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Palm Sunday

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By Taylor Poindexter, Seminarian

I went on a walk earlier this week over at Seminary. There are square miles of green space, the Seminary and Episcopal High School are right next to each other, and across the road is Fort Ward park. In the Spring, the trees and the flowers are over the top beautiful. As I walked around it was hot on my back, there was wind in my face. As I made the last turn on my walk I caught a wiff of that fresh spring flower smell and went “whoo” and looked to see where it was coming from. It seemed to be coming from a young tree with little green leaves on it. Just beautiful. But kind of all the while on my walk, there was a dark rain cloud off in the distance, there were frequent sirens, there were the military helicopters going around. So there was this juxtaposition, that we live with, with beauty smack dab next to pain, next to worry, sometimes next to real danger.

Right in the thick of those beautiful sights and smells. This is how I am approaching this holy week, and I think it’s one good way to do it, ready to experience the ups and the downs.

Palm Sunday is joyful, we process, we make the way, we wave palms, Jesus is coming into Jerusalem. If I put myself in the place of those putting their coats down before Jesus as he approached Jerusalem I imagine there were beautiful sight, thrilling moments, and the joy of the crowd. But we know now and probably many knew at the time, that Pilate, the governor, was entering Jerusalem from the other side. We have this epic that we can see unfolding before us and life’s just going on. For a moment, Jerusalem is the center of the universe. This is where the drama of salvation takes place. This is where we will walk with Jesus during Holy Week. This is where the powers, the principalities, the mob mentality try to take on the greatest power in the world, which is love incarnate. Jesus Christ experiencing that mix that we do of beauty and pain, and then redeeming it, making it whole, making it new. We look to that redemption, and in the meantime I struggle with walking this tightrope of beauty and pain. On that walk a few days ago, I saw that beautiful smelling tree and those little green leaves and I could imagine pulling off one of the skinny branches and I could imagine that the inside of it would be green. And along with that storm cloud, I was reminded of the warning Jesus gives to the women:

“Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children…For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

If they hang this man without sin on a freshly cut cross, if they do this to the one without sin, the savior of the world. If people can be so swept up in the mob over this man, what will they do to others? Jesus says this kind of pain doesn’t go away. So there’s beauty in this life, hope, forgiveness, love, and then there’s all this pain, and the reality of people’s ability to be so brutal.

As always, Jesus reverses things. There’s this powerful savior whose greatest act was in becoming a servant. He turns it on its head.

And somehow this savior of the world, is in some real way made known to us by breaking. Christ is present in this breaking, the breaking of the bread, the breaking of our hearts over the knowledge of the ways we are complicit in evil, broken open people. There’s something about the broken hearted, God incarnate being so strong that he could be broken open, poured out, and in that make us new. This whole movement has to do with the broken hearted. The broken open Christ, the brokenness we live with. So I pray that this holy, holy week we can allow ourselves to be a little broken open to Christ, I pray that we can have the same mind as Christ, and I pray that any brokenness will be like cracks through which God’s grace can grow.

Glory Unveiled       

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by Taylor Poindexter, Seminarian

Transfiguration, to be totally changed, to be totally different and yet recognizable. Christ’s transfiguration came on a mountain to which he and three disciples, Peter, John and James went to pray, to have a moment of peace. It seems that this quiet holy moment among dear friends became a little crowded, and quickly.

Moses and Elijah appear and Jesus’ appearance changes! A man who was likely a little weary from traveling and who had just hiked up a mountain is suddenly transformed into a vision, dazzling white, and his face was shining. Moses and Elijah talk with Jesus, and the disciples look on with awe-here their messiah is talking with two of the greatest figures, long gone, of their history. We don’t get the details, but they speak with him about the coming time of persecution, that would lead to his departure, his death. Place yourself on a desert mountain with these six figures, and imagine the bewilderment, everything has changed, everything has become more real. And maybe change is too simple a word. It is not as if Jesus was just ho-hum before this, but this is a sacred moment from which there is no turning back. The disciples cannot unsee the glory of the Lord, Jesus even if he wanted to cannot ignore his identity, and we, we cannot unsee this glimpse of the true reality of God in Christ.

British Poet Malcome Guite offers a poem about this moment:

For that one moment, ‘in and out of time’,
On that one mountain where all moments meet,
The daily veil that covers the sublime
In darkling glass fell dazzled at his feet.
There were no angels full of eyes and wings
Just living glory full of truth and grace.
The Love that dances at the heart of things
Shone out upon us from a human face
And to that light the light in us leaped up,
We felt it quicken somewhere deep within,
A sudden blaze of long-extinguished hope
Trembled and tingled through the tender skin.
Nor can this this blackened sky, this darkened scar
Eclipse that glimpse of how things really are.

