To our United Methodist brothers and sisters

Even on vacation, I have been watching the very disappointing vote yesterday regarding LGBTQ full-inclusion in the United Methodist Church closely. My disappointment in this vote is nothing compared to the ramifications this has for my many United Methodist friends and colleagues at this time. I worked in the UMC for a few years back in my 20s and was amazed by the incredible people I came to know and love (many of whom are still close and dear friends). I am especially grateful today for the several former United Methodists (including two former pastors) who are such a vital part at St. Stephen's.

5 Epiphany

February 10, 2019

Isaiah 6.1-13; Luke 5.1-11

+ Last week I observed a somewhat sobering anniversary. On January 29, I realized it had been twenty years since I began the process to be ordained in the Episcopal Church.

It was definitely a momentous moment in my life. Occasionally we have those moments in our lives when we look back and realize the life we lived before that ended on a particular day. These momentous moments happen and we realize life will never be the same again.

January 29, 1999 was one of those days in my life.  Life changed drastically for me on that day, though I didn’t fully realize at the time. And twenty years later, here it is.

As I look back at the 1999 Jamie, I wonder what I—2019 Jamie—would tell him.  Did he really know what he was getting himself into? It was definitely not an easy route he was about to take.

But despite all the heartache and pain, despite homophobia and the cancer and the really terrible people he would encounter at times along the way, at time of seeing the Church be a truly ugly, horrible place at times, despite the people who really did try to throw a wrench into the ministry 1999 Jamie felt called to do, who did not want him to be a priest, or to serve in the Church (and yes, there were lots of those people over the years), I have to ask myself; if I had to do it all over again, would I?

And the answer is: Yes.

Yes.

Because, the good of these years definitely outweighs the bad.  There were so many more good people, supportive people, loving people who were there for me. And the Church, as a whole, really is not a terrible corrupt place.  It really isn’t.

And, of course, I have to accept the greatest reality in all of this: there was God with me through it all.  God held me up and led me through. Or, as the hymn we will sing later today says,

“I will go, Lord, if you lead me.”

God led me.

In the ordination process, there were several scriptures that were often used to describe the discernment and ordination processes.

Our reading from the prophet Isaiah is definitely one of the scriptures people in the process quote often.  A very powerful image of the call and response process of ordination is right there, with God, on the throne, asking:

“Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?”

And Isaiah’s response of “Here am I; send me!”

For me, I realize, that call is still resounding my own life:

“Whom shall I send?” God still is asking in my life.

And even 20 years after first heeding that call, I can say again, now:

“Here am I; send me!”

Another of those discernment images was the one we get in today’s Gospel reading. And, like the scripture from Isaiah,  it works. And, like the reading from Isaiah, it’s not just for people who seek ordination. It works for all of us in our ministries.

In that Gospel for today, we have an interesting dynamic happening.  A very enthusiastic crowd has gathered beside the water to hear Jesus preach. Jesus, in a sense, use the boat of these work-weary fishermen for a pulpit to preach to the crowd.

Now, put yourself, for a moment, in the place of those fishermen. They have been working all night. They are trying to come home, clean up and go to bed.

Still, Simon Peter agrees and Jesus beings to teach. Then, Jesus does something a bit strange. He tells these weary guys to throw their nets into the water.  Again, put yourself in the place of the fishermen. Here’s a carpenter’s son—a Rabbi—telling them to do even more work. Certainly anyone else would simply say no and go home.

But not these guys.  They do as Jesus says.  They put the boat out into the water, they put down their nets.  And what happens?  They get fish.

I know none of you this morning fish for a living. For most of us here, in this part of the country, if we fish, we do so for sport. (I don’t fish; I’m vegan. I have never understood why people fish for sport anyway)

So, to some extent, we might not “get” the imagery here. Or rather, we might not “get” the imagery in quite the same way those fishermen Jesus spoke to in today’s Gospel would have.

When Jesus talks about “catching” people for God, it might not mean the same thing for us as it did for those disciples—those men whose very livelihood was catching fish.  Jesus is using their language to make real what they are called to do in following him. Jesus is using what they knew and held dear to go out and do what he is calling them to do.  He is not over-intellectualizing this for them. He is not making it complicated. He is being as straightforward as one can get.

