March 8 2009 at Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Genesis 22: 1-2,9,10-13,15-18 + Psalm 116 + Romans 8: 31-24 + Mark 9: 2-10

The opening line of our first reading today sets the focus for our week:  “God put Abraham to the test.” Last week it was a test for Jesus in the desert, and as I said then,

such experiences need not simply be a time of trial and temptation.  They may also result in an unmistakable encounter with God who is always there in the wilderness. Abraham faces a test and meets the God who had promised him so much!

Our Gospel today is also the story of a test – a test for Peter, James, and John. Jesus is not the only one who has an encounter with the divine on that mountain. These followers of Jesus have one as well. Their test is about obedience and about what they see when they look at their Rabbi. Do they see a carpenter’s son who might be a political messiah leading them to freedom from Roman occupation? Or do they see someone who will be handed over and rise again? Can they follow a man whose destiny and whose vision they do not understand?

It is important to notice that their experience on the mountain is communal not individual just as the experience of Pentecost was not private or individual in an exclusive way; but communal and mutually formative and supportive.

This is an experience available to us when we have assembled on this mountain. What we see here is a “transfiguration” so to speak. If Peter, James, and John no longer saw a man from Nazareth but the glory of his exaltation, then we no longer see bread on this altar; but what it becomes for us. If Peter, James and John no longer saw the man they followed up that mountain but saw the glory of divine life in him, then we no longer see each other just a neighbor or a stranger for by grace that same glory shines in each of us. If Peter, James, and John heard a voice that said: “Listen to him.” So have we. If Peter, James, and John can take the risk of following Jesus even when they did not understand where he would lead them and what it would mean, so can we.

The risk of standing back and hearing this Gospel as though it was about something that happened to some apostles a long time ago takes the life out of the Word of God. This is the Living Word that we proclaim here in the midst of a living community. These are the stories of our faith today with Abraham, Peter, James, and John.

For Jesus, what happens there is strictly an act of God who allowed those apostles to see Jesus in his glory. For the Apostles, for Abraham, and for us all, we are confronted with a divine command on this mountain: “Listen.” In this season, our time for change is at hand. It can and it will proceed for those who will listen and heed the voice of God that affirms the importance of Jesus in our lives.

The risk of moving forward when we may not understand is made more possible by the example of Abraham and these disciples. “Playing it safe” has never been the style of serious disciples of Jesus. Knowing all the answers or having perfect understanding has never led anyone the truth either. This is not the posture of a disciple it is simply a pretense and often an excuse for not listening. If you do not always understand what God asks of you and sometimes are confused about what it seems to mean, just keep listening. That is what led Peter, James, and John deeper into the mystery of Christ in their midst, and it was what ultimately saw God’s promise to Abraham fulfilled.

March 1, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Genesis 9: 8-15 + Psalm 25 + 1 Peter 3: 18-22 + Mark 1: 12-15

At my age it is getting increasingly difficult to love weight. I lose everything with no trouble at all from keys and cell phone to my car in the parking lot, but five or ten pounds or an inch or two from my waist becomes a major effort that requires more concentration and attention than anything I can think of. There are candy bowls all over that office! Any trip to the south that brings me near La Baguette or Panera Bread, and I’m done for. So, I avoid driving the streets that get me there. Have you ever noticed what gets placed just inside the door of the grocery store? Two steps inside and there is a table of cookies, cakes, and pies. To make matters worse, they offer free samples. The other day I came home from lunch and there was a cheesecake on the front seat of my car. What could I do? I was going to lunch and passed that bakery. I decided that it was no accident that I had to go that way, so I said: “Ok Lord, if you want me to have a nice cheese cake, make sure there is parking place near the door. If there is no place to park, I’ll do without.” Would you believe than on the seventh trip around the block a parking spot opened up!

I have a good friend who announces proudly at the conclusion of every purchase of something he does not need that, “God wanted me to have it.” We have gotten to the point in our great and long friendship that it is a constant joke between us. I often begin our conversations by asking: “What did God want you to have today?” It has dawned on me that with almost no conscious awareness all of us have slipped into a pattern of negotiations or bartering when it comes to temptation, and I believe that simple little things become big things before we know it. What starts as cheating on a diet might end up with cheating on a spouse or cheating on an expense report.

