reallifepastor

Today begins our season of Stewardship.  It’s a time when we reflect together on our mission as a community of Jesus’ followers and how we’re going to support that mission in the coming year, particularly with our financial gifts. Our stewardship theme this year is “Like a Tree Planted:  Past, Present, Future.”  The sermon I wrote for today explains the theme.

Then yesterday, a man entered a synagogue with an assault rifle and three handguns and opened fire.  Today, 11 people who had gone to their place of worship to participate in a bris, among the most joyous occasions of worship in Jewish faith, are dead.

Certainly, there’s a lot we can learn from the prophet’s metaphor of the tree planted by streams of water.  In the wake of yesterday’s shooting, though, I think it more important to focus not on trees as a metaphor for stewardship, but on finding some hope in the tragedy at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh.

The sermon I wrote for today will keep.  We’ll hear it next week.  Today, I want to share with you part of a sermon I wrote three years ago for Easter.  I know.  An EASTER sermon on the day after a mass shooting in a synagogue?  Here’s the thing.  If our Christian faith doesn’t show us how to relate to our sisters and brothers of all faiths—especially in times of tragedy—it’s not much of a faith, is it?  So, what might it mean to be an Easter People, we who follow Jesus, in a world where our Jewish sisters and brothers still are not safe?

On my last trip to the Western Wall in Jerusalem in 2006, I walked by a group of people, standing in a circle, hands joined, praying.  As I passed, I heard a prayer that God would help all these Jews see their way to accepting Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.  Yeah.  That ain’t it.

If the heart of the Easter story is about how love triumphs over evil, how hatred might kill the body, but love always is stronger, then imposing Christian faith on people who practice other faiths doesn’t seem very Easter-y, does it?

One of the Scripture texts read each Easter comes from a sermon from Paul in the book of Acts.  “I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to God.”  Isn’t that a terrific text for Easter?

For Paul, the Easter message of love’s triumph over evil meant extending the good news of God’s love through Jesus to people outside the Jewish faith—contrary to what many Jews thought, Paul was saying one need not be Jewish to be Christian.  After nearly 2000 years, hopefully, our faith has evolved some.  I propose we interpret these verses to mean that one need not be Christian to be loved by God.  In 2018, perhaps the best way to live the Easter message of love’s triumph over evil is to extend God’s love to all people, no matter what faith they practice, even if they practice no faith at all.

So, I want to share with you one of the best Easter stories I’ve ever heard…except for the original.  J  It comes from Pete Hamill’s novel, Snow in August.

Thirteen year old Michael lives in New York City in 1947.  Just two years after World War II has ended, Michael is still adjusting to the loss of his dad in the war.  One Saturday morning on his way to serve as altar boy at his church, Michael approaches the neighborhood synagogue.  As he passes, a man leans out the door and motions to Michael.  In halting English, the man says that, because it’s Sabbath, he is not allowed to turn on the light.  If Michael could get the light for him, he’d be so grateful.

That first encounter turns into a weekly ritual.  Every Saturday morning, Michael stops by to flip on lights for Rabbi Hirsch.  Soon they add weekday sessions, where Michael teaches the rabbi English and the rabbi teaches Michael Yiddish.  They share stories.  Michael tells the rabbi about losing his father in the war.  Rabbi Hirsch tells Michael about losing his wife.

Folks in the neighborhood aren’t always kind to the rabbi or to the synagogue’s dwindling membership.  Post-war anti-Semitism runs high.  Like African Americans in the Jim Crow South, or Jews in pre-war Germany, Michael’s friend, Rabbi Hirsch, lives in fear.

That fear was evident in the cry Michael heard as he walked to Easter mass one morning.  “How could they do this?  Who could do this?”  Michael rounded the corner and saw Rabbi Hirsch, his face gray with anger and grief, violently scrubbing at one of a dozen ugly red swastikas that had been painted on the synagogue’s front walls and doors.

Taking in the scene, Michael said, “Wait here,” and ran “all the way to his church, where he caught Fr. Heaney as 9:00 mass was ending.  After relating what had happened, Michael said, “We’ve got to help him!”  “Why should we get involved, kid?” the priest asked.  “Because Rabbi Hirsch is a good guy!”  Skeptical, the priest asked, “How do you know?”

“Michael exploded.  ‘How do I know?  I’m the Shabbos goy at the synagogue!  I help him turn on the lights every Saturday morning.  I’m teaching him English.  He’s teaching me Yiddish.  And his wife is dead and he’s alone and he doesn’t need some Nazi painting his synagogue!  My father died fighting the Nazis.  You saw all kinds of guys die in the war…”

“Fr. Heaney’s eyes opened wider and he stepped back a foot, as if the words had pierced a part of him that had been numb for a long time.  He reached for his coat.  “Come on,” he said.

“He walked out into the church, pointed at a few men and gestured for them to follow him.  He grabbed one of the altar boys from the previous mass, a tall Italian kid named Albert… Mr. Gallagher, who owned the hardware store across the street, arrived late and was searching for a seat when Fr. Heaney took him by the elbow and guided him back outside.