You—fishermen—go out and catch people like you would catch fish.

And that is our job as well. We are called, just as those first disciples were, to bring back people for Christ. We are called just like the Prophets Isaiah, to respond, “Here am I! Send me!”

We are called to not be complacent in our faith. We cannot just sit on our hands and expect to feel good about being a Christian.  

To be a fully useful Christian, we need to go out and be a follower of Jesus in the world and, in doing, so, to bring others to God’s love.

Now, this sounds very uncomfortable for most of us. We have all encountered those somewhat unpleasant people who proselytize to us—who, very obviously, want to catch us.  They have come to our doors or they have called us on the phone or we have worked alongside them at work.  They are the people who preach AT us, who tell us that unless we accept Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior we won’t be saved. They are the ones who spout their memorized verses from their Bibles and give us religious pamphlets and are always talking about their plastic, blond white Protestant Jesus.   And more often than not what they do NOT do is draw us closer to Christ.

Rather, they often make us uncomfortable with the Christian faith.  I’ll be honest, they make even me uncomfortable at times. Often when I hear someone go off to me (and they like to do that to priests, let me tell you), I find myself sitting thee wishing I was Jewish or Buddhist.  Their Christ—their blond plastic Protestant Jesus—seems so unpleasant and alien to those of who strive to know the true Christ.

Now, we Episcopalians just don’t do things like that. We’re not comfortable knocking on doors or spouting Bible passages at strangers or co-workers. After all, doing so rarely works.  And that kind of proselytizing has done great harm in people’s lives.

By spouting Bible passages and waving Bibles at people and demanding that people accept Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior (which, by the way, is completely unscriptural) , and inflicting the fear of hell into people, we aren’t really evangelizing.  We are just manipulating. We are just coercing.  We are just hiding. We are hiding behind the Bible, hiding behind platitudes and tired catch-phrases. We are preaching with our mouths, but not with our hearts and our lives.  Bringing people for Christ sometimes involves nothing more than being who we are and what we are.

I worked with a priest once who loved to repeat something St. Francis of Assisi supposedly said:

“Preach the Gospel, use words only if necessary.”

I like that quote.  And it’s true.

Oftentimes, the loudest preaching we’re ever going to do is by what we do and how we act. By being who we are.  Even being the imperfect, fractured human beings that we are.  And, let me tell you, what we do and how we act is sometimes much harder than preaching with our mouths and hiding behind memorized Bible verses.

In a sense, our very lives should be one long proclamation of the Gospel.

We all should be living the Gospel in our very lives, and then our proclamation comes naturally in how we live and interact with people. We should be clear to those around us who we are:

Yes, we’re Christians—we’re followers of Jesus, just as those people in the boat in today’s Gospel were.

Yes, we’re Episcopalian Christians.

But how do we live that out in our lives? How does that fact become a way to bring people to Christ?

Now for each of here this morning, that might be something different. For one it might mean inviting someone to St. Stephen’s, which I know many of you do. To others it might simply mean living our lives a little differently than our neighbors do, even living our lives a little different than what is expected of Christians to do.  

For many of us, it means standing up and speaking out loudly when we see injustice and oppression and sexism and homophobia and transphobia or any other kind of oppression that causes people to be less than who they are.  And to do so in the name of Christ.

And not just speak out. But to actually live that way of life. To not treat others disrespectfully. To not ignore the homeless in our midst, to not ignore those who are invisible to others.  To do whatever we can to change injustice and oppression, in the name of our God in any way we can.

It might mean being just a compassionate human being in this world.

It might just being a kind, loving person in this world.

Whatever we do—however we do it—all we have to remember is that it is not us who does the proclaiming. It is not us who does the catching, ultimately. It is God’s Spirit in us who does the proclaiming and the catching. And our job is to simply let God use us as we need to be used to bring people to God. It is sometimes as simple as letting God use our actions and our way of life to bring people closer to God.

It doesn’t have to be hard or complicated. It can be as simple as Jesus telling fishermen to bring in people like they bring in fish. It can be as simple as living a life of integrity and uprightness and holiness in all that we do and say. It is as simple as living a life in which we do not allow injustice and oppression to happen around us.

