rant and rave at God in your anger. God can take it.

But, the Psalms teach us as well that once we have done that—once we have opened ourselves completely to God—once we have revealed our shadows to God—then we must turn to God and praise God for the goodness in our lives as well. See what we find in today’s Psalm after that little verse that may have caught us?

I will offer you a freewill sacrifice
and praise your name, O LORD, for it is good.


See, it is good theology; it is good psychology. It’s good theology because we are being open and honest in our relationship with God. And it is good psychology because we not carrying around that psychological baggage that can hurt us and eventually destroy us. Hatred and anger and pain are things that, in the long run, make us less than who we are meant to be.

At some point, as we all know, we must grow beyond whatever anger we might have. We must not get caught in that self-destructive cycle anger can cause. We must not allow those negative feelings to make us bitter.

In the same way it’s good psychology and good theology when we can recognize that shadow side of ourselves and, like our stubborn egos, we can see it for what it is: an illusion. It is not us—not who we really are. It is a fragment of ourselves and one that simply dissolves in the Light of God that we find shining on us in Jesus.

So, when we pray these psalms together and we come across those verses that might take us by alarm, recognize in them what they truly are—honest prayers before God More importantly, pray those psalms when you are angry or frustrated. Pray those psalms when your ego is strutting about thinking it is so wonderful. Pray those psalms when you are grumbling and complaining. Let the Psalms help you to release your shadow side to the God who loves you and knows you more completely than anyone else.

A bit of good news

September 17, 2009

Greetings,

As I shared with you last week, This Grass, a book of my poems and paintings by artist Gin Templeton, is scheduled to be published in December, 2009.

This afternoon, as Gin and I were meeting to discuss that book, I received an email from the Institute for Regional Studies at North Dakota State University, informing that another book of my poems, Fargo, 1957, was accepted for publication.

As some of you know, this was the book I was researching in the summer of 2008, concerning the tornado that struck Fargo on June 20, 1957. Twelve people were killed in that tornado including my mother’s cousin, Betty Jo Titgen and her husband Don.

I very pleased that these two books will be published. Samplings of the poems from these books can be found at my website:

http://jamieparsley.com/


I have also included a poem from Fargo, 1957 below.

I will keep you posted on publications dates, readings, etc as they become available.


-peace,
Jamie Parsley+


)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))



We Gasp


It was a gasp—
a breath—
they heard first.

A steady mantra
came from someplace
beyond it

and yet around it all at once.
Then the shadow came,
cold and black—

a strong body
and a rush of air
moving against the day,

against the persistent flatness
of the place below it.
It went on through them

and beyond them,
who squinted into the gray slate
of the half-night,

measuring it as it rose,
circled,
fell,

then rose again—
perfect and precise
over the churning chaos it wreaked.


--Jamie Parsley
(from Fargo, 1957)

15 Pentecost

September 13, 2009

Psalm 116.1-8; Mark 8.27-38

It is appropriate in more ways than one to speak about the Cross today. Not only do we encounter language concerning the Cross in our Gospel reading, but, tonight is the eve of the Feast of Holy Cross. Here at St. Stephen’s, we will celebrate the Feast of the holy Cross on Wednesday at our mid-week Eucharist.

Also, today is Dedication Sunday. It is the Sunday in which we commemorate the dedication of St. Stephen’s congregation around this date in 1956. And today, on Dedication Sunday, we are dedicating…we are dedicating our Children’s Chapel. At our service for dedication after this Eucharist, we will go down and participate in consecrating and setting aside that chapel for God’s use. We will bless the chapel. And we will stand before the Cross that not hangs above the altar in that chapel.

Today and this coming week we are surrounded by the image of the Cross. And that’s not such a terrible image to have before us always.

Yes, it is a symbol of capital death, of execution, of torture and murder. Yes, it is not a pleasant , beautiful thing, despite all the decorating we have done to the Cross through art and paint and imagination.

But the Cross, whether we like it or not, is the symbol of our faith. On it, died the one we follow. On it we saw ultimate defeat. And in the face of that defeat, we saw ultimate victory.