The veil that makes it so hard to see was lifted, and the glory of God was revealed. It is one of those things that you cannot unsee. And it colors everything else. In two of my best friends I have seen a glimmer of this, when the world is changed. I have known these two since we were pre-teens, we went to school together, we went to college together, they got married last year and they just had a baby who they named Jillian. Because we’ve known each other so long and so deeply we know each other’s faces, each other’s moods and the way we see the world. And because I have known them so long I know that in a way they have been transfigured by their daughter. Their faces shine like a veil has been lifted. They look different as they are transformed by God’s love and their love for their child. Their view will never be the same, it will be guided by a love and responsibility that expands and narrows their understanding. And there are other things that you can’t unsee, when the world turns and you are left figuring out where it all fits together. When I returned home for Christmas in the midst of my first job in Baltimore, my brother in law said “you look like you’ve seen the eye of the tiger.” I’m not sure exactly what he meant but I figure that he thought my face had changed, my eyes looked different, my view of the world was different and it showed, I couldn’t unsee. There is no turning back.

Now when the veil is lifted and we see the truth, deeper than my examples here, when we see with the disciples that Jesus Christ shines with the light of God, we are transfixed, we look harder to see-what does it mean? Scholars often pose that this transfiguration was shoring up the disciples and Jesus for the hard journey ahead, on the road to Jesus’ death. Was it emboldening Christ, reminding him of who he was, giving him strength for the journey? In some real way this was a change in the person of Jesus, a readying , an equipping for his ministry as it changed from traveling and healing and sharing the knowledge of God, to his ministry in his final days, equipping the disciples, instituting the Lord’s supper, being handed over.

This transfiguration event was as big as the Exodus, when God made a covenant with the Israelites as he delivered them from slavery. Moses’ appearance at the transfiguration seems to signify the continuing reality of God’s saving nature. In this exodus, this departure, Jesus leads God’s people out of the slavery of sin and death. This is another time when God is leading God’s people to the promised land. Elijah, the prophet from 1st and 2nd Kings who so steadily works for Yaweh to be recognized as the true God, is there too. These figures, Moses, the law or covenant, Elijah, the prophet, and Jesus, the savior and redeemer talk about the coming trials.

And the disciples, they watch in fear and amazement, and the newest among them, Peter, out of a desire to hold this moment static, to revel in it longer, offers the suggestion, “let’s make a dwelling for you three here!” But even as he said it surely he recognized that this moment is passing, and that it can’t be clung to. The melancholy he must have felt. And we, passing through lent may too want to grasp for an image to hold onto, a figure that stays the same, a way of being that works. The passing away-nature of human life seems all too fast at times. Peter got that. He glimpsed the eternal light and reached for it. And in so doing he got a message from God who spoke from above, “this is my son, my chosen one: listen to him.” So he was left with a view that is forever changed, a glimpse of the eternal God and sacred history and he being in his new state was grasping. He was reckoning with what he had seen and can’t now unsee. The reality of God in Christ.

Paul offers encouragement and comfort to the community in Corinth, about a hundred years after Jesus’ transfiguration and his passion, and encourages them to let the light of this truth of God in Christ shine. He encourages them both to live without a veil, hiding their inner selves, but also not to see with a veil, but to see the light of Christ, shining white. To live boldly because of the transfiguration that they had heard of, that had transfigured their hearts.

To be aware of the light of Christ, and to look for the ways it is changing you and others. He writes “And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” The glory of the Lord, a light to enlighten the nations, Christ’s transfiguration is an insider look into the reality of God’s world, reaching back to the law and the prophets and forward into the redeeming work of God in Christ.

May the transfiguring of Christ embolden us to walk with him on the journey to Gethsemane and to Golgotha. Let our hearts be transfigured. Let us reckon with what we have seen. May the holy lent that we are approaching be attuned to the Glory of God, not a project, but a reckoning with the world and ourselves when our view is transfigured, when we cannot unsee the Glory of God. When we must follow the chosen one.