So, let us listen together to what Jesus is saying to us this morning. Bring in people to God.  Let us do it by whatever means we have. Let us do by words, if that works.  Let us do it by actions, if that works. Let us do it by the very ministry of our own selves. Let us hear God’s call to each of us:

“Who will I send? Who will go for us?”

And let us respond:

“Here am I! Send me!”

And let us let God, who dwells within us, use our voices to proclaim God’s words and presence to the world around us. Amen.

6 years meat-free

The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple

February 3, 2019

Luke 2. 22-40

+ So, let’s see if you can remember this. What happened 40 days ago yesterday?

I know it’s hard.

But, yes, Christmas happened 40 days ago yesterday.

I know it’s hard to even think of Christmas, now in early February. It feels so long ago already. But, 40 days ago we commemorated the birth of Jesus.

Which is why, today, we are commemorating the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple.  Which simply means that, in Jewish tradition, the first born son was to be presented to God in the Temple on the 40^th day after his birth.  And on that day, the child was to literally be redeemed.

This is reminiscent of the story of Abraham and his first son Isaac. But instead of an attempt to sacrifice the son, an animal sacrifice would’ve made in the place of the life of the son, which in the case of Jesus’ family who were poor, would have been two doves.

Now why, you might ask? Why 40 days? Well,  until about the Thirteenth century, it was often believed that the soul did not even enter a boy child until the 40^th day. (The soul entered a girl child on the 80^th day) I suppose this kind of thinking had to do with the high rates of infant mortality at the time.

So essentially, on the 40^th day, the boy child becomes human. The child now has an identity—a name.  And the child is now God’s own possession.

Now, we’ll get into the specifics of Jesus’ own particular presentation in the Temple in a moment.  For now, we just need to recognize that this feast of the Presentation has been an important one of the Church.

In fact, it’s been a very important feast in the Church from the very beginning. Of course the Eastern Church, which celebrates Jesus’ birth on January 6, doesn’t celebrate the Feast of the Presentation until when???    …    February 14^th.

This day is also called Candlemas, and today, of course, we at St. Stephen’s, in

keeping with a tradition going back to the very beginning of the Church, will bless the candles that will be used throughout the church year on this day.  In the early Church, all the candles that would be used in the Church Year and in individual people’s lives would be blessed on this day.  Here, as the hope of spring is in the air.  

The candles blessed on this day for personal use were actually considered a little more special than other candles. They were often lit during thunderstorms or when one was sick or they would be placed in the hands of one who was dying. The reason being, the flame of  blessed candle reminded people of God’s love and protection in their lives.   

It was also believed that the weather on this day decided what the rest of winter would be like.  In fact there was also a wonderful little tune used in rural England that went:

If Candlemas-day be fair and bright

Winter will have another fight

If Candlemas-day brings cloud and rain,

Winter won’t come again.

What does that sound like? Yes, Ground Hogs Day. In fact, Ground Hogs Day, which originated in Germany, was a Protestant invention to counteract what they perceived to be this Catholic feast—even though the Lutheran Church has always celebrated this feast.

Now all of that is wonderful and, I think, is interesting in helping understand this feast day and in its importance in the life of the Church and the world.  But the real message of this day is of course the fact, in presenting Jesus in  Temple, the Law of God in Jesus was being fulfilled.

This morning, in this feast,  we find the old and the new meeting. That is what this feast we celebrate today is really all about . The Feast of the Presentation is all about the Old and the New meeting.

 In fact, in the Eastern Orthodox Church, this feast is called the Meeting  of Christ with Simeon.

In our Gospel reading for today, we find Simeon representing the Old Law. He is the symbol of the Old Testament—the old Law. We have Simeon who, it seems, is a priest in the Temple. He is nearing the end of  his life.  He knows he is in his last days. But he also knows something new is coming. Something new and wonderful and incredible is about dawn.  The Messiah, he knows, is about to appear. And, of course, that is important for all Jewish people. This is the event they have been longing for, deeply.  If he was a priest, he performed those Levitical rites that fulfilled the Law. He oversaw the rites of purification.

Mary herself—as a devout Jew—would certainly be going through the purification rites all mothers had to go through on this fortieth day, according to the Law we find in the Book of Leviticus.  

