8-21-16 Giving and Forgiving

Sermon; 8-21-2016‘Giving and Forgiving’

Matthew 6:9-14 NRSV

Dennis, Matthew & Sheila Fabricant Linn, Sleeping with Bread, Paulist Press, 1995.

Paul Buckley, Owning the Lord’s Prayer, Friends Journal Vol. 51, No. 2, February 2005, Friends Publishing Corporation, pps. 6-13.

http://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/merchant/quotes.html

‘Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who have sinned against us.’

“During the bombing raids of WWII, thousands of children were orphaned and left to starve.  The fortunate ones were rescued and placed in refugee camps where they received food and good care.  But many of these children could not sleep at night, fearing waking up to find themselves once again homeless and without food.  Finally, someone hit upon the idea of giving each child a piece of bread to hold at bedtime.  Holding their bread, these children could finally sleep in peace.  All through the night the bread reminded them, ‘Today I ate and I will eat again tomorrow.’”  Sleeping with Bread, p. 1

Sleeping with bread, fulfilling the need for daily nourishment, the sense of safety and security… that we will wake up in abundance, rather than want.  This is our prayer, when we ask God to ‘give us this day our daily bread.’ 

Paul Buckley, in his article ‘Owning the Lord’s Prayer’ writes, ‘In considering this petition, I have learned not to be too literal – in both Greek and Hebrew the word for bread can mean any kind of food.  More than that, I have come to read it as a metaphor for all the things a person needs to live.  Looked at in this way, the phrase can be read as, “Give us what we need today.” Why specify ‘this day’ or include the word ‘daily’? Both seem unnecessary.  God provides what we need today and every day.’

Do you remember the story told in Exodus [Chapter 16] about the Israelites need for food – for ‘daily bread’, and God’s provision of manna and quail in the desert?  Every day, enough for each day. People had to trust God for what they needed, each day, and no more.  Daily bread – daily trust.   

‘Give us this – give us that… give us what is needed…’  The Israelites always wanted more, and so do we. They and we, become bored and dissatisfied with what we have.  How many ways can you cook, bake, fry, or roast, quail and manna?  God gave and continues to give daily bread… what we need for this day, and asks us to trust God absolutely.  Jesus teaches us to ask God for our needs, not selfishly, not with greed, but with trust that God cares and provides for us each and every day. 

Christ took this a step further when he taught us this lesson: ‘Do not judge, and you will not be judged.  Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.  Forgive, and you will be forgiven.  Give, and it will be given to you.  A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap.  For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Luke 6:37-38If God gives us all we need, then we, without judgement or condemnation, are called to incarnate God for others... we are commanded to give as God has given to us.  Can you imagine the reward those refugee workers in Europe felt when the children were able to sleep; when their fears were calmed; when they knew they were cared for?  Giving is receiving, both for God and for us. 

Giving is also forgiving.  Forgiving is for giving…  not just a daily practice or need, but an everlasting, enduring gift we offer to ourselves first, and then to others.  When we forgive someone, we first have come to a place of forgiveness in ourselves – that we are flawed, that we aren’t perfect, that we make mistakes, that we don’t always succeed or accomplish what we had hoped to.  The list goes on and on. 

Once we have realized this about ourselves, we begin to see these same things about the other – the other person, the other nation, the other organization, the other family.  And then… we are made ready to forgive. 

The gift of forgiveness is not neatly wrapped.  It may look more like an arrow flying through the air, rather than a pretty package tied up with a bow.  The arc of forgiveness may take a long time to meet its mark, but the important thing is that the arrow has been released and that it flies with purpose.  I am ready.  I have found it right to pull the arrow from the quiver, and send it flying.  I forgive.  I forgive.  I forgive... 

It takes strength and agility to shoot an arrow.  You must be able to pull the string back.  You must be certain of your target, with clear eye and full intention.  You must be steady, so as not to miss the mark.  You must be prepared.  Practice.  Think.  Set your feet.  Wait.  Deep breath… let it fly. 

Are you unsure of yourself?  Here’s some advice from ‘raisedhunting.com’: “Looking for a simple solution? Start your bow practice now so you can have enough time to truly get proficient again without sacrificing your health or form. Regular archery practice builds muscle memory, so that shooting a bow becomes second nature to you. When the moment of truth comes, you can simply focus on the [target] instead of all the micro-decisions about your form and where to aim the pin. As you’ve heard before, only perfect practice makes perfect.” 

Forgiveness is something that comes more easily to us when we’re in good shape, when we’ve practiced shooting short distances, and then steadily increased the strength and precision of our intention.  And more than anything, we are empowered when we remember that we weren’t the first to shoot the arrow of forgiveness… that we have received mercy, that we ourselves, were the mark for that arrow.  How can we not forgive another, when we ourselves have been forgiven?  How can we withhold mercy, when God has been so merciful to us?  

The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene I; William Shakespeare, 1564 – 1616

The quality of mercy is not strained;

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven

Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest;

It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:

‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes

The throned monarch better than his crown:

His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,

The attribute to awe and majesty,

Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;

But mercy is above this sceptred sway;

It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings,

It is an attribute to God himself;

And earthly power doth then show likest God’s

When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,

Though justice be thy plea, consider this,

That, in the course of justice, none of us

Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;

‘Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who have sinned against us.’   Amen. 

8-14-16 Thy Kingdom, Come

Sermon 8-14-2016; “Thy Kingdom, Come”

Matthew 6:1-13 Cotton Patch Gospels, Armchair Mystic, St. Anthony Messenger Press, Cincinnati, 1989

Mark Thibodeaux, S.J.,

Psalm 139:7 (God is Everywhere!)

"Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

Mark Thibodeaux, a Jesuit Priest, wrote a book, Armchair Mystic, about Contemplative Prayer, and takes a look at The Lord’s Prayer.  Studying phrase by phrase as we are this month, Thibodeaux asks us to look at the words carefully…  Who is God in this phrase?  The king.  What kind of king is he?  What would it be like if his kingdom came?  Or has it already come?  If so, how?  How has it not? Why has it not?

Who am I in this phrase?  I am God’s subject.  What does my King expect of me? What do I expect of the King? How far will I go in service to God, my King? How loyal am I?  How loyal do I want to be?

Friend Elton Trueblood once wrote: “We are told to pray for the Kingdom, which is defined as that situation in which God’s will is made manifest on earth.  Our prayer is that that which is potential may become actual, here and now.  We are keenly aware of how far from such a situation we, in fact, are.  God’s will is not now perfectly done, perhaps not anywhere.  If it were, there would be no point in praying for it!” 

But Christ taught his disciples – and us - to pray that God’s kingdom would come, that God’s will would be done, that earth and heaven would be one.  Why did he want us to ask for such an incredible thing?  I think it’s because Christ knew it could happen – if we put ourselves in the phrase.  If we each meant the prayer we prayed.  “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done…” If humankind, if Christ’s followers, if those who counted God as king, would live in a way that invited the kingdom of God into the world, it would come.  If we would live in God’s will, we would see it ‘made manifest’.  If we would live as those who know God is present in our lives, and the lives of all humankind, God would be made visible – not just in heaven, but on earth.  God and God’s kingdom would be made known.