Invitation to New Life

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Mark 10:17-31

by Taylor Poindexter, Seminarian

I have been invited over and over to leave my perfectionistic tendencies behind. This past summer when I did a hospital chaplaincy internship, I was invited yet again to let go of what my supervisor thought was holding me back. To let go of the to-do list, to let go of the high expectations. And I wondered, but how will it get done if I don’t do it in this way? What does life look like if not like this? This is not the first or last time that faithful, caring people will invite me to loose the bonds that hold me, and invite me to live in a different way. One of you may be the next to remind me that my to-do list and I will not be the ones to bring forth the kingdom of God. But it hurts, it literally pains me, to let go of a piece of my identity, of a part of my self-worth. The growing pains are not over, I am afraid.

When Jesus answers the anxious rich man’s question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life? – What must I do to draw near to you, what must I do to have what I most deeply desire?” Jesus loves him, I imagine the corners of his eyes crinkling with understanding. Jesus knows human yearning, desiring, and seeking God. He knows forsakenness, he knows confusion. So he says “Follow the commandments, you know them…” and recites them from memory. And with love for this human predicament, he tells the man to let go of the thing that is holding him back. He’s got the commandments, he’s got the law and faithfulness and desire. But Jesus lovingly knows there is more for him. There is deep, abiding presence with God, there is eternal life, there is a kingdom to which he is invited. And the man wonders, and hangs his head, knowing he is not ready to give up that aspect of his identity that keeps him from living the faithful life that Jesus offers at the time. Jesus knew it wouldn’t be easy for this man to follow him. His investments were in an identity that he would have to give up, in order to identify as a follower of Jesus. And those caring people who have offered me another vision of my life, one with less pressure, one with less perfectionism, they knew it wouldn’t be easy for me. But I wonder, what hope lies beyond the identity to which I cling? What must I do to inherit eternal life? The rich man’s identity was invested in comfort, and that kept him from making his investment into the deeper reality of life with God.

Jesus talks to the disciples and reminds them that this teaching refers to them too. What must they do to inherit eternal life? Where is there investment? The disciples are taken aback by this news that the rich, those with that identity blinding them, will have a really hard time entering the Kingdom of God! Those who normally do such a good job of taking care of themselves and others, cannot save themselves. Disciples, holy followers of God in Christ are scared. It sounds familiar, doesn’t it. This teaching by Jesus is scary. To give up an identity focused on security and wealth and doing fine, is scary. It’s scary to think this is the good news-that a comfortable life on earth may not lead to the union with God, that deepest desire. It’s scary. But what’s scarier than letting go of those attributes holding us back, is the idea of the kingdom being so far away. And the idea that my attribute leads me to a lack of trust in God. It’s impossible for a camel to fit through the eye of a needle. It’s metaphor, hyperbole, where Jesus seems to be saying, hey guys! It can’t happen. So the disciples are anxious, like the man Jesus spoke to is anxious, and the disciples may be a little angry, since they had worked so hard to be who they are. And they ask, maybe whisper to each other “who can be saved?”

For mortals it is impossible. For God all things are possible, for God camels might just fit through holes of needles, for God all are invited, for God, nothing is impossible, in God we have our breath and being and identity. And we are invited to act out of the gratitude that comes with the relief that my whole self and your whole self are invited. Invited to a life of discipleship. Invited to a new identity. Invited to a new understanding. Invited to seek the kingdom of heaven. Invited to follow Jesus. Invited to embrace one another, the last, the first and the in-between. Invited to give up what holds us back form seeking God and God’s face in one another. I remember when I was early on in my year in the Episcopal Service Corps in Baltimore, Maryland. I was having a hard time adjusting to the daily experience of poverty and violence in Baltimore, it was all so close for the first time. I remember thinking in anger-“this is going to change me!” After that heated moment, my boiling point, there was this sense of calm, like, “Oh, I see. That’s the point.” I felt different after releasing myself to be changed, like a weight had been lifted. Learning to live and love in a new environment and as an outsider surely was going to change me. Once I made my investment in following the call to this community, I was ready. I could experience that closeness of God that I so desired on difficult days, I knew that what I was doing was hard, but that God was with me and molding me. Knowing that God invites us to change for the better, to let go of what binds us reminds me of how close God is.

The new identity we are invited into, as followers of Jesus, is one that is well-articulated in our Baptismal Covenant. We promise to let go, to die with Jesus and rise with Jesus. We promise to follow the commandments and then some. We promise to seek righteousness and turn from things holding us back from fullness of life. That is our identity. Our identity is in baptism, our identity as followers of Jesus is that we are Christ’s, Christ’s own, forever. Our investment is with Christ. With our baptized identity we promise to love one another and seek Christ in all people. We have a lot to lose, but it’s not money or comfort or my perfectionism. It is the loss of the opportunity to have a life that trusts the love and salvation of Jesus. We stand to lose the joy that comes from living in relationship with God and one another. We stand to lose that sigh of relief when one recognizes “for mortals it is impossible. But for God all things are possible.” We cannot save ourselves through perfectionism or money or status, but Jesus invites us into a saving relationship, into the reign of God.

