Isaiah 58:1-9a; Psalm 112:1-10; 1Corinthians 2:1-12; Matthew 5:13-20
Preached by Rev. Jason M. Haddox
Do you remember the three-dimensional images that were the new cool thing a few years ago? You would stare at a page of what appeared to be nothing but multicolored dots. You would see nothing at first, just those dots. You would sit with it—looking close, then far away, then somewhere in between. And then, out of the corner of your eye, something would start to emerge. If you looked directly at it, it would vanish. You would have to be very patient, and relax your focus until suddenly it would appear: a house, with a picket fence and smoke coming out of the chimney. Or a cat, licking its front paw and washing its face. Or a football (we have to remember Superbowl Sunday today, after all) hurtling toward you from the printed page. And there it was. But even then…You had to look at the image carefully but not too closely, in order to see it. If you tried to focus your eyes, it would disappear. It was almost like looking through the paper, at something on the other side.
The author of Matthew’s gospel is very crafty in the way he tells the story. And by “crafty” I don’t mean deceptive or sneaky. I mean crafty in the way that Don Rief takes a piece of canvas and a bag of colored yarn and makes something beautiful with it, one single stitch at a time, over many hours and days. Or the way a carpenter takes wood and nails and glue and stain and varnish and makes a piece of furniture, with great craft and care and attention to detail. But to see the crafty-ness you have to look at the whole object, and then the details, and then the object. Close up and from a distance, and even then you might see something new each time you come back to it.
This morning, Jesus speaks to his hearers in the second part of the Sermon on the Mount. One of our folks at the Bible Study on Wednesday morning remarked that the passage for this week “…starts out easy to understand, and then gets really complicated.” She saw lots of dots and details, and not as much of the house, or the cat, or the football. Or the needlepoint banner, or the hand-made bookshelf.
The author of Matthew’s gospel is crafty—he is designing something very intentional in the way he builds the story. And in the Sermon on the Mount, we see this design. Now, Jesus did not have secretaries following him around taking dictation. And the Gospels are all written between seventy and a hundred years after the events they describe. So it’s not likely that Jesus said all these things in exactly this way. But the writer of Matthew has a story to tell, and means to tell it in a very particular way.
So what does he say? A few things, and we will begin at the wrong end. First of all, the final portion of the passage this morning: “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Whenever Jesus speaks of the kingdom of God or the kingdom of heaven, he’s usually talking about here and now. “The kingdom of God is among you, it has drawn near, it is here, turn around, do you see it?” This is not about “going to heaven when we die.” Most of our images of heaven and hell do not come from the Bible at all, but from an amazing work of thirteenth-century science fiction, the Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri. So this is not Jesus lecturing on the life of the world to come—he’s teaching about God’s life, in this world, the world in which we live right now.
Second, he says “I tell You…unless YOUR righteousness is thus and so, YOU will never…” As Bishop Benhase reminded us last Sunday, Jesus is a Southerner. “You” is second-person plural: It’s “y’all”. It is NOT “You and you and you and you…” It is all-encompassing.
Y’all are the salt of the earth. Salt is good for many things, but at bottom it’s about bringing out the flavor of the food. One of the translations we read in the adult Bible study this morning translated this as “You (all) are the seasoning, to bring out the God-flavors in the world…You (all) are the light, to show off the God-colors in this world.” No one person can be all the colors at once—we need yellow and green and red and pink and blue (Preacher gestures toward the stained-glass windows of the church) and all of the colors, and even then we have to sit with the mosaic and see what God is showing us in it.
For God is showing Godself in it. Bishop Benhase told us that last week too—that the Sermon on the Mount is a portrait of God, what God’s kingdom looks like. And we are part of that portrait, in all its various colors and flavors and textures.
We are invited—this day and every day, at every moment—to be a chunk of light and color, in the multicolored mosaic of the People of God.
May it be so for us; may it be so among us.
Thanks be to God.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Friday, February 4, 2011
4th Epiphany, Year A, 30 January 2011
Micah 6:1-8; Psalm 15; I Corinthians 1:18-31; Matthew 5:1-12
Preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
“The White House announced on Thursday that the economy will show significant improvement by September of this year.”
Well, not really. Our vocabulary word for today is Synecdoche (Suh-NECK-tuh-kee), which is a substitution of a single image or object for an entire complex of persons and events and intentions. We say “the White House” when what we mean is the presidential administration.
For Paul in the letter to the Corinthians this morning, the Cross serves as such a synecdoche. The Cross functions as a symbol (or kind of shorthand) for the life and death and resurrection of Jesus. The Incarnation, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection and the Ascension are all in it.
We are surrounded by images of this complex of events in this room. Right up front, we see the pendant cross over the altar. But it is missing something—it is all Resurrection and very little crucifixion. You cannot see the nails in the hands and feet; there is no sign of bloodshed. For that, we need the fourteen wrought iron crosses around the sides of the room, the Stations of the Cross. Good Friday in detail. And the windows—from the Creation through the Final Consummation of All Things, with the Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension at the center. All these events and episodes, represented by one image: The Cross.
And it is STRANGE beyond our comprehension. God became one of us; to live and show us how to live in God’s world, as members of God’s family. We were so frightened by that new proclamation—which made no sense to us at all. “Blessed are the poor? Blessed are those who are hungry and thirsty? Blessed are the powerless?—God is with ‘them people’ and not the obviously powerful and well-connected and we’ve got it together?”
We were challenged by that preaching and teaching, by this Jesus who was clearly not interested in cultivating the kind of power-and-authority that the world he lived in—the world we live in—was interested in. Some of us were drawn to him, wanting to learn more. Some of us recognized ourselves in what he had to say about those who are poor in spirit, or those who long for justice and right dealings among human beings. Or those who are grieving over the state of the world. Or those who know they don’t have it all together, and are almost able to say so, in so many words.
