God's Transforming Call

God calls us... do we follow?

SJF • Epiphany 3b 2015 • Tobias S Haller BSG
Jesus said, Follow me, and I will make you fish for people

Our scripture readings today present us with variations on a theme, and the theme is “Transformation.” The transformation takes three different forms, but all three forms have God as their author. And these three forms of transformation have the advantage of being a version of the “three R’s” — in this case Repentance, Renunciation, and Renewal.

We hear the middle movement of the “Jonah Symphony” this morning. You recall the first movement: Jonah rejected God’s transforming call — to him! He ran away from God and ended up repenting in the belly of a fish. In today’s passage we see him finally doing as God instructed him, and preaching the message of repentance — one which he himself has learned so well, up close and personal, and under water. The great and the small, the folk of Nineveh, respond to the call of God, and repent, turning, each of them, from their evil ways. But notice this: God calls through Jonah, himself called, and himself knowing in himself the need for repentance; and perhaps that is what makes his preaching so persuasive: and the people respond and repent.

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Saint Paul delivers a different form of God’s call to the people of Corinth. He wants people to detach from the normal courses of life because all of life is about to be transformed — the present form of this world, he says, is passing away. So Paul commends a kind of transforming renunciation — acting in a way that takes no mind of the situation in which one finds oneself, whether married, or mourning, or rejoicing, engaging in commerce or worldly matters: because the world itself is about to be transformed, and radically so!

What I’d like to note is that this too reflects some of the backstory about Paul, just as Jonah’s preaching had some relation with his own earlier life. He also had himself gone through a tremendous transformation when God called him out — literally knocked him down and senseless. His old world passed away on that road to Damascus, when God made him realize that all the things he was so sure of, all of the things he believed with all his heart, all his reputation and even all of his religion, were to be regarded as so much rubbish. Next to the call from God, nothing else in this world mattered. He no longer needed to lay claim to being a Jew born of Jews, a Pharisee among Pharisees, a star pupil of a great Rabbi — for the greatest Rabbi of all, Jesus himself, had taught him a lesson, had turned his whole world upside down, leading him in the end to renounce all that was past and to reach out to what was promised.

And so Paul too passes on what had been delivered to him: the transforming power of God to renounce all worldly expectations and values that could stand in the way of proclaiming the Gospel and leading a Gospel life.

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Finally, we come to the gospel itself, which portrays the calling of the first disciples. Jesus passes along the Sea of Galilee and finds four fishermen — he tells them literally to drop everything and follow him. He calls on them to change their livelihoods and their lives — to leave behind the boats and the nets and even their family in order to follow him. And in this call, they will be transformed by being renewed. What was there in them will somehow remain, but be transformed and renewed. Their catch may change but not their way of life: now they are going to catch people instead of fish.

Their catch may change, but not their way of life: and in doing so they will still be sailing out — metaphorically — into dangerous waters, risking their lives and taking a chance. Their fishermen’s skills will be called upon and put to use, but in new ways. They will still need the keen eye that can read the signs of sunset and sunrise, and the sharp nose that can smell a change in the wind. They will rely on the sense of balance that can feel from the movement of the boat where the next big wave is coming from. And above all they will need the patience to wait wait wait in quiet, and then the strength to pull pull pull to haul in the catch. Jesus is calling to these fishermen to go with him in search of the greatest catch the world had ever seen — they are going to cast their nets abroad and catch the whole world itself with the message of the gospel.

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It is the call, my friends, that is important; the call and our response to it, whether it is a call to repent, renounce or renew: God’s transforming call. When we hear God’s call, does it lift our hearts and move us forward to do the work that God assigns? Does it empower us to change our direction if we are heading the wrong way, or to free ourselves from the world’s distractions, and renew our energies? Does God’s voice sounding in our heart, his call and command echoing in our ears, fill us with inspiration and move us to leave behind the safe and the familiar and to follow him, bringing with us nothing but the skills that God has given us in the first place? Or do we allow the complacency and comfort of our condition, or the cares of this world, to limit the scope of our response to God’s call?

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Roland Meredith tells of an experience he once had one night early in the spring out in the country when he was young: In the midst of the quiet night, suddenly he heard the sound of wild geese in their seasonal flight back home. He ran up onto the porch to call everyone out to see them, because the sight of wild geese flying in the moonlight, is one of the great beauties of nature, singing their peculiar song as they fly the night sky. As he was enjoying this beautiful, wonderful sight, he noticed the tame mallard ducks that lived on the family pond. They too had heard the wild call, the honking of the geese, and it stirred up something in their little breasts. Their wings fluttered a bit in a feeble response. The urge to fly, to take up their place in the sky for which God had made them, with the wings God had given them to do so, was filling their little breasts — but they never rose from the water. They had made a choice, you see, long ago; the corn from the barnyard was too secure and satisfying — and fattening — to risk a flight to who knows where. The security and safety of that little pond kept them from fulfilling the call of the wild to that wild and exciting life for which they had been made.

My friends, God is calling us to a wild and exciting life — the mission of his church to the ends of the world. He is calling on us repent our sins, renounce our worldly attachments, and renew our lives; to spread our wings — the wings he gave us; to leave behind whatever might hold us back, and yet to bring with us all the gifts and skills with which he has equipped us all along — the steady hand and the patient heart, the ready will and joy in the spirit; and above all the good news itself which we have received and are called upon to share. This is his rule in all the churches. It doesn’t matter if we are wage-earners or executives, working or retired, single or married, buyers or sellers, rich or poor — whatever our condition God can make use of it through his call.

So will you join me on this quest? God is sending us out from this place to fish for people — to spread the word and to bring in the catch of friends and family, of coworkers and associates, of strangers we meet on the street and the companions of our breakfast table, here, here to the banquet, where we feast upon the word of God in Scripture and in broken bread. It is a high calling my friends — high as the sky and as broad as God’s good, green earth. But God has called us, and his call is transforming, as we repent, renounce, and are renewed: so let each of us resolve to lead the life that the Lord has transformed and fitted us for, and to which we have been called. The one who has called us will not take No for an answer.+

Hard Words

Jesus has some hard words for at least some in the crowd that followed him... but is it all or nothing?