Simeon would also have presided over the dedication service of the new child to God, which, of course, would have included both his naming and his circumcision.  All of this fulfils the Old Law.

Then, of course, there is a figure who we always seem to overlook in the scripture. The Prophet Anna.  I like Anna for some reason.  She seems to be the bridge here.  She seems to come forward out of the background.

Now whether she recognizes Jesus has the Messiah is not clear.  But it seems like she suspects that’s who he is.  What she sees is Jesus—born under the most unusual of circumstances.

In case we forgot what happened 40 days ago, he was conceived and born of a virgin, with angels in attendance, with a bright shining star in the sky and mysterious strangers coming from the East.

These are signs.  This is no ordinary person. This is the Messiah. This is the Son of God whom God has sent to us.  And in Jesus, we have the Law fulfilled.

Eventually, in this baby that comes before Simeon, the old Law and the New Law become blended and brought together.  The Law is fulfilled in this baby, who will grow up, to proclaim God’s kingdom in a way no else has before or since.

But no doubt we start asking this important question: why do we even need the Old Testament. If Jesus came to fulfill it, it seems pointless. But what we need to remember is that this New Law does not overcome or cancel out the old Law. It only solidifies it. It makes it more real.

The Old Law will simply change because now there will be no more need of animal sacrifices and atonement offerings. In Jesus—this ultimate Lamb of God—those offerings are taken away. They were needed then. They are not needed now. But they foreshadowed what was to come. We have one offering—that offering of Jesus on the Cross—and through it we are all purified.

But even more so than that. This Feast of the Presentation is about us as well. We too are being Presented today.  We too are presented before God—as redeemed and reborn people. We too are being brought before God in love.

And just as the favor of God was upon Jesus, so that same favor is upon each of us as well.  From this day forward we know that we are loved and cherished and favored by God. We know that we are all essentially loved children of God, because Jesus, the first born, led the way for us. 

The Old Law hasn’t been done away for us. Rather, the Old Law has been fulfilled and made whole by the New . Everything that the Old Law was anticipating was fulfilled in the New Law.  

We see that there is a sort of reverse eclipsing taking place. The Old Law is still there. But the New has overtaken it and outshines it.

See, it really is a wonderful day we celebrate today. The Feast of the Presentation speaks loudly to us on many levels. But most profoundly it speaks to us of God’s incredible love for us.

So, this morning, on this Candlemas, let us be a light shining in the darkness. Let us carry that light of God within us like the Christ Child who was presented in the Temple.  We, like Jesus being presented to Simeon, are also be presented before God today and always.

So let us rejoice.  Let us speak to all who are looking for redemption. And with Simeon, let us sing:

“Now you may dismiss your servant in peace, according to your word;

For my eyes have now seen your salvation which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples.”

Amen.

3 Epiphany

Annual Meeting Sunday

January 27, 2019

Luke 4.14-21

+Today is, of course, our Annual Meeting Sunday. And it’s the Sunday when I usually preach a sermon about the uniqueness of this place we call St. Stephen’s. And I will do it again today.

We ARE, as you all know, a unique place. There are not many church congregations like us. 

We are a blend of all the things that makes the Church what it is.  But our uniqueness is not just in our blending of Protestant and Catholic, in Evangelical and Liberal, in Broad Church and Anglo-Catholic/High Church—all of which make us truly and totally Anglican.  We are, after all,  Episcopalians within the Anglican tradition. And this is Anglicanism.

 Our uniqueness is not just in the fact that we honor Scripture and the saints and social justice and the worth and dignity of all human beings all at once.  There are other congregations like that in the Episcopal Church

Our uniqueness is just in who we are. Our uniqueness is in the fact that we are not a highly polished church with matching pews.

 Our uniqueness is in the fact that when it seems the odds were against us, we find they have actually been with us.

We are a little church building, far off the beaten trek. We are here, tucked away in the far corner of northeast Fargo, in the shadow of the much larger Messiah Lutheran.