Friends believe that there is no reason to wait for death to be with God… to live in God’s

kingdom.  We believe we do, now.  That God’s presence is real, and made known in our lives.    And that changes the way we see, and live in, the world.  We are not meant to abandon the world for the hope of heaven.  We are meant to live in the world, experiencing the same Presence of God with us now that heaven holds. 

Friends believe, as Jesus taught, that the kingdom of God surrounds us.  So many times, Jesus shared stories, explaining God’s kingdom…  “The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, like buried treasure in a field, like a farmer sowing seeds, like a leaven for bread, like a fisherman’s net.  Jesus showed us how real, how ordinary yet extraordinary, how palpable the kingdom of God is.  It is not just a place with pearly gates and streets of gold.  On the contrary, it is very much an everyday reality that we must choose to live out.  Christ is teaching us to see this in our earthly lives, and make God’s kingdom real for everyone.

Jesus lived a very ordinary life.  He got up in the morning, dressed for the day, ate breakfast, and headed to his dad’s shop.  He worked sawing and shaping wood.  He sanded, he sawed, he fastened, he did all that his dad had showed him how to do.  He supported the family business.  For thirty years, he lived his life.  The sacrament of life.  The one incredible, ordinary life he was given – just as you and I are.  The astonishing, beautiful thing called life.

He made something out of nothing.  A block of wood became a table leg, a vase, a bowl… something useful and beautiful.  He saw what others did not see.  This is a lesson about the kingdom of God.  It is the way we see the world in every person.  There is something there – as George Fox said, ‘there is that of God in every person’.  We are called, just as Christ was, out of the sweetness of the carpenter’s shop and into the world around us, seeing in others what they do not see.

Christ did it.  Christ showed up.  Christ showed up to his own life.  No matter what, no matter where… Christ showed up. And God asks us – expects us - to do the same.   To make the kingdom of God real.  This is God’s will… to see God’s kingdom on earth, even as it is in heaven.

I spent all day yesterday at a Leadership Conference at Earlham School of Religion, about holy experiences and risk taking.  The plenary speaker was Samir Selmanovic, who grew up a in a culturally Muslim family in Croatia, converted to Christianity as a soldier in the then-Yugoslavian army, and went on to become a Christian pastor in Manhattan and in Southern California.

This is a poem that Samir shared with us yesterday at the Conference:

Self Portrait by — David Whyte
from Fire in the Earth, Many Rivers Press, 1992

It doesn’t interest me if there is one God
or many gods.
I want to know if you belong or feel
abandoned.
If you know despair or can see it in others.
I want to know
if you are prepared to live in the world
with its harsh need
to change you. If you can look back
with firm eyes
saying this is where I stand. I want to know
if you know
how to melt into that fierce heat of living
falling toward
the center of your longing. I want to know
if you are willing
to live, day by day, with the consequence of love
and the bitter

unwanted passion of your sure defeat.

I have heard, in that fierce embrace, even
the gods speak of God.

He told a story about a woman, out in the cold on morning in New York City, forced into Samir’s church by the weather.  She would never have come in, except for the cold.  She was a practicing witch… a good witch!... but a witch, part of a Wiccan congregation.  A church was absolutely the last place she wanted to be.  Samir spoke to her, befriended her, and eventually, Sue became a part of the life of his family.  He and his wife hired her as their babysitter. Samir reminded us that “we know enough to judge, but not enough to relate to other people.  The ‘others’ – the ‘outsiders’. Are we willing to help people see what we see?   

Samir invited people to share their stories of failure, to see God in failure.  And he asked Sue, by then a regular part of the congregation, if she would pray.  They had to agree on a name for God, and finally she chose ‘holy spirit’.  Here is Sue’s prayer: 

Dear Holy Spirit,

I am not a Christian.  My son and I may one day be.  But we belong to this community.  What would the world be like without them?  Without these pastors?  Without their love?

Thy kingdom, come.  Do we invite God’s kingdom to come?  Are we willing to show up, and make God real in the world?  It would be easy to stay in the carpenter’s shop, shut the door, focus on the work at hand, and despair about the condition of the world beyond us.  Samir challenged us, saying that the kingdom of God is deeper outside the church than in… Too many times we stay in our Meetings, in our churches, doing good work we’ve been trained to do, only to discover Jesus standing at the window, waving his arms, and calling us out into the consequence of God’s love, into struggle, into despair, into loneliness, and into the risk of sure defeat.  That’s where Jesus went.  And he invites us to come.  It would be great if we could remain in our own little heavenly homes, and ‘let the rest of the world go by’.  But Christ insists that we ask for God’s kingdom to come into our own lives… into our ordinary work and routines; that we show up to our own lives, that we make God’s kingdom as real on earth as it is in heaven.

Why did you come to Meeting this morning?  What did you want?  What did you need? What did you hope to find?  There are so many people who need and want the same things… who crave silence, who hunger for presence, who need friendship and companionship, who want to know God is real.  Rather than thinking of this as a problem, consider it a possibility!  Is it possible that they would find those things where you have found them?  Is it possible that they have been standing outside churches or meetinghouses, waiting for the weather to change, to push them forward in their lives?  Hoping for an invitation into the warmth of God’s embrace?

How can we see what is not there?  How can I invite God’s kingdom into my life?  How can I show up to my own life, to God in me, and especially, to God in others? Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven…

8-7-16 A Hallowed Name

Sermon; August 7, 2016“The Lord’s Prayer – A Hallowed Name’

Matthew 6:7-13 New English Bible

Elton Trueblood, The Lord’s Prayers, Harper and Row, 1965.

Bethanne Kashkette, Baltimore Yearly Meeting: http://patapsco.bym-rsf.net/files/2012/05/heron200404.pdf

What have been your experiences with the Lord’s Prayer? 

I pray the Lord’s prayer every time I fly.  It’s a ritual for me – a way to connect fear with faith.  Once, when returning from a Spring Break trip to Florida with my family, we flew into terrible turbulence near Denver.  The plane was buffeted every which way. People were screaming, the plane shuddered… it was awful.  When we landed in Denver, I sat on the concourse floor, and did not want to move.  But I had to… we still hadn’t gotten home.  From that time on, I have prayed The Lord’s Prayer as we take off… it gives me something familiar and soothing to concentrate on, and it reminds me of God’s presence.

I’ve also played the Lord’s Prayer to accompany my father when he would sing it as a solo.  The Mallotte.  You know… “Our Father, who art in heaven….”  It’s not easy to sing.  And it’s horrible to play… there’s these places where the accompaniment is totally exposed, and of course there’s tons of accidentals, and tough stuff right there – out in the open!  Especially when you’re in junior high or high school, that kind of pressure can be rough!  I’ve since learned to love it, whether I’m playing it, singing it, or praying it.

The Lord’s Prayer is really everybody’s prayer.  It’s meant for all of us. Notice the form:  it’s in first person plural… Our Father, Give us, Forgive us as we forgive…  The prayer was not meant for just one person only, but for everyone.  Friend Elton Trueblood says it should be called The Disciples Prayer, because really, Jesus gave the prayer to them- to us - as a gift.    He taught us all to pray.  What prayers were you first taught?  One that I learned was a table grace:

Thank you for the world so sweet. Thank you for the food we eat.

Thank you for the birds that sing. Thank you God, for everything.

