The Christmas Message of the Sans Day Carol

A brief homily for the 7:00 PM Service of Lessons and Carols on Christmas Eve, December 24, 2024.

Some weeks ago, Adam shared a draft of this service with me. Among the familiar music and the much-loved carols, I noticed a few anthems that seemed new to me, or represented arrangements I did not know. But as I called up these anthems on YouTube and compared settings, choirs, and versions of the pieces, I soon had a favorite.

For some weeks, I’ve been obsessed with the Sans Day Carol. It’s also known as the St. Day Carol, after the village of St. Day in Cornwall, England.

Though the music is by John Rutter, the carol was first discovered by a priest named Gilbert Hunter Doble. But Doble heard it from—and get this— from the head gardener, W.D. Watson, of the Borough of Penzance! How wonderful is that?  Can’t you just see this gardener going around singing his heart out in Cornish and Father Doble stops and says, “You’ve got to teach me that carol.”  Gardner Watson said he learned it from another Cornish man around 1900.  And so, it was translated from Cornish into English, and eventually arranged by John Rutter in the version we heard tonight.

You may wonder, as I did, about the various colors of berries mentioned in the carol. Well, they exist!  Black berries exist. It seems that most cultivars of the inkberry produce black fruit on the female plants, hence the name inkberry. But there are also cultivars with white fruit, including ‘Ivory Queen’.  Inkberry also has a green variety called Green Magic. And, of course, most of the hollies we might see have red berries.

What I most love about the carol—in addition to the strange color scheme—is the blending of joy and sorrow, of Christmas with Easter. The imagery of death mixed in with life reminds us that the truth of Christmas lasts through the year. Christmas and Easter are linked by the love that saves us all.

God has come into the world as Jesus Christ to be like us and to experience everything we experience—the good and the bad, the painful and the extraordinary. 

The message of Christmas, so beautifully summed up in the carol, is Emmanuel—God is with us, no matter what.

Mary, Magnified

A sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Advent, December 22, 2024. The scriptures are Micah 5:2-5a, Hebrews 10:5-10, Luke 1:39-45, (46-55), and Canticle 15 (or 3).

In an interview in yesterday’s online NYTimes, scheduled to be in print on Christmas Eve, Nicholas Kristof talks with Elaine Pagels, the professor of history and religion who raises eyebrows with just about every book. Professor Pagels is, for me, a model Episcopalian—with almost equal parts faithful and skeptical. Her forthcoming book, Miracles and Wonder raises questions about a number of the Christian miracle stories, but the one that makes the headline in the newspaper raises questions about the Virgin Birth of Jesus. Pagels looks at early rumors of Jesus’s father being a Roman soldier, as always, Pagels, argues that each of the Gospels has its agenda, and especially with Matthew and Luke, that agenda is to explain unsettling questions and rumors about Jesus’ parentage.

That the Virgin Mary makes headlines is no surprise. The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, whose celebration was last week, is championed by anti-abortion activists on one end of the spectrum and by those in solidary with Palestinians, on the other. In September, the Vatican finally released a measured and uncommitted opinion on the ongoing appearances of Mary in Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina.

A couple of months ago in Chihuahua, Mexico, the Virgin Mary appeared in a very 21st century way on the wall of a parking deck so that everyone coming or going from the Chihuahua Cathedral would see her. Activists hung a banner that showed a version of Our Lady of Guadalupe, but around her head was a black-and-white kaffiyeh and her cloak was decorated with tiny watermelons. Beneath the image were the words, “Mi hijo es Palestino,” “My Son is a Palestinian.” The image was a reminder of the way in which the Virgin Mary turns up wherever and whenever there are people who are oppressed, mistreated, ignored, or forgotten.

Far from being the meek and mild Mother of Jesus some traditions might cast her, Mary has created complications, disruptions, questions, and challenges since the beginning.

In describing my own move from the Presbyterian Church to the Episcopal Church, I sometimes make a long story short by explaining that my first theology class in seminary used a textbook by the Anglican priest John Macquarrie. I noticed a footnote about a group called the Ecumenical Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and I began to read, and pray, and study about Mary. I began to feel as though the Virgin Mary was a part of what was urging me on, continues to pull me closer God in ways that are sometimes disruptive, often surprising, but always lead me to a deeper faith and sense of God.

Mary is a powerful figure. Not only as Our Lady of Guadalupe, or Medjugorje, Fátima, Lourdes, or a folk-hero of Catholic and Orthodox piety. But some believe (and I agree with them) that Mary might be the best hope forward for us to be in conversation and prayer with people of other faiths. For Jews, she is Miriam. Christians know her as the Mother of Jesus who gave him birth and witnessed his death. Muslims know her as Maryam, and in the Quran, there is an entire chapter named for her.

Mary sings in our place of humility and neediness in her song, Magnificat, the Latin shorthand for the beginning of, “My soul magnifies the Lord.” She begins by singing, “My soul magnifies the Lord,” but really, the Lord has magnified Mary. This is a theme that runs through today’s scripture lessons—this idea that God takes what’s small, insignificant, or weak, and God magnifies it—enlarging and creating more than was ever imagined.

In the first reading the Prophet Micah singles out Bethlehem, tiny Bethlehem. “From you shall come forth the ruler in Israel. And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they shall dwell secure, for now he shall be great to the ends of the earth.”

The second reading is from the Letter to the Hebrews, a kind of poetic argument about the ways in which Jesus is both high priest and perfect sacrifice, who accomplishes salvation for us in a way that nothing else can. Hebrews argues that no amount of offering from us, no amount of sacrifice or work or good deeds or perfect living will ever accomplish what was accomplished by the simplicity and purity of Christ’s faithfulness to God. God is more pleased by the simple act of faithfulness than the complicated scheme of temple sacrifices and offerings.

Far beyond the scriptures we read today, the Bible recounts over and over again how God favors the small and insignificant. Israel was not the mightiest of the nations. Moses was not the most likely to lead the people of Israel out of bondage. David was not the most likely to be king. Sarah was not the most likely to be the matriarch of an entire people. Great things were not expected from Jonah the prophet, Ruth the Moabite, Ezekiel or Esther, and many others.

Mary’s song in today’s Gospel sings with eloquence the song of God’s reversals, of God’s ability to turn everything upside-down and inside-out. The lowly and ignored are seen and appreciated. The mighty are put down and the left out are lifted up. The hungry are fed and those who are full are sent away. God remembers. God shows mercy. God magnifies.