Proper 18c 2013 • SJF • Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.

In this morning’s gospel, Jesus has some hard words for the large crowds that are following him. In addition to the challenge about carrying the cross and giving up all of their possessions, he calls for a complete separation from ordinary family life: “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” These words are shocking to us now — even though we’ve heard them more than once in our lives. So imagine how shocking they must have been to the crowds who followed Jesus, and who heard them for the first time.

These words are perhaps all the more shocking because Jesus himself criticizes the Pharisees for neglecting their parents as they perform their religious duties; and in his conversation with that rich young man he cites the commandment to honor your father and your mother. Is Jesus talking out of both sides of his mouth? This passage warrants a much closer look before we come to any such conclusion.

First of all, let’s pay attention to the fact that each of these things — forsaking family, carrying the cross, and giving up all of one’s possessions — are set as the conditions for becoming a disciple. Jesus is speaking to crowds who are following him, but says, “If you want to be my disciple you have to do these things.” This raises the question, Is Jesus talking about anyone who simply puts their faith in Jesus as a Christian, or is he referring only to those who are called literally to give up everything to follow him — the real “disciples” — the apostles and the others who traveled with Jesus on the road? Not just coming out for a day or two to hear what Jesus had to say, but who would follow him for the rest of their lives. If these are requirements just to be a Christian, then precious few would qualify! I know I wouldn’t.

Secondly, it’s helpful to look closely at that first qualification for discipleship — probably the hardest for us to understand in light of the scriptural commandments to love and honor one’s parents, to be faithful to one’s spouse, and support one’s family.

If we look at the whole of Scripture more closely we will find that there are particular exceptions to those general laws regarding loving your father and mother, caring for your spouse, and caring for your children. For example, in the book of Deuteronomy (33:9) a blessing from God is pronounced upon one “who said of his father and mother, ‘I regard them not’; he ignored his kin, and did not acknowledge his children.” And in the book of Numbers (6:7) a rule is laid down concerning deceased family members, “Even if their father or mother, brother or sister, should die, they may not” go near them to do the usual and customary funeral preparations. Finally, a similar rule concerning the dead is described in Leviticus (21:11), “He shall not go where there is a dead body; ...even his father or mother.”

Obviously these exceptions did not apply to everyone — that’s why they are exceptions. So to whom do these exceptions apply? The first — about the one who said of his father and mother, “I regard them not,” who ignored his kin, and did not acknowledge his children — that is part of the farewell blessing bestowed by Moses upon the tribe of Levi — the tribe of the priests, who have no property in the land of Israel, and instead lived dispersed throughout the land, and have to be provided for by the rest of the people of Israel, for they have no property to hand down to their children.

The second is part of the rule for a Nazarite: that is someone who has taken a dedicated vow to serve the Lord in a particular way for a period of time, separated from normal society by means of strict regulations.

And the third is part of the rule of life of the high priest himself, a member of the tribe of Levi but set apart even further and regulated more severely than his brothers.

The Jewish believers who followed Jesus, that crowd that came out following him during his ministry, they would have recognized his demands as a reference to these portions of the Law of Moses. They would have understood that these are not general rules for the Christian life, but special requirements for those who are indeed prepared to give up everything and serve him as disciples — whose life would be as different from the normal life of most Christians as the Levites , the Nazirites, and high priest would be from ordinary Israelites.

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Now, before we get too relaxed and imagine that we are off the hook of having to despise our families, crucify ourselves, or give up all of our possessions — because not everyone is called to be a disciple in the sense of following Jesus on the dusty roads of Palestine — let us also remember that there is another kind of discipleship that involves following Jesus on the dusty sidewalks of the Bronx!

It is also helpful to know that there is one more passage in the law of Moses concerning the kind of harsh treatment of one’s own family described by Jesus. It relates to the passage from Deuteronomy we heard this morning — the choice between serving God and serving idols, described by Moses as choosing a blessing or choosing a curse; choosing life and prosperity, or death and adversity.

For earlier in Deuteronomy (13:6-10) Moses had laid down a law concerning the worship of idols: “If anyone secretly entices you — even if it is your brother…, or your own son or daughter, or the wife you embrace, or your most intimate friend — saying, ‘Let us go to worship other gods,’ ... you must not yield…. Show them no pity or compassion… you shall surely kill them; your own hand shall be first against them to execute them…. Stone them to death for trying to turn you away from the Lord your God….”

Strong words! Stronger indeed than those of Jesus who only called for separation from family — not their slaughter. But those words of the Law of Moses must also have echoed in the minds of the Israelites who heard Jesus that day, those crowds that went out to follow him. And they echo in our minds today as we consider that sometimes family does get in the way of being even an ordinary Christian believer, much less a disciple. Possessions and belongings do sometimes get in the way of the ordinary practice of Christian generosity and charity. And don’t each and every one of us want to be a disciple of Christ in the truest and the purest sense of that word — to follow him with all of our heart and mind and soul and strength?

If so — and I think it is so for many of us here — we had best also take to heart the advice that Jesus gives, to consider, to count the cost. Will we will be able to follow through on this commitment once we begin? No one wants to spend time and effort to build half a tower or to fight one battle and then surrender. The path of discipleship of this sort is not an easy path — and perhaps not all are called to it. But if you think you are, my friends, then consider it carefully — and if a member of your family or a close friend tempts you away from serving Christ as you think you ought to serve, have the courage to shake the dust from your heels and move on. The sad fact is I know — you may know too — there are plenty of people who haven’t spoken to a brother or sister, a son or daughter, in years because of some small slight, some passing insult or neglect — would the same person have the courage to do so — to cut them off — if they drew them away from a call from God to a path of discipleship?

It is the same with possessions — and only each of us can know in our own hearts whether you own the things you have or they own you! I will be candid and say that there are times I think I spend too much time tending to my computer and its needs than it does to serving me! And don’t get me started on smart phones. I’m not sure who’s really smart. Maybe it is the phones! I think they are the smart ones and we the dumb ones. I sometimes wonder who is in charge — but when I do I am called to remember that neither I nor Microsoft nor T-Mobile are the rulers of my life.