As a confessor and spiritual director, I more and more recognize how common this thinking has become. “The devil made me do it.” is the silly way we often trivialize bad behavior and wrong choices. We just don’t want to call it what it is: temptation. It is not a game of manipulation. Temptation is a serious encounter.

If we study the behavior of Jesus in such an encounter, we can learn something helpful. Name the temptation. Call it what it is in particular. No generalizations allowed. Be specific. That is what fixes the situation. Then name the tempter. It is the only way to stop rationalization as in saying: “I had to take that money from work to pay my mother’s hospital bills.” No, you did not! Next, practice resistance. Moral training is just like any other training; music or sports. It takes discipline and regular practice. You start small and build up. “No” to a tiny pleasure is how you end up saying “No” to a big one. The amount of money spent at gyms for a personal trainer strikes me as a bit curious when moral or spiritual trainers called: “Confessors” are avoided, maligned, and ignored.

Finally, call for help. Relying on one’s own resources alone is programmed failure. Claim the grace that God offers, consult a mentor, but always ask and trust the help of God. This is what Jesus did. He found temptation to be a time and place in which to meet God.

The presence and the power of evil can never be ignored. The human interest in self-gratification and ambition goes right along with it. But temptation need not be a bad thing because in the midst of the struggle between good and evil one will always find God. That is where Israel found God: in the desert. It is where Jesus found His father: in the wilderness. His experience in temptation changed him, and no doubt made him more humble and stronger. It would be right to believe that it can be the same for us.

In the classic and wonderful work, Murder in the Cathedral, T.S. Elliot gives us Thomas Beckett facing a wilderness of loneliness, doubt, confusion, and fear. He reflects that the greatest temptation anyone ever faces is rarely about right or wrong; but most often it is the temptation to do the right thing for the wrong reason. This is the final test we have in our quest for holiness and greatness. It is well to consider it now in the first days of Lent. Doing the right thing for the right reason takes a considerable amount of self-knowledge, humility, courage, and patience to do so; but these are gifts we have and will always discover when we live in the presence of God.

February 25, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Joel 2:12-18 + Psalm 51 + 2 Corinthians 5: 20-6:2 + Matthew 8:1-6,16-18

 It is a season of love that we begin today: A season that celebrates love’s greatest gift, forgiveness. The forty days we begin now comes as an opportunity to remember, to recover, to restore, and heal what ever in us remains broken by sins of pride, greed, laziness, envy. How we use these days will be the measure of how rooted these sins have become in us, and of how strongly we have grasped the hand of grace that would lift us up.

We have heard often enough the command of Jesus, “Rise”. Last Sunday, the week before, and all through the Gospels, he speaks to the lame and the lost, to the dead and the doubtful: “Rise up.” It is a command and call to us all. Rise up from what is false and selfish, shallow and empty. Rise up from what can never make you happy or from what can never bring you peace. Rise up from greed and all the power abused that oppresses and dims the light of God’s glory. Rise up from laziness that keeps you from prayer and worship – from Mass, sacrifice, and service. Rise up from the jealous ways of a competitive world that destroys human dignity and life itself.

“Return to me.” says God in the words of the prophet; not next week, next month, or next year; not when you have time or when you feel like it; but now. Today. This Lent.

Last Sunday’s prophetic reading said this: “Remember not the things of the past, the things of long ago. See I am doing something new.” That prophet along with Joel today announces what can happen for those who will rise up. If this season is about forgiveness, then it is about forgetting the things of the past. At the heart of forgiveness is the willingness not to drag the hurts of the past into the moment and the future. The forgiveness we seek from God must be the forgiveness we enjoy with each other; and “enjoy” is just the right word. For what greater Joy can there be than in knowing that what we have done is the past will not be remembered, drug up again, thrown in our faces, and used to humiliate and destroy us.

In this hope lies the spirit of this season. Not a time for gloom and doom, sad faces and sorrow, reluctant alms with pocket change.  This is a time and a season for greatness: our greatness because of God’s greatness. It is a time for hope and for a Joy that will explode and burst into flame come Easter night. A Joy that can stand in darkness with a flame that dispels all fear. A Joy that springs from sacrifices made out of love, from fasting that leads to feasting, and from prayer that will soon proclaim: “He Is Risen”.  With the sure and certain knowledge that so shall we rise again. And today we renew and restore the kind of life worthy of those will shall surely rise.