Some of us were angered by these things. By the fact that Jesus seemed indifferent to “the rules” as we had always been taught them. That he sat down and ate and drank and hung out with the wrong kind of people. That he loved the unlovable, and forgave the unforgivable, and gave generously to the unworthy and ungrateful. That he did justice, and practiced mercy, and walked humbly and securely in the love and presence of God. And taught that that was what living in the kingdom of God looked like.
So we had to get rid of him. The world of “common sense and the way things are” could not bear to have its assumptions challenged in such a flagrant and subversive manner. So the powers that be—of privilege and status and being somebody by keeping somebody else under our feet—rose up in fear and hate and violence, and made an end of him.
But that wasn’t the end. God wasn’t finished, not by any means. When we had imagined and crafted the most horrible, degrading, shameful punishment that human beings could conceive, and had executed it upon a mere nobody (as it seemed to us at the time) God had something else in mind. Our loudest, most clamorous NO was met with “yes.” God’s Yes, in Jesus. The resurrection is God’s refusal—then and now—to take no for an answer. When we wanted to do away with the call of God to us—each and all of us—and slam the door and holler “No I won’t you can’t make me la la la la la…” God would not leave us alone in that shut-away stubborn fearful place. God refused to take no for an answer.
The Cross is the sign and symbol and synectoche for that reality. For us as Christians it is not merely two sticks tied together—it summons and evokes an entire story and identity and purpose. It is the sign of life, and more than just one life—of all our life in Jesus. It is the lens through which we see and make sense of the world around us; it is the banner that leads us on our life’s journey. It is the standard which judges the actions and behaviors of humanity, beginning with us who bear it on our foreheads and in our hearts. In it, we see the death of all things, and the new life which God promises. Jesus’s resurrection is for us all, and for the entire creation itself. And this is the scandal—the point of stumbling, the place of disbelief and mistrust and wonder: How can this be?
It is, because God will have it so. And declares it so: Out of the worst that humanity could imagine or do, God brings God’s best. Life, and light, and joy, and transformation.
In the font this morning there is water. I intend to have the font out in the aisle, with water in it, every time we have the Eucharist. (Altar guild, take note.) I invite you, when you come forward for communion, to take some water and mark the sign of the cross on your forehead with your thumb. Remember that you are baptized with the sign of the cross, and water, and the name of God the Holy Trinity. Remember that you are more than a consumer of commercial goods; that you are more than a cog in some enormous impersonal machine. In the water, under the cross, we are joined into something larger and more powerful than we can begin to imagine. It is as old as the cosmos, and it is as new as this new day. It is the way of life for us as Christians; the way that leads to real, true, full life. God’s life, in this world and in worlds we have yet to experience.
Preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
“The White House announced on Thursday that the economy will show significant improvement by September of this year.”
Well, not really. Our vocabulary word for today is Synecdoche (Suh-NECK-tuh-kee), which is a substitution of a single image or object for an entire complex of persons and events and intentions. We say “the White House” when what we mean is the presidential administration.
For Paul in the letter to the Corinthians this morning, the Cross serves as such a synecdoche. The Cross functions as a symbol (or kind of shorthand) for the life and death and resurrection of Jesus. The Incarnation, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection and the Ascension are all in it.
We are surrounded by images of this complex of events in this room. Right up front, we see the pendant cross over the altar. But it is missing something—it is all Resurrection and very little crucifixion. You cannot see the nails in the hands and feet; there is no sign of bloodshed. For that, we need the fourteen wrought iron crosses around the sides of the room, the Stations of the Cross. Good Friday in detail. And the windows—from the Creation through the Final Consummation of All Things, with the Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension at the center. All these events and episodes, represented by one image: The Cross.
And it is STRANGE beyond our comprehension. God became one of us; to live and show us how to live in God’s world, as members of God’s family. We were so frightened by that new proclamation—which made no sense to us at all. “Blessed are the poor? Blessed are those who are hungry and thirsty? Blessed are the powerless?—God is with ‘them people’ and not the obviously powerful and well-connected and we’ve got it together?”
We were challenged by that preaching and teaching, by this Jesus who was clearly not interested in cultivating the kind of power-and-authority that the world he lived in—the world we live in—was interested in. Some of us were drawn to him, wanting to learn more. Some of us recognized ourselves in what he had to say about those who are poor in spirit, or those who long for justice and right dealings among human beings. Or those who are grieving over the state of the world. Or those who know they don’t have it all together, and are almost able to say so, in so many words.
Some of us were angered by these things. By the fact that Jesus seemed indifferent to “the rules” as we had always been taught them. That he sat down and ate and drank and hung out with the wrong kind of people. That he loved the unlovable, and forgave the unforgivable, and gave generously to the unworthy and ungrateful. That he did justice, and practiced mercy, and walked humbly and securely in the love and presence of God. And taught that that was what living in the kingdom of God looked like.
So we had to get rid of him. The world of “common sense and the way things are” could not bear to have its assumptions challenged in such a flagrant and subversive manner. So the powers that be—of privilege and status and being somebody by keeping somebody else under our feet—rose up in fear and hate and violence, and made an end of him.
But that wasn’t the end. God wasn’t finished, not by any means. When we had imagined and crafted the most horrible, degrading, shameful punishment that human beings could conceive, and had executed it upon a mere nobody (as it seemed to us at the time) God had something else in mind. Our loudest, most clamorous NO was met with “yes.” God’s Yes, in Jesus. The resurrection is God’s refusal—then and now—to take no for an answer. When we wanted to do away with the call of God to us—each and all of us—and slam the door and holler “No I won’t you can’t make me la la la la la…” God would not leave us alone in that shut-away stubborn fearful place. God refused to take no for an answer.