Like Moses, my friends, I set before you this day a choice — to forget it all and go about your life without allowing God to be a part of it, or to strive each day to live your life in such a way that God’s Name will be honored and the people of God served. Consider, my friends, which path you choose. But as Joshua said in similar circumstances, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” (24:15)+

Follow the Lord

What happens to the church, or a Communion, when it takes its eyes off Christ.

SJF • Epiphany 3a 2011 • Tobias S Haller BSG
Jesus said, follow me and I will make you fish for people. Immediately they left their nets and followed him.
In last week’s gospel from John we heard one version of the call of Andrew and his brother Simon Peter. This week we hear Matthew’s version of this call; and a very different version it is, with a very different message. Last week we heard about Andrew, a disciple of John the Baptist, asking after Jesus; and then finding his brother Peter.

Today we hear of two pairs of brothers, all four of them fishermen. And all four of them, upon hearing the compelling call of Jesus Christ himself — not an intermediary like John the Baptist, but the Lord himself — all four of them drop everything and immediately leave their familiar world of work and family to answer the call of this fascinating stranger. So it is that Jesus gathers up the first four disciples as he strolls by the seaside, catching fishermen with the net of his word, and then setting them free to do his work.

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These are Christ’s first four disciples, and it is discipleship I want to talk about today, what it means for us and for the church of which we are members. Disciple is a word we are likely to misunderstand. We often think of a disciple as someone who carries out a particular ministry. But we can see the true meaning of discipleship in this call of Jesus to the first four disciples. For to be a disciple is to be one who follows. A disciple of Christ is one who follows Christ, one who upon hearing the call of Christ, of his compelling voice, sets all else aside: livelihood, family, and sometimes even life itself. The disciple is devoted to the one he or she follows, and leaves everything else behind.

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In the reading from First Corinthians, we see what happens when disciples forget who it is they are supposed to be following, and instead get focused on their own issues, their own personal problems, their own needs, their own desires, and most importantly upon the persons and personalities of their earthly leaders in the church. The Corinthians have taken their eyes off Christ, and instead have turned to their favorite teachers, the ones who brought them the word of God, rather than the incarnate Word of God himself. Is it any wonder they are lost and stumbling? Some say, “I belong to Apollos,” while others claim to belong to Cephas or to Paul. And Paul himself reminds them that the one they belong to is Jesus Christ, who is not divided into bits and pieces or parts or parties. He is the head of the body of the whole church which builds itself up in unity through the Spirit. By ceasing to focus on Christ, and turning to their own earthly leaders, the Corinthians have become quarrelsome, divided and disagreeable. They have lost their way.

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Now, this sounds very familiar. It is no secret that our own Anglican Communion has been going through some very quarrelsome times over the last few years. Division abounds, and some would like to see that division made permanent: some bishops have ceased to recognize other bishops — a few have even said they won’t be in the same room together, let alone talk to each other.

This coming week the Primates — the leaders of each church of the Anglican Communion — are supposed to meet in Dublin. They all have been invited, but a number of them have said they will not come if the Primate of our church, .the Episcopal Church — our Presiding Bishop — is there. I hope you will forgive me if I say this sounds more like students in a middle school than bishops and leaders of the church! Let’s pray that sense will prevail, and these leaders will recover some humility and charity, and meet together in spite of their differences.

This meeting together in spite of differences is part of what that “Indaba Process” — in which I have been involved — is all about. As you know, I travel to London twice a year to play my part in helping Anglican church leaders to learn how to talk with each other, to deal with each other, in spite of their differences — not in an effort to change each others’ minds, but to get a handle on what Paul is taking about when he speaks of “the mind of Christ.” It isn’t that you have to have my mind, or you have to have my mind, but that both together are under that larger, embracing mind of Christ, who came to us when we were at our most disagreeable, as sinners. It is not to change one another’s minds in this Indaba Process, but to have that “mind of Christ” — to be unified in Him, not in some favorite theory or worship practice, or some local theology or discipline.

How did we come to such a state of affairs; where difference of opinion meant an end to the conversation rather than the beginning of the real hard work of what it means to be a Christian — a disciple of Christ? After all, it is how we behave when we disagree that shows our ability to love. If God loved us and came to save us even when we were in rebellion against him as sinners, how much more gently ought we treat one another.

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So how did we come to this mess among Anglicans? I think it is in large part because, just as with the Corinthians, we have taken their eyes off of Christ — who cannot be divided — and instead focused attention upon the various other leaders of the church, as if what really mattered most to God was who gets to be a bishop or not.

And what does the gospel have to say about bishops? Not one word! The only time the root of the Greek word for bishop appears in the Gospel, Jesus is talking about himself. Remember that verse: he is shepherd and bishop of our souls. He is the one we follow. And when he uses that word, he is referring to himself and Jerusalem’s failure to recognize him at the time of his visitation! (Luke 19:44)

Christian discipleship, as Saint Paul reminded the Corinthians, is not about following another Christian, but about following Christ. It is Christ’s visitation, not the bishop’s, or even the Primate’s, that should concern us. And when it happens that following another Christian, whether a priest or a bishop or a Primate, leads us to division in the body of Christ, then something has gone terribly wrong.

Various solutions to this problem have been proposed, among them a new Anglican Covenant, and agreement that all member churches of the Communion are being urged to sign. Not all see this document as a way forward, however, for this Covenant dangles ecclesiastical division as the ultimate threat. It speaks of “relational consequences” for bad behavior imposed by a process that is not entirely clear. But since what really matters about the church is the relationship we have with one another, this approach raises two problems.

First, if you see division in the body of Christ as a penalty, a possibility from the start, you have undertcut the call to Christian unity that God calls us to in the first place. It is rather like someone crossing his fingers during a marriage ceremony, mouthing “till death do us part” but thinking “until I change my mind.” You won’t build unity by threatening division! That is something, if we are to have the mind of Christ, is to be put out of our mind, because Christ is not divided. He does not call us to division; he calls us to follow him. You can’t build relationships by threatening to dissolve them the moment things get rocky. As with marriage, Jesus calls Christians to stay together for better for worse, for richer for poorer, till death do us part. He calls us to leave behind the familiar and to follow him into the unknown territory that lies before us, knowing it can only be realized and explored with him who is our guide and our God.