The Cross, as much as it a symbol of death and of our faith, is really a symbol of the paradox of all we believe as Christians.

And in our scriptures for today, we find that paradox played out more poignantly not in our Gospel reading, in which Jesus tells us to take up our cross and follow him (though there is a beautiful paradox being played out there), but rather in our psalm.

Throughout my life in the church, I have heard many different styles of preaching. I have known pastors who have preached on every scripture reading assigned by the lectionary for a particular Sunday. Probably most of us have heard some of those pastors preach. Certainly in those days in which twenty- even thirty-minute long sermons were the norm, we all got our full of what each scripture meant and why it was meaningful to us.

I have also known pastors who have preached on a just one word from the scriptures reading for the day. Most pastors (including myself) prefer to preach the Gospel reading where there is such a wealth of vital spiritual help contained in the words of Jesus.

But one area I have heard very few preachers preach from is the book of psalms. One of the few sermons I remember hearing as a little boy was on the Psalms. The pastor at Maple Sheyenne Lutheran Church preached on Psalm 56 (verse 8), the one about the Lord collecting every tear we cry into a bottle. The actual verse is:

“You have noted my lamentation;
you have put my tears into your bottle.”

Now, of course, at that age I would never have known if he was preaching on a psalm or a Gospel or whatever, but what I do remember, even to this day, is the Pastor holding up a bottle of milky water that he said was filled with tears. It was a powerful image for me at that age. And it was, I think, the beginning of my love for the Psalms. Over the years since, as I’ve come across verse 8 in Psalm 56, I remember for a moment how I felt that Sunday morning all those years ago when that Pastor held that bottle up.

Outside of that, I don’t remember any priest or pastor ever preaching on the psalms—or certainly never preaching an entire sermon on just the psalms. And I realize that, by not preaching on the psalms on occasion, preachers really are missing out on some beautiful images that can help all of us in our relationship with God.

All my life I have been drawn to the psalms. Although I have received much consolation from the Gospels and have enjoyed reading the Wisdom Books and the Prophets from the Old Testament, the book that I have come back to again and again in scripture, is the Book of Psalms.

I have kept up a practice for the last ten years or so of praying the Daily Office—the services of Morning and Evening Prayer from the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer. These services revolve, in a sense, around the daily reading from the Psalms. The Psalms, in the Daily Office, are used very much as prayer. Psalms can be read, but Psalms are most effective when they are actually prayed—when we use them as prayer. After praying the psalms in such a way, one finds that they, in a way somewhat different than other scriptures, really do seep into one’s very spiritual core. To use language form the psalms, they “seep into our bones like oil.” They speak to us in a way few other scriptures do.

The reason they are so appealing to me personally is because I am a poet. I know a few things about poetry after living the life of a poet for over twenty years.

And as a poet and priest, I love to preached on some of the poetic language we find in the scriptures and how sometimes it is good to have a poet in the pulpit (sometimes it’s bad to have a poet in the pulpit, especially when he or she gets a little too fancy in their language).

What so many people seem to forget about the psalms is that they are poems. Yes, originally they were written to be sung. But as well know, the words to songs are poems. Poems were originally written to be sung.

A few years ago, I taught a day-long poetry workshop at Oak Grove Lutheran School here in Fargo. I taught an hour-long course to each grade—sixth through twelfth grade. At first, you could tell that the last thing these kids wanted to do was learn about poetry. Partly the reason for this was because they always associated poetry with those rhyming poems about roses and clouds. But when I started to share with them that the words to all those songs they listened to—even the words of rap music—were poems, I saw something open up within them. And when they engaged in their own “rap battles” in the class, their appreciation for poetry changed. I was told later by faculty there that they were amazed to find teenaged boys sharing poems with each other at lunch that day.

When we look at the psalms as poems—when we recognize the poetic language contained within them and within much of scripture— most of us find ourselves coming away from the psalms with a deeper understanding of them. The language and the imagery of these poems has spoken to us for thousands of years, in much the same way the words to our favorite songs have.