Jesus invites the rich man and the disciples to abide in eternal life with God, saying “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”

Amen.

Living the Creed: Jesus is Lord

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by Taylor Poindexter, Seminarian

“My kingdom is not from this world.” Christ the King Sunday was proposed by Pope Pius after World War One. He saw that nationalism was at its height, and he saw people all over the world who were willing to die for ideologies such as communism, fascism, and political democracy. It was the year Mussolini came into power, and the year when a huge KKK rally happened in DC. Pope Pius instituted a call back to alignment with Christ for the Catholic Church. He called for all Christians to recognize their creator, and to keep God’s commandments, and to not ignore God in their public lives. Anglicans, Lutherans and others followed suit as they recognized that Christians were placing all of their eggs in the baskets of governmental and economic systems. For 90 years now the feast has been celebrated, calling Christians to remember where their allegiances lie, to remember that Jesus is Lord, and that Christians are citizens of an alternative kingdom.

“Jesus is Lord” is the first creedal statement in the Christian tradition. This is an affront to an individualistic, self-focused way of life. My primary King, Lord, leader, is Jesus. If Jesus is Lord then I am not, and neither is my reputation, my accomplishments, or my ideologies. Being a Jesus-follower makes for a life that seeks a kingdom beyond those passing away on earth. Following Jesus is following a saving God, rather than all the worldly things that may promise to save us from the powers of death, but cannot deliver.

Pontius Pilate doesn’t seem to know what to do with Jesus. Jesus seems to have made his fellow Jews mad, but Pilate can’t do anything about an inter-religious spat. Pilate asks “are you the king of the Jews?” That’s the only question that can get Jesus into big trouble, crucifixion trouble. Jesus claiming kingship affronts the empire that Pilate represents. The only problem worth Pilate’s time is the one that Jesus answers with “You say that I am.” He interrogates Jesus and Jesus says “For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.” This truth to which Jesus refers is that he is God incarnate and that the kingdom he represents is out of this world, will not bend to the empire, will not bow to another ideology or king. The truth is that Jesus rules, the risen Christ rules, and that through baptism we are made citizens in that kingdom, committing to die and rise with him. We don’t know whether or not Pilate knew who he was dealing with, if he felt his nerves rising within him because he knew who Jesus might have been. But we can tell that Jesus was leading through questioning, even as he was being questioned. This truth, Jesus is Lord, means Pilate, and Caesar, are not.

If you decide to follow Jesus in this alternative kingdom, how do you know what God wants you to do? I asked a dear friend and mentor that question, she is the Episcopal Chaplain to JMU’s students, and she gave me advice that has stuck with me. She said, ask yourself, “Will this action help me to love God’s people more?” This theological question shapes how you think and act when you practice using it. “Does this help me love God’s people more?”

How do you follow Jesus? How do you choose to claim your citizenship in the kingdom of God, rather than in the kingdom of the world? Being a citizen of God’s kingdom sometimes means living by different norms. I was raised by caring, loving parents who instilled in me a big value for efficiency. I owe them an incredible debt for a lot of things, but even just that efficiency has been of great service to me! My Mom is very efficient, she’s the original multi-tasker. She worked from home so I got to watch her juggle different demands with grace. My Dad is a semi-retired economist, so I know a thing or two having to do with maximum efficiency from our dinner time conversation. As a result, I am a horrible grocery store companion-I can’t fathom buying anything that either isn’t in bulk, or that I can’t use for multiple dishes. I never go up the stairs empty handed-why not use my legs efficiently, and I tend not to waste too much time. And there’s that economic principle wherein it is most economical for people to do things that they are good at. It’s the principle that justifies outsourcing-an administrator hires a web designer to design a website. It makes most sense to make products where their raw components are readily available. Contractors complete projects for which they’re trained, rather than one office reinventing the wheel every time. These principles are deeply engrained in me, and they make sense. We need certain standards in any page economy or government. But sometimes, the norms of this kingdom just butt up against following Jesus into his kingdom. Sometimes the most efficient way, or the most economical way just doesn’t align with the norms of Christ’s kingdom. On campus, for instance, I work with the 5 demonstration gardens there, which we have developed to show church leaders how to engage their communities through work with gardening, food, sustainability, and justice. One of the biggest projects is the wheat we plant to harvest for the flour for our communion bread. I spend a lot of hours shoveling leaf compost, spreading chicken manure, hand sowing wheat seeds, and praying in a muddy field. Wheat is of course much more commonly produced in the heartland. And it’s a dollar in the grocery store! So why does the daughter of an extremely efficient pair of people spend time on these tasks? These tasks that I’m really not burly enough for, these tasks that take time away from other work on campus? Because it helps me to love God’s people more. When I invite my community to share in the planting, harvesting, milling and baking of our communion bread, I follow Jesus. When we learn together, pray together, share stories together, when we stoop together in solidarity with those who always work with their hands, we follow Jesus. It helps me love God’s people more. The rules of this earthly kingdom-efficiency, profit, don’t govern the kingdom in which Jesus reigns. The almighty doesn’t seem to operate on modern east-coast American metrics. The good habits of our age don’t necessarily pave the way to follow Christ.