Second, if you look for unity not in Christ himself but in your earthly leaders, you are simply replicating the mistakes the Corinthians made. If Anglicans have learned anything down the years — and given the current state of affairs I’m wondering if we have learned anything — it is that we find our way forward in the One who is the Way, true unity in the one who is the Truth, and life lived together in him who is the Life, Jesus Christ the only Lord, the Son of God.

An international body of Christians cannot possibly look to itself to be robust enough to contain all of the many cultural differences which exist at a human level. These differences ultimately only can be embraced and comprehended and included through the spirit of Christ, in whom, as Saint Paul assured the Galatians, there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, no more male and female — but all are one in him: having that one mind, the mind of Christ. On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is shifting sand.

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As I said, the Primates — or some of them; that is all of them are invited to meet, but some may not attend — but all are invited to meet this week. I hope some come who threatened to stay away may come after all. Sometimes threats are just threats, after all. Perhaps if they actually meet, actually sit down around the meeting table at the dinner table, and I hope the Table of the Lord, they may come to realize that the things they’ve found so troublesome and tense are not quite so dire as to lead them into condemnation and separation. Bishops from around the world who have been taking part in that Indaba process have in fact learned that there are more important things that unite us than divide us, especially Christ himself. Perhaps if they do make the effort to come together they will come to see the face of Christ even in those with whom they disagree, and recognize that in Christ they can celebrate that unity through their common baptism and call in Him, who is the shepherd and bishop of their souls. They are all, I hope, committed, come what may, to following the Lord. Perhaps they will realize that this is the only form of church unity that is ultimately meaningful, for only as disciples of Christ can we have trust that we are one in him who is our Savior and our God. In this coming week, especially as the Primates meet, and in the next year and a half as we and other churches of the Communion consider the proposed Anglican Covenant, let us pray for the Spirit of wisdom to descend upon us and our leaders, all the members and the leaders of the church, wherever they may be. May the Spirit of our loving God turn our hearts from quarrelsome division and tiresome dissent, taking our minds off of themselves, and finding the mind of Christ. May they and we turn towards Jesus Christ our Lord in whom alone our unity is assured and whose visitation we await with hopeful and devoted hearts.+

Promises, Promises

SJF • Proper 14c 2010 • Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

Our gospel this morning ends with a series of parables about homecoming and servants and thieves. Few people these days can afford to have servants anymore, though most of us have bars or our windows or an ADT alarm system on our homes. Still, a few of us have (or are) healthcare attendants who assist with tasks of daily living. But I think most of us may be familiar with the phenomenon of the babysitter. So let me try a few parables of my own with that in mind.

A couple returned home one night after celebrating the wife’s birthday with a dinner at a local restaurant. As they came through the front door they found the babysitter demurely seated on the sofa watching television, with the sound turned down very low so as not to disturb the sleeping children upstairs. All was well and the parents praised the babysitter and gave her a tip in addition to her wages; and blessed was that babysitter!

But another couple returned home one night after a similar birthday celebration and found the babysitter lying flat out on the sofa, drunk and snoring, with a half-finished bottle of the husband’s best single-malt scotch whisky sitting on the coffee table, and the children rampaging through the hallways after a tremendous pillow-fight which filled the house with feathers and broken knick-knacks, and the kitchen a disaster area worthy of BP after the children’s efforts to microwave a can of Spaghetti-Os. And when the babysitter was roused from her drunken slumber she wondered greatly at what had happened, and needless to say not only didn’t get a tip or her wage, but didn’t get a blessing either! And she was cast out into the place of wailing and gnashing of teeth, and had a terrible hangover the next day!

The point of these parables, both mine and the ones that Jesus told to the disciples in today’s Gospel, is that being a servant implies both a promise and a trust. People who employ a servant, whether parents or the master of the house, are committing things (or people) they value into the care of someone else. And they trust that the one so employed will take good care of those things or people — whether their children or the knick-knacks in their household.

And from the servants and the babysitter there is an implicit, or perhaps even explicit, promise that they will do what they are hired to do. In short, assurances and promises are given and trust is placed in those assurances.

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There are, of course, more theological words to express this principle: faith and faithfulness. What is interesting to me, and I hope to you, is that in our life in Christ is to a large extent a reversal of the kind of faith described in those parables — the faith of a master in his servants’ faithfulness. Isn’t it, for us, usually the other way around? It is God who is sure and trusted and reliable and faithful — the one in whom we place our trust, trust in God’s assurances: “In God we trust” (as our money tries to remind us), the one in whom we have faith is our Lord and God, the one of whose promises we are sure.

Surely this is the message of the other Scripture readings we heard today. Abram has a vision in which God makes a great promise: that Abram’s own children will succeed him — that he will be a father and a grandfather and a great-grandfather of many nations, greater in number than the stars of the heavens.

And as the letter to Hebrews continues, Abram — or as he became, Abraham — continues steadfast in that faith. He is assured of the things he hopes for by his faith, faith in God’s promise, faith in God’s great faithfulness, God’s trustworthiness. He sets out from his familiar home to go to an unknown land, trusting and full of faith that he will find a new home; and he lives and grows old for a long time in that land of promise, a land foreign to him and to his people, until in his late old age (and his wife’s old age too) a son is born to him and Sarah. From one as good as dead, the promise was fulfilled, the promise in which he had faith — the first installment on that promise that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars of the heavens. God’s trustworthiness is proven.

And finally, Jesus calls upon the faith of his disciples. He assures them with a divine promise that they need not be afraid, that that little flock need not fear, because God is pleased to give them the kingdom. In God’s great faithfulness, God’s trustworthiness, God will provide them with all that they need. Jesus calls them to radical faith and radical poverty — the kind that risks everything: to sell their possessions and give away all that they have; to make purses for themselves that do not wear out, and to put their hearts — that is, their faith and trust — where the true treasure is to be found, with God in heaven.