February 15, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Leviticus 13:1-2, 44-46 + Psalm 32 + 1 Corinthians 10: 31-11:1 + Mark 1:40-45

“Moved with compassion, Jesus stretched out his hand and he touched him.” If you had been there, you would have recoiled in shock, gasped, and some of us might have run away! This is astounding, unheard of, forbidden, and frightening! The holy, the healthy one touched the unclean one. Think of this! Do not take it for granted. You may have heard and read this story 500 times; but every time, if you get it, you cannot help but shudder, wonder, and be amazed. Simple as it is, this story is the summary of the whole gospel message. It’s not about leprosy. It’s not about Moses. It’s not about begging. It is about compassion, a hand stretched out, and a touch. This is about the Incarnation. It is about the meaning of Jesus Christ, his presence, his life, his mission, and it is about what happens to us and what we must do because of it.

It is the touch that matters. It is about the touch of God who through his only son responded in Godly compassion to our condition of alienation and brokenness and did more than touch our human nature. He entered into us: into our social leprosy of polarized racism, into our alienation, loneliness, and brokenness. This is compassion at its best. He did not look at us, wonder about our condition, or say: “Isn’t that a shame.” He touched it and in doing so, he became what he touched. As we shall soon remember in Lent, he became broken, alienated, and untouchable as even his friends fled from him in fear, doubt, and disappointment afraid that they might be associated or connected with him.

Notice in the last verses of this story what happens to him. Mark says: “It was impossible for him to enter a town openly. He remained outside in deserted places.” It would be easy to think that this was because he drew such a crowd; but I would like you to consider that it might have been because he became what he touched – a kind of leper who could not enter the towns openly and remained outside in deserted places. In terms of those times, by touching that man, Jesus became unclean and would have been required to observe certain customs and rituals of purification.

I would like to propose to you that what this story is really suggesting is that Jesus traded places with that man who knelt before him. Jesus, the clean and holy one, took upon himself that man’s infirmity in order to free that man from everything that kept him from life and the relationships that nurtured his life. This is the Good News we preach. This is the Gospel, the whole story in five verses.

Because our wholeness and healing is the will of God, we have been touched and immediately made clean; at least in theory and theology. But, what about in reality? If it were really true, our likeness to the man in the story would go further. If it were really true, we would be a people who would “publicize the whole matter”, as Mark put it. At this point, we go deeper into this story to discover that it does not just tell us something about Jesus, his life and his mission; but it says something about us as well.

The living Word of God is not simply repeating stories about ancient times. The living Word of God continues to reveal what God is doing today. Divine Compassion still sees our need and still wills that we be “clean” so to speak. We are a people who are touched by the hand of God, a God who would trade places with us just to make us whole. But who talks about this? Who lives every day as though they were touched by God? Who lives in recognition that everyone around is touched by God? Who lives with the conviction that in compassion God has traded places with those around us? The fact is, and the Gospel affirms that when do live this way, people will be coming to Jesus from everywhere. Until they do because of our testimony and example, we might just as well stay outside in deserted places, and feeling as though we might be the first sign that we have not yet come and knelt before Jesus so that he can reach out and touch us with the wonder of divine compassion.

February 8, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Job 7: 1-4, 6-7 + Psalm 147 + 1 Corinthians 9 16-19, 22-23 + Mark 1:29-39

Those silly apostles! They are all excited, and so easily impressed. You can almost feel their mood as they go chasing out to that “deserted place.” Mark tells us that it was “early before dawn” that Jesus had gone out there. If we were as familiar with scripture images and language as we ought to be, our minds would have snapped to attention at that phrase, because it is the same words and the same image as Easter morning when some women went seeking the tomb “early before dawn” only to find it empty. So, Mark with his attention to detail has now in just these ten verses put us in the context of the resurrection because just verses before the verb he uses to describe what Jesus does for Peter’s mother-in-law is the resurrection verb: “raise up.” Remember, this is just the first chapter of Mark’s Gospel. He wants us to reflect upon this incident in light of the resurrection which is the whole point of writing the Gospel to begin with.