Look back over your own lives. How many times—at how many funerals—have we found ourselves comforted by the words of the 23rd Psalm? Think of how many times you may have prayed these Psalms in church on Sunday over the course of your lifetime. The reasons the Psalms are so important to us is because they are so universal. They cover the whole gamut of emotions and feelings. It’s the one part of the Bible we all know we can turn to and find just what we need when we need it. When we are angry or frustrated, it’s not hard to find a psalm that addresses that feeling. If we are joyful and happy, there are psalms for that as well. When we feel as though we’ve been betrayed and slighted, there are psalms there for us at that moment as well.

Today we the beginning section of Psalm 116. At first, as we read it, we might think that it has a tone of self-centeredness. The psalm is not a collective—it is not “us” collectively, who are praying here—it very much singular.

“I” love the LORD who has heard “my” voice.

We’re not talking about common prayer here. We are talking about individual prayer. Another reason why the psalms are so vital is that they are very much the prayers of each of us as individuals. The psalms involve God and you. As we continue on in the psalm, we find the poet giving us a bit of background. Obviously he or she is emerging from a life-altering experience.

“The cords of death entangled me,”

“The anguish of the grave came upon me.”

This is not light and airy verse. These are the words of the Cross. These are words that could easily have been sung while someone hung on the cross of their death.

Psalm 116 isn’t a poem of roses and clouds. This is heavy language and heavy imagery. And language we don’t often use for ourselves. The first thought might be of an illness that has brought someone close to death.

But we need to remember here, that it is a poet writing these words. Poetic language is sometimes not as literal as we might think it is.

Oftentimes in our lives—when we have been so filled with despair, with depression, with fear—we might often feel as though death has, in fact, entangled us. Certainly in those moments when we are feeling desolate and down, life seems far away from us, while death seems too close for comfort. And if we are looking at it from a spiritual point of view, spiritual death is always lurking closer to us than we might want to admit. It is easy to fall into the snares of despair. It is easy to find our feelings of spiritual life far from us and a spiritual darkness and death come over us. In those moments, we do truly come to “grief and sorrow.”

However, in the psalms—even the laments and the dirges—those psalms that deal with the depressions and despairs of this life—those moments when one cries out to God and complains to God—even in those psalms there is always a moment, when everything turns for the better. This psalm starts out on a dark note, but there comes the moment, when the poet turns from despair and illness and looks to God—to the Life and Light God grants. The poet at this point calls out to God, “Save my life.”

And here is the paradox we are dealing with. The poet is vindicated in calling out to God in the midst of despair. The poet is innocent—of what we’re not certain, possibly innocent of whatever sins he or she feels punished for by depression or illness. And God, who is gracious and righteous and full of compassion, hears the prayer and grants it.

God saves the poet.

So, in a matter of moments, we have gone from complete despair—from a place near death—to a place of absolute joy. The restless soul of the poet finds its rest in the peace and calm of God’s Presence. The eyes that were once filled with tears have been rescued from their crying, the feet that stumbled in their weakness are now steady and full of strength, because of God’s life-giving presence. And this section of the psalms ends on a note exactly opposite of how it began. Those images of being entangled by death in the beginning of this section are replace by this incredible image of walking with God among the living.

Here we have a prime reason why the psalms are so powerful and important to us still. Most of us gathered here this morning can no doubt relate in many varying ways to this psalm. We know what this feeling is like—to be able to have our unhappiness turned to joy. Or if we don’t—and we haven’t experienced it—then we certainly long for it. Here, in the words of this psalm, are what we long for in our relationship with God. See how powerful and wonderful these psalms are. See what a storehouse of spiritual help these psalms contain.

So, take to heart the words of the psalms we pray each week. Don’t just take them for granted. Let them become your prayer as well. Take the psalm that we pray each week with you as you leave here and return to them often during the week. Read it again and again. And more importantly, pray it. Use it as your prayer as you take up your cross and follow Jesus where he goes. Like him pray it even from the crosses of your life. Even in those dark moments, let it be your voice that rises to God in joy and happiness in the face of the encroaching darkness. Let it be your voice that says,

“I love the LORD, who has heard my voice,
and listened to supplication.”