If we brought one of those experts on church growth in, they would tell us this: sell this building, move into a storefront or into some more visible place with much better foot traffic; conform a bit more to the Diocesan standards of what a congregation should be; don’t be so radial in what you do; choose one Christian expression and stick with it; if you’re evangelical, then go with it, if you’re Anglo-Catholic, then go with it. Advertise! And please, don’t be so liberal! Otherwise, they’ll never find you. And you’ll never grow.

And, of course:  liberal Anglo-Catholic congregations don’t grow!

I know that’s what they say, because I’ve heard it again and again.

But not us. Not the rebels that make up St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church.  Not this Island of Misfit Toys that we are!

And yet, when I tell people about St. Stephen’s, when I tell them about the amazing growth and vitality here, when I tell them about the diversity and the unique blend of people and spiritual expressions we have here, they are amazed by it.

Inevitably, I am asked, again and again, what is the secret of St. Stephen’s success. And what do I always answer?

The Holy Spirit.

Actually, no secret at all. And that is what it all comes down to. It is our total and complete surrender to God’s Spirit, working in our midst that is our success.

Well, that, and the hard work we are compelled by the Spirit to do here and in the world.

That’s it, in a nutshell.

Now, in our Gospel reading for today, we find a seed for all we do here at St. Stephen’s.  We find this story of Jesus, standing up and reading this amazing scripture from Isaiah.

‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
   because he has anointed me
     to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
   and recovery of sight to the blind,
     to let the oppressed go free, 
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’

He then, after rolling up the scroll, says,

‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’

Those words echo in our midst, here at St. Stephen’s this morning.

Do you hear it?

Listen.

‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’

Because, yes, today, that scripture from Isaiah has been fulfilled in our hearing.

By Jesus standing and proclaiming who is and what he has come to do, he really sets the standard for us here at St. Stephen’s on this Annual Meeting Sunday in 2019 as well.  We too should proclaim our faith in Jesus in the same way.

Now, as I say that I pause.

Most Christians take that to mean something I did not intend it to mean.  When I say “faith in Jesus,” I don’t mean we should be obnoxious and fundamentalist or bullies in our views.  You have heard me say a million times from this pulpit that I think way too many Christians proclaim themselves as Christians with their lips, but certainly don’t live it out in their lives and by example (and I am guilty of this myself).

As the great theologian Richard Rohr famously says,

“We worship Jesus more than we follow Jesus.”

And the longer I am in the Church, the more I see this to be true. And the more I rebel against this traditional view of worship of over following Jesus. 

I see so many people in the larger Church staying safety in their church buildings, safely worshipping Jesus, but not going out into the world and living the Gospel of Jesus in their lives. To me, that is a classic example of Jesusolatry. That dangerous “me and Jesus” attitude is rampant in the Church. And all it is does is make Jesus into an idol, and it makes the Church an angry, exclusive country club.  And it is something at which I bristle again and again.

But for us, this Gospel reading for today speaks loudly to us and what we do as Christians, as followers of Jesus, as members of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church.  Because the Spirit of God was upon Jesus, and because he was appointed to bring good news to the poor, that truly becomes our mission as well because we follow Jesus and the Spirit of God rests upon each of us as well.  Because Jesus breathes God’s Spirit upon us, that same mission that the Spirit worked in Jesus is working in us as well.  

And we should, like Jesus, stand up and proclaim that mission to others. We, like Jesus, should breathe God’s Spirit on others.  That is our mission as followers of Jesus.

How do we do that?

Jesus has empowered us to do what he says in that reading from Isaiah:

We are to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of the sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Well, that sounds great. But…how do I do that in my life? It’s easy for priests and poets to say that, you might say. But how do I do that in my own life?  What does that mean to us—to us who are here, in this place, in these mismatched pews, who may be quietly judging this sermon with arms crossed?

It means that we are not to go about with blinders on regarding those with whom we live and work.  

It means that we are surrounded by a whole range of captives—people who are captive to their own prisons of depression and alcohol and drugs and conforming to society or whatever.

People who are captive to their grief or their pain or their own cemented views of what they feel the Church—or this congregation of St., Stephen’s—SHOULD be.  Our job in the face of that captivity it to help them in any way we can to be released.

It means that we are not to go about blind and not to ignore those who are blinded by their own selfishness and self-centeredness.