The Cross is the sign and symbol and synectoche for that reality. For us as Christians it is not merely two sticks tied together—it summons and evokes an entire story and identity and purpose. It is the sign of life, and more than just one life—of all our life in Jesus. It is the lens through which we see and make sense of the world around us; it is the banner that leads us on our life’s journey. It is the standard which judges the actions and behaviors of humanity, beginning with us who bear it on our foreheads and in our hearts. In it, we see the death of all things, and the new life which God promises. Jesus’s resurrection is for us all, and for the entire creation itself. And this is the scandal—the point of stumbling, the place of disbelief and mistrust and wonder: How can this be?
It is, because God will have it so. And declares it so: Out of the worst that humanity could imagine or do, God brings God’s best. Life, and light, and joy, and transformation.
In the font this morning there is water. I intend to have the font out in the aisle, with water in it, every time we have the Eucharist. (Altar guild, take note.) I invite you, when you come forward for communion, to take some water and mark the sign of the cross on your forehead with your thumb. Remember that you are baptized with the sign of the cross, and water, and the name of God the Holy Trinity. Remember that you are more than a consumer of commercial goods; that you are more than a cog in some enormous impersonal machine. In the water, under the cross, we are joined into something larger and more powerful than we can begin to imagine. It is as old as the cosmos, and it is as new as this new day. It is the way of life for us as Christians; the way that leads to real, true, full life. God’s life, in this world and in worlds we have yet to experience.
3 Epiphany, Year A, 23 January 2011
Isaiah 9:1-4; Psalm 271, 5-13;1 Corinthians 1:10-18; Matthew 4:12-23
Getting Ready to Go Fishing, preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
Last weekend your Vestry on went on retreat in the Wilderness, down in south Georgia at the Honey Creek Camp and Conference Center.
We went to get know each other better—you have a new priest, I have a new vestry, we have new vestry members and officers, and we wanted to spend some time together.
We also went to acknowledge, and wrestle with the fact, that the world most of us grew up in is not the world we live in now.
Most of us remember the Blue Laws. Sunday was protected by the culture. No movie theaters or stores or unnecessary businesses of any kind were allowed to open on Sunday. No youth sporting event would have been scheduled before 1:00 on Sunday afternoon. Schoolteachers were encouraged not to give homework on Wednesday nights—because that was midweek prayer meeting and youth group night.
We are no longer receiving those kinds of subsidies from the wider culture. The church is one of many options on Sunday morning, and we are working in a time and place that is increasingly disinterested in institutional maintenance for its own sake. The fastest growing religious group in North American culture are those who label themselves: “None of the above.” They have little or no background or exposure to organized religion as such. This does NOT mean that they are “irreligious” or without a potential for deep faith. The fact is, we all worship something or someone. But these folks are suspicious, at best, of institutions.
How do we reach out and touch those folks? How do we speak to them, minister to them? That’s the big question we wrestled with, on our retreat at Honey Creek.
In our gospel this morning, Jesus has just come back from his own retreat, in the wilderness, after his baptism. You remember the baptism. In the Jordan, with John the Baptist, and the Spirit descending like a dove, and the voice from heaven: “This is my Son, the beloved, in whom I am well pleased.” Immediately after which, out he goes into the desert for forty days and forty nights to be tested, to wrestle with the demons. And today he comes back to discover that John the Baptist is in prison, and the world as he knew it is no longer the world in which he lives.
He relocates to Capernum, a village near the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel, which will be his home base for a while. He’s already getting a reputation, and his message is consistent: The kingdom of God is at hand. It is near, it is here, do you see what is right in front of you? Open your eyes; clean the wax out of your ears; here and now God comes to bring you into his new way of living.
Jesus walks this morning by the Sea of Galilee. This is actually a large freshwater lake, along whose western shore a major highway connects Jerusalem and the south to the northern provinces. Fishing and farming are the major industries there, in Jesus’ time. Fishermen like James and John and Peter and Andrew had their own boats and equipment—they were professionals, businesspeople. They knew how to do things—in particular how to catch fish.
Jesus calls to them, with a strange and even bizarre proposition. Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.
The King James Bible puts it rather more colorfully: I will make you fishers of men. It’s actually a play on words…from “fisher-men” to “fishers-of-men” that we lose in the more contemporary translation.
Fish and fishing images come up throughout the gospels, perhaps most notably in the accounts of Jesus’ feeding miracles. With five little loaves of bread and two fish, Jesus is able to feed thousands of people. The early Christians cherished the story of that miraculous event, and understood it (among other things) as an interpretation of what happens at the Eucharist—a very small amount of “stuff” becomes the sign and vehicle of God’s abundant bounty and goodness.
We’ve all seen THE FISH on people’s car bumpers around town. In early Christian art, the image of a fish was frequently depicted—long before anyone dared to paint or sculpt the Cross, in fact. The Cross itself was still too raw; too contemporary as an active method of political execution. But the fish was an interesting alternative. In Greek, the common word for fish is Ichthus. This word (Iota; chi; theta; upsilon; sigma) can be read as an acronym for the phrase “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.” One of the early writers and teachers of the Church, a man named Tertullian, compared all Christians to smaller fish, following Jesus our great Ichthus in a “school..” Fish were often depicted in mosaic work on the floor of baptismal pools, playing on this image of Christ as the one we little ones follow through baptism.
Peter and James and John and Andrew follow him—without a single word, they drop everything and go. We don’t know if they’ve ever even met before—this could be the first time. He must have really been something special, for people to respond like that. But he didn’t beat around the bush either. “Come with me. Come and see.” A simple, direct invitation—and then they had the choice.
They chose to follow. And this morning, in this gospel, they’re getting ready for a big fishing trip that begins in a few verses. We’ll hear about it next Sunday.
I’m not much of a fisherman but I know that getting ready to go fishing takes some preparation. You want to lay out the equipment, gas up the boat motor, make sure there’s enough ice in the cooler for the beer we’re taking and the fish we’re bringing home. Where are we gonna go? Someone knows—they’ve been there before. They’ll navigate us safely there. Out on the water, look out for the right conditions…hopefully someone of the group knows what to look for. Ideally everyone does, but maybe some are still learning.