It was a patterned prayer – something simple to remember, and to recite.  The prayer is lovely, and in a very few words, expresses both thanksgiving, and need.  The prayer Christ taught the disciples does the same thing, using a pattern.  A beautiful prayer, easily remembered, that follows a form, and helps us remember what Christ thought was most important in our conversations with God.  Reverence, God’s Kingdom, Daily Needs, Forgiveness, and Help. 

How often do I begin praying by asking for something I need, and then for God’s help?  Do I ask for forgiveness – am I even self-aware enough to know I need to be forgiven?  Do I long for God’s kingdom to be made real in my life, in my family, in my nation, in my world?  Do I remember that God is more than just my friend?  That God is God, loving and powerful, merciful and righteous? 

When we recite the Lord’s Prayer, it’s easy to let the words tumble out – sometimes without thinking about what we’re saying… especially if we’ve been raised in churches where it’s used every Sunday as part of the liturgy.  It becomes part of the service, and not necessarily part of us.  But Christ didn’t teach it in a church, or synagogue, or any place set aside for worship.  It wasn’t given to Rabbis or the Priests… it was given to common, ordinary followers who had heard Christ praying – speaking to God - and they wanted to know how to do the same thing.  “How should we pray?”

The first thing Christ told them is how NOT to pray.  Don’t use empty, meaningless phrases.  Don’t pray in order to be seen and admired.  “Pray then like this…”

With reverence.  We name God, before we name ourselves.  Without arrogance.  Without conceit.  Christ teaches us to honor and recognize God as we come in prayer.

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed by thy name… Thy name. Names matter.  A lot!  When I meet someone for the first time, I try to make sure I learn their name correctly.  Is their name Katherine?  What do they want to be called?  Are they Kathy, Kate, or Katherine?  When I led the Concert Program at Yearly Meeting last month, a performer told me her name was Kris.  But no one called her that!  She had been raised in the Yearly Meeting, and everyone there still called her Kristy!  Jim, Bill, Dan and I had a great time remembering what Kareem Abdul Jabbar’s name used to be: Lew Alcindor!  (Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Jr. to be exact!)  We are known by our name.  Our personhood is attached to our name.  Remember?  God changed Abram’s name (high father) to Abraham (father of many nations).  “No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations.”  Just a few letters can make a huge difference in meaning.   

Names matter to God.  Elton Trueblood again: “It is hard for us in the modern world to understand or to appreciate the Hebrew’s sense of mystery about a name, and particularly about the name of God.  The name of God stood for God’s character, for God’s integrity, and for God’s active power…  Moses asked God’s name and was told that the name is a form of the verb “to be”.  “And God said unto Moses, I am that I am.”  Yahweh, then is “He who is.”  Here the tremendous emphasis is on the real being of God, in contrast with illusion or with mere projections of desire.  God, according to this conception, is not remote, or the object of speculation, but is the real Being of continued self-manifestation.”  Not God as we hope God is, or want God to be.  But, Godself revealed! 

When Christ teaches us to address God as Father, he is inviting us to pray with a sense of belonging.  Pray with a sense of intimacy.  Of acquaintance and connection.  This is your father – your mother – someone who loves you, that you’re talking to.  If you have a tough time thinking of God as your Father, give God a name that means love to you.  That means acceptance.  That means that if you called him on the phone, he’d be happy – overjoyed – to hear from you.  What is that name for you? Our Father?  Our Mother?  Our Lord?  Divine Light?  Lord God?  Use a name that means something to you in your life with others. 

Hallowed be Thy name. Hallowed comes from the verb hallow, a term that descends from the Middle English halowen. That word can in turn be traced back to hālig, Old English for "holy." The word means sacred, or consecrated.  During the Middle Ages, All Hallows' Day was the name for what Christians now call All Saints' Day, and the evening that preceded All Hallows' Day was All Hallow Even, or, as we know it today, Halloween.  Many faith traditions still celebrate All Saints Day – a holy day - on November 1st each year. 

God’s name is Holy.  Sacred.  Set apart for us – not from us.  Our prayers, our conversations with God, are sacred.  Whether walking in Fort Harrison State Park, or through our neighborhood as we pray, we’re in sacred company.  Whether we’re doing dishes, or sitting in silent communion in Meeting, talking with God is a holy conversation.   God can be Light one day, Lord another, Keeper, Shepherd, Friend, Redeemer… the many names of God we use in prayer are a reflection of our yearning for God in that moment.  A sign of our belonging to and with God.

I pray that as we explore this prayer Christ taught, that it will teach us in the weeks to come - a personal expression found in a communal prayer. 

How do you pray?  How do you encounter God in your mind and heart?  What is your name for God? What experiences have you had with the Lord’s Prayer?  What do we, as Quakers who do not use patterned or recited prayers, gain from Christ’s lesson to his disciples? How would you write the Disciples Prayer?

From Bethanne Kashkett, Baltimore Yearly Meeting:

Great Spirit, whose name is sacred,

Guide us to follow your laws of peace here on Earth, as the stars obey the laws of heaven.

May there be food for all beings, so that none may go hungry.

When we have been hurtful, give us the courage to say we are sorry. Help us to be forgiving, when others hurt us.

Give us the strength to do what we know is right and turn away from what harms us, our planet or other beings.

For your wonder, beauty and goodness all around us, we give grace and thanks.

Amen.

7-31-16

Hello Friends!

This past Sunday we celebrated our very special week of Vacation Bible School.  “Cave Quest” was an adventure in discovering Christ’s Light – and boy, did we have fun!  There’s nothing like being in a dark place to discover how important the Light is in our lives… and we did! Through music, stories, games, and even our snacks, we found that Christ gives us hope, courage, direction, love, and power – when we need it most.  Even in a very dark cave!

Thank you for your continued prayer support for the children of our Meeting.  They mean so much to us, and even more toGod.  Bless you, as you remember your days at Vacation Bible School perhaps in days gone by, and always remember that you are a Child of God.

Love,

Pastor Ruthie

7-24-16 Spelunking

Sermon 7-24-2016“Spelunking”

John 1:1-5

Oregon Caves: https://www.nps.gov/orca/index.htm

Caroline Stephen, Quaker Strongholds,Philadelphia, 1890.

Journal of George Fox, http://remembered-gate.net/sing-and-rejoice-early-quaker-bible-reading-for-feb-22/

“Sing and rejoice [Zech 2:10], ye children of the day and of the light [1 Th 5:5]; for the Lord is at work in this thick night of darkness that may be felt [Exo 10:21f]. And truth doth flourish as the rose [Isa 35:1], and the lilies do grow among the thorns [Song 2:2], and the plants atop of the hills, and upon them the lambs do skip and play.

And never heed the tempests nor the storms, floods nor rains, for the seed Christ is over all, and doth reign. And so be of good faith and valiant for the truth [Jer 9:3]: for the truth can live in the jails. And fear not the loss of the fleece, for it will grow again; and follow the lamb, if it be under the beast's horns, or under the beast's heels; for the lamb shall have the victory [Rev 17:14] over them all.