Yet there are those apostles never quite putting two and two together. My guess is that they pursued Jesus feeling very important. After all, they knew where he was! They were his friends! Suddenly these no-body fishermen are important. They have access to power, and so they pretend to be the great facilitators. “Everyone is looking for you!” they say. Can’t you just hear how impressed they are? They think that it’s all about the crowds: the bigger the crowd the greater the success. It’s all in the numbers they are thinking, while Mark must have smiled as he concludes the Gospel with no one left but a handful: no crowd, no one pursuing Jesus, in fact, even these apostles who are so easily impressed are no where to be found when reality hits.

“What is this reality?” we ought to ask. What is it Jesus is revealing here and why is it that the demons of earlier verses are hushed in the face of such power? Perhaps it is because this is not about power but rather about service. Perhaps it is because this is not about what Jesus can do, but about what God expects us all to do. I have come to believe that Jesus demands that the demons keep quiet because they keep pointing to him, making him the focus of attention, and thereby making it more difficult for Jesus to make his point that we must go and do likewise. To whatever extent we have bought into the thinking of these demons, they have been successful. Spectator Christians are the demons success story. Excusing ourselves from doing what Jesus does because he was the “Son of God” is exactly what the demons are out to accomplish. It puts a stop to the work of God in this world.

This story is not about power. It is about service. It is about seeing what needs to be done, and doing it. Notice that this miracle happens inside Peter’s home. There is no one there to see it, no one there to impress. It happens privately because there is human need that Jesus sees and responds to. Miracles are not great demonstrations of divine power performed to stir up crowds of the curious. They are the moments when one human being sees the need of another and quietly responds to that need with the gifts that have. What is more impressive here, Jesus who crosses a room and holds the hand of Peter’s mother-in-law or the mother-in-law who gets off a sick bed to take care of guests in her home? I’m not so sure – perhaps both actions are what this is all about.

One thing is certain. Nothing Jesus did was for crowds in spite of how impressed the apostles seem to be by their growing numbers. Jesus knows that the crowds are going to be gone when what he wishes to reveal and teach becomes clear: a message of service, sacrifice, forgiveness, and love. Even today these things do not draw crowds even of the curious. None the less, this is what he has to say to us and what he will teach us. Eventually the apostles do catch on, and the hope is that we shall as well:

catch on to the truth that what is recorded in this Gospel is not here to amaze us, impress us, or excite us. It is not here to prove the divinity or the power of Christ nearly as much as it is to point to what can happen when one person does what ever there is in their power to ease the suffering of another human being.

That is miraculous and it is sure sign of the coming of the Kingdom of God.

February 1, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Deuteronomy 18:15-20 + Psalm 95 + 1 Corinthians 7:32-35 + Mark 1:21-28

The “amazement” is what I want you to reflect upon with me this morning. It occurs again and again in this gospel. If we fail to reflect upon this amazement and pass over it thinking that power is always amazing. The Word of God falls on deaf ears. There are things that amaze us all the time: good and bad. Watching a lift-off for a trip to the space station is amazing. Watching the power of a tornado even from a distance is amazing. The disciples and people all around Galilee are not amazed at the “power” of Jesus. It is not the violent casting out of an unclean spirit that amazes these people.

Not unlike our own times, the response of these people to evil or to anything that might endanger their holiness was avoidance. They simply did not deal with it. They avoided it. So, what amazes them first of all is that Jesus did not do so. The authority of the past told them to avoid the evil, “pretend it isn’t there” is the suggestion. “Stay away, look the other way, and everything will be fine.” And so, in some ways, things only got worse. Do not miss the detail that this unclean spirit is inside the synagogue!

The holy place is defiled! There is a subtle and fascinating detail in this story. It takes place in a holy place at a holy time: synagogue and Sabbath. Holiness is going to confront evil in a new way, and that’s amazing.

A new authority suggests that holiness is not possible by ignoring evil, pretending it isn’t there or by looking the other way; and I am not talking about evil in someone else. This is about how one attains to holiness within themselves. If it is not just about clean pot and pans, observing the correct religious diet, and the other minute details of the Jewish Law, neither is about avoiding unclean spirits. Holiness is about getting it out. It is about silencing the tempting voice of evil not pretending it isn’t there. This is amazingly new not just back then but today as well.