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This is a great challenge to us, as it was to the disciples. It is a challenge both as individuals and to us as a community, as a church. Beyond that, it is a challenge to us as a society and a nation and a world. Our natural human nature is self-preservation. We want to store everything up close to us, not off in heaven, but here, here: we want our treasure where our heart is, not the other way around. Our natural urge is to store up our treasure, to hold it close, to keep it where we think it will be safe. And so we put it in a bank — forgetting the truth of the old saying attributed to a notorious thief and bank robber of the last century, who, when asked why he robbed banks, said, “That’s where they keep the money.” For not only do thieves break in and steal, but sometimes even the promises of the bankers, the promises of those who tell us that our money is safe with them are unable to follow through on their promises. How many broken promises and failed dreams were revealed as the economy shuddered and sank over the last few years?

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Not so God. For God is not promising us a return our investments, or a secure retirement, or that the value of our home will go on increasing and increasing year after year. These are the promises the world makes, and it doesn’t often keep them. God promises us more, and his promise is true, and worthy of our trust. Great is his faithfulness, and worthy of our faith in him. For his promise is not the promise of some merely earthly happiness, but of something more lasting; everlasting, in fact: a heavenly hope. We are, all of us, looking from a distance towards a homeland we that will not attain in this life; a better country, a heavenly one.

Now, the worldly will say, “That’s just the same old ‘pie in the sky when you die!’” And what I say to them is what I say to you: we are all going to die someday. And the question is, What next? The promise that we are mortal is a promise in which only the most foolish person would fail to have faith. And since it is absolutely 100 percent sure that we are all going to die some day, having an assurance, a promise from one who is trusted for his faithfulness from everlasting and beyond all time, is of paramount value.

Who do you trust? I know who I trust. I know such a one; his name is Jesus. He has told me not to be afraid, and that it is the Father’s good pleasure to welcome me into his kingdom. He has said the same to you — I know he has; haven’t you heard him? He calls to our minds and he calls to our hearts, that we should place our hearts and treasure in his hands. He has promised us that nothing will be lost, of all the Father has given him.

And so let us put our faith in his promise and our treasure in his care, that our hearts may surely there be set in that place of trust and assurance. An let us as well, in the meantime, like those good servants, be about our Master’s business, doing what we have promised God to do, to do the work he has given us to do. There’s a lot of work to do, my friends, a lot of work to do. But great is God’s faithfulness, and his promises are sure.+

Body Building

SJF • Lent 3b • Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
Saint Paul wrote to the Romans, “Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”+

In the movie The Karate Kid, young Daniel seeks a master to teach him karate. The master tells him he must agree to obey his instructions to the letter, without any objection, without any question. Daniel has visions of that smart white suit, and a black belt within easy reach, so he readily makes that promise.

But when he shows up for his first class, karate master Miyagi-sensei tells him to hold on to his T-shirt and jeans; he’s not ready for that smart uniform yet. Instead of taking him to the work-out room the Master takes Daniel outside and puts him to work painting a fence, showing him exactly how the brush must move, evenly and smoothly up and down. Daniel figures since Miyagi-sensei is going to teach him karate for free this is the least he can do, to paint the old man’s fence for him.

The next day he arrives expecting to start class, only Miyagi-san puts him to work scrubbing the floor, again showing him how to move the wash-brush left and right. And again, Daniel thinks this is probably only fair trade — but begins to wonder when the karate lesson is going to start.

The next day he figures it’s about time, only to discover Miyagi-san has another chore: washing and waxing three beat-up old cars, after more tedious instruction, on how to bend to fill the sponge with soapy water, and how to move the polishing cloth in circles circles circles. When the end of that long day comes — this third day — the boy can restrain himself no more, and blurts out, “I thought you were going to teach me karate, but I’ve only been doing your chores!”

Miyagi-sensei turns in anger. Daniel has broken his promise to do as he was told without question, without objection. The old man snarls, “I have been teaching you karate. Defend yourself!” and thrusts out his arm, up, then down. And Daniel, reacting immediately, guards himself up and then down, with exactly the movement he’d used to paint the fence.

The Master then sends out a powerful kick, and using the same bending motion he’d used while dipping the sponge in the soapy bucket, Daniel dodges. And so it is for each assault the old man throws; each one is countered with a movement learned in the household chores. At the end the Master stares at the boy, frowning, but with a little bit of a twinkle in his eye, and then walks away in silence.

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The church has it’s own training program for body building — building the body of Christ, that is. And sometimes the program may seem to have as little to do with the life of the world to come as painting a fence has to do with karate. But if we look closely at the discipline of the church, we will find that it works in much the same way, strengthening us and training us to do God’s work even as we do worldly work.

And I take as an example the Ten Commandments, God’s training plan, which we repeated in the Decalogue at the beginning of our liturgy, and heard in full as our first lesson this morning. Only the first three commandments directly address what you would normally call “religious” issues, directly defining our relationship with God. The fourth commandment is transitional: it deals both with God and us, and relates our rest here upon earth with God’s heavenly rest at the end of creation.

But the rest of the commandments, a majority six out of ten, deal with entirely human affairs, and hardly seem theological at all — God is only even mentioned in the commandment to honor ones parents, to assure those who do so of a reward. Apart from this passing mention to God, the last six commandments focus entirely upon us, and how we are relate to each other. We turn, as Jesus’ own summary of the law puts it, from matters concerning our love of God to matters concerning our love of neighbors, with our parents standing right there as the first “neighbor” we encounter.

From the commands to worship God alone, to accept no substitutes for God, to honor God’s name and to remember the sabbath, we move to the commandments about honoring our parents, not killing, not being unfaithful, not stealing, not bearing false witness, and not envying our neighbors. Those six commandments have nothing explicitly to do with God, and yet it is God who gives them to us; it is God who gives us these exercises, these chores.

It may seem to be as irrelevant to religion as fence-painting is to karate, but God knows better. God knows that if we do not love our neighbor we cannot love him. God gives us each other to practice on, so to speak, teaching us what love is all about. You may remember what John the beloved disciple wrote, “If any one says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.”1 John 4:20

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Still there are those who think, like the Karate Kid, that they can rush right into loving God without loving their neighbor. They concentrate their effort on the externals, and miss the essence. And when the Master comes, he is simply furious.