I am still so amazed by how many people (especially in the Church, amazingly enough) are so caught up in themselves.  I really think self-centered is a kind of blindness.  And Jesusolatry—me and Jesus—only feeds that self-centeredness.  

One of the greatest sins in the Church today is not all the things Bishops and church leaders say is dividing the Church. The greatest sin in the Church today:

Hubris.

Self-centeredness.

Selfishness.

Bullying.

That “me and Jesus” attitude that essentially throws everyone else to wayside.  Hubris causes us to look so strongly at ourselves (and at a false projection of ourselves) that we see nothing else but ourselves.

By reaching out to others, by becoming aware of what others are dealing with, by helping others, we truly open our eyes and see beyond ourselves.

When we do these things, we are essentially letting the oppressed go free.

Finally, we are called to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.  This is simply the icing on the cake.  Once we have proclaimed that God favors us—all of us—not just the single me—that God loves us—not just me—we must then proclaim God’s blessings on us and the work we are called to do.  And by doing so, we truly become liberated.

God favors a liberated people.  God does so because God can only effectively work through a people who have been liberated from captivity, blindness and oppression.

This to me is where the heart of all we do here at St. Stephen’s lies. It is not in our blind faithfulness to the letter of scripture. It is not in our incense and beautiful altar frontals and our stained glass windows and what hangs on our walls. (If you are caught up in those things, then there is blindness in that as well).   It is not in our smugness that I—the great and wonderful singular me—somehow knows more than the priest or the Church or the Bishops or our elders.

It is in our humility and the love of God that dwells within each of us.  It is the Spirit of the living God that is present with us, here, right now, in this church.  It is in the fact that even if this church building gets blown away, or even if we gloss ourselves up and match our pews and spit-shine our processional cross and preach sermons based squarely on the correct interpretation of scripture (whatever that might be) , we would still be who we are, no matter what.

We need to be aware that the poor and oppressed of our world—here and now—are not only those who are poor financially.  The poor and oppressed of our world are those who are morally, spiritually and emotionally poor. The oppressed are still women and LGBTQ people in the Church and in the world, or simply those who don’t fit the social structures of our society.  They are the elderly and the lonely.  They are those who mourn deeply for those they love and miss who are no longer with us.  They are the criminals trying to reform their lives, and for those who are just leading quietly desperate lives in our very midst.

We, as Christians, as followers of Jesus, are to proclaim freedom to all those people who are on the margins of our lives both personally and collectively.  And often those poor oppressed people are the ones to whom we need to be proclaiming this year of the Lord’s Favor, even if those people might be our own very selves.

This is the year of the Lord’s favor.

I am not talking this particular Year of Our Lord. I am not talking about this year until our next Annual Meeting.

I am talking about this holy moment and all moments in which we, anointed and filled with God’s Spirit, go out to share God’s good news by word and example.  This moment we have been given is holy. And it is our job is to proclaim the holiness of this moment.

When we do so, we are making that year of the Lord’s favor a reality again and again.  This is what we are called to do on this Annual Meeting Sunday.

And always.

So, let us proclaim the good news.  

Let us bring sight to the blind, and hope to those who are oppressed and hopeless.  

Let us bring true hope in our deeds to those who are crying out (in various ways) for hope, which only Jesus and his followers can bring.

And when we do, we will find the message of Jesus being fulfilled in our very midst.

20 years ago I began the ordination process

As I was cleaning out the last of my things from the Rectory I was pleasantly surprised to come across my Commonplace Book. This was the book we were expected to keep throughout the process of ordination in which we kept copies of all our documents, applications, etc. (are Commonplace Books still used in the ordination process?). I was also surprised to see that I began the process twenty years ago this month. 

Looking back on it, I realize it was a long, often overwhelmingly difficult journey for me to the Priesthood. 

The odds were most definitely against me. In fact, the first clergyperson I told I wanted to be a priest told me in no uncertain terms, “No. Absolutely not! It’s not going to happen in this Diocese…” 

But, as often happens, the doors that needed to open, opened. And by the grace

(and mystery) of God, I somehow made it, even despite the homophobia, the cancer diagnosis, the opposition of some downright mean-spirited people, people who both vocally and privately opposed me being a priest  along the way, the very intentional roadblocks that were put in my way.