We have become experts at denial. We have denied ourselves into a national and world-wide economic crisis. We have denied the seductive voice of violence to the point that this evil has entered the holy place of our homes. We have avoided facing the evil of individualism and isolation while the unclean spirit of poverty and sickness lurks all around us spoiling our uneasy peace. We have made boundaries where there ought to be none setting ourselves apart through racism and all kinds of fears and suspicions and then transgressed boundaries with sex and exploitation where there ought to be respect.

A new authority is speaking these days, says Mark. It is an authority that does not allow lesser beings to harm those God loves. That authority says: “Get out!” and it does taking with it the pain it has caused. The Jesus of today’s Gospel is not a “play it safe” authority, and “playing it safe” is not the style of his disciples. Again and again, he names evil and he demands that it shut up and get out. Our comfortable accommodation of evil within ourselves will not bring us to holiness no restore the innocence of baptismal experience. We may to hit the floor, so to speak. We may end up being cast down; but if it brings us to holiness, to salvation, to justice, and to the peace of God’s Kingdom, then that would appear to be what is happening here.

It is amazing what can happen when we cease denial, avoiding, and pretending in order to embrace the kind of change, conversion, and holiness to which Jesus invites us all.

January 18, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

1 Samuel 3:3-10 + Psalm 40 + 1 Corinthians 6:13-15, 17-20 + John 1:35-42

The most fundamental question in life opens the Gospel of John: “What are you looking for?” “Security.” some would say, and that’s not a wrong aim, it’s just a low aim. Anyone with a few years on them knows only too well how fragile that can be. “A career” others might say. Power, Prominence, Respect, an opportunity to do work they believe they are capable of doing. Again, not a bad aim, and it might even be high aim if it is motivated by a real desire to be of service rather than simply by personal ambition. “Peace” some might say; peace with themselves, peace with God, peace with others. Those however who are to become disciples of Jesus are not looking for any of those things. They want to know where he is “staying.”

Now they are not asking for his address. They want to know his home. This is not that silly question we often use to start up a conversation with strangers: “Where’re you from?” To begin with, they knew perfectly well where he is from. Word was out about him. It’s a small place. They all know where everyone is from, and in those days one’s speech always revealed where someone was from. Those who would become disciples of Jesus want to know something more than a passing casual conversation is going to reveal.

They want to know where he stays. They want to know what this place is that makes him so grounded, wise, and steady. They want to know what he knows which is why they call him “rabbi.” They want to know where he gets all of this, and he says to anyone willing to ask: “Come and See”.  What he shows them in John’s Gospel is a wedding feast in Cana with water and wine, a Healing at Bethesda’s pool, a Feeding of Multitudes with broken bread that gives life, a Shepherd like no other that seeks the lost and becomes himself gate, a guest who calls a dead friend back to life, and finally they see an empty tomb.

What he shows those will come to see these things is the difference between a miracle and a sign. Anyone can see a miracle. Late this past week, we all heard the news reports of a “Miracle on the Hudson” as a plane load of people stepped off a sinking plane into waiting boats. Disciples of Jesus see more than miracles. They see signs and, in those signs, they see where Jesus stays. They see the coming of the Kingdom and the Reign of God. They see in Cana the power of Christ’s presence and what happens when we do what he asks as Mary instructs on that occasion. They see at a pool of water what can happen when one is lifted into it.

They see a bread that leaves no one hungry when broken and shared:

but more than that miracle, they see a sign of Heaven’s feast in the Eucharist.

They see that Shepherd who seeks, who finds, who calls, and knows each one by name.

They in Lazarus more than a miracle.

They see a sign of the power of this man’s command.

They see more than a stone rolled away. They see a promise kept for a faithful servant.

What are we looking for in this church?

What are we looking for day in and day out in our homes, marriages, and friendships?

What do we want to see? or Who do we want to see?

As you let this Gospel settle into your hearts and minds,

do not miss two little but important details in its telling.

Jesus turns to them.

He is the one who takes the initiative.

He meets them half way.

He is looking for them as well.

And then, don’t miss that small detail reporting that it was 4:00 in the afternoon.

It’s late, late in the day, getting toward the end. Another day will soon begin.

Maybe it’s time for us to begin to wonder what God is looking for.

That you are here in this place at this hour must raise not just the question of what you are looking for, but what God is looking for in us.

I do not think God is looking for miracles nearly as much

as God might be looking for signs:

signs of our faith, of our hope, of our love.