I wonder in what ways we are being called to be like Mary and to magnify the Lord even as we are aware of the way that God magnifies our efforts and prayers? What can we do to lift up the lowly, to help feed the hungry, to offer healing to those who hurt? The scriptures today invite us to do at least two things: First, we can extend the love of God to those who might feel small or insignificant.   And second, we can remind ourselves of God’s ongoing work of lifting up, no matter how far down we might feel sometimes.

Shannon Kubiak Primicerio is a writer who wrote a great little book a few years ago called God Called a Girl.  She writes

Mary was a nobody, yet she found favor and blessing with God.  How many times do we look in the mirror and find a nobody staring back at us?  We often limit what God can do with our lives because we think our upbringing, our appearance, or our life is not a sufficient tool for the hands of God to use….[But] if Mary really was a nobody, all  it took for God to make her “somebody” was one miracle on a lonely day when she was just going about her daily business… God called a girl. And that girl changed the world.  The same God is calling again, and this time He’s calling you.” (God Called a Girl, p. 14-19, passim)

May we sing with the Blessed Virgin Mary the song of God’s reversals, of God’s surprises, and of God’s magnifying love, that we may do our part to magnify the Lord.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Moved by Joy

A sermon for the Third Sunday of Advent, December 15, 2024. The scriptures are Zephaniah 3:14-20, Philippians 4:4-7, Luke 3:7-18, and Canticle 9.

The Third Sunday of Advent is nicknamed Gaudete Sunday. We light the rose candle, some churches have rose vestments they wear today, and in others, today is the only Sunday in Advent when flowers are allowed on the altar. And, you guessed it, they’re usually roses.

The day takes its name from the Latin minor propers of the day that sing over and over again, “Rejoice! Gaudete!” We hear it in English in our scripture readings, in our music, and perhaps even a little in the air:  Rejoice. It’s almost Christmas!

Last week, the scriptures asked us to prepare—to make room, to clean out, and to get ready for God to do something new. 

This week, the scriptures add another piece:  Prepare for Joy! Get ready not only for what God is going to do, but for the joy that breaks in along the way.

We hear about preparing for joy in our first reading, as the prophet Zephaniah prepares the way for a future of hope. He can preach about what’s coming because he’s filled with the confidence of God. “Rejoice and exult with all your heart,” Zephaniah says, because our God is a God of deliverance and forgiveness. Whatever has happened in the past is over and done. New life is coming. “God will rejoice over you with gladness,” the prophet says. “God will renew you in his love; will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival.”

Zephaniah is showing the people of Israel that one way of living into joy is by moving out of the past.

I recently heard a nurse talk about when she did this—when she helped prepare the way for someone, in that same way as Zephaniah, and as John the Baptist. This nurse worked in a drug rehab center and people came in and went out, so one rarely knew what the long-term outcome might be. But she remembered this one man that the other nurses avoided. He was angry and almost violent, and nothing they did seemed to help him move forward. One night, when everyone was just about at their wit’s end, this nurse remembered a left-over cake in the nurses’ lounge. She got a piece, found a candle and put it on the slice and lit the candle, and then she got the other nurses and staff to join her as they went into the difficult man’s room. They sang “Happy Birthday.” The man was so stunned that he didn’t even have a chance to tell them this was not at all his birthday, and the nurse I know explained to him: “This can be the first day of a whole new life for you. The past is over and done, gone forever. Today begins a new life, if you’ll have it.” Through tears and in shock—at least for the moment— the man seemed to catch a glimmer of the possibility. That nurse had helped prepare the way. She didn’t know what the results would be, but she had done her part.

In the Gospel, John the Baptist shows us that another way of living into joy is by doing the small things right in front of us.  John’s words can sound scary and foreboding at the beginning, a little like he’s throwing a bucket of ice water in our face:

“One is coming,” he says, “who will baptize not only with water but with the Holy Spirit and with fire…” and “His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”  But then the very next sentence is, “So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people.”

Good news?  What’s the good news that we’re going to be baptized with fire, and one is coming whose job it will be to separate out the good stuff from the junk and will throw all the junk on a fire?  But John gets our attention to wake us up from the past.

John gets really practical.  The crowds ask John what I might have asked John, “Ok, so what do we do? How do we live faithfully? Especially when times are confusing and the bad seem to get more prosperous while the good are steadily losing ground.  What do we do?”

More good news from John:  Do the simple, faithful thing that’s right before you.

Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?” He said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”

John the Baptist, with all of his slightly scary talk about the end of times and the beginning of new days, of one who is coming who will sort things out and given people their due—when it comes down to it, the way we prepare for God’s coming more fully into our world is through simple acts of kindness and mercy.

And so, we prepare for joy by having the courage to move out of the past, and by doing the little things right in front of us, but also by allowing for God to surprise us.

Last Thursday was the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and you might have seen some of the gatherings or processions around town as people carry images of the Virgin Mary, flowers, candles, and make their way to churches and shrines. The stories around Our Lady of Guadalupe are filled with joyous surprises, but they all begin with a simply, indigenous man in 16th century Mexico named Juan Diego.

It was in 1531 that Juan Diego, Juan was walking on the outskirts of what would become Mexico City. There, he say a vision of the Virgin Mary. But she looked different. Mary appeared as a mestiza, a mixed race young woman and she asked Juan to go to the Bishop and ask permission to build a little house, a place where people could come and meet Mary’s son Jesus. This first appearance was on December 9, but Juan had trouble convincing the bishop. Then also, Juan’s uncle was dying, and Juan felt like he needed to tend to him. And so, after some coming and going, trying and failing, Mary gave a sign. She told Juan to go to a particular hill, and there he would find roses in full bloom.  He went, found the roses, and gathered them up in his work apron, his tilma. He went back to see the bishop.

But again Bishop Zumárraga doubted, but then Jean unfurled his tilma, and out fell all the roses, but even more, on the garment there appeared the vision of the Virgin Mary—as a mixture of the well-known Virgin of the Immaculate Conception, that would have been recognizable to Europeans, but also with the unmistakable darker skin and features of an indigenous woman, recognized by the people who had long inhabited the land.

The symbol of the Virgin of Guadalupe would become a central point for people of mixed backgrounds and histories to find a common welcome to the little house, the place of welcome, where they could meet Jesus in a new way.

Juan Diego was clear that his mission was to relay the news—first to the bishop, but then as a protector of the house, the chapel outside Mexico City, where for days leading up to last Thursday, and still, people are celebrating God’s surprising and joyful grace in Jesus through Our Lady of Guadalupe.

Our job is to prepare—like Zephaniah, like John the Baptist, like the Virgin Mary in scripture and through Guadalupe, and to keep forging ahead in joy, like Juan Diego so that there can be a space, a place, an openness, a peace, in which Christ can be born again.