And so all live in the seed Christ [Gal 3:16], your way [John 14:6], that never fell [1 Pet 2:22]; and you do see over all the ways of Adam's and Eve's sons and daughters in the fall. And in the seed Christ, your way, you have life and peace; and there you do see over all the ways of Adam in the fall, in which there is no peace. So in the seed Christ stand and dwell, in whom you have life and peace; the life that was with the Father before the world began.”                                                                                 George Fox, Epistle

We have a choice – children of the day or children of the night.  Children of darkness or children of light.  God calls us, and our faith tradition as Christ followers, and as members of the Religious Society of Friends - to the Day and to the Light.

The natural call on each one of our lives is to darkness, or so it seems.  “Nestled deep inside the Siskiyou Mountains, the caves formed as rainwater from the ancient forest above dissolved the surrounding marble and created a special marble cave system.”  This is how the National Park System describes the Oregon Caves – one of the highlights of tourism in Southern Oregon.  If you’ve ever toured these deep and cool caverns, you know just how dark darkness can be.  Especially when they turn off all the electric lights that have been placed along the pathways.  You cannot see anything – not a thing.  The darkness is thick – just as George Fox described it… “this thick night of darkness that may be felt”.  When one goes ‘spelunking’ or exploring a cave, you can be certain you will find darkness.

Are you willing to go spelunking with me, friends? Are you brave enough, in the darkness of this world, to be a spelunker?  The world needs spelunkers, who bring light into very dark places.

The Oregon Caves and the darkness they hold were formed in a natural, organic way as water, over many years of time, dissolved stone.  There are many who feel that humankind is naturally set in darkness – that humanity, created in companionship with God, was thrown out of that garden of Light and Life into the darkness and void of relationship with the Light. 

No, they weren’t.  We weren’t.  I don’t believe that.  I believe that humankind was created in light.  In love.  In God’s intention for a loving, meaningful companionship with his creation.  The story of Adam’s fall has an important piece that is difficult to deal with, and many have tried to explain it.  I can’t explain it all.  What I will say is that humankind chose darkness. 

Eden was God’s garden.  Creation was God’s home.  Humankind were God’s companions at home with God.  Were they tempted?  Were they curious?  Were they dissatisfied?  God had given them everything, everything they would ever need.   They wanted what they could not have – what only God held for Godself.  Knowledge.  Not understanding or the love of learning or knowing more… but specifically the knowing of good and evil.  The most good and the most evil.  They bit on that one… and humankind has seen the heights and depths of goodness and evil ever since… or have we?  Not only good and evil was opened to humankind, but the Lord God said, “…Now, man might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever…”  Someone, with the knowledge of good and evil who could live forever.  Not God.  Not good.

Genesis 3:23 “Therefore the Lord God sent man forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken.  He drove out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life.”

I personally don’t believe that we were thrown into darkness, naturally set in darkness, abandoned in darkness.  A careful reading of Genesis 3 shows us something remarkable…

Two verses before God sends humanity out of the garden, once he has spoken with his creation and knows that they have chosen their own way – God does something incredible… God bends down and stitches clothing for them… Of course God is angry and disappointed with his beloved companions, but he doesn’t send them away without providing for them – without compassion for them.  God does not send humanity out of the garden without caring for their survival.  And you don’t put a bright, flaming sword at the entrance if you don’t want people to find their way back to the Garden!

George Fox: “Now was I come up in spirit through the flaming sword, into the paradise of God. All things were new; and all the creation gave another smell unto me than before, beyond what words can utter. I knew nothing but pureness, and innocency, and righteousness, being renewed up into the image of God by Christ Jesus, to the state of Adam, which he was in before he fell. The creation was opened to me; and it was shewed me how all things had their names given them according to their nature and virtue. And I was at a stand in my mind whether I should practice physic for the good of mankind, seeing the nature and virtues of the creatures were so opened to me by the Lord. But I was immediately taken up in spirit, to see into another or more steadfast state than Adam's in innocency, even into a state in Christ Jesus that should never fall. ...Great things did the Lord lead me into, and wonderful depths were opened unto me beyond what can by words be declared; but as people come into subjection to the Spirit of God, and grow up in the image and power of the Almighty, they may receive the word of wisdom, that opens all things, and come to know the hidden unity in the Eternal Being.”

“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not, cannot, will not, overcome it.”  I believe, Quakers believe, that God in Christ, the Light of the World, is stronger than any darkness.  It is our choice to seek the Light, and to live in that Light.  The easiest place to find the light is in the dark.  It’s most obvious there.  The smallest light is SO BRIGHT in the darkness of a cave!  So if you’re dealing with darkness in your own life – look for God in the darkness.  Instead of concentrating on the darkness, look for the Light of God and what God is doing in that darkness. 

Caroline Stephen wrote in her book “Quaker Strongholds” : … the Early Friends were accustomed to ask whether they did not sometimes feel something within them that showed them their sins; and to assure them that this same power, which made manifest, and therefore was truly light, would also, if yielded to, lead them out of sin.  This assurance, that the light which revealed was also the power which would heal sin was George Fox’s gospel.  The power itself was described by him in many ways.  Christ within, the hope of glory; the light, life, Spirit, and grace of Christ; the seed, the new birth, the power of God unto salvation, and many other such expressions… To “turn people to the light within,” to “direct them to Christ, their free Teacher,” was his daily business.” 

Early Quakers used the light to search the darkness all the time – starting with themselves.  They welcomed the revealing Light, Life and Grace of Christ in their own souls to instruct them, and to lead them out of darkness, even as they worked to lead the world in the same way.  And so, my companions in spelunking, I ask you to join me – not by strapping on a head lamp, but by opening your hearts and souls to the force of Christ’s Light Within, illuminating and cleansing the darkness in our own lives, as we work to remind our dark world of this same cleansing, healing light.  

7-3-16 Faith in Action

Sermon 7-3-2016 ‘Faith in Action’

James 2:14-26

Arthur Kincaid, The Cradle of Quakerism, Quaker Books, Friends House, London, 2011.

Thomas R Kelly, Reality of the Spiritual World, Pendle Hill, 1942.

Parker Palmer, The Promise of Paradox, Ave Maria Press, Notre Dame IN, 1980.

George Fox, Journal, http://www.strecorsoc.org/gfox/ch01.html, footnote #30.

Pastor Ruthie Tippin, Indianapolis First Friends Meeting

The basis of faith for a Quaker is the experience of God.  It is not a logical argument.  It does not exist in creed or doctrine.  It does not exist in law or command.  It is Moses’ burning bush. It is Samuel’s voice in the night.  It is Paul’s blinding on the Damascus Road.  It is Fox’s experience of Christ speaking to his condition.  It is this for each one of us…  our own experience of God. 

Friend Thomas Kelly writes: ‘There is a wholly different way of being sure that God is real.  It is not an intellectual proof, a reasoned sequence of thoughts.  It is the fact that [people] experience the presence of God… Sometimes these moments of visitation come to us in strange surroundings – on lonely country roads, in a classroom, at the kitchen sink.  Sometimes they come in the hour of worship, when we are gathered into one Holy Presence who stands in our midst and welds us together in breathless hush, and wraps us all in sweet comfortableness into His arms of love.  In such times of direct experience of Presence, we know that God is utterly real… This evidence for the reality of God is the one the Quakers primarily appeal to.  It is the evidence upon which the mystics of all times rest their testimony.  Quakerism is essentially empirical; it relies upon direct and immediate experience.  We keep insisting: It isn’t enough to believe in the love of God, as a doctrine; you must experience the love of God.  It isn’t enough to believe that Christ was born in Bethlehem, you must experience a Bethlehem, a birth of Christ in your hearts.  To be able to defend a creed intellectually isn’t enough; you must experience as reality first of all what the creed asserts.  And unless the experience is there, behind it, the mere belief is not enough.”