Or perhaps, just any sign at all that we are listening and ready to come and see.

January 1, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Numbers 6:22-27 + Psalm 67 + Galatians 4:4-7 + Luke 2:16-21

There is no way to turn the calendar page without some sense of hesitancy and caution. We live in historic times, and it is yet to be seen how we shall emerge from these times and what life will be like ten years from now. There is little doubt that an age of hedonism and conspicuous consumption is probably at an end. The “good life” as some who could afford it have called it is on life-support called “bail-out”. The prognosis is not good for those who want no change or challenge to privilege and power. Those who have profited at the expense of others are now publicly ridiculed and challenged by those who have worked for their comforts.

I think of these things and mention them here because it is January; a month named for the god, “Janus”. He had two faces, one looking forward, the other back. Perhaps Janus describes the way we must live in the ninth year of the 21^st century. We can and ought to look back, but if we fail to look ahead, there will be little reason celebrate today – because our celebration cannot simply be about the past. It must also contain the seed or the promise of the future.

The church proposes a model of January life with this Feast in Honor of the Mother of God. She was a woman who had two faces in the best sense of that phrase. She could and did look back. She lived the tradition of her faith. Her presence in Bethlehem and her journey to Jerusalem’s Temple make that perfectly obvious. She lived with the expectation of God’s promises being fulfilled. She knew the prophets and the Torah. Her prayer reveals that deep knowledge.

At the same time, she looked to the future with a heart open enough to allow God’s will to accomplish things in unexpected and out-of-the-ordinary ways. The message of an angel encouraged her to have no fear, to trust, to believe, and to live in such a way that unexpected surprises became opportunities for God’s plan to unfold.

If Christmas is a way of life rather than a date on the calendar as I proposed to you a week ago, then we are January people who look back and see how God has cared for us and brought us to this day. We look forward as well without fear because the past tells us fear is useless and that faith is what we need. The simple truth is that without Christ or potential for a bright and joyful future is very limited. There is no better way to look forward to this new year than by looking back and deeply into the mystery of this covenant of Christ’s Body and Blood. Broken and shared for us, it is the only reason for a new year and new hope.

December 28, 2008 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Sirach 3:2-6, 12-14 + Psalm 128 + Colossians 3:12-17 + Luke 2:22-40

In an age of isolation and individuality this Gospel is easy to sentimentalize and then dismiss. There are profound, deep, and powerful images and implications in these verses that revealing something of God’s will for what we are to become.

The question of what makes this family “holy” is the issue. The shallow response is: “the child, Jesus.” Of course, that’s it, they think, and with that thought, they are off the hook when it comes to “holiness”. In this thinking, for holiness all you need is a few angels, some sheep, shepherds some visitors with unique gifts, a couple of dreams thrown in, and of course, an Immaculate Conception and presto, it’s a holy family. Anyone here qualify?

Of course there is something else going on, and when we dig for it, pray for it, and desire it enough, holiness becomes available to every family. You don’t need a divine child whose birth was announced by an angel to achieve it.

There are a few clues here that lay out the path to holiness for those who would seek that holiness and its blessings.

Mary, Joseph, and Jesus belonged to a people. They were not isolated, nomadic unit. They were not simply a nuclear family, but they were part of a larger religious community.

Mary, Joseph, and Jesus kept the law of Moses, and they centered their life on the Temple of Jerusalem which encouraged and assisted them in keeping alive and practicing long-held religious customs.

This is what made them holy: belonging to God’s people and living that way made a difference. Living by the laws and the values of that people and fulfilling the obligations of that people makes for holiness. And finally, practicing the customs of that people leads to the holiness desired: but the desire is the important part. Just doing the customs and keeping the rules to look good will not do — desire “completes the circuit,” so to speak.

So, you want a “Holy” family? Chapter two of Luke gives you the plan. It does not guarantee the “perfect family” nor does it promise a life without struggle pain, disappointment or tragedy. It does not necessarily imply a father and a mother all along the way. What it does promise is that the relationships of that family will reveal the presence of God and be the source of God’s work of forgiveness, love and mercy.

My wish for you all as a New Year approaches is that you will all be holy.