John the Baptist proclaims, “One who is more powerful (than us) is coming …. And he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” We have that Holy Spirit. At our baptism we receive the Holy Spirit who protects us from any harm. Who strengthens us for whatever lies ahead. Our baptism, the ongoing presence of the Spirit, and the power of Christ in community, empower us to turn again and again to God.

As we move through these days of December, may God show us how to prepare for joy—to move out of a frozen past, to do the little things right in front of us, and to be open to God’s surprise, whenever it comes.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Helped out of a Ditch (of Sin)

A sermon for the Second Sunday of Advent, December 8, 2024. The scriptures are Baruch 5:1-9, Philippians 1:3-11, Luke 3:1-6, and Canticle 4 or 16.

Today’s scriptures ask us to prepare ourselves for the coming of God. They invite us to make ready, to allow God, in the words of Malachi, to “refine us like gold and silver, until we present offerings to the Lord in righteousness….until we are “pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years. ” We are invited to a way of “repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” “Repent so that sins are forgiven.” All these words that sound familiar for the language of the church, but what do they really mean?

At some level, it’s all clear enough, probably. Just like when we were children, if we took something that didn’t belong to us, or hit a sibling or playmate, or acted out in some way, our parents taught us what it is like to say we’re sorry. The saying of “sorry” opened up a door to forgiveness, and a way to restore the relationship. We could play again with our friend. We could feel again the closeness and warmth of the love of the parent. But as we grow older, sin becomes a little more confusing sometimes.

How do we repent when we’re not even sure if we have sinned? How do we know if something is our fault, or the fault of someone or something beyond us? How do we know if God is listening, when we say we’re sorry? And what does forgiveness feel like?

In our culture, I think we’ve inherited a combination of attitudes around sin. Some would simply dismiss any talk of “sin” as something outdated and leftover from a time when the church used superstition and power to rule over the lives of the faithful. And so, a lot of people don’t really think much about sin, or reflect much on their part when things seem to go wrong.

But for people who are at some level involved with God, people who seek to be in relationship with God, people who want to follow the way of Jesus Christ, one of two attitudes toward sin often prevails. The first attitude toward sin is intensely personal. The belief is that God has shown us what God expects of us, through the 10 Commandments and other laws, through the life of Jesus Christ, through the preaching of the apostles, and through the teaching of the Church. So, when we break a rule, it’s my fault, it’s the fault of the individual. It’s my responsibility, then to approach God and ask for forgiveness.

This can happen through silent confession (me and God), or might happen through the church’s sacrament of reconciliation (whether using an old fashioned confessional, or sitting aside a priest in the chapel).

And yet, some have pointed out that there is no such thing as an individual Christian. To be a Christian is to be a person of faith in community, and so everything about the living out of our faith involves other people.

At the other extreme of attitudes toward sin is to view sin as primarily communal or social. When we see a tragedy on the news of a person who goes on a shooting rampage, such a view moves beyond the perpetrator to think about the societal forces that might have moved the person to do such an awful thing. One is unlikely to say the kind of thing that might have been said in other ages: “that person has a demon,” or “that person is evil.” But instead, we’re more likely to hear, “that person must have grown up in a bad family, and must not have had other options. They must have been driven to do such evil.”

How do we balance the two extremes—the one that only blames the individual with the one that gives quick and easy absolution to the individual and blames society?

Our scriptures give us a clue. John the Baptist quotes Isaiah by saying, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’” John, through Isaiah, shows us that sin is indeed personal, but it has communal effects. In the same way, when I repent and am restored to new fellowship with God, that also brings with it a restoration to right relationship with other people. It makes the way not only for justice, but it also makes the way for peace.

One of the best images for dealing with sin, for me, comes from the 14th century holy woman, Julian of Norwich (1342-1416). When she was 30 years old, Julian almost died from a fever or some other ailment, and while she was sick, she received a vision from God. She wrote down the vision, but continued to pray to God for more insight. Twenty years later, she wrote down an extended version of what she remembered and how the Holy Spirit helped her understand its meaning.

In a part of her vision, Julian is shown a great Lord who has a devoted servant. The Lord sends the servant off on some errand, and the servant is excited to do it. But then the servant falls into a ditch. And the servant “is greatly injured” as Julian writes.

[The servant] groans and moans and tosses about and writhes, but cannot rise to help himself in any way . . . And all this time his loving lord looks on him most tenderly . . .with great compassion and joy.” She explains that the servant “was diverted from looking on his lord, but his will was preserved in God’s sight. I saw the lord commend and approve him for his will, but he himself was blinded and hindered from knowing this will. And this is a great sorrow and a cruel suffering to him, for he neither sees clearly his loving lord, who is so meek and mild to him, nor does he truly see what he himself is in the sight of his loving lord.

We can probably identify with the moaning and tossing of the servant who has fallen. Sin can be painful. When we’ve fallen so low that we can’t see out, we feel cut off and alone. It can feel like death. But if we remember that God is watching, God is smiling at us, we can gain the encouragement to begin to try to get out of the ditch. We pray. We ask for help. We look for creative insight. Sometimes we need a boost, and we ask for others to help us. Sometimes, we simply need to do some climbing, get dirty, use our spiritual and physical muscles and simply get up and out. It is the work of spiritual discernment for us to learn to know what is needed to get out of the ditch. God gives us the church for help, the Bible for help, the saints and tradition, and God gives us one another.

The Collect for the Second Sunday of Advent has us ask God that we might be given the grace to heed the warnings of the prophets “and forsake our sins, that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ our Redeemer.”

May God help us not to be paralyzed by sin, and not to ignore sin that could make us stumble later on. But instead, may God help us believe the words of Jesus when he says, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”  Jesus extends his hand to help us out, to pull us up, and to enable us to stand, walk, and run again.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Christ the King

A sermon for Christ the King Sunday, November 24, 2024. The scriptures are Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14, , Psalm 93, Revelation 1:4b-8, John 18:33-37.

Today we celebrate the Feast of Christ the King. It is a little like a New Year’s celebration in the church, since this day works as a kind of exclamation point to the church year. A new church year begins next Sunday with the First Sunday of Advent, as we slow down a bit, breathe deeply, and begin to think about what it means that God has come into the world in the flesh, as a little baby named Jesus.

But today is Christ the King and in the scripture readings there runs the steady theme of the Kingdom of God.

In the Book of Daniel there are some frightening images. There are fires and flames, beasts and burnings. There is conflict and warfare, but the end result is a kingdom, a kingdom that is glorious and everlasting and serves the Ancient of Days for ever.