Getting ready is important. If you don’t have what you need (Bait, nets, mosquito repellent, beer) this will not be a good experience, you will not be able to do what you came to do. If we as St. Augustine’s do not have what we need (prayer, worship, Scripture, service to the community) in order to do the work, we will “miss the boat”—figuratively and perhaps more profoundly than that.
Last weekend the vestry of St. Augustine’s went on a retreat together. “Vestry Lock-In” as someone called it later. We were at a place where none of the vestry had ever been before, down in south Georgia on the marshy area behind the barrier islands. A holy place, a treasure of the diocese of Georgia. A place where fish leap out of the water during the Sunday Eucharist; where wild herons settle in the marshes and sing with the angelic choirs. We went there to get to know each other, and to learn some skills, and to get ready to go fishing.
Come, follow me, Jesus invites Peter and John, Andrew and James. And us, each one and all together. Come and let me show you how it’s done. Healing the sick, and casting out the powers of darkness, and teaching and telling folks “Something amazing is here—come and see. Open your eyes, turn around, heads up!” See what is already before you; welcome what has already arrived.
Getting Ready to Go Fishing, preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
Last weekend your Vestry on went on retreat in the Wilderness, down in south Georgia at the Honey Creek Camp and Conference Center.
We went to get know each other better—you have a new priest, I have a new vestry, we have new vestry members and officers, and we wanted to spend some time together.
We also went to acknowledge, and wrestle with the fact, that the world most of us grew up in is not the world we live in now.
Most of us remember the Blue Laws. Sunday was protected by the culture. No movie theaters or stores or unnecessary businesses of any kind were allowed to open on Sunday. No youth sporting event would have been scheduled before 1:00 on Sunday afternoon. Schoolteachers were encouraged not to give homework on Wednesday nights—because that was midweek prayer meeting and youth group night.
We are no longer receiving those kinds of subsidies from the wider culture. The church is one of many options on Sunday morning, and we are working in a time and place that is increasingly disinterested in institutional maintenance for its own sake. The fastest growing religious group in North American culture are those who label themselves: “None of the above.” They have little or no background or exposure to organized religion as such. This does NOT mean that they are “irreligious” or without a potential for deep faith. The fact is, we all worship something or someone. But these folks are suspicious, at best, of institutions.
How do we reach out and touch those folks? How do we speak to them, minister to them? That’s the big question we wrestled with, on our retreat at Honey Creek.
In our gospel this morning, Jesus has just come back from his own retreat, in the wilderness, after his baptism. You remember the baptism. In the Jordan, with John the Baptist, and the Spirit descending like a dove, and the voice from heaven: “This is my Son, the beloved, in whom I am well pleased.” Immediately after which, out he goes into the desert for forty days and forty nights to be tested, to wrestle with the demons. And today he comes back to discover that John the Baptist is in prison, and the world as he knew it is no longer the world in which he lives.
He relocates to Capernum, a village near the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel, which will be his home base for a while. He’s already getting a reputation, and his message is consistent: The kingdom of God is at hand. It is near, it is here, do you see what is right in front of you? Open your eyes; clean the wax out of your ears; here and now God comes to bring you into his new way of living.
Jesus walks this morning by the Sea of Galilee. This is actually a large freshwater lake, along whose western shore a major highway connects Jerusalem and the south to the northern provinces. Fishing and farming are the major industries there, in Jesus’ time. Fishermen like James and John and Peter and Andrew had their own boats and equipment—they were professionals, businesspeople. They knew how to do things—in particular how to catch fish.
Jesus calls to them, with a strange and even bizarre proposition. Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.
The King James Bible puts it rather more colorfully: I will make you fishers of men. It’s actually a play on words…from “fisher-men” to “fishers-of-men” that we lose in the more contemporary translation.
Fish and fishing images come up throughout the gospels, perhaps most notably in the accounts of Jesus’ feeding miracles. With five little loaves of bread and two fish, Jesus is able to feed thousands of people. The early Christians cherished the story of that miraculous event, and understood it (among other things) as an interpretation of what happens at the Eucharist—a very small amount of “stuff” becomes the sign and vehicle of God’s abundant bounty and goodness.
We’ve all seen THE FISH on people’s car bumpers around town. In early Christian art, the image of a fish was frequently depicted—long before anyone dared to paint or sculpt the Cross, in fact. The Cross itself was still too raw; too contemporary as an active method of political execution. But the fish was an interesting alternative. In Greek, the common word for fish is Ichthus. This word (Iota; chi; theta; upsilon; sigma) can be read as an acronym for the phrase “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.” One of the early writers and teachers of the Church, a man named Tertullian, compared all Christians to smaller fish, following Jesus our great Ichthus in a “school..” Fish were often depicted in mosaic work on the floor of baptismal pools, playing on this image of Christ as the one we little ones follow through baptism.
Peter and James and John and Andrew follow him—without a single word, they drop everything and go. We don’t know if they’ve ever even met before—this could be the first time. He must have really been something special, for people to respond like that. But he didn’t beat around the bush either. “Come with me. Come and see.” A simple, direct invitation—and then they had the choice.
They chose to follow. And this morning, in this gospel, they’re getting ready for a big fishing trip that begins in a few verses. We’ll hear about it next Sunday.
I’m not much of a fisherman but I know that getting ready to go fishing takes some preparation. You want to lay out the equipment, gas up the boat motor, make sure there’s enough ice in the cooler for the beer we’re taking and the fish we’re bringing home. Where are we gonna go? Someone knows—they’ve been there before. They’ll navigate us safely there. Out on the water, look out for the right conditions…hopefully someone of the group knows what to look for. Ideally everyone does, but maybe some are still learning.
Getting ready is important. If you don’t have what you need (Bait, nets, mosquito repellent, beer) this will not be a good experience, you will not be able to do what you came to do. If we as St. Augustine’s do not have what we need (prayer, worship, Scripture, service to the community) in order to do the work, we will “miss the boat”—figuratively and perhaps more profoundly than that.