Pope Pius’ idea continues to call us back into alignment with Christ the King. When we are members of Christ’s kingdom, we are invited to act in different ways. Yes, efficiency is important sometimes. But there are other practices that help you love God’s people more, that matter. Just as you vote, take out your trash and pay taxes, there is another set of expectations for citizens of God’s kingdom. Following the commandments, including the one about Sabbath, help to conform you to the culture of the kingdom of Christ. Sabbath was offered to those Israelites returning home after being held as slaves in Egypt, as God offered them one day a week where they only belong to God, and aren’t beholden to worldly powers. We are also offered that day, or hour, or afternoon, to pray, to unplug, to listen for God, to love God’s people, to leave room for those heart to heart conversations. Finding that inner and outer rest is so important, to honor your created body and to leave room for God to shape you, and to know God more closely. Taking Sabbath seriously is one way that we take part in God’s kingdom in transformational ways. Aligning ourselves as followers of Christ, embracing our place as citizens leaves room for God to work in us and through us.

And I wonder, when we seek to love God’s people more, how our rhetoric will be shaped, how our choices will be shaped, when it comes to the big questions of our age. How do we love God’s people more when they are refugees from a war-torn Syria, how do we love God’s people more when fear is an innate part of the culture of this world? Take heart and do not be afraid, for Christ’s kingdom invites you into live-saving, life-giving relationships. As members of Christ’s kingdom, Christ gives us the revelation we need to know, that Christ’s saving kingdom is the one to which we want to belong. Pilate wasn’t sure what this other king was about, but we have a little more information, and this King is the one I want to follow. The one I want to align myself with through prayer, Sabbath, listening, abiding and the action that flows from this citizenship in the kingdom.

So this saving Christ, this saving promise, this saving king, deserves our worship. And thus we turn to the altar, where Christ invites us to the feast set for his kingdom. It’s not about efficiency or fear other norms that rule our lives. It’s about God. It’s about the kingdom where we are already citizens, even as we fumble with our norms between these two worlds. Let us seek the things that help us to love God’s people more, let us act as the citizens of the kingdom God invites us to, let us live into the creed, Jesus is Lord.

Molded by God

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by Taylor Poindexter, Seminarian

This John the Baptist, the son of Zechariah, the son of Elizabeth, the baby who lept in his mother’s womb when she was near her cousin Mary carrying the Christ-child, is now a grown man.

He is called out of the desert by God to proclaim the coming of the Messiah, and he does so with vigor. He is so dynamic, and so wild, and you can imagine, so frantic and haggard from his desert experience, that people wondered if he might be the Messiah himself.

He assures them that he is not, and that his baptism is by water, but that the coming one, the Christ will baptize with the Holy Spirit, and with fire.

Baptism was a Jewish practice in the first century, it was ritually cleansing, and it was used when a gentile wanted to convert to Judaism. John calls for people to prepare themselves, to repent and turn to God with them whole selves, in order to be ready for the one who was coming. He demands that they be baptized as a part of this converting and readying for the coming of the Christ.

John is frantic and he talks about hatchets and fire and winnowing. He is clear that the time has come to be ready to meet God in a new way, in a saving way.

Farmers in the first century used a winnowing fork, like a big wooden pitchfork, to process their wheat products from the field. They would take the crop to their barn and they would throw the crop into the air. The wheat grains are heavy, so they would fall to one side, and the chaff, the outer coating on the grain, would fall to the other.