The psalm invites us to sing the praises of the Lord God who is like a king. So mighty is our God that all creation rises up to praise him, people, nations, even the waters themselves lift up their voices.

The Revelation to John also celebrates the king as victor. While it gives hope to the scattered Christians being persecuted in the first century, it also describes a cosmic battle of good and evil, where the victory is so complete that even we, living much later, become royals. John gives glory, “To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever.” This is a vision of victory that stretches to everyone, making us all kings and queens, princes and princesses, people created in the very image and likeness of God.

In the Gospel, Jesus explains to Pontius Pilate, “My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews; my kingdom is not from here.” “My kingdom is not from this world.”

From the calling of the disciples, through the healings and parables and teachings, even as they enter into Jerusalem for the celebration of the Passover, there is confusion over this kingdom of God as it pertains to Jesus. He explains his kingdom by what it is not, rather than by what it might be. When asked, Jesus gives simple images. The kingdom is like a mustard seed. The kingdom is a like the yeast used by a woman baking bread. The kingdom is like a pearl of great price. The kingdom is here, but it is not here.
How we perceive the kingdom of God will directly affect how we live out our lives in faith.

The Church over time has understood the kingdom of God in different ways. At some points, it has understood the kingdom of God as a goal for the here-and-now. The idea of Christendom, a civilization ruled by Christian kings, following Christian laws and fighting for Christian ideals allowed for and encouraged the crusades.

It has allowed for the persecution of Jews and Muslims and anyone perceived not to fit into the prevailing understanding of what it means to be “Christian.” There are, of course, still those who would have this nation be an overtly Christian one, with so-called Christian laws on the books, just like people in other places advocate for another religion’s laws to rule the day. But whenever people begin to try to create the kingdom of God in time, before long, the kingdom of God often seems to look a lot like us. It becomes a reflection of our own values and beliefs, and often the uglier side of those believes. However, the words of Jesus are clear: “My kingdom is not from this world.”

Others in the history of the Church have taken our Lord at his word and understood his kingdom as only having to do with heaven, far, far away. Therefore, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness in this world, simply need to wait: they’ll get their justice in the next life. But to believe that the kingdom of God only exists in heaven leaves us with little or no responsibility for the earth where we live.

But there is another view. Instead of the kingdom absolutely now or the kingdom way away in heaven, Christ calls us into a more unpredictable place, to live between the “already” and the “not-yet.” Wherever there are signs of justice and hope and faith, there is a breaking-in of the kingdom. But it’s partial, not yet fully realized.

The season of Advent will give us opportunity to explore this further as we look at what it means for Christ to have come into the world as a child, but also for us to look forward to his coming again in glory at the end of times.

So the kingdom, in some sense, is Christ himself. As he reveals himself, the kingdom unfolds. The kingdom of God spreads out as we receive Christ and come to know and love him and continue to embody his kingdom-goals in our lives. As Saint John realizes from the Revelation, “God has made us (with Christ in us) to be a kingdom.”

This kingdom is not of the world. It is a kingdom of reversals. Our Lady, herself, sang of this kingdom, “He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has put down the mighty from their thrones, and exalted those of low degree. He has filled the hungry with good things; and the rich He has sent empty away.” To live with Christ as King is to live with an awareness of this reversal.

His is also a kingdom of welcome. When we read the Gospels it is a wild array of people who come to hear Jesus, who follow him, and who make him their Lord. Some are prostitutes, some are tax collectors, some widows, some soldiers; some are very rich, some are very poor, but they are unlikely to meet except in the presence of Christ. To live with Christ as King is to live in continual welcome of the outcast, of those who have nowhere else to go.

And finally, his is a kingdom of possibilities. To live with Christ as King is to live in expectation, to live in hope, and to live in faith. It is a kingdom of second chances, and third chances and fourth and fifth and sixth chances.

Especially on this day, we give thanks for Christ our King. And we give thanks that it is a kingdom that has been given to us, for us to extend to all of those who might believe. May we rejoice in this kingdom of reversals. May we open our doors to a kingdom of outcasts. And may we open our hearts to a kingdom of possibilities.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Sense and Beyond Sense

A sermon for the Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, July 7, 2024. The scripture readings are 2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10, Psalm 48, 2 Corinthians 12:2-10, and Mark 6:1-13.

Summer can bring an all-out assault on the senses, if you think about it. To walk outside is to be hit with a bright light and our skin feels the difference between standing in the sun, resting in the shade. Though it gets dark later, once it’s dusk, the lightening bugs come out and put on their own version of fireworks. Our ears hear fireworks, and church bells, traffic and birds, and tourists who are tired, and hot, and lost.

A neuroscientist, Dr. Lisa Feldman-Barrett has suggested that we have much more beyond our five senses of seeing, hearing, touch, smell and taste. She writes about various receptors our bodies have that detect information beyond what is normally imagined. For example, she explains that our retinas are, of course, portals for the light waves we need for vision, but some retinal cells also inform our brain if it’s daytime or nighttime. This ‘day/night sense’ is the basis for circadian rhythms that affect your metabolism and your sleep/wake cycle. Who knows what else there might be?

The scriptures today invite us to think about our senses, but also to think about the way they stop short of something else. Together they help us ask the question, “what does it mean to walk by faith, not by sight?” (2 Corinthians 5:7).

Jesus runs up against people who look but don’t see. They listen, but they don’t hear him. In today’s Gospel he runs into local opposition. The very people who know him best can’t reconcile the Son of Mary with the Son of God. It’s doesn’t compute. It’s doesn’t flow. It’s as though their senses are all clogged up, somehow closed off from God.

When they look, all they see is Mary’s son, Joseph’s stepson. What they hear just sounds like the same old stories. To perceive Jesus as the Christ, to receive Jesus as the Son of God, come to redeem us and live in us and be with us through death and into everlasting life— this takes faith. As Jesus moved through Nazareth, he was “amazed at their unbelief.” And he and his disciples could accomplish very little there. And so they moved on to places and people who were open, who could perceive, who dared to live by faith.

In today’s Epistle reading, Paul tells the people of Corinth about someone he knows who had a particular religious experience. He says that “this person” was caught up into what Paul calls the third heaven. Whatever that “third heaven” was or is, Paul means to convey that the person had an experience beyond the normal senses. Paul covers a lot of ground in the life of faith as he points to this person who has known God through a sublime, rare, spiritual experience, and Paul himself, who most days has to seek God in the kingdom of here and now, of aches and pains, of thorny people and situations and thinking… who knows what Paul refers to here, but whatever it was that afflicts him, he uses it to remind him to turn again and again to God.