Do we trust the experience?  There are many, including ourselves if we are honest, who wonder… ‘Is this God, in me?’  Kelly answers this concern in three ways: the Divine Energizing given to us by our experiences of God – not required of us, but brought forth naturally;  2) these experiences coming from beyond us – not ‘mustered up’ by our own doing, but from God as the active initiator; and lastly, a felt reality of God that is utterly different from an intellectual convincement of the reality of God.  Experience brings a new meaning. 

Are there ‘intellectual holes’ or ‘defects’ in the logic of faith in God? Certainly.  But such defects, says Kelly, “do not prove that God does not exist. They only drive us back to the old, old truth: we walk by faith and not by sight.  Let us then be bold enough to face and acknowledge such criticism of the testimony of religious experience.”

The experience of God was all the people of Cumbria longed for in the mid 1600’s.  The English civil war had divided the country politically, socially, religiously.  The enforcement of God as Catholic or Protestant, Presbyterian or Church of England, left people wanting.  There was an apocalyptic sense of doom… what was God’s intention?  Where was God?  Was God real? 

Religious life in England had been torn back and forth between Catholic and Protestant doctrine, depending on who sat on the throne.  Civil War had ravaged England, the king had been beheaded, and government was in the hands of the people, under Oliver Cromwell and the Commonwealth.  The Fifth Monarchists were certain that Christ was returning and would destroy the government. 

For a young man named George Fox, there was no waiting for an apocalypse – for Christ’s return.  Christ was already present, and would teach his people himself.  Fox’s openings – his experiences of God - came at a time when a great number of people in North West England, like him, were seeking truth in their own lives.  They were poor, isolated, and hungry to hear God declare himself to them.  They had begun to meet in small gatherings, sometimes with travelling ministers, sometimes not, but always in waiting worship.  ‘George Fox was to draw together many of those in search of a new religious impetus… in the spring of 1652… he felt God move him to climb to the top of Pendle Hill in Lancashire.’ [Kincaid]  He struggled to the top, looked westward toward the sea, and saw a region where the Lord had ‘a great people to be gathered’.  That ‘great people’ became the Religious Society of Friends.       

The experience of God changes us.  It changes the way we see ourselves, our families, our cities, our nation, our world.   It energizes us, motivates us, moves us, into action.  It causes us to seek.  We are not satisfied with the status quo.  Just as the people in Ulverston, Preston Patrick, and Sedburgh felt, we feel hungry for more of God, and see and feel God transforming us. But it’s not enough that God is transforming us alone – we need God to transform the world.  And… we feel called to this transformation, with God.

Thomas Kelly: “Lives that have experienced God as vividly real are new lives, transformed lives, stabilized lives, integrated lives, souls newly sensitive to moral needs of men, newly dynamic in transforming city slums and eradicating war.  By their fruits we know that they have been touched, not by vague fancies, by subjective, diaphanous visions, but by a real, living Power.  The consequences of the experience are so real that they must have been released by a real cause, a real God, a real Spiritual Power energizing them.”

You can’t be a Quaker and not put your faith into action.  The experience of God within you is so real, so important, so life changing, that you cannot help but be an activist.  For Early Friends that meant prison reform, government reform, the right to assemble, civil disobedience.  Their experience of God taught them the value of each person – that we are all God’s creation – there is ‘that of God’ in every person and that God speaks directly to each one of us. 

The understanding of God’s love and capacity for mercy, forgiveness, grace, and wholeness is so real and so full, that living out your faith with everyone around you tells them who you are. Your lives, often more than your lips, preach.  Our testimony of integrity underlies all of life… the inner experience of God for us, informs the outward expression of our lives. This is what James, in his scriptural letter tells us:  It is not enough to say, “Be well, be fed, be safe”.  Just as the experience of God enlivens us, so our experience, our faith in God, must serve to enliven others. This is why Quaker physicians serve medicine more than money.  Quaker judges serve rehabilitation more than repression.  Quaker business people consider the welfare of their clients as much as their own.

The expression of our activism is personal, formed by God in us.  What God is in you will look different, feel different, and make a difference in a unique way.  Some of us, like John Woolman, will act alone, tirelessly reaching out to change the world.  Others will surround themselves with a team of people, dedicated to a cause.  Some of us, like Abraham, are willing to sacrifice our future, putting our faith into action. 

Some, like Rahab, are willing to sacrifice ourselves.  Some of us pray like mad, and some of us anger others with our persistence.  Some of us carry banners.  Others knit baby blankets.  Your activism may lead you to the Food Pantry.  Others will find themselves in a classroom, teaching young children how to resolve difference peacefully.     

Some may say they are moved to social concern, political activism, without the benefit of faith.  It’s my position that those who have experienced God have no choice – they are drawn to concern for the wellbeing of others as a result of their experience of faith.  And, I would propose, those who say they are acting independently of God have not recognized yet, the power of God acting in them. 

Do we recognize the experience of God in our lives?  Do we long for truth, Divine energy, initiative, and presence?  Do we recognize it when we feel God in us – when we see God in the world around us? What does that experience call us to?  The beauty of our life of faith – of paying attention and recognizing how God moves, lives, and works in each one of us, is that it challenges us all.  Jesus began his ministry with these words: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.”  [Luke 4:18]   What has your experience of God called you to?

“Faith in action is love, and love in action is service.  By transforming that faith into living acts of love, we put ourselves in contact with God Himself, with Jesus our Lord.”  Mother Theresa

6-12-2016 Planting for the Future

Sermon 6-12-2016; ‘Planting for the Future’ [Friends Education Fund Sunday]

Ecclesiastes 11 – all     

Mary Oliver, The Summer Day  https://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/133.html

Pastor Ruthie Tippin; First Friends Meeting Indianapolis

Cast your bread upon the waters… you know how you go to the park with your children and grandchildren and you bring dry bread. You toss it out on the pond—the duck pond, where all the ducks have been sitting, waiting anxiously for a person to come by. And they want something to eat! Cast your bread upon the waters!

The wisdom writer is sharing with us all – young and old – a beautiful poem about the precious value of life.  How do we see our lives?  And how should we live our lives?  Generously.  Unselfishly.  Joyfully!  Rather than eating the bread of life – share it!  Instead of consuming all that you have available to you – give it away!  Find six, seven, eight different ways to give of yourself!  You never know when your generosity will be returned to you.

And remember… you’re not in control – and you don’t really want to be!  Clouds will roll in, trees will fall, children are formed in the womb… you and I cannot explain it.  It’s not our work to do, but God’s work.  But we do have a part to play…

If we spend all our time watching the wind, we’ll never sow seed.  If we spend all our time staring at the sky, we’ll never harvest any crops.  Get to it!  Wake up to your work, and wait to see what will come of it.  What God will make of it.  Plant now for the future.  That’s what John Williams did.