But more importantly than any of that,  there were many, many more loving, supportive and caring people who truly held me up, who prayed for me and who walked alongside me. I am grateful for them all. And when I think of them, I realize that the Church, when it’s done right, is incredible and amazing!

2 Epiphany

January 20, 2019

Isaiah 62.1-5; John 2.1-11

+ I know. I joke about it often. I say I don’t like doing them. But…I actually really do. I really do like doing weddings. And I have been really fortunate to do some really great weddings in my career as a priest.

When they’re good, they’re great. When they’re not good…well…let’s just say, they’re not great…

Still, I actually do enjoy weddings that are truly joyful events in which two people express their love and their commitment for each other.  Of course, I have done my fair share of weddings in the fifteen years I’ve been a priest.  And I am grateful that I am now allowed to do same-sex marriages in this diocese.  So, weddings actually are pretty good.

In our gospel reading for today, we find what seems to be one of the really good weddings.   But, it actually might not have been that great after all. There’s a problem at this wedding feast.  The good wine has run out and the wedding feast is about to crash quickly.  But Jesus turns water into wine and when he does, there is a renewed sense of joy and exultation.

That I think is the gist of this experience from our gospel reading.  It is not just some magic trick Jesus performs to wow people.  It is not some action he performs at the whim of his mother.  He performs this miracle and in doing so instills joy in those gathered there.  But more than that, by doing this he does what he always does when he performs a miracle.  He performs miracles not just for the benefit of those at the wedding.  It is for our benefit of us as well.

Because by performing this miracle, he is giving us a glimpse of what awaits us all.  If we look closely at the story and at some of the details contained in it, we will find clues of the deeper meaning behind his actions.

First of all, let’s look at those jars of water.  This is probably the one area we don’t give a lot of thought to.  But those jars are important.  They are not just regular jars of water.  They are jars of water for the purification rites that accompany eating in the Jewish tradition.  That’s important This Jewish sense of purification is important still to us. If we think purity isn’t important to us, we’re wrong. Purity is important to us. Cleanliness and purity are still a part of our lives.

I recently heard this interesting story. Back in the 1990s, Paul Rozin, a social psychologist, did an experiment he called “Hitler’s Sweater.” Dr. Rozin displayed a very old tattered sweater to a group of people, telling them that it was a sweater that belonged to Adolf Hitler. The sweater, he said, was worn by Hitler the week before he committed suicide in April of 1945. The sweater, he said, had not been washed and he even showed them the perspiration stains on the sweater.

He then proceeded to ask people if they would like to try the sweater on.  Most people, as you can imagine, refused. In fact, several people said they were uncomfortable even being in the same room with the sweater.

Richard Beck, a  psychologist, wrote of this experiment:  

“What studies like this reveal is that people tend to think about evil as if it were a virus, a disease, or a contagion.  Evil is an object that can seep out of Hitler, into the sweater, and, by implication, into you if you try the sweater on.  Evil is sticky and contagious.  So we stay away.” 

I think most of us feel this way to some extent.  But I would add, most of us, at least on some base level, think of evil as “unclean,” as well as “sticky” and “contagious.” Sin is “unclean.” There are things in our lives that we simply view as “unclean.”

So, those stone jars of water at the wedding feast  are not just for thirst.  They are about uncleanliness.

Scot McKnight writes in his wonderful book,  The Jesus Creed:

“The water in these stone jars is not for hygiene. This water is sacred. This water is used to purify people and things. People and things are made pure to get them in the proper order before God, to render them fit to enter into God’s presence. Observant Jews wash their hands in this water so they can eat their food in a state of purity.”

Over and over again in the Gospels, if you notice, Jesus seems to have issues with these laws of purity. Or rather, he has issues with people getting too caught up in the rituals of purity.

So, what we find is that Jesus turns these waters of purity into wine.  And not just any wine.  But abundant fine wine that brings about a joy among those gathered. 

In a sense, what Jesus has done is he has taken the party up a notch. What was already a  good party is now an incredible party. It’s a beautiful image and one that I think we can all relate to.

The best part of this view of the wedding at Cana is that Jesus is saying to us that, yes, there is joy here in the midst of us, but a greater joy awaits us.  