Paul knows about the senses. His first encounter with Jesus Christ was an overwhelming of his senses, as he was blinded by a vision, and “in the darkness of having no sight [he] is led across the boundary of what, for him, had not been credible: faith in Jesus Christ.”

So God’s grace comes in ways that work through the senses and in spite of the sense. God’s grace brings forth faith from us— grace reaches into us to pull out faith, like the sun reaches into the earth and brings forth green things that sprout, and grow, and blossom.

Martin Warner, the Bishop of Chichester, has a little book of meditations for Holy Week that connects our senses with the presence of God. Warner says we’re drawn into a relationship with God through the experience of our senses, “but also through the challenge to leave them behind. It’s like “diving into the sea,” he says. “a new world emerges in which we feel strange and unfamiliar with what governs it and how we inhabit it.” (Martin Warner, Known to the Senses, viii.)

Through the ages, people searching for God have been led through the senses into deeper faith. In the 3rd century, men and women left cities and went into the desert to fine-tune their senses. The Desert Mothers and Fathers, and all who tried to learn from them since, have sometimes prayed for the lessening of the senses so that faith might be developed more strongly.

Some have maintained the “custody of the eyes” so that one’s gaze might be directed more upon God. (In a culture as saturated with appearance and presentation as ours, that might be a good practice from time to time.)

There is the tradition of fasting, so that one’s hunger might be less, say, for carbohydrates and more for Christ. (By noticing our emptiness, we can make better choices about what fills us.)

There is the tradition of silence so that the inner voice of God’s Holy Spirit might be heard.

In these ways, Christian ascetics have taken seriously this spiritual training of the senses—the training, itself being a kind of faith—so that a deeper faith and reliance upon God might be developed and sustained.

Certainly, God works through what we see and feel and taste and hear, but also, there comes that place beyond, that other “sense.” That sense beyond all sense that we call faith.

As we move through this sensual season of summer, may God quicken and deepen the sense beyond sense—the faith, that is in us. May we take time out this season—times in which we allow our over-stimulated and over-used sensibilities to vacate our bodies, so that we might be newly open to faith. Whether it’s through long walks, visits to quiet places, a retreat or even silence in the midst of a crowd, may we take time this summer to practice training our senses, that me might not always depend upon what we see or hear or taste, reach in faith. And may the Holy Spirit develop within us the kind of faith that allows God to work wonders, make miracles, and do mighty works.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Who needs healing?

A sermon for the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost, June 30, 2024. The scripture readings are 2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27, Psalm 130, 2 Corinthians 8:7-15, and Mark 5:21-43.

Yesterday afternoon, I passed through Times Square. As I made my way towards my street, I noticed a large, rainbow-covered stage set up to celebrate Pride Weekend. There was a large crowd around it, so I walked closer. A drag queen mistress of ceremonies was about to introduce the next act and asked people in the crowd where they were from. We heard a roll call of states and countries, with lots of cheering. And then Giaconda, from Lucky Cheng’s restaurant, took the stage and offered her own creative and hysterical version of the song, “Barbie Girl.”

At the same time, not far away in the same plaza, but in a clear spot was a young man with a sound system. He was preaching to the air a message of judgment, fire, damnation. I got lost in the jumble of his denunciations, but I did hear him say something about “being healed.”

In light of today’s Gospel, I took in the two very different scenes around me and ask myself (and God), “Who, here, really needs to be healed?”

–The happy, laughing people around the stage–who with ever wave of laughter, moved closer to each other and more deeply into a shared energy of fun?

–Or, the solitary young preacher—angry and judgmental, who pushed people farther away even as he reinforced his own cluster of beliefs and generalizations.

Healing moves us out of ourselves, towards other people, and into the presence of God.

Our first scripture reading might sound strange, out of context. The scripture takes the form of a lament, a ritualized prayer that King David offers for his predecessor, King Saul, and for David’s friend (perhaps more than friend), Jonathan. I say “perhaps more than friend,” because of the line in verse 26 were David cries out, “I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan; greatly beloved were you to me; your love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.”

David uses the lament as a part of his healing from grief. He prays to God but invites others to pray with him. In his lament, he lifts Saul and Jonathan up into the presence and care of God. Rather than grieve alone, and risk that grief turning even more deeply inward, David grieved outwardly, and moved with the current of healing.

In the Gospel, too, we see people who look for the current of healing and step into it, allowing it to move them with Jesus, into the power of God’s love.

We hear about Jairus, a leader in the local synagogue. He sees Jesus approach, and immediately, falls on his knees. Jairus is a religious big shot, the kind of religious leader who so often is threatened by Jesus. But here, Jairus is reduced to his knees, like a begger. His daughter is sick, and so nothing else really matters to him at this point—not his position in the synagogue, not his wealth, not the rest of his healthy family, not his own health— instead, here he is begging, hoping, praying for help because his little girl is sick and things are looking bad.

As Jesus makes his way to the village of Jairus, another story interrupts. [This is often a tactic of the Gospel writer, Mark the Evangelist, who loves to begin a story, interrupt himself with another story, and then complete the initial one—and that’s what he’s doing here.]

Jesus makes his way, but a huge crowd surrounds him. And one lady in particular reaches through the crowd and places her hand on Jesus’ robe.

Desperation (a kind of faith) makes her do it. We can imagine that she must have tried everything. Gone to doctors, but no help. In our day, we can imagine she might try every kind of doctor — specialists, technicians, geniuses, quacks—anything, anyone, to try to help her. So finally, she practically lunges at Jesus as a kind of final prayer.

Jesus feels power go out of him. The woman is healed and is made whole again. She is restored to life. But this story is an aside, an insertion into the other story of Jesus going to the house of Jairus.

Jesus makes it to Jairus’ house. He sees the little girl and is told that she has died. But Jesus touches her, he tells her to get up, and she is healed. She is made whole again. And she, too, is restored to life.

The scriptures today don’t explain everything. They don’t give a recipe for miracles, but they do point us in the direction of God’s healing.

For there to be healing, at least two conditions are usually present:

The first is that there is an openness to God, a reaching towards God.

And the second is that there is what could be described as a “reaching towards God with others.”

The first is faith. Part of having faith means that we’re open to the way in which God might move in our lives. We sometimes limit our expectation of healing because we look for a cure. But sometimes healing brings something different from a cure. Healing can give us new strength. It can give us new confidence. It can bring us Christ himself. In healing, God works like a good doctor, working best when we give God room to work, not limiting God’s work by what we think we want or think we need. With such faith, we can pray for healing, resting in the knowledge that God works and wills nothing but the very best for us.

