September 21, 2008 at Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Isaiah 55: 6-9 + Psalm 145 + Philippians 1:20-24,27 + Matthew 20:1-16

It is a dark day in the life of Paul. He is in prison. He will be tried,

and there is every possibility that he will face execution. From that prison under these circumstances, he writes to his most beloved community of friends at Philippi, and we are privileged to hear what he writes on a few Sundays this month and are led into a profound reflection on the meaning of and the hope we have by our relationship with Christ Jesus.

The Philippians have sent him a gift of money to ease his suffering in confinement. He writes to thank them, and then turns the tables, so to speak by comforting the ones who wanted to do the comforting. Their fear for him is challenged by his joy, and their anxiety is challenged by his faith. The message here is addressed to anyone who has any fear or anxiety about death. Paul sees the possibility of his death as a portal to a deeper union with Christ. He understood dying as the beginning of a new way of living.

It is not as though Paul hates this life and longs for the next. On the contrary, what we feel in his writing is a tension between the two which have noble and worthy ends. He could remain and carry on his mission and work in which he finds meaning and happiness, or he could be with the Christ for whom he longs. This tension becomes a marker by which we all might well measure the development of our faith. It might be something to examine in our selves without the pressure of a serious medical problem or advancing age. In fact, those challenges to this life might be easier if we have already come to the point to which Paul has come. By his own admission, Paul was not sure whether he preferred to go on living or to die and be with Christ. Living meant more work, more preaching and more confrontations with those who opposed his efforts and rejected his message. Dying was a plus all the way around; “for me,” Paul said, “death is gain.” What he shows us is how to arrive at that point of faith,and then be content to do as God sees fit.

All of us who follow Christ as did Paul have our feet in both worlds;

the already and the not yet. We have already a sense of God’s presence and love,but have not yet realized and seized it entirely. There is so much to keep us focused on this life: our families, our children, our careers, our hopes and expectations! Getting rid of the dread of death and jumping with both feet into a faith-filled loving relationship with God means that first of all we have to embrace what the prophet Isaiah said to us today: God’s ways are not our ways. God sees how things will end up, and as God said at creation, “It is good.” And then we must immerse our selves into God’s merciful love. That is the generous mercy we have just heard of in the Gospel. Without that kind of mercy and generous love, we have no hope of survival. Whether we believe it or not, we are the ones who have come late and last. Out best hope is that a generous God

will receive us with the same welcome as those who have done more and done better and served longer.

I think sometimes we are more afraid of faith than we are of death. We are afraid of what faith may ask of us or where it may lead us.

It seems safer to keep God at a distance. Faith will challenge our lifestyles; it may cost us a relationship, some pleasure, and may make us more religious. But without it, we will never know the depth of the fullness of life and love in Christ unless we take the plunge with both feet. Living this life to the fullest like Paul is what makes it possible to face the next life with Joy rather than fear.

September 14, 2008 at Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Numbers 21: 4-9 + Psalm 78 + Philippians 2: 6-11 + John 3:13-17

An ancient feast of the church takes us deep into the faith’s deepest mystery and symbol. For the earliest Christians, the cross was a source of shame and scandal. The leader, the one in whom they had placed all their trust had been executed as a common criminal. They were discouraged and they were ashamed. Yet they found the courage in time to take the very symbol of that disgrace and raise it high as a sign of God’s glorious intervention on their behalf. Just as the serpents in the desert has afflicted the Israelites with death and suffering, the cross was a source of death and suffering to the earliest church. Yet the faithful God of Israel intervened to protect the faithful people in the desert, and as a reminder of that God’s action, they raised up an image of their former suffering high on a staff – now a sign of hope and of victory. Conscious of that history, the early followers of Christ had the same experience with the cross.

This feast proclaims the intervention of God in the midst of suffering, and the victory of those who suffer in hope and fidelity. It gives to those who suffer a new look at the cause of their suffering. It invites any of us who face discouragement and disgrace of any kind to look again at the source of that discouragement and disgrace.

During the great Vigil of Easter, the Church in its Easter Proclamation addresses sin in these words: “O Happy Fault, O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer!”  The experience revealed in this expression is that God’s hand turns the most disgraceful, ugly, sinful shame into glory. The truth revealed in this expression is that for those who are one with God, even the most shameful sin can be a sign of God’s love, and a cause for discovering God’s redeeming, healing presence.