Last weekend the vestry of St. Augustine’s went on a retreat together. “Vestry Lock-In” as someone called it later. We were at a place where none of the vestry had ever been before, down in south Georgia on the marshy area behind the barrier islands. A holy place, a treasure of the diocese of Georgia. A place where fish leap out of the water during the Sunday Eucharist; where wild herons settle in the marshes and sing with the angelic choirs. We went there to get to know each other, and to learn some skills, and to get ready to go fishing.
Come, follow me, Jesus invites Peter and John, Andrew and James. And us, each one and all together. Come and let me show you how it’s done. Healing the sick, and casting out the powers of darkness, and teaching and telling folks “Something amazing is here—come and see. Open your eyes, turn around, heads up!” See what is already before you; welcome what has already arrived.
Monday, November 8, 2010
All Saints Sunday, Year C, 7 November 2010
Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18; Psalm 149; Ephesians 1:11-23; Luke 6:20-31
Preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
From the letter of Paul to the Romans:
“To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you, and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Romans 1:7)
From the first letter of Paul to the Corinthians:
“To the church of God that is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints…Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 1:2)
From the letter to the Philippians:
“To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the overseers and the helpers: Grace to you and peace…”(Phil. 1:1-2)
Anyone notice a theme going on here?
All these letters and many others in the Christian scriptures open with a greeting directed to “The saints who are at…” this or that place. Today we celebrate the feast of All Saints, one of the principal feast days of the Church—a day that is so important that it can “take over” the Sunday following its proper date of November 1st.
All of which raises a question. What does it mean, to be a saint? Who gets the title?
As shown above, it’s a common form of address in Paul’s writing. The phrase is literally “The holy ones”, and is related to the same root word from which we get words like sanctify and sanctity. All of which point back to the original meaning, which has nothing to do with morality or a particular sort of behavior as such, but rather with being set apart. Chosen and designated for a particular purpose by God—and decidedly “different” in many cases. To be holy is to be distinctly Other-than-ordinary. Unusual. Even a bit odd. Or a lot.
The truth shall make you free, one of my professors used to say, paraphrasing the gospel of John. But first it shall make you STRANGE.
In a few moments we will sing the song of ultimate strangeness, ultimate otherness, ultimate out-of-the-ordinary. Not once, but three times: “Holy! Holy! Holy! is the Lord, the God of hosts.” We might well rethink those words: Other! Other! Other! Not like this, not like that, not like anything we can imagine or envision. God is always and forever, More Than.
God’s chosen ones, God’s set-apart-for-a-purpose ones, God’s particular, peculiar ones: The saints.
I grew up in the evangelical Bible-belt culture of southeast Texas. The saints, insofar as I ever gave them much thought at all, were long ago and far away in Bible times, or they were a somewhat dubious devotional practice of my Roman Catholic neighbors and school friends. Kind of like Mary—who got unwrapped, along with the strings of lights and glass baubles and green scratchy garlands around the first of December—and then around the first of January disappeared again for the rest of the year. I had to discover a little more about life, and about the mystery of God active in my own life, before I could reimagine what a saint might look like.
A story is told of a Sunday School class where the teacher asked “Who is a saint?” One of the children, remembering the stained glass windows in the church, replied “A saint is a person with the light shining through them.”
A person with the light shining through them. The colored glass of the image itself may be dusty, or cracked, or flawed in all sorts of ways; but the light shines through anyway.
The second letter to Timothy says that “In a large house there are utensils not only of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for special use, some for ordinary use.” (2 Tim. 2:20) Some vessels of gold or silver, or pottery or glass, or wood…all with a purpose, all with a designated use.
Who are your saints? Who have been the people in your life “through whom the light has shined?” Who have been the vessels of God’s grace and love and mercy to you, when you were in need of those gifts?
We have built a place of remembrance for those people, an All Souls altar, in the narthex of the church this morning. You have brought pictures and objects of remembrance to share those stories, and I hope that you will take time during coffee hour to tell each other about our own saints.
Many years ago, a young mother wanted to teach her children about the saints. So she began to think of some of the big names: St. Luke the physician, the writer of the Gospel; Margaret of Scotland, who built hospitals and churches and encouraged the clergy to preach better sermons; Joan of Arc, who left her farm and village and challenged the crown prince of France to drive the English soldiers out of his country. And that young mother sat down and wrote a poem about the saints. She never intended to publish that poem, or that anyone outside of her family would ever hear it. These are the words she wrote:
I sing a song of the saints of God, patient and brave and true;
Who toiled and fought and lived and died for the Lord they loved and knew.
And one was a doctor, and one was a queen,
and one was a shepherdess on the green;
They were all of them saints of God, and I mean, God helping, to be one too.
We’ll sing those words in a few minutes. They have become one of the most beloved hymn texts in the Episcopal Church, and with good reason. Lesbia Scott wrote them to be easily understood, an explanation of the words of the Creed: “I believe…in the communion of the saints.” The words of the last verse move the singers out of the long-ago and far-away, into here and now:
They lived not only in ages past; there are hundreds of thousands still.
The world is bright with the joyous saints who love to do Jesus’ will.
You can meet them in school, on the street, out at sea;
In church, on the bus, at the store, on TV;
(Okay, yes, I changed those last two lines up a bit…)
For the saints of God are just folk like me, and I mean to be one too.
The saints—the holy ones, the set-apart ones who have been God’s vessels of grace and mercy—the sometimes cracked, dingy, spider-web-covered ones through whom the light has shone in spite of their flaws—are all around us. What we look for, we will see; what we seek, we will find.
And so my dears, this week look for the light shining around you. Look for the light of God in the world, even and especially in the most unlikely people and places. And when you find it, put yourself in front of it. Open up to let it shine in, and through, you.
Amen.
Preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
From the letter of Paul to the Romans:
“To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you, and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Romans 1:7)
From the first letter of Paul to the Corinthians:
“To the church of God that is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints…Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 1:2)
From the letter to the Philippians:
“To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the overseers and the helpers: Grace to you and peace…”(Phil. 1:1-2)
Anyone notice a theme going on here?
All these letters and many others in the Christian scriptures open with a greeting directed to “The saints who are at…” this or that place. Today we celebrate the feast of All Saints, one of the principal feast days of the Church—a day that is so important that it can “take over” the Sunday following its proper date of November 1st.
All of which raises a question. What does it mean, to be a saint? Who gets the title?
As shown above, it’s a common form of address in Paul’s writing. The phrase is literally “The holy ones”, and is related to the same root word from which we get words like sanctify and sanctity. All of which point back to the original meaning, which has nothing to do with morality or a particular sort of behavior as such, but rather with being set apart. Chosen and designated for a particular purpose by God—and decidedly “different” in many cases. To be holy is to be distinctly Other-than-ordinary. Unusual. Even a bit odd. Or a lot.
The truth shall make you free, one of my professors used to say, paraphrasing the gospel of John. But first it shall make you STRANGE.
In a few moments we will sing the song of ultimate strangeness, ultimate otherness, ultimate out-of-the-ordinary. Not once, but three times: “Holy! Holy! Holy! is the Lord, the God of hosts.” We might well rethink those words: Other! Other! Other! Not like this, not like that, not like anything we can imagine or envision. God is always and forever, More Than.
God’s chosen ones, God’s set-apart-for-a-purpose ones, God’s particular, peculiar ones: The saints.
I grew up in the evangelical Bible-belt culture of southeast Texas. The saints, insofar as I ever gave them much thought at all, were long ago and far away in Bible times, or they were a somewhat dubious devotional practice of my Roman Catholic neighbors and school friends. Kind of like Mary—who got unwrapped, along with the strings of lights and glass baubles and green scratchy garlands around the first of December—and then around the first of January disappeared again for the rest of the year. I had to discover a little more about life, and about the mystery of God active in my own life, before I could reimagine what a saint might look like.
A story is told of a Sunday School class where the teacher asked “Who is a saint?” One of the children, remembering the stained glass windows in the church, replied “A saint is a person with the light shining through them.”
A person with the light shining through them. The colored glass of the image itself may be dusty, or cracked, or flawed in all sorts of ways; but the light shines through anyway.
The second letter to Timothy says that “In a large house there are utensils not only of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for special use, some for ordinary use.” (2 Tim. 2:20) Some vessels of gold or silver, or pottery or glass, or wood…all with a purpose, all with a designated use.
Who are your saints? Who have been the people in your life “through whom the light has shined?” Who have been the vessels of God’s grace and love and mercy to you, when you were in need of those gifts?
We have built a place of remembrance for those people, an All Souls altar, in the narthex of the church this morning. You have brought pictures and objects of remembrance to share those stories, and I hope that you will take time during coffee hour to tell each other about our own saints.
Many years ago, a young mother wanted to teach her children about the saints. So she began to think of some of the big names: St. Luke the physician, the writer of the Gospel; Margaret of Scotland, who built hospitals and churches and encouraged the clergy to preach better sermons; Joan of Arc, who left her farm and village and challenged the crown prince of France to drive the English soldiers out of his country. And that young mother sat down and wrote a poem about the saints. She never intended to publish that poem, or that anyone outside of her family would ever hear it. These are the words she wrote:
I sing a song of the saints of God, patient and brave and true;
Who toiled and fought and lived and died for the Lord they loved and knew.
And one was a doctor, and one was a queen,
and one was a shepherdess on the green;
They were all of them saints of God, and I mean, God helping, to be one too.
We’ll sing those words in a few minutes. They have become one of the most beloved hymn texts in the Episcopal Church, and with good reason. Lesbia Scott wrote them to be easily understood, an explanation of the words of the Creed: “I believe…in the communion of the saints.” The words of the last verse move the singers out of the long-ago and far-away, into here and now:
They lived not only in ages past; there are hundreds of thousands still.
The world is bright with the joyous saints who love to do Jesus’ will.
You can meet them in school, on the street, out at sea;
In church, on the bus, at the store, on TV;
(Okay, yes, I changed those last two lines up a bit…)
For the saints of God are just folk like me, and I mean to be one too.
The saints—the holy ones, the set-apart ones who have been God’s vessels of grace and mercy—the sometimes cracked, dingy, spider-web-covered ones through whom the light has shone in spite of their flaws—are all around us. What we look for, we will see; what we seek, we will find.
And so my dears, this week look for the light shining around you. Look for the light of God in the world, even and especially in the most unlikely people and places. And when you find it, put yourself in front of it. Open up to let it shine in, and through, you.
Amen.
Monday, November 1, 2010
23 Pentecost, Year C, October 31, 2010
Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4; Psalm 119:137-144, 2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12;
Luke 19:1-10
Today, Salvation Has Come preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through it. A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich. He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today." So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. All who saw it began to grumble and said, "He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner." Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, "Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much." Then Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost."
Much of my ministry so far has been some form of “talking people down out of trees.” You know what I mean? Someone will come into my office or call me on the phone and be completely in a fizz about something or another—maybe they’ve gotten really bad news that day. Or maybe they’re angry with someone else, so angry that they can’t speak to that person without yelling and ranting and raving. Maybe they’re sad and upset about a situation they can’t control or fix or influence…the reasons are infinite. I find myself with them, sitting and listening as hard as I can. Just being with them—sitting and hearing what they need to say.
Eventually the flood of words slows down to a stream…then a trickle…then finally silence. And then—only then—I look over and ask, “Would you like to come down out of the tree now?”
Nothing outwardly has changed, the situation is still whatever it was in the first place. But inwardly they have already “come down out of the tree” and are perhaps ready to get back on the road. Maybe they remembered there is something they can do, some word they can say, some gift they can bring. But in any case, they’ve discovered that they themselves have changed in the encounter, in the conversation.