Faith is a part of healing, but notice also that in scripture, as in experience, healing rarely happens in isolation. It happens when two or three are gathered. It happens when one is brought into community by prayer, or by intention. Sometimes the reaching with others involves touch. In the Gospels, it was often the touch of Jesus himself. Sometimes it was the touch of friends who brought one into relationship with Christ. And after the Resurrection and Ascension, it happens that through the touch of the disciples, God’s healing begins to spread. It’s not so much the apostolic succession of bishops that makes the miracles happen. Instead, it’s apostolic succession as the deposit of faith and hope is passed down person to person, faithful community to faithful community.

And we pass it on, still.

In our day, we may be tempted to think that healing comes only through professional healers with medical degrees, or at least through specially gifted people who are healers, but the truth is that, more often than not, healing happens through ordinary people, when we reach for God together, with the touch of one person to another.

Ann Weems is a poet who writes about our relationship with one another, the relationship that can encourage healing. In one poem, she writes,

I see your pain and want to banish it with the wave of a star,
but have no star.
I see your tears and want to dry them with the hem of an angel’s gown,
but have no angel.
I see your heart fallen to the ground and want to return it,
wrapped in cloths woven of rainbow,
but have no rainbow.
God is the One
who has stars, and angels and rainbows,
And I am the one
God sends to sit beside you
until the stars come out
and the angels dry your tears
and your heart is back in place
rainbow blessed.

Going back to my experience in Times Square and my question about who needs the healing? The real answer is probably all of us—some of us from old wounds of not fitting into societal expectations, some of damage done by religious systems based in fear, but if we are open to God and invite others, we can find healing.

And may the almighty Lord be now and evermore our defense and make us know and feel that the only name under heaven given for health and salvation is the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

In that name, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

A Cross of Healing

A sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Lent, March 10, 2024. The scripture readings are Numbers 21:4-9, Psalm 107:1-3, 17-22, Ephesians 2:1-10, and John 3:14-21.

The San Damiano Cross in Assisi.

If you’ve noticed the windows of bars and restaurants around New York, you may have seen decorations for next Sunday. Though we will observe it as the Fifth Sunday in Lent, for many outside the church (and quite a few inside) it will be St. Patrick’s Day, all day long. People will wear green, decorate with shamrocks, fountains will be dyed green, and legends told again about Patrick, the 5th century bishop and missionary.  A few years ago, at my church in Washington, DC, the Men’s Fellowship had a meeting in mid-March. There was a wonderful parishioner named Louis, who made special table decorations for the event, depicting some of the legends and stories about Patrick.  The one I still remember was a poster that sat in the middle of a table. From one side, it had a view as though one were looking into the front windshield of a car.  Behind the window, seated in the driver’s seat, was a man wearing a miter on his head. In the passenger’s seat was a large snake.  And Louis explained the picture to anyone who didn’t immediately get it:  This was (of course) St. Patrick driving the snakes out of Ireland!

Though it was long before St. Patrick came along, I think the people of Israel in our first reading would have really liked Patrick and Patrick’s reported power to get rid of snakes. Because there in the wilderness, God’s people had a serious snake problem. 

Our first reading from the Book of Numbers is a strange old story.  It’s one of a number of Old Testament passages in which the people of God are “murmuring.”  They are impatient, restless, and whiney.  They’re complaining against God and against God’s leader in their midst, Moses. They miss what was familiar back in Egypt—even though they had been enslaved, there had been a certain predictability about it all.  And now, there isn’t much food or water at all, and when there is, the food is dreadful.  But then it gets worse. 

These poisonous snakes show up.  The snakes bite the people, and many of them die.  And so, the people pray to God, and ask God to forgive their murmuring, their whining, and their lack of faith.  God hears them, and then God gives them a symbol of healing.  God uses the very thing that has hurt them, and God turns that hurtful thing into a symbol of healing.  This new, strange but powerful symbol is of a serpent raised up high on a pole.  When the people look up at this image, they are healed. 

In some ways this story has in it a kind of symbolic vaccination, like in modern vaccinations, when a little part of a disease is put into us.  When things go correctly, our body’s immune system fights the intruder and we become protected from the illness. 

In the Old Testament lesson, the image of the serpent reminds the people of risk involved in life, itself—especially in living a life that tries to be faithful to God.  But the story also tells of God’s protection, of God’s promise to deliver them, and save them.  It is this image of death that is converted to life, that foreshadows the salvation we have through the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. 

In the image of the cross, there is suffering and pain. There is danger and death.  But on the other side of Easter morning, there’s healing.  There’s resurrection.  There’s new life for ever.  The very thing that has hurt (the cross) provides the means for helping. 
 
The fancy, theological word for what happens on the cross is Atonement.  The word implies that Jesus’s action on the cross is some way atones, or makes up for, or is the cure for, our sin.  Some have defined Atonement as “at-one-ment” with Christ—it all comes from the idea of being at-one, of being reconciled, of being brought into harmony and friendship with God through Jesus Christ. 

The cross can’t be explained scientifically.  It can’t even be explained very clearly through theology.  But the cross is understood (if one can use that word) by experience.  What happens on the cross is a mystery that must be explored, experienced, and approached through faith. 

I should say clearly, that I in no way mean to suggest that I understand the full power of the cross. I don’t. But what I do understand is that part of the mystery of the cross involves God turning pain into power.  God uses wounds to bring about healing. 

We experience this whenever people gather with others who have suffered as they have.  When we meet others who share the same wounds—whether that be a traumatic event, a loss, an addiction, some experience of violence, or any other common hurt—we can begin to find healing in the experience of being with each other, of hearing others’ stories, of sharing others’ strength.  If you’ve ever been a part of such a group, you’ll know that while the individuals differ and may not agree on anything else, the common suffering can create a kind of energy, a kind of power, and a kind of strength.  Whether one calls it a higher power or something else, I believe that it’s God who is behind that power.  It is God who is behind the conversion of pain into power. 

We experience healing through the combined experience of pain, but we also come to understand it in ourselves sometimes.  When we are able to be honest, to be vulnerable, again— we begin to move toward healing and toward being what Henri Nouwen and others have called “wounded healers.”

With the Academy Awards happening tonight, I’ve been thinking about movies a lot lately—especially the movies I’d like to give awards to, some of which don’t become all the well know.  One of those movies came out a few years ago with William Hurt, called, “The Doctor” (1991).  The movie begins by showing a heart surgeon, played by William Hurt, who’s at the top of his game.  Dr. Jack MacKee is shown early in the film instructing his interns, “There is a danger of feeling too strongly for your patients,” he says.   “There is a danger in getting involved.  You have to be detached.”   Dr. MacKee’s way with his patients is clinical.  It is cold, objective, and detached. 