Look at what happened to the Temple in Jerusalem — which was intended as a house of prayer for all people. The priests had leased out the Court of the Gentiles, leaded it out to traders, as if the Gentiles didn’t matter to God, as if all the rest of the people of the earth didn’t deserve their place in God’s Temple, as if God hadn’t provided them with their own space to worship him. The leaders rejected God’s transforming grace. The conformed the Temple to a world-view in which Jew and Gentile couldn’t possibly get along, let alone worship in the same building. They refused God’s purpose that the Temple be used as a training ground for the next world, for God’s new creation, in which all people — Gentile and Jew alike, would be gathered into God’s kingdom.

The Temple took 46 years to build, and about a decade to corrupt. But it took only a day to cleanse it, when the Master came to whip it into shape.

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We still need periodic visits from our Lord and Master, and normally we get them once each week on the Christian sabbath, the Lord’s day, when God reminds us that our religious disciplines are meant to turn us into disciples; our love and honor shown to God are meant to equip us to love and honor each other, to train us to be all that we can be. God wants to build the body of the Church, the body of Christ.

When our worship of God doesn’t have our heart in it, when it is mixed with worldly concerns, it won’t be able to inspire and lead us to love our neighbors more. And if our love and respect for our neighbors is only a token and a show, it will not equip us an empower us to know and love God. But when our love and respect for others is truly and freely given, it will strengthen us to bear God’s love, building our spiritual muscles as we are clothed with grace to bear the weight of glory, freed from the body of death and given the body of life, which we become as we are built into the church.

And as I say, when it doesn’t work, when we come to see loving God and neighbor as empty exercises that have nothing to do with our daily life or the life of the world to come, well, that’s when we need the Master to spark us to remember what we’ve learned, to spark us to life as he challenges us, and changes our chores into charisms.

That transformation of ourselves, our souls and bodies, into something better than what we are to start with, that took more than one day, the day Jesus took to whip the earthly Temple into shape. No, this takes a bit longer. It takes three days — from Good Friday to Easter Sunday. For it is in that particular destruction and rebuilding, that destruction that took place on Good Friday, and that rebuilding that took place through the rest in the tomb, and on to the glorious rising on Easter Day, Jesus shows us how completely made-over we can become when we live in him, when we allow him to live in us; when we let him into our hearts to transform the temple of our body into something new and amazing — even if it takes 46 years to build, or 56, 66 — dare I say 86? There is always room for rebirth, renewal and restoration. And we don’t the strength to do it on our own.

Who will deliver us when our spirit fails and languishes? Who will deliver us when our discipline seems pointless, and our spiritual well runs dry? Who will deliver us when our friends and our neighbors just get to be too much for us and we flee to some imagined sacred haven where it will just be God and us? Who will deliver us from this body of death?

Well, thanks be to God in Jesus Christ our Lord! For Jesus Christ, starting with his own death and resurrection on that weekend long ago, shows us perfect body building: building his body, the church, that wonderful and sacred mystery. And it starts out there, my friends, out in the world, out there where six out of ten of the commandments are obeyed, out in the world where it is so tempting to dishonor our elders, to lie and to cheat and to steal and to kill and to covet. For if we have not made peace and loved our sisters and brothers outside the doors of this church, we will find neither peace nor love within. We will simply find ourselves changing the coins and buying the pigeons, instead of worshiping the one true God who alone is love.

But again I say, thanks be to God in Jesus Christ our Lord! He will help us; he has helped us. He has not forsaken us, and has in his own person shown us that even what is dead can come to life, when it is built up in him. When spiritually dead are raised to new life when they let Jesus into their lives, they can be built into the body of the church to do God’s will in the world.

When the church is working as it should, trained by its Lord and Master, it is a marvelous thing to see. When the church is working as it should, people can love the unlovable, forgive those who hurt them, comfort those who suffer, rejoice with the joyous, kneel with the humble, and stand with the righteous. This is the body that God wants to build us into if we will let him. This is what God means the church to be. This is what Christ died for, and this is what he was raised to life for. Are you ready, sisters and brothers; are you ready? +

 

Particularly Clean

SJF • Epiphany 6b • Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG Naaman the Syrian asked, Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel?

There are two things about the Christian faith that often provoke controversy, sometimes even within the church. The first is the claim that Christ is unique, the sole assured way to salvation. This doctrine is embodied in Jesus’ statement that he is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and that no one comes to the Father except through him. The second is the observation that what God demands of us through Christ is neither complicated nor difficult, but simple. And this is embodied in Jesus’ statement that his yoke is easy and his burden light.

We can find a foreshadowing of both of these doctrines in the story of Naaman the Syrian warrior — and leper. Naaman hears of a cure of his illness from a young slave who was kidnaped from her home in Israel. He sets off loaded with treasure, expecting some kind of grand royal reception. What he gets, however, is a message from the prophet Elisha to go and wash in the Jordan seven times. And the Scripture describes his anger at what he perceives to be off-handed treatment.

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Naaman’s anger has two aspects, which reflect the two Christian doctrines I mentioned a moment ago. First, he finds it is absurd that there should be anything special or unique about the River Jordan. Aren’t there rivers back in Syria that are bigger and better? What’s so special about the River Jordan? Second, the Syrian general expects an elaborate healing ceremony, some kind of a ritual where the prophet will come forth and call on God by name and wave his hands over the diseased spot.

But the general’s servants know better, and they give him very good advice: if the prophet had asked for something difficult, wouldn’t you have done it? How much easier simply to do as he says, to wash and be made clean? And so he does, and is healed, and comes to realize that the power of God is at work both in its particularity and in its simplicity. Only God can save and heal; and what God asks is simple, as simple as the faith to do as you are told.