This feast speaks to all who have known sin, who have known failure, who have known disgrace, disappointment, and guilt; and it speaks of God’s power and God’s love. It addresses our desire to deny and pretend that there is no shame, there is no sin, there is nothing wrong in us; and it calls us to confess and embrace our very weakness as it is turned into God’s strength.

To exalt the Cross is to admit shame. To exalt the Cross is to embrace our weakness. To exalt the Cross is to admit our failures. And in so doing, to embrace the power of God to turn the cross into a sign of victory. For it does not stop there. If it’s addiction and the shame that comes with it, by God’s grace it becomes a Happy Fault, for how else would the recovered know of God’s grace. If it’s infidelity, the shame of hidden sins; If it’s hatred, distrust and hardened hearts; these too become the Happy Faults when they are confessed and claimed for the evil that they are. For how else would the forgiven ever know the peace of God’s grace.

This is a feast of strange contradictions. It is a feast that calls us to rejoice in our weakness while proclaiming the power of God. The cross which we lift high is the both the cross of our shame and the cross of God’s Mercy. It is both the instrument of death and the source of life. It is the end and the beginning, shame and glory, defeat and victory. Only those who know forgiveness, recovery, and healing can understand the riddle of the cross.

For those who seek to understand that riddle, it must first be embraced in all it’s ugliness and shame, just as those who were bitten by the serpents in the desert had to know that sting before they could ever begin to rejoice in the serpent on the pole.

September 7, 2008 at Saint Mark Church in Norman, OPK

Ezekiel 33:7-9 + Psalm 95 + Romans 13:8-10 + Matthew 18:15-20

In verses just before these, Paul has given his Roman community instructions about how they are to relate to civil society. He speaks of their “obligations” and how believers are to fulfill those obligations within their society. They are to pay all their dues, taxes to whom taxes are due, too to whom a toll is due, respect where respect is due; honor where honor is due. These are things that the believer owes to the greater community, and in that frame of thinking, the verse begins today addressing one last great debt. It is a debt that can never be repaid, the deepest and biggest debt of all: love. Having fulfilled all other obligations, there is one left that defines and completes what is expected and asked of those who would be counted as members of a community of faith in Jesus Christ.

As we discovered last week, the heart of morality in Paul’s teaching is the recognition of what God has done for us and the stirring desire to seek God’s will. As I put it last week, “You make me want to be better.” is the way we respond when we live in awareness of what God has done. In Paul’s development of this kind of morality, today’s instruction begins to address the question: “Why?” Why is God so merciful, generous, and kind? What is it about God that brings out these divine actions? How is it that everyone merits this mercy, generosity, and kindness? Paul knows, and we do too. It is Love. It is love for us. It is love for us all; and as soon as we recognize that, we begin to understand what it takes to live a moral and good life. We know what it is that colors, shapes, and motivates our search for what God desires for us; love.

Paul speaks of this love as an obligation, not an option. It is a duty, a debt we owe to God – not simply to love God; but love as God loves. Divine love is self sacrificing not self serving. Divine love is not a feeling or emotion. It is a way of life that we have seen in Jesus Christ. It is way of life that reaches out to others that includes and embraces everyone. It is a way of life that seeks the will of the Father; that finds time for prayer and fellowship. It is a life marked by forgiveness, simplicity and truth. It is a life of justice and passion for the outcast, the hungry, the grieving, the refugee. This is the Will of God for us that we love as God loves. It is no anemic or emotional experience. It locks us into active concern for the good of others and permits no hint of retaliation or vengeance in the human heart. All of that evil is put out by the transformation we seek in the Spirit.

This love is a simple idea; but a huge obligation on our part. If God loves us in spite of our unfaithfulness, in spite of what we have done and how we have dismissed his Son, we owe God something. We owe God the obligation of that same love for one another. It is a debt created by the infinite love we have received from God in Christ. Deserving and undeserving alike know the love of God, and so it must be for us who stand in this grace. We do not love and care for only those who deserve our respect, our sacrifice, and our service.

Parents, you know and understand this. It is the way you love your children even when they do not seem to deserve it, or take you for granted. Children see your parents and how they care for you even when you misbehave, are rude, and selfish. This is the love Paul speaks of today. It is the love that keeps us together, the love that reconciles, and heals. It is the love that does no evil. It is a love that is found where ever two or three have gathered. It is the love that we find then in this place, a house of love, a house of God.