Washington County, Indiana was founded two hundred years ago.  Quakers arrived in 1808 and founded Blue River Friends Meeting.  Others had been pouring in – part of the territorial expansion of the time.  We are not certain how many people of color arrived in the county, but we know that many came and lived in at least half of the townships there.  Among them was John Williams.  John was a freed slave who lived on a tract of one hundred sixty acres that he purchased from John Reyman, Sr..  Mr. Reyman held a mortgage on the farm for a time but John paid it off rapidly. He cleared fields, built a cabin and raised sufficient grain to fatten many hogs and cattle each year until the time of his death. By any standard of the day – John Williams became wealthy. 

Perhaps it was his wealth.  Perhaps it was the color of his skin.  Perhaps it was the war.  No one knows for sure, but it’s likely that all these things put John’s life at risk.  Early on a December morning in 1864, his lifeless body was found in his dooryard in Washington County, Indiana.  A light snow covered the ground, and it appeared that someone had come and roused him from sleep in the middle of the night, causing him to fear for his life.  He ran outside in his nightclothes, and soon fell to the ground, mortally wounded by a gunshot. He was murdered, and no one was ever convicted of the crime.  The Civil War would end six months later in May, 1865. 

John spent his life.  He literally spent his life, using it each day as an investment in what he could not see.  Imagine living as a freed slave in Southern Indiana during the Civil War, and living generously, building a life of meaning and purpose in his community. 

‘Ask not ('tis forbidden knowledge), what our destined term of years,
Mine and yours; nor scan the tables of your Babylonish seers.
Better far to bear the future, my Leuconoe, like the past,
Whether Jove has many winters yet to give, or this our last;
This, that makes the Tyrrhene billows spend their strength against the shore.
Strain your wine and prove your wisdom; life is short; should hope be more?
In the moment of our talking, envious time has ebb'd away.
Seize the day; trust tomorrow e'en as little as you may.’           [Horace; Odes]

The wisdom writer of Ecclesiastes wasn’t the only one to wonder about the quality and purpose of a life well lived.  The Roman poet Horace had the same concern.  Carpe Diem!  Seize the day!  No one knows what length of years they’ve been given, or the number of days they’ll live…

John Williams certainly didn’t.  What many didn’t know was that John had written a will, with the help of his Quaker friend, Mr. Lindley, who agreed to serve as the executor and trustee of John’s estate… at the time of his death it was worth $6000.00.  Today, that would be nearly $150,000.00.  John Williams directed his monies to be used for the education of young black children.  Soon after his death, in 1870, the Home for Friendless Colored Children was opened in Indianapolis by Quakers at 319 West 21st Street at the crossroad with Senate Street.  ‘When it opened, it was the only orphanage in the state of Indiana to care for African American children.  At the end of the home’s first year, it had housed 18 children.  By 1922, it had sheltered more than 3000.  Although most of the children came from the Indianapolis area, the orphanage accepted children from all over Indiana.  In 1922, the management of the orphanage changed hands.’ The closing balance became the basis of the Friends Educational Fund – a scholarship fund for black college students – administered by First Friends Meeting.  Today, we will honor those recipients of the Scholarships for 2016. 

John could have eaten his bread.  He could have worried about his farm – his hogs, his cattle to the point of anxiety.  John could have wasted his life.  Instead, he invested it.  He planted his heart in his friends, his church, his community, his future – not knowing what that would be.  He cast his bread upon the waters.  And, as a result, literally thousands of orphans and scholars have received bread. 

The poet, Mary Oliver, challenges each of us: ‘Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?’  Horace, and the Wisdom Teacher of Ecclesiastes, teach us to take hold of it.  To live it fully.  Generously. Lovingly.  And live it – now.

‘O youth, enjoy yourself while you are young! Let your heart lead you to enjoyment in the days of your youth.  Follow the desires of your heart and the glances of your eyes – but know well that God will call you to account for all such things – and banish care from your mind, and pluck sorrow out of your flesh!  For youth and black hair are fleeting!’  [Ecclesiastes 11:9-10; Jewish Study Bible] 

Enjoy your life!  God wants – even hopes – that you will.  The Jewish Study Bible teaches that God will hold us to account for joy, for fullness, for meaning – God will want to hear your stories of a life well lived.  Get out and enjoy a generous, loving, devoted, meaningful life.  Discover those things that matter to you, and plant them in the lives and hearts of those you care most about.  Seize this day – for tomorrow. 

Carpe diem! 

5-22-2016 Commencement

Sermon 5-22-2016“Commencement”

Acts 2:1-17

Anthony Manousos; http://laquaker.blogspot.com/ http://laquaker.blogspot.com/

John Piper; http://www.desiringgod.org/messages/old-and-young-shall-dream-together

Pastor Ruthie Tippin; Indianapolis First Friends Meeting

Isn’t it strange that we end the school year, commencing?  With commencement? With beginning?  To commence means to start or begin; come or cause to come into being; from the Old French commencer.  Endings are always beginnings.  They always signify change.  Something different.  Something new.  Something perhaps unexpected.  Something possibly longed for.  We end the school year, and start the rest of our lives.

We watch our kids graduate from pre-school.  I remember that.  Then, from elementary school, middle school, high school, college, grad school.  Graduating means completion – finishing a course of study, receiving a diploma that states your accomplishment.  This part of your life has ended, and there’s no purpose in repeating it.  It’s time to begin – to move forward and learn something new.  And there’s always something new to discover – about the world and about yourself. 

God is all about this stuff – endings and beginnings – because God IS endings and beginnings.  God is Alpha and Omega – the first and the last – from A to Z.  God is there at our borning, at our leavetaking, and with us throughout the stretch of our lives.  God schools us with Godself – teaching us with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, what it is to be human, what it is to be created, what it is to be creative.  There is no age or time when God says we cease to learn, or to be led.  God expects us to continue to grow, to walk, to be.  “And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.”  Old and young, vital in the continuing circle of endings and beginnings in life, and especially in the life of the Spirit.

The opening of the Book of Acts is an ending.  Life, as the followers of Christ has known it, had ended.  Christ had died on the cross, his body had been taken to a tomb, and then was not to be found.  He appeared physically to many who knew him, and it was known that he had risen to life again – just as Lazarus had, not too long before.  Their teacher and Lord had promised this, and indeed, had kept his word.  Christ told his followers they would not be left hopeless, but instead would be given the power of the Holy Spirit.  They were to wait in Jerusalem, where this would happen. 

What a great example of ‘ending well’.  Christ completed his work, but he didn’t just disappear.  He wrapped up his lesson plans – he turned everything into the Office.  He told all his students where he’d be going next – where they could find him.  He reminded them of what they’d been taught, what they had yet to accomplish, what this Teacher hoped for them.  He left, satisfied that nothing had been left undone.  And he told them to carry on.   Christ returned to heaven - his incarnate ministry on earth ended - and his followers went on to Jerusalem.

And then, everything began again!  Normal life.  Christ’s followers worshipped at the temple.  They prayed in the upper room.  They conducted business, naming Matthias as a new disciple to take the place of Judas.  They lived their daily lives.  Until that Feast Day of Pentecost.  50 Days after Passover, a Harvest Festival was celebrated.  The harvest that year?  The Holy Spirit!  Wind, fire, and flame swept over the people as they gathered.  Everyone was filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak in languages they had not known.  A crowd gathered, and was amazed, because they heard their own language being spoken.  Visitors from around the world, gathered in Jerusalem for the Feast, heard the wonders of God declared in their own languages!  It wasn’t wine or strong drink – the followers of Christ were intoxicated with the power of God’s Spirit!  An ending became a beginning… the start of the ministry of the Holy Spirit in and through all people:

“In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people.  Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.  Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.” 