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Let’s look more closely at these two attributes of God’s power and working. First, God’s power and working are particular. God could have chosen to settle his people Israel by some other river than the Jordan; he could have taken them up to Syria to settle by the Abana or the Pharpar. For that matter, when they were in captivity in Egypt, he could, instead of bringing them to the Promised Land, simply have wiped out Pharaoh and kept them comfortably settled by the Nile — a far more impressive and significant river than the Abana, the Pharpar or the Jordan. Or, choosing instead when he led them forth from Egypt, in forty years of wandering he could have led them to the Tigris or Euphrates or even the other way on up north and into Europe. God could have led his people to the Rhine or the Seine or the Thames. Or, he even could’ve inspired them to build boats, and bring them to the Hudson or the Mississippi! Why, God could even have settled his people by the shores of the Bronx River running through the Botanical Garden just a few blocks away!

But he didn’t. God settled his people in Israel by the Jordan, and that was where the slave-girl came from who told Naaman about the prophet, and that was where the prophet lived, and that was where Naaman went, and that is where he was healed. There; and no where else.

In the same way, God could have chosen to become incarnate in fifth century BC India, or in twelfth century Japan or fifteenth century Mexico. But he didn’t. God chose to be incarnate, “God in Man made manifest,” in the person of Jesus Christ, born in a suburb of Jerusalem in the reign of Caesar Augustus of Rome and Herod the Great of Palestine. This Jesus would be a man of a particular height, speaking a particular language, of a particular complexion and build, and most importantly, and particularly and uniquely and most importantly God from God, light from light, true God from true God.

The uniqueness and particularity of Christianity after all doesn’t lie in its content but in Christ himself — personally. Other religions have creeds and scriptures, liturgies and teachings and moral advice, many of them similar to Christianity in many respects. But only Christianity has Christ, the Son of God. It is in him that the Christian faith finds its uniqueness and particularity.

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So it is that Christians believe God’s power and working to be particular. And God’s power and working are also simple and direct. God could have commanded the prophet Elisha to put on a big show for Naaman the Syrian, something to impress him with thunder and lightning and spells and incantations, wavings of the arms and high drama. Instead he simply told him to take a bath, seven dips in the river.

In the same way, Jesus could have healed that leper that approached him, in the Gospel we heard this morning, with an elaborate ritual. He could have placed upon him some complicated act to perform after he was healed. Instead he simply touched him and spoke the word, and told him to do no more than what the Law of Moses already asked, a simple offering to the priest to certify the cure.

The simplicity of Jesus’ teaching is given in his own summary of the ancient law of Moses: to love God and one’s neighbor. That is the simplicity of Christian duty, simplicity so simple that sometimes it is hard! How many Christians down through history have afflicted themselves with terrible penances instead of simply doing what Jesus asked, to love God and their neighbors! And even that love takes a simple form — to do to others as we would be done by.

This is so simple and so fair that even a child can understand it — perhaps better than many an adult. Perhaps that is why Jesus said we had to become like children if we are to enter the kingdom of heaven. For children know what fairness is — believe you me. If you don’t think so, just try a little experiment with two children: sit them side by side and give one of them a dish of ice cream and the other a bowl of oatmeal, and you see if they can’t tell the difference! Of course, it takes a bit longer for the child to learn that fairness also means giving up something. I’ll be if you tried that experiment you might find a child ready to share the ice cream. It takes a while to learn that sometimes, but children do often grasp it, and you can see them, especially if they don’t know you’re watching, sharing, giving up his or her own toy, or learning to share it with another — that takes a while, sometimes; and sometimes we forget, too soon.

And yet children often seem to grasp that spirit of generosity to others that can put many an adult to shame. And perhaps that is why Jesus said “come to me as a child does” — with a clear sense of what is fair, but also a willingness to be generous, a willingness to share with others.

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After all is said and done, Jesus does not ask heroic feats of us. He has done the heavy lifting for us. He bore the cross for our salvation, and he asks us each to take up — each of us — our own cross, not his. He carried his cross, and he only asks us to take up our own, and follow him. This yoke of our own cross is easy and the burden light. For even given his unique and particular power, he asks of us only a simple task. He does not expect us to do anything more than to accept his love: to love him and to love each other just as he has loved us.

And to help us on our way he touches us in the sacraments and he speaks a word to us in the Scriptures, and he says to us, Be made clean. Be made clean from the false self that seeks only itself, and turn to the true self that gives itself for others. Be made clean from the burden of guilt so that you may accept the yoke of service. Be made clean of the elaborate show of religion so that you can experience the simplicity of faith. Be made clean of running about in confusion and aimlessness after this or that way to salvation, so that you can run the true race with your eyes fixed on the finish line, where an imperishable crown awaits you.

The way lies before us, as particular and clear as a lane marked out on the 400-meter track; the task lies before us, as simple as putting one foot in front of the other. All we are asked to do is follow: to run with perseverance the race that is before us, led by the one who goes before us to prepare a place for us: the one who has touched us in Baptism; the one who has spoken to us in the living word of his Scriptures; the one who has washed us clean in his blood; and the one who has fed us with his own body at this holy table: even Jesus Christ, our only mediator and advocate, to whom we offer our praise and thanksgiving, now and for evermore.+

The Fire Alarm

SJF • Epiphany 3b 2009 • Tobias Haller BSG
And immediately they left their nets and followed him.+

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, once said that the Constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech does not give one the right to yell “Fire” in a crowded theater. He was assuming, of course, that there was no fire. It would indeed be a dangerous prank to shout “Fire” in any crowded place — when there is no fire. People could be seriously injured, maybe even killed, in the panic.

But what if there is a fire? What if there is some imminent danger and you see it? What do the signs in the subway warn us? “Si ves algo, di algo — if you see something, say something.” Surely it is incumbent upon you to do something to warn those around you of danger they — and you — are in, and shouting might just be the best way to do it. This is part of our understanding of civic duty — the responsibility we bear for one another. And it is no accident that the ancient rabbis taught that one of the principle failings of the wicked city of Sodom was precisely that people there did not look after one another, did not look out for others. It was said that the people of that wicked town were the sort who if they saw both your and their house on fire, would fight the fire at their own house but leave yours to burn.