That is, until the doctor, himself, discovers that he has throat cancer.  Slowly, he begins to see what it is like to be a patient.  He learns what it’s like to have to wait for hours in a waiting room, what it’s like to fill out endless paperwork, what it’s like to have all the important decisions made on your behalf, as though you—the patient—are not even a part of the process.  You can probably guess the ending of the movie.  It is Hollywood, after all.  Dr. MacKee learns from his experience.  He realizes that the very best healer, the one who can offer the most, will be the one who is aware of his or her own wounds, the one who is aware of one’s own pain.

Prevailing themes in our culture suggest otherwise, of course.  Strength is admired more than weakness.  We’re encouraged to bandage up wounds quickly, and to hide grief.  How often do we hear someone who is grieving, “holding up well.” We say this as though there is some shame in crying, grieving, or showing emotion. In our heart, behind closed doors, in the quiet and at night, we know that real grief is messy.  We know that suffering, disease and illness are disorganized, unpredictable and can almost get the best of us.  There are tears, emotional outbursts, confusing physical effects— in short, as long as there is life, there is life with all of its untidiness. 

There is pain and heartache in life, but God promises to be with us. Today’s Gospel reminds us that God SO loved the world that he entered into it at a fully human level, to walk beside us, to experience what we experience, to know love and heartbreak, and pain, and suffering.

But then, God-in-Jesus goes through the pain of death. Some theological traditions imagine that sometime between his death and resurrection, Jesus even went into hell and freed everyone who might have been bound there, opening the way for all to be born again into new life.

When the people of Israel were making their way through the desert, they were healed when they looked up a the serpent on the pole.  As Christians, we find healing when we look up at the cross of our crucified Lord, but when we walk in the way of the Cross.

There are many images of the cross for our gazing, but one of my favorites is the San Damiano Cross, often called the cross of St. Francis.  Tradition says that when Francis heard God’s initial call, he was looking at a particular crucifix in the church of San Damiano. I love this particular cross because it neither ignores the suffering of Jesus, nor glorifies that suffering.  On the St. Francis cross, Jesus is not alone. He is surrounded by all kinds of people. The crucifix is a kind of icon, including the friends of Jesus and even outsiders. It includes Mary and John the Baptist, but it also includes Peter and John running from the empty tomb on Easter Day. There are angels and patriarchs. There are saints.

The great thing about the St. Francis cross is that there is also room for you and me. The cross of Saint Francis reminds us that even in our darkest times, we are never alone, just as, even on the cross, Jesus was never totally alone.  The cross reminds us of many things, but among them it reminds us of God’s power, God’s intention, and God’s promise of healing and resurrection. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Sorting out the Temples

A sermon for the Third Sunday in Lent, March 3, 2024. The scriptures are Exodus 20:1-17, Psalm 19, 1 Corinthians 1:18-25, and John 2:13-22.

Memorial Garden made of chapel ruins at Virginia Theological Seminary.

Those of you who know a little history about our church know that we are sitting in what is really the third Church of the Holy Trinity. The first parish was founded in 1864 at 42nd Street and Madison Avenue (where air rights are currently selling for zillions of millions… but never mind). The parish grew and so, a new building was built on the same spot in 1873—a huge building that supposedly could seat 2,300 congregants. Because its tile and brick patterns were so colorful, it was nicknamed “the church of the holy oil cloth” by one critic. Over time, leadership changed, demographics shifted, and the parish declined. When Holy Trinity asked the Diocese if it could move northward a few blocks, it was told that there were already enough churches in that area—so Holy Trinity would need to look farther north. In conversations with St. James’ Church, a plan eventually developed whereby Holy Trinity’s property would be sold to help pay the debt of St. James, the two would combine, but a new mission with a church would one day be established in Yorkville. Thus, with the gift and vision of Serena Rhinelander, our current building was built (St. Christopher’s Mission House in 1897 and the larger church in 1899.) And so, this year, we celebrate 125 years of THIS incarnation of Holy Trinity.

I’m reminded of our “three churches” by our Gospel today, in which I think we can see three churches, or rather—three temples.

The first temple we hear about this morning is the physical temple, the one that was standing in Jerusalem, the centerpiece of religion, culture, as what theologian NT Wright has described as the “heartbeat of Jerusalem.” The temple was the place where God and people met. There the veil was thin between heaven and earth. It was the place of pilgrimage and procession, of incense and intrigue, and it’s this area of this temple that Jesus enters and causes a disruption. Though we might associate this story of Jesus overturning the temple tables with his entrance into Jerusalem just before his crucifixion, and we hear it in mid or late Lent each year, the Evangelist John places this story of the cleansing of the temple early in the Gospel. Near the beginning of John’s Gospel, it then sets tone for all that follows. Jesus in John’s Gospel gives the ending away when he says very clearly: “destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”

This brings us to the second temple in today’s Gospel. Jesus speaks of the temple of his body. He speaks of himself as a temple because it is in him that God meets humanity. It is in Jesus that God is known and loved and worshipped, through Jesus that God makes possible sacrifice, intercession, forgiveness and life eternal. Paul extends this image to include us as well when he asks the Corinthians, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and that temple you are. (1 Corinthians 3:16-17).

Jesus is the prototype for this new understanding of temple. His cleansing of the temple, the physical action of overturning the tables of the moneychangers and trying to restore purity and sanctity to the physical temple foreshadows his work on the cross. Through the cross and resurrection, Jesus restores, purifies and makes holy. And, he is, indeed, raised up on the third day.

And so, there’s the “first temple,” the one made of stone. There’s the second temple—the one made of the body. But I think there’s also a third temple in today’s Gospel. It’s the temple of the imagination and perhaps it is just as strong as the one made of stone.

Before the actual temple was built by Solomon, there was a dream and a desire to locate God, to have a place that was special to God, a place set aside and made not only holy, but especially holy. And so after years of waiting and praying, God allowed Solomon to build. Years later when the people of Israel were taken off to Babylonia, they remembered their temple and they wept. They remembered the songs that were sung, the worship, the glory. And this became an enormous inspiration and encouragement. By the time of Jesus, the temple was the center of a well-developed system of power and money and status and commerce.