A greater joy awaits when the Kingdom of God breaks through into our midst. When it does, it is very much like a wedding feast.  When it does, the waters of purification will be turned into the best-tasting wine because we will no longer have to worry about issues like purity. In God’s Kingdom, there is no impurity, no sin, so racism, no homophobia or transphobia or sexism. There are no arrogant, angry people confident in their privilege.

To some extent, the wedding at Cana is a foretaste of what we do every Sunday (and Wednesday) here at this altar.

It is a foretaste of the Holy Eucharist—the meal we share at this altar.

And the Jesus we encounter at this feast is not a sweet, obedient son, doing whatever his mother says, though I truly believe there is an almost playful attitude between Jesus and Mary in their exchange.  

Both Mary and Jesus know who he is and what he can do. They know he is the Messiah.  They know that is he is this unique Son of the Most High God. They know that because he is, he is able to do things most people cannot.

Now, to be fair to Mary, however, we must realize that at no point does she actually request anything from Jesus, if you notice.  All she does is state the obvious.

“There is no wine,” she says.

She then says to the servants, “Do whatever he asks.”

No one, if you notices, asks Jesus to perform this miracle.  And that is important too.

The great Anglican poet W.H. Auden once wrote:

“Our wishes and desires—to pass an exam, to marry the person we love, to sell our house at a good price—are involuntary and therefore not themselves prayers, even if it is God whom we ask to attend to them. They only become prayers in so far as we believe that God knows better than we whether we should be granted or denied what we ask. A petition does not become a prayer unless it ends with the words, spoken or unspoken, ‘Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.’”

I will take this one step further. I have a standard message at most of the weddings I do.  It’s adapted to each couple, but the message remains the same. And the message carries within it my own understanding of how love and marriage works. (And granted I’m definitely not the world’s greatest expert in either of those fields—love or marriage)

I say this at weddings:

Love and marriage are a grace from God. But to truly understand that statement we have to understand what “grace” is in this context. My definition of grace is this: Grace is a gift we receive from God that we neither asked for nor even anticipated.  It is something God gives us out God’s own goodness. Love and marriage are often—often, not always—signs of grace. Oftentimes the right person comes into our lives at just the right time. No matter how much we might want to control such situations, the fact is we cannot. That person comes into our lives on God’s terms, not ours. Often it happens when we least expect that person. But when they do come into our lives, our lives change.

That is how grace works. Grace changes our lives. We can’t control God’s grace. We can’t really even petition God and ask God for a particular grace. Grace is just there because God chooses to grant us grace.

That’s how grace works.

It just happens on God’s own terms. Sometimes we might not deserve it. But God—in God’s goodness—just gives us this one right thing in our lives.  And all we can do, in the face of that grace, is say, “Thank you.”

McKnight probably sums up the miracle at Cana most perfectly in this phrase:

“When the water turns to wine and the eye of faith peers into the purification vessels, it does not see sacred water but sacred wine. The eye of faith sees not an image of itself but the image of Jesus floating on the surface of the wine. Jesus is seen in the wine for who he is really: the one who not only provides but is himself the joy of the kingdom.”

I love that!  And that to me only cements the fact that what happens at Cana happens each time we gather together at this altar for the Eucharist.  Here too, at this altar, we see Jesus reflected in this wine. And in each other!

The wedding at Cana, this Eucharist we celebrate is a foretaste of that meal of which we will partake in the Kingdom. In that meal, the words of the prophet Isaiah that we heard earlier this morning will be spoken to us as well:

“for the Lord [will delight] in you,

and your land shall be married.

For as a young man marries a young woman,

so shall your builder marry you.

And as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride,

so shall your God rejoice over you.”

God rejoices over you! In God, our truest and deepest joy will come springing forth.

So, as we come forward for Communion this morning, let us do so with that image of the wedding feast of Cana in our hearts and minds.  

Let us look, and see the image of Jesus reflected in the Communion wine. And in one another.  

Let us know that we come forward to not just a magic trick.

We come forward to a miracle. We come forward to a sign of God’s kingdom breaking through into our very midst.  And all we can do, in that holy moment, is say,

“Thank you!”