December 25, 2008 at Saint Mark in Norman, OPK

I can remember it as clearly as if it were this morning: April 19, 1995. More than anything else on that terrible day, more than the site of debris blowing on the downtown streets, more than the image of that ragged, torn, and twisted building, more than the faces of confused and frantic workers, I remember the silence. I remember running into Presbyterian Hospital and the strange silence that had settled into those hallways. A voice from somewhere was saying: “Code Black, Code Black, Code Black.” I remember the odd silence as I stood where a policeman had taken me to the corner of 5th and Harvey; and the next day, I remember again the silence as I stood inside that mess on a lower level. The only sound was a strange groaning as the building shifted and settled a bit on unsteady beams. I could see buckets of hand moved debris moving around as men literally dug through walls of broken concrete; but all I remember is the silence in that place.

I remember another silence that settled into a hospital emergency room when beeping monitors were switched off because the life signs they recorded from my parents were no longer there. It was silent in those rooms, and it was a silence I did not want to break.

And there was another time not so long ago when I was standing outside a hospital room with my sister listening through a partially opened door to sounds from inside. We could hear a doctor giving instructions as my niece gave birth to her first child. “Push once more.” a voice said, and then there was silence. It seemed to last an hour. Long enough for my sister and I to look at each other in surprise wonder, and alarm, but then the silence was broken by a baby’s cry followed by the most wonderful Joy.

I want you to think of times in your lives when silence has been memorable because we’re not too comfortable in silence.

I live alone in a big house, and I’ve gotten quite accustomed silence, but every now and then I realize that without thinking I have turned on something: the TV, the stereo, the radio, or I find myself humming. Late last night I was in the elevator at Norman Regional Hospital, and there were several people in with me, but no one said a word. When one of the passengers broke the silence, the others looked for just a brief moment with caution at each other, and then the silence resumed. I thought later that the person who spoke out did so because the silence was simply too much for them. Either that, or the sound of piped in “Joy to the World” was just wrong in a place of such  lonely suffering.

Silence is hard for us, at least for very long. Car radios are on all the time. If yours isn’t chances are on any given day someone will pull up beside you with a thumb/thumb, thumb/thumb pulsating loudly enough to hear on the moon. People walk through the streets and ride airplanes with their ears stuffed with tiny speakers. Cell phones beep, jingle and screech rock music adding to the noise of our lives. Only the most rural of settings is free of the whine and whoosh of traffic sounds in the middle of the night.

Even in here, it seems impossible to keep quiet. If I sit for more than ten seconds after communion in silent prayer, half of you wonder what’s wrong, and you get restless because you think we should “get on with it” or that we’re wasting valuable time.

I have come to suspect that the reason we can not get comfortable with prolonged silence is that we are afraid to be alone. It must have some roots in our childhood – and something to do with an innate fear of being alone, and so we cry out to see if anyone is there, turn on the radio or the TV to make sure that someone somewhere is out there.

All of which of course, is why we are here and will soon share a song of this night called Silent. Into the frantic noise of this world, a single, simple Word has been spoken, but this world so deafened by its own noise must struggle to hear. It is the Word Made Flesh, the Word of God, the Word of love, of peace, of healing forgiveness. It is Word for which we must listen, a Word spoken in the silence of the night, at a time when the “world was at peace”, says Luke. Probably until we restore that kind of silence we shall not be able to hear that Word again, and find joy in its promise.

New parents must understand this best of all. In the night or in the day, the silence of your sleep is broken by the sound of a baby in your home, and suddenly you know and you remember that you are not alone. This is the wonder, the mystery, and the message of this night. When we become silent, when we are anxious about being alone, there is a baby that cries out to us. If we feel alone because our job is in danger, our savings are shrinking, our future is troubled, there is news in this long anxious night. We are not alone. “Immanuel is the Word: God is with us it means.”

But my friends, the Incarnation is not something we celebrate, it is something must become. Christmas is not a feast. It is a way of life: a way of life to which we have been called and empowered to follow. At Bethlehem everything we are has been claimed by God, and no matter how much noise there is from Washington, Wall Street, and Baghdad, there must still silence in the Bethlehem of our hearts so that we may hear that soft spoken word, and let our fears be calmed, for we are not now, never have been, and never will be alone. So the message of an angel is real: “Fear Not.” The message of the God who sent the angel is: “I love you.” And in the stillness of this night, the message we must share with each other is: “Peace be with you.”