The temple had become many things for many people. For some it was source of income—certainly the taxes sustained a lot of people. For some, to be associated with the temple meant prestige and protection. For the Romans, the temple pacified the people to a certain extent—it kept them at worship and out of trouble. As long as they couldn’t see beyond the incense, they would be blind to injustice. But to the vast majority of people, those faithful and unfaithful who simply tried to get through life–the temple must have represented a mystery—a place where prayers and sacrifices might be offered. Or perhaps they weren’t offered– you really never knew if the priest offered your sacrifice or not, did you? And who was to say whether God would listen?

This third temple, this temple of the imagination, had grown into much more than a physical place for meeting God—part symbol, part magic– for many it had replaced God. It was in the way of God. It was in-stead of God. Which brings all this talk of temples home to us.

On this Sunday when we remember Jesus overturning the tables in the temple, calling into question the structures of the temple, itself, what are the temples in our lives that God wants to cleanse?

Are there things that have become for me like temples, things that get in the way of God’s presence? Are there temples of my own making that need to be cleansed or knocked down?
Are there thoughts or opinions or ideas that God would overturn this season?
Have I inherited temples from others without questioning, or even cleaning up to make my own?
Have I learned from the church in some way particular habits or attitudes that need to be cleansed or thrown out?

Or are there things—pretty things, nice things, comfortable things, things I may have worked hard for, things I saved up for and finally bought, making them mine, mine, mine—are there things that God might be trying to overturn in my world this season?

As the people of God in THIS place, let us give thanks for our several temples—or churches—the one that allows us to worship, and the second, which is the Body of Christ and our bodies united with his, but let’s also be mindful of the need to cleanse, renew, tear down, and rise again, as we follow our Lord and Friend Jesus, who died and rose again, showing us the way forward.
In the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Ashes to Rainbows

A sermon for the First Sunday in Lent, February 18, 2024. The scriptures are Genesis 9:8-17, Psalm 25:1-9, 1 Peter 3:18-22 and Mark 1:9-15.

“The Rainbow” by Grandma Moses, 1961.

This year, on Ash Wednesday, we again offered ashes on the front patio, at the gate. Between the cold weather and the competing activities of Valentine’s Day, I don’t think we had quite as many people outdoors as some years. I did meet a Turkish neighbor who explained that while she’s not Christian, she likes the idea that ashes remind her to live each day to the fullest. “It’s a kind of ‘memento mori,’ right?” she asked.  “Well, yes, in a way,” I tried to explain, and gave her what I hoped was a good, proper ash cross on her forehead.

Christians took up ashes from Jewish customs around grief, the idea being that ashes show one’s remorse for sin, and one’s reliance upon God for life and renewal.

Today’s scriptures give us another important symbol, and one that the scriptures tells us was given by God: the rainbow.

The rainbow serves as a reminder, pointing to something in the past, but it also serves as encouragement, pointing a way forward. Even if we can’t see the end, even if the end of the rainbow shifts as we move along, it still urges us to look, to dream, and to imagine what lies ahead. It encourages us to trust where God leads. The rainbow is a good image for our beginning of a new season of Lent.

A contemporary hymn writer captures the tone of this season as he sings,

This is the day for new beginnings.
Time to remember and move on.
Time to believe what love is bringing;
laying to rest the pain that’s gone.
[This is a Day of New Beginnings, by Brian Wren]

A “time to remember and move on.” It’s the rainbow, again. Remembering and moving on. Both are central to the spiritual life and the season of Lent itself can help us to remember and to move on.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus is baptized. A voice is heard from heaven saying, “You are my Son, the beloved; with you I am well pleased.” And before the water even dries or the voice of God fades away, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Into the desert, he goes for 40 days and there he comes face to face with all kinds of temptations. Does that not sound a whole lot like the life we live? At some point we all probably know that phenomenon of one minute, knowing we are God’s beloved (we can feel it, we don’t doubt it, everything is going right), but then in what seems like all too after, we find ourselves surrounded by temptation. There are all kinds of temptations, but most of them are symptomatic, nagging, sorts of things. Perhaps the greatest temptation is more subtle—it has to do with forgetting. In the midst of temptation, we can forget who we are, and momentarily, we can forget who God is.

“Remembering” is so much a part of our faith tradition. Over and over, again, scripture says, “Remember!”

Remember this day on which you came out of Egypt.
Remember the covenant I made with your ancestors.
Remember not the former things.
Remember the devotion of your youth.
Remember the law.
Remember those in prison.
Remember, I am with you always.
Remember me when you come into your kingdom.

In Mark’s version of the temptation story, we’re not told how exactly how Jesus was tempted, or really how he faced down the temptation. But we know that he survived it alongside the wild beasts, and he even felt the presence of God’s holy angels.

Matthew and Luke both give us more details about Jesus’ temptations. They say that when the devil suggests that Jesus ignore hunger, listen to his stomach, and turn stone into bread; Jesus remembers. “It is written,” he says to the devil, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’” The devil shows Jesus the kingdoms of the worlds and suggests to Jesus they could be his for the taking, but again, Jesus remembers the first commandment, that God alone is Lord of Heaven and Earth. God’s will be done. And then when the devil tries to get Jesus to jump off the tower of the temple and summon up angels to carry him to the ground, Jesus again remembers scripture. 

But he also remembers more than scripture. Jesus remembers who he is, he remembers his baptism and that he is a child of God. He remembers whose he is, that God is watching, is waiting and is even now, aware and present and offering his love.

Martin Luther writes that he sometimes fought off the devil by shouting at him, “I am baptized.” That’s what we do when we make the sign of the cross, and when we dip our finger in holy water and place a little on our foreheads: we are reminding ourselves that we are baptized, that we are loved, and that God is in charge. In the same way, when we see a rainbow, we can recall the covenant God has made—that God will always take care of us and that God is with us. We have not only the old covenant (God’s promises to the people of Israel), but we also have the New Covenant, God’s promise in Jesus Christ sealed and shared with us in the sacrament of bread and wine. Memory keeps these signs and sacraments close by us.

Baptism, Holy Communion, symbols of faith help us to remember. But God also gives us other “memory helps.” Spiritual disciplines like prayer, meditative reading, fasting, keeping a journal, studying, hospitality, almost any activity that is given over to God, and that allows us to give ourselves over to God can be a spiritual discipline. Practiced– that is done over and over again– spiritual disciplines remind us of God. They remind us of our reliance on God, of our need for God, of our connection with God.

In the days ahead, as we practice spiritual disciplines, as we notice the symbols of the season, perhaps giving some things up and taking on other things, may God sharpen our memory and make us alert and awake to temptation, that we might remember the covenant God has made with us. May God strengthen us in the face of every temptation.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.