Conversation—talking—and conversion—turning around—are from the same root word, which has to do with change. See the thing anew; change your mind; go in another direction; remember what you are intending and pursue it. Come down from there, get your feet on the ground again.
Zacchaeus is, literally and figuratively, up a tree this morning. He’s worked himself into quite a fizz indeed trying to see Jesus, “to see who Jesus was.” We know that Zaccheus is a chief tax collector, and that he was rich. We heard last week about another tax collector, or as I described him: Extortionist Goon. The neighbors feared him and hid their children when he passed by; he was in cahoots with the occupying Roman military and political system, he could get away with almost anything. Clearly one of the bad guys, outside all bounds of decency and acceptable social acquaintance.
And he wants to see who Jesus is. I wonder…how did he know about Jesus in the first place?
Maybe there had been a conversation. Maybe Zacchaeus overheard someone else—some of his own servants or entourage—talking about this rabbi from Nazareth who healed the sick and fed the hungry, who had a reputation for hanging out with the wrong kind of people and telling wild upside-down stories about tax collectors and Pharisees. Clearly the word had gotten around, because this crowd has gathered to meet Jesus on his way through town, and Zacchaeus can’t see what’s going on.
He could have easily gotten one of his entourage to break through the crowd for him. Sent one of the under-goons to knock some people out of the way—but he does not do that. Instead he does something altogether different, something humiliating to his own dignity, something a child would do. He runs ahead of the parade, and climbs a tree at the side of the road.
Jesus comes along, surrounded by the crowd, everyone talking at once. He looks up, and sees—and everyone else in the crowd sees as well—Zacchaeus hanging from a branch over the roadway.
I mean, really!
Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector of the district, the baddest bad guy in town, hanging over the path, with his robe hitched up around his knees, hat knocked half-off to one side…they could hardly stifle the giggles, not daring to openly guffaw, but what else could you do?
And in the midst of all this commotion, Jesus stands looking up. Gazing at a man hanging from a tree, the object of laughter and derision by the crowd. He sees Zaccheus there, really sees him. He stands, not saying one single word. And when the laughter stops, he speaks so that everyone can hear.
Zacchaeus—come down ! Hurry, do not delay, for I must stay at your house today.
What did he say? He’s going to stay at HIS house? Surely not—of all people, can you imagine, I never heard of such a thing, what could he be thinking…chatter chatter chatter, pick-a-little-talk-a-little, cheep cheep cheep…
And so they arrive—Jesus, Zacchaeus and this entire entourage of people, sweeping up to Zacchaeus’ front gate. Poor Mrs. Zacchaeus, whose daily routine has just completely been thrown for a loop, looks with dismay at this enormous lunch crowd. Signaling the cook to put some more water in the soup and mentally counting the extra vessels of wine in the storeroom, she comes to greet the guests.
Zacchaeus stands there, and says to Jesus—with everyone in the crowd overhearing every word—“Look, half of everything I own, I will give away; if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.”
“IF I have defrauded” indeed! They all know who he is. Everyone within earshot has been affected, one way or another, by his defrauding others—the neighbors who were victimized; the members of his own household, servants and syncophants and all who benefitted from his shady doings.
It’s not just Zacchaeus’ own decision, you see. Everyone else has a stake in this too. What he does, or does not do, affects many people besides himself. Some who had been struggling and suffering will be relieved; others who have been important and well-off because of his patronage will have to adjust their own expectations. We heard this all the way back at the beginning of Luke’s gospel, in the song of Mary:
God has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.
The grammar of the statement is worth noting. Our translation renders it as a future action: “I WILL give back, I WILL repay four-fold.” But it’s actually not even that far in the future—it might be rendered just as rightly “Even now, see, I am giving back…I am repaying even now…” Did he take out his moneybag and start handing out funds right then and there? Can’t tell…the story doesn’t say.
Jesus approves Zacchaeus’ action, but more than that, he approves Zacchaeus. “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham.” Today salvation has come--not in some distant, future, life-after-death understanding, but now, even now, this day, this moment—the mysterious power of God arrives, to take and bless and gather and restore a broken life into something new, something it had not been before.
For the writer of Luke’s gospel, the use of possessions—wealth—the Stuff, matters enormously. As does the gathering in of those who were outsiders and strangers, the feared and mistrusted ones. Them People.
We’re on the verge of election day, as you have perhaps noticed. The ads are flying thick and fast, with seemingly little regard on either side for careful thought or conversation. The general intention is to get as many voters as possible well and truly “in a fizz, up in a tree.” One of the favorite tools toward this end is fear—fear of “them people”, whether that means out-of-touch leaders in the state house or out-of-sight strangers who want to take over and ruin everything for “US.” Whoever “US” might be imagined to include—it certainly requires someone to be “not US.” Them people, again.
Jesus confronts this notion this morning. In the presence of people on both sides—those who have been victims of an deeply unjust system, and those who have benefitted from it—he welcomes even the man who stood at the heart of it all. He tells him who he is—a son of Abraham, one of the people of God, no questions asked. And Zacchaeus, for his part, begins something new altogether. His hands and heart are open to give; in the same instant, they are open to receive.
Today salvation has come, because today he gives and shares?
Or, today he gives and shares, because today salvation has come?
Yes. Exactly. That’s just it.
May it be so for us; may it be so among us.
Luke 19:1-10
Today, Salvation Has Come preached by Rev. Jason Haddox
Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through it. A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich. He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today." So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. All who saw it began to grumble and said, "He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner." Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, "Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much." Then Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost."
Much of my ministry so far has been some form of “talking people down out of trees.” You know what I mean? Someone will come into my office or call me on the phone and be completely in a fizz about something or another—maybe they’ve gotten really bad news that day. Or maybe they’re angry with someone else, so angry that they can’t speak to that person without yelling and ranting and raving. Maybe they’re sad and upset about a situation they can’t control or fix or influence…the reasons are infinite. I find myself with them, sitting and listening as hard as I can. Just being with them—sitting and hearing what they need to say.