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In today’s Gospel Jesus bursts upon the scene fresh from his baptism and temptation in the wilderness, which in the headlong style of Mark’s Gospel have taken up only the first thirteen verses. We are hardly off the first page, and yet the story presses on. The story has hardly begun and here is Jesus storming in and crying out, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” And immediately, to use one of Mark’s favorite words, immediately he calls those four disciples — Simon, Andrew, our own patron James and his brother John — and immediately they follow him, leaving behind their nets, their boats, and in the case of the two sons of Zebedee, their bewildered father and the hired servants. It is as if Jesus has burst into the crowded theater and shouted, “Fire!” and the audience has jumped up and run for the exits, tossing buckets of popcorn in the air and leaving their coats and handbags behind in the rush to escape the disaster.

That is the immediacy with which Jesus delivered his message, and the immediacy with which the received it — at least by some of those who heard it. And let us recall what “immediate” means — with nothing in between, no intermission, no transition or connection. Those who follow Jesus will leave behind all the connections to their former lives: their nets, their boats, even their families. They will be transformed into disciples, and given a new task, to fish for people. And it happens all at once, without preparation or warning or transition. Jesus calls; they follow; no questions asked — immediately.

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It seems strange then to turn to our reading from Saint Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians. In contrast with the panicked immediacy of Mark’s gospel it is as if Saint Paul is saying, “Not so fast!” He says, “Let each of you lead the life that the Lord has assigned,” and later, “Let each of you remain in the condition in which you were called.” Could it be, after Jesus calls out, “Fire!” that Paul should counter, “Sorry folks; false alarm”? Of course not, and if we look more closely at what Paul is saying, we can learn that far from contradicting Jesus’ gospel, Paul’s warning is — in its own way — a realization of it.

Paul is not saying, ignore the call of Christ: on the contrary Paul is saying that Christ is calling at least some of the Corinthians to do what they are already doing, because that is what God wants. Let each of you lead the life, he says, that the Lord assigned, and the state in which God has called you.

While Jesus did and does call some to leave their nets and boats and families behind to follow him as disciples on the road, Paul assures the Corinthians that Jesus also calls some people — in fact most people — to stay right where they are, right as they are, to “bloom where they are planted” as the old saying goes. Paul assures us that God calls some to stay put and do the work God has given them to do with singleness of heart, and to do that work with the newly discovered commission that it is God’s work, and that the kingdom needs those who toil at home as much as it needs those who toil on the road. And what could be more immediate than continuation? Continuing to do God’s work without intermission, being assured at last that this is the task the Lord has assigned? Discipleship takes many forms: for some it means totally changing their lives, for others, a deeper commitment to the life they already lead.

For what matters ultimately is how one’s heart stands with God, how well one’s heart is attuned to God’s will for each and every one of us. The Corinthian congregation was being split apart by some troublemakers who were insisting that in order for Gentile men to become Christian they had to be circumcised. Others felt that anyone who had given in to that teaching had betrayed the faith, and should seek to remove the marks of circumcision. It is hard for us to imagine the church being torn apart over such matters, though we have been through many similar debates in recent years, which centuries or decades from now may seem just as absurd as the circumcision argument did to Saint Paul. “Circumcision is nothing, uncircumcision is nothing,” Paul affirms, “but obeying the commandments of God is everything. Let each of you remain in the condition in which you were called.” The problem, of course, as I’m sure some of the Corinthians must have said to Paul, is that the Scripture was clear. The Scripture demanded circumcision of any Gentile male who wanted to be part of the holy people, anyone who wanted to eat of the Passover. But as Paul would also say to the Corinthians, “That was then; this is now. Since Christ has come, he is our Passover who has been sacrificed for us. Things have changed, and Paul is trying to get the Corinthians to hear God’s call to them in the blood of Jesus, over the noise of their squabbles — and they squabbled over just about everything, spending their time in useless controversies instead of building up the church for which Christ died and rose again, and to whom he gave his body and his blood. That is the thing Paul keeps trying to call them back to again and again — the significance of that holy meal, the Holy Eucharist. But, of course, they even argued about that!

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This is a powerful lesson for us. This is a lesson for us as a congregation, and a lesson for all Christian congregations, a warning not to act like the Corinthians and let the church fall apart over matters about which God doesn’t give a hoot.

But there is also a lesson for us as individuals. Some of us will be called to life-changing tasks, like the fishermen by the sea-side, called to follow Jesus by leaving behind the nets of entanglement with the old life, abandoning the boats that provided security and livelihood, and even forsaking the comfort and support of family and home. Other of us, and if we can judge from Paul it will be the majority, will be called to follow Jesus by finding his commandments for us in our hearts, by discovering, like little Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz” that there’s no place like home, and that we can be most effective blooming where we’re planted, bearing fruit in season and flourishing with leaves that do not wither.

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Downstairs in my office is a picture of a liturgy in this church from about 1985, and I can see myself in it, and I’m sitting right there. Father Basil Law is opposite on the other side, as Bishop Paul Moore preaches in the aisle. I had no idea at the time that God would call me one day to follow him on a path that would lead me to seminary and to priesthood, and a parish up in Yonkers; but then by his grace to be planted right back here just a few feet from where I was almost 25 years ago!

But that is how the call of God works sometimes. Sometimes when God yells out “Fire” you will discover that the fire is in your own heart, and it is a fire God doesn’t want you to put out, but to share, and God will help you find the place to share it best, if you will let him. That is what Paul tried to tell the difficult Corinthians, that by squabbling over the gift they were destroying it, like peevish children who fight over a toy and end up breaking it beyond repair, and neither of them can enjoy it. God calls us, all of us and each of us, sometimes to journey, sometimes to remain, but always to be his. God calls us each by name as I said two weeks ago, and gives us each a task as I said last week. He knows our going out and our coming in, our rising up to follow on the road, or our sitting down to work where we are. May we — each of us and all of us — answer his call, be faithful to our task, and ever conscious of his presence, the burning of the Holy Spirit, the fire of his love in our hearts; to whom we give — as Father Basil Law was always wont to say from this pulpit — as is most justly due, all might, majesty, power and dominion, henceforth and forever more.+