Some people get the notion that prophets tell the future – that they are magicians of some sort.  Friend Anthony Manousos writes: “Just to be clear about what prophets do: inspired by God, they challenge or warn their religious community to live up to its highest ideals (aka the "will of God") and 2) they challenge leaders to live up their highest ideals. (This is sometimes called “speaking truth to power.”)  What does it mean to be “inspired by God”? It means that we have taken time to be silent, reflect deeply and listen to the “still, small voice” that is within each of us. We can do this both individually and corporately.”

No one is left out.  No one is excluded.  God’s spirit is poured out on all people. Young and old.  Servants and those served.  Men and women.  Everyone receives the blessing of God’s spirit.  Each person receives the gift of the Spirit for the good of all.  [I Corinthians 12:7]  We are all empowered for witness and ministry.  Christ has left, but his work and witness has not.  It has begun in a new way, through this beginning in the lives of his followers.  It didn’t, and still doesn’t matter whether they’re young or old, graduates of high school, or the school of hard knocks.  Whether they’ve completed a formal degree or a great degree of work and struggle.  What matters is that they, that you, that I, have discovered the power of God through the Holy Spirit.  It is this power that allows us to move through endings and to begin again.  To say farewell to our youth, and to accept the challenge of maturity.  To say goodbye to those we love, and move forward to loving others – including ourselves.  It is this power that gives us freedom to love God in new ways, not holding our understanding of God in patterns that served us well at one time, but now inhibit our growth and experience of God.

How do we discover the power of the Holy Spirit?  Jesus told his followers to go back to normal life – to live each day, waiting.  We must do the same.  Live each day, waiting expectantly.  Ending, and beginning.  Allowing things to fall away, leaving room for newness.  Ending our own chatter, and allowing an empty space of quietness to be poured full of God.  Ending our own answers, and allowing space for God’s questions.  Ending our own insistence, and allowing God’s way to open within us.  In our end is our beginning.  Alpha.  Omega. The beginning and the end and the beginning.

Amen.  

5-15-2016 The WOW of God

Sermon 5-15-2016; ‘The WOW of God’

Psalm 145, read responsively

Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow – The Three Essential Prayers, Riverhead Books, 2012, pps 71, 73

“The third great prayer, Wow, is often offered with a gasp, a sharp intake of breath, when we can’t think of another way to capture the sight of shocking beauty or destruction, of a sudden unbidden insight or an unexpected flash of grace.  “Wow” means we are not dulled to wonder…” Anne Lamott

Years ago, Jon and I were traveling and stopped at a wayside.  We climbed down a trail and could hear a waterfall deep below us.  What an incredible ‘wow’ moment it was to stand beneath that power, in bright sunshine, with tons of water falling so nearby, flushing the pool below it, surrounded with tall trees, lush greenery, and the fullness of sound.  It was a cathedral of space.  It was an holy experience.  It was an unforgettable ‘wow’ time of God’s ‘shocking beauty’, grace, and presence in my life and memory.

Anne Lamott reminds us that, “When we are stunned to the place beyond words, we’re finally starting to get somewhere.  It is so much more comfortable to think that we know what it all means, what to expect and how it all hangs together.  When we are stunned to the place beyond words, when an aspect of life takes us away from being able to chip away at something until it’s down to a manageable size and then file it nicely away, when all we can say in response is “Wow”, that’s a prayer.”

Jon and I recently visited New York City.  We hadn’t been there in twenty years or so.  We had a fabulous time going to some Broadway shows, eating great food, rowing boats in Central Park, and seeing and hearing lots of different people and languages all around us.  What a great city!  What a great experience!  But one of the most incredible experiences was the day we spent at the World Trade Center… or what was left of it.  It’s been fifteen years since that September 11^th, and many of us have been able to ‘chip away’ at that horror, getting it down to a ‘manageable size’ – especially those of us who weren’t in New York City or near there that day.  But when you walk up toward the place where the towers once stood, when you see the beautiful pools that fill those voids surrounded with plaques naming all those who died in each of the buildings, when you notice the white rosebuds next to certain names – those whose birthdays are being celebrated that day – you can’t but breathe a prayer of awe… wow. 

‘The words “wow” and “awe” are the same height and width – all w’s and short vowels.  They could dance together,’ says Lamott.  Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.  Wow and Awe.  Picasso’s ‘Guernica’. Awe and wow .  The Grand Canyon.  Beethoven’s 9th.  The white and purple iris’ flagging us in to the Meetinghouse these past few days… Wow.  Awe.  Wow.  Awe. 

Barbara Dubois shares this story: “We had a tour guide during a Canadian trip to Banff a few years ago. Every time she saw something, if not several things in nature (God's wonders), she acknowledged it with a joyful "wowwowwow” - always three wows!  We heard it when we witnessed a gorgeous blue sky with mountains behind, or Lake Louise with a tiny red canoe crossing it, the chance to witness rare animal wildlife, or the blessing that sunshine afforded so we could travel to exciting sights.  She seemed to see beauty in every day's adventures. We all got to hear her positive "wowwowwow" daily and frequently, so much so, that on the last evening of the trip, at dinner, we all declared aloud our appreciation for her leadership and enthusiasm throughout the week by saying all together, "We think YOU are "wow wow wow!!!"

Lamott says “Wow” has a reverberation – wowwowwow – and this pulse can soften us, like the electrical massage an acupuncturist directs to your spine or cramped muscle, which feels like a staple gun, but good.  The movement of grace from hard to soft, distracted to awake, mean to gentle again, is mysterious but essential.  As a tiny little control freak, I want to understand the power of Wow, so I can organize it and control it, and up its rate and frequency.  But I can’t.  I can only feel it, and acknowledge that it is here once again.  Wow…  Gorgeous, amazing things come into our lives when we are paying attention: mangoes, grandnieces, Bach, ponds.  This happens more often when we have as little expectation as possible.  If you say, “Well that’s pretty much what I thought I’d see,” you are in trouble.  At that point, you have to ask yourself why you are even here.  And if I were you, I would pray, “Help”.  Astonishing material and revelation appear in our lives all the time.  Let it be.  Unto us, so much is given.  We just have to be open for business.”

Friends, the WOW of God is what Quakers call ‘continuing revelation’ – all those things God has yet to show us of Godself.  The things God surprises us with every day – that we wake up in and for. The things we cannot yet see.  The things we’ve perhaps missed.  Those things we remember, and then say, ‘Oh… wow…  that was God!”  We sang, with the psalmist this morning, a song of awe.  When have you experienced God’s power in your life?  When have you experienced God’s mercy?  When have you been awed by God’s goodness poured out in the face of evil?  When have you been astonished by God’s ‘shocking beauty’ and grace? When have you been stunned by wonder?  When have you been surprised by God?

Find a partner in the meetingroom this morning.  Perhaps someone of a different age.  Describe to them a moment when you sensed awe – wonder - the ‘wow’ of God.  In nature.  In another person.  In an experience.  What, for you, have you found to be the “wow” of God?