This separating of the inside from the outside, was part of the process to make a good product. To get the grain ready to mill and share and sell.

In the same way, John is saying the Christ will act. When the Messiah comes he will call for lives to be transformed, and will be rid of the parts of us that hold us back from God. The Christ will take all of who we are and mold us and shape us into who we are meant to be.

This winnowing of the people of http://cialis-versus-viagra.com/ God is not destructive, but refining. It’s not pushing some good people to one side and some bad people to the other, it is a refining process, to get that good product God is looking for. It is in baptism that the spirit of fire and the living water of Christ shapes us and molds us, and calls us to the daily vocation of baptized living.

John the Baptist calls to the tax-collectors and the soldiers, the ones who were taking a skim off the top and profiting from a shifting social order where the rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer, and he calls them to be baptized. He says this opportunity is for you too. This demand is for you too. Do your job, he says, but don’t take extra, don’t harm those among you. Even the least of these, even the disgraced are called to turn to God in repentance, with the understanding that even they can be redeemed. This baptized living requires letting go of those means of control, and letting God have it.

In the same way, John calls us in our modern lives to repent and to turn to God, over and over. He is preparing the generation to encounter God in Christ, and his prophecy is preparing us too, to encounter the God who is here among us and yet coming still, the God who desires our repentance and focus, our hope and our trust.

This baptism that Christ is soon to offer, the fire that comes with the water of baptism is that refining fire, that work of the Holy Spirit on our lives.

This is a God who is willing and ready to reach out and shape us, refine us, and to make us whole.

Thanksgiving might have been a nice reminder of how those we love, those we are closest to, can be the refining fire that changes us and causes us to grow. From what I understand, marriage calls you to be more than you ever thought you could be, parenthood knocks off rough edges, and caring for parents or siblings separates the selfish parts of ourselves and calls us to give more than we thought we could.

In a similar way, our relationship with the God shapes us and molds us, by fire and water and God’s spirit. Repentance is a joyful thing to seek, it is a way of trusting the God in whom we trust our salvation. When we offer our whole selves, our wheat and our chaff, this is our sacrifice. God can work with that, and we are exhorted to do that this advent season.

As we wait for the coming of Christ, we wait for the God who we trust to make us who we are meant to be.

The Nicene Creed that we recite together says “We believe in one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins” and when we live that, we live the daily vocation of the Christian life, the daily hope in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. We trust in the God who can forgive, who wants our wheat and chaff, our blessings and our burdens.

This rebirth of baptism and at this time of year is not about destruction, but about God’s molding and shaping.

So how do we allow ourselves to be molded? What hard edges is the holy spirit knocking off in our communal life? The Apostle Paul writes to the Philippians and exhorts them to rejoice! And to “let their gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near.” What’s going on with the Philippians? Were they feeling as low as we are?

Were they in the midst of strife like we are in our context? Wondering about climate talks, ISIS, fear of neighbor, a presidential election?   Paul continues, “Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” If Paul exhorted this community to rejoice, to live in thanksgiving as the Lord is near, and to pray what would we do? What would we do if we got that letter?

How is this molding spirit shaping us to make way for God in the world? They will know we are Christians by our love. They will know we are Christians by our gentleness. They will know we are Christians by our trust and thanksgiving.

These grounding beliefs that teach us to repent to make way for the Lord, do bring us to rejoicing. Repentance begets joy which begets forbearance. By returning to God and to our vocation as baptized Christians, we realize we are coming back to a loving and merciful God, who equips us with the forbearance we need to take on the tasks that so demand our attention in this life.

The demands to love God and our neighbor and ourselves, to demands to seek justice and peace and to seek Christ in all. John the Baptist calls to all the people gathered, encouraging them to examine their lives, and we too are called to examine our lives and the spirit of God may be leading us to.

Part of finding this peace is repentance to God, turning to God, making room for God, making the path straight for God. John the Baptist and Paul are asking their people to live in ways that are brave, simple and honest, because they really believe that Christ is coming. They implore their communities to live like Christ will be back, any moment. John demands this repentance and hope from us because he is excited. He desires everyone to know that the great one is coming, that it’s time to prepare the way.

If God can raise up children for Abraham from these stones, then surely God can raise up children from us and from our neighbors. Through faithfulness and repentance, we can join in this raising up.  I pray that we will follow John’s exhortation, that we will listen to his demand.

I pray that we are not children of snakes, takers, thieves, but instead that we will be thanks-givers, rejoicers, and children of light, ready for the savior.

Amen