Eventually the flood of words slows down to a stream…then a trickle…then finally silence. And then—only then—I look over and ask, “Would you like to come down out of the tree now?”
Nothing outwardly has changed, the situation is still whatever it was in the first place. But inwardly they have already “come down out of the tree” and are perhaps ready to get back on the road. Maybe they remembered there is something they can do, some word they can say, some gift they can bring. But in any case, they’ve discovered that they themselves have changed in the encounter, in the conversation.
Conversation—talking—and conversion—turning around—are from the same root word, which has to do with change. See the thing anew; change your mind; go in another direction; remember what you are intending and pursue it. Come down from there, get your feet on the ground again.
Zacchaeus is, literally and figuratively, up a tree this morning. He’s worked himself into quite a fizz indeed trying to see Jesus, “to see who Jesus was.” We know that Zaccheus is a chief tax collector, and that he was rich. We heard last week about another tax collector, or as I described him: Extortionist Goon. The neighbors feared him and hid their children when he passed by; he was in cahoots with the occupying Roman military and political system, he could get away with almost anything. Clearly one of the bad guys, outside all bounds of decency and acceptable social acquaintance.
And he wants to see who Jesus is. I wonder…how did he know about Jesus in the first place?
Maybe there had been a conversation. Maybe Zacchaeus overheard someone else—some of his own servants or entourage—talking about this rabbi from Nazareth who healed the sick and fed the hungry, who had a reputation for hanging out with the wrong kind of people and telling wild upside-down stories about tax collectors and Pharisees. Clearly the word had gotten around, because this crowd has gathered to meet Jesus on his way through town, and Zacchaeus can’t see what’s going on.
He could have easily gotten one of his entourage to break through the crowd for him. Sent one of the under-goons to knock some people out of the way—but he does not do that. Instead he does something altogether different, something humiliating to his own dignity, something a child would do. He runs ahead of the parade, and climbs a tree at the side of the road.
Jesus comes along, surrounded by the crowd, everyone talking at once. He looks up, and sees—and everyone else in the crowd sees as well—Zacchaeus hanging from a branch over the roadway.
I mean, really!
Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector of the district, the baddest bad guy in town, hanging over the path, with his robe hitched up around his knees, hat knocked half-off to one side…they could hardly stifle the giggles, not daring to openly guffaw, but what else could you do?
And in the midst of all this commotion, Jesus stands looking up. Gazing at a man hanging from a tree, the object of laughter and derision by the crowd. He sees Zaccheus there, really sees him. He stands, not saying one single word. And when the laughter stops, he speaks so that everyone can hear.
Zacchaeus—come down ! Hurry, do not delay, for I must stay at your house today.
What did he say? He’s going to stay at HIS house? Surely not—of all people, can you imagine, I never heard of such a thing, what could he be thinking…chatter chatter chatter, pick-a-little-talk-a-little, cheep cheep cheep…
And so they arrive—Jesus, Zacchaeus and this entire entourage of people, sweeping up to Zacchaeus’ front gate. Poor Mrs. Zacchaeus, whose daily routine has just completely been thrown for a loop, looks with dismay at this enormous lunch crowd. Signaling the cook to put some more water in the soup and mentally counting the extra vessels of wine in the storeroom, she comes to greet the guests.
Zacchaeus stands there, and says to Jesus—with everyone in the crowd overhearing every word—“Look, half of everything I own, I will give away; if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.”
“IF I have defrauded” indeed! They all know who he is. Everyone within earshot has been affected, one way or another, by his defrauding others—the neighbors who were victimized; the members of his own household, servants and syncophants and all who benefitted from his shady doings.
It’s not just Zacchaeus’ own decision, you see. Everyone else has a stake in this too. What he does, or does not do, affects many people besides himself. Some who had been struggling and suffering will be relieved; others who have been important and well-off because of his patronage will have to adjust their own expectations. We heard this all the way back at the beginning of Luke’s gospel, in the song of Mary:
God has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.
The grammar of the statement is worth noting. Our translation renders it as a future action: “I WILL give back, I WILL repay four-fold.” But it’s actually not even that far in the future—it might be rendered just as rightly “Even now, see, I am giving back…I am repaying even now…” Did he take out his moneybag and start handing out funds right then and there? Can’t tell…the story doesn’t say.
Jesus approves Zacchaeus’ action, but more than that, he approves Zacchaeus. “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham.” Today salvation has come--not in some distant, future, life-after-death understanding, but now, even now, this day, this moment—the mysterious power of God arrives, to take and bless and gather and restore a broken life into something new, something it had not been before.
For the writer of Luke’s gospel, the use of possessions—wealth—the Stuff, matters enormously. As does the gathering in of those who were outsiders and strangers, the feared and mistrusted ones. Them People.
We’re on the verge of election day, as you have perhaps noticed. The ads are flying thick and fast, with seemingly little regard on either side for careful thought or conversation. The general intention is to get as many voters as possible well and truly “in a fizz, up in a tree.” One of the favorite tools toward this end is fear—fear of “them people”, whether that means out-of-touch leaders in the state house or out-of-sight strangers who want to take over and ruin everything for “US.” Whoever “US” might be imagined to include—it certainly requires someone to be “not US.” Them people, again.
Jesus confronts this notion this morning. In the presence of people on both sides—those who have been victims of an deeply unjust system, and those who have benefitted from it—he welcomes even the man who stood at the heart of it all. He tells him who he is—a son of Abraham, one of the people of God, no questions asked. And Zacchaeus, for his part, begins something new altogether. His hands and heart are open to give; in the same instant, they are open to receive.
Today salvation has come, because today he gives and shares?
Or, today he gives and shares, because today salvation has come?
Yes. Exactly. That’s just it.
May it be so for us; may it be so among us.
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