5-8-2016 Gratitude and Grace

Sermon 5-8-2016‘Gratitude and Grace’;

2 Corinthians 4:5-15

Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow – The Three Essential Prayers, Riverhead Books, 2012, pps 43,46,47, 57,58.

John Piper: http://www.desiringgod.org/messages/grace-gratitude-and-the-glory-of-god

Pastor Ruthie Tippin, Indy First Friends

“Thanks” is the short form of the original prayer I used to say in gratitude for any unexpected grace in my life.  ‘Thankyouthankyouthankyou.”  As I grew spiritiually, the prayer became the more formal “Thank you,” and now, from the wrinkly peaks of maturity, it is simply “Thanks.”  So says Anne Lamott, in her book, ‘Help, Thanks, Wow’.  Thanks.  Gratitude.  Grace.  Grace and gratitude are tied together, often in ways we don’t see.

Giving thanks covers a wide range of circumstances:

Whee!  Level One Thanks:  I found a close parking space!

Whoo!  Level Two Thanks:  The cop didn’t notice me speeding – or at least didn’t stop me for it.  What a relief. 

(deep breath)  Whoooooo…  Level Three Thanks: The white blood cell count was about allergies – not leukemia.

The scriptures are full of thanksgiving, just as we are, often after facing huge crises.  It’s as if these deep places force us into exhaustion, need, our cry for help, and finally, our sense of gratitude that we are not alone.  That the thin places between life and death, human and divine, love and Light are transparent, and God-in-us is also God-with-us.  Thankyouthankyouthankyou.  I have found grace.

Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians, is a clay jar.  He’s just like any one of us.  He’d be happy to have a cop pass him by, to discover that he doesn’t have leukemia, or to pull into a close parking space at Kroger. He works for a living.  He has friends - and he has enemies.  Here, his integrity has been called into question, and his work, his ministry, is in trouble.  The folks at Corinth aren’t sure they can trust him, so what he has to say matters even more than we might think: “We have this treasure in ordinary, everyday, clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. For while we live, we are always being given up to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may be made visible in our mortal flesh. [2 Cor. 4:7-11]

Ordinary, fragile, regular people, are able to overcome incredible things through the life, power, and grace of God.  What looks and feels like death, is really life.  True life. 

Anne Lamott: “Gratitude runs the gamut from shaking your head and saying “Thanks, wow, I appreciate it so much,”… to saying “Thanks, that’s a relief,”… and of course, gratitude can be for everything in between… But grace can be the experience of a second wind, when even though what you want is clarity and resolution, what you get is stamina and poignancy and the strength to hang on.  Through the most ordinary things… life is transformed.”

This transformation is just what Paul is talking about.  Our reading today ended with Paul saying in verse 15, and our NRSV translation got it right: “Everything is for your sake, so that grace, as it extends to more and more people, may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.”  John Piper writes: “Almost all English translations miss a beautiful opportunity to preserve in English a play on words that occurs in Paul's Greek. Paul says, "It is all for your sake, so that as charis extends to more and more people it may increase eucharistian to the glory of God." The Greek word for thanks is built on the word for grace: charis becomes eucharistian. This could have been preserved in English by the use of 'grace' and 'gratitude' which show the same original root. So I would translate: "It is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase gratitude to the glory of God." The reason this is important is because when we try to define thanks or gratitude, what we find is that it has a very close relationship to grace. Unless we see this relationship, we really don't know what gratitude is.

Piper goes on to explain what gratitude is NOT.  Saying ‘thank you’ out of habit, or because your dad told you to, is not being grateful.  It’s a good thing to be trained to have good manners – ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ goes a long way – but true gratitude is a feeling, not a rehearsed response. ‘…gratitude is more than delighting in a gift. It is a feeling of happiness directed toward a person for giving you something good. It is a happiness that comes not merely from the gift, but from the act of giving. Gratitude is a happy feeling you have about a giver because of his giving something good to you or doing something good for you… [and] the emotion of gratitude generally rises in proportion to how underserved a gift it is. In other words, gratitude flourishes in the sphere of grace. And that is why the play on words in 2 Corinthians 4:15 is significant. Grace is charis and gratitude is eucharistian because gratitude is a response to grace. Gratitude is the feeling of happiness you feel toward somebody who has shown you some undeserved kindness, that is, who has been gracious to you.

For Paul, for me, for you, that’s Christ.  Christ loves us at our worst, at our best, at our most selfish, at our most generous, at our most ugly, at our most beautiful.  Christ loves us.  Christ loves us all.  Regardless of who we are, of how atrocious or spectacular our manners are, how kind or thoughtful we are, how much we deserve kindness in return.  Christ loves us all without qualification.  Christ loves Donald, and Bernie, and Hillary.  Christ loves Muslims and Christians.  Christ loves gays and straights, fundamentalist Christians and atheists.  Christ loves you and me.  And there isn’t a thing we can do about it.  Christ loved the Corinthians that weren’t so sure about Paul, and Christ loved Paul.  Christ would have died from old age if he didn’t love us… all.  That’s grace.  That’s what Paul, and Annie, and I, are talking about today.  And that’s why we can all say, “Whoooo… thanks.”

Anne Lamott:  “The truth is that ‘to whomever much is given, of him will much be required; and to whom much is entrusted, of him more will be asked,” if Jesus is to be believed.  He meant us.  Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior.  It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.  It means you are willing to stop being such a jerk.  When you are aware of all that’s been given to you, in your lifetime and in the past few days, it’s hard not to be humbled, and pleased to give back.”  Gratitude is a response to grace.    

So – this is Sunday – First Day.  Think backwards.  Just this past week.  Where did you experience grace?  How did you respond?  How did you behave?  How did your behavior reflect the grace of God?  The goodness of God?  The gratitude you have for all you have, toward God?  It’s hard not to be humbled, isn’t it?  A big part of the word gratitude is attitude! 

“Saying and meaning “Thanks” leads to a crazy thought”, says Annie.  “What more can I give?  We take the action first, by giving – and then the insight follows, that this fills us.  Sin is not the adult bookstore on the corner.  It is the hard heart, the lack of generosity, and all the isms, racism, and sexism and so forth.  But is there a crack where a ribbon of light might get in, might sneak past all the roadblocks and piles of stones, mental and emotional and cultural?  We can’t will ourselves to be more generous and accepting.  It obviously behooves me to practice being receptive, open for the business of gratitude.  A nun I know once told me she kept begging God to take her character defects away from her.  After years of this prayer, God finally got back to her:  “I’m not going to take anything away from you.  You have to give it to Me.”

“I have found,” Annie says, “that I even have to pray for the willingness to give up the stuff I hate most about myself.  I have to ask for help, and sometimes beg.  (Mayday!)  That’s the human condition.  I just love my own guck so much.  Help.”

Perhaps, if we ‘cracked pots’ – so fragile, thin, and open, can allow the Light of God, that ‘ribbon of light’, to permeate us, to fill us, to provoke us to use the Light we are and have for others, we will discover the charis – the grace of gratitude - for ourselves, and for others.  Our thanks will mean more to us.  We will say it more often.  We will say it with greater cause and for deeper reason.  Our thanks will be filled with giving.  Our giving will be filled with thanks.   Our gratitude will come from the attention we’re paying to God’s good grace.  ‘thankyouthankyouthankyou’  Amen.