“At the foot of the church steps, Fr. Heaney started giving orders like the military man he’d once been.  He slipped two dollars to Albert, the altar boy, and sent him to buy some coffee and buns at the bakery.  He convinced Mr. Gallagher to open the hardware store and hand out rags and scrubbers and solvents.  On the corner near the schoolyard, he saw Charlie Senator, who had left his leg at Anzio, limping toward the church.  He whispered a few words to him, and Senator gave him a small salute and fell in line.

“Then all of them were marching down the avenue, carrying mops and rags, pails and solvents.  People in Easter finery looked at them in surprise.  A few more men joined the march, with Fr. Heaney and Michael out front as the platoon turned into Kelly Street.

“When they reached the synagogue, Rabbi Hirsch was still poking with his mop at the first swastika.  ‘Rabbi, I’m Joe Heaney,’ the priest said.  ‘I was a chaplain in the 103^rd Airborne.  Most of these men fought their way into Germany two years ago, and one of them lost a leg in Italy.  They are not going to let this kind of thing happen in their parish.”  “Please,” Rabbi Hirsch said, “I can do it myself.”  “No, you can’t,” Fr. Heaney said.

“They went to work.  Mr. Ponte, the stonemason, fingered the texture of the bricks, while Mr. Gallagher examined the paint… Together, he and Mr. Ponte mixed the solvents in a steel pail.  Others peeled off their Easter jackets, removed their ties, rolled up their sleeves, and grabbed rags and mops.  Albert, the altar boy, arrived with buns and coffee, then grabbed a cloth.  Michael hung his jacket and tie on the fence and joined in the scrubbing.”  The men and boys worked together in silence until the job was done.

“Rabbi Hirsch walked back and forth, examining the walls.”  “The men had finished cleaning their hands and pulling on their jackets and neckties.  Most were sipping coffee and smoking cigarettes and wolfing down the buns from the bakery.  They looked awkward now, saying little, staring at the wall or the sidewalk or the sky…  The synagogue was as strange a place to them as it had been to Michael on that first morning.  He saw Rabbi Hirsch flex his fingers as if to shake hands, but his hands were covered with paint.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” the rabbi said hoarsely. “I wish to the synagogue you all could come, to have a big seder together, but food we don’t have here, just tea, and matzoh, and..” “It’s all right, Rabbi,” Fr. Heaney said. “Some other time.” The rabbi bowed in a stiff, dignified way.

“‘I’ll see you, Rabbi,” Mr. Gallagher said, and grabbed the pail, emptying the solvents into the gutter, nodding to the others to retrieve the mops.  ‘Let’s move out,’ he said.”

“Charlie Senator glanced at his watch and then at Fr. Heaney.  “Well,” he said, “I better go do my Easter duty.”   Fr. Heaney replied:  “You just did.”

What might it mean to be an Easter People in a world where our Jewish sisters and brothers still are not safe?  As Easter people, we affirm the lives of our siblings in faith.  As Easter people, we actively support our Jewish neighbors.  As Easter people, we actively oppose anti-Semitism.  As Easter people, we live our belief in life after death…in light amidst darkness…in love beyond hatred.

As followers of Jesus, we loudly proclaim with our voices and our lives that “God shows no partiality, that any person of any nationality who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to God.”  As Easter people we grieve with our Jewish sisters and brothers and do what we can to act them into wellbeing.  If we don’t do that, if we don’t grieve with and pray for and support our Jewish friends, then I fear we have missed the point of Easter all together.

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2018 (2015)

Karl Barth once said that when writing sermons, the preacher should hold the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other.  Doing that is a little dicey with today’s text.  When you read Jesus’ statement that “anyone who aspires to greatness must serve the rest,” to which items in the newspaper are you drawn?  Does any specific cultural phenomenon come to mind?

Anybody want my job right now?  🙂

The title of today’s sermon is—If any of you had preached today, I’m sure you would have come up with the same title…almost certain of it.  Here goes.  The title of today’s sermon is:  “Making the Church Great Again.”  Now you know why the title isn’t in the bulletin.  J

We do hear a lot about greatness these days.  Regardless of how we might feel about those references, I want to invite us to engage our imaginations for a minute, to peel away any current associations we have with the notion of greatness–and simply be here in this moment, in this place, with these people and our desire as a community to follow Jesus.

As followers of Jesus seeking to act the world into wellbeing in Jesus’ name, what can we learn from today’s Gospel story about greatness?  How do we make the church great?

After the things that happen in today’s Scripture, James and John, “Sons of Thunder,” might have some ideas.  They—along with the other ten disciples—had been following Jesus around for a while, taking in all the teaching, preaching, and healing he’d been doing.

Then one day, Jesus takes Peter, James, and John up a mountain.  While they’re up there, in a flash of light, two figures join Jesus–Moses and Elijah.  It’s known as the Transfiguration. The experience is so BIG and breathtaking, Peter proposes putting up three shelters, one each for Moses, Elijah, and Jesus.  At that point, a cloud covers them and in the midst of the cloud God repeats what God said at Jesus’ baptism: “This is my child, whom I love.  Listen to him!”

Then—Poof!—It’s just the 4 of them again, no Moses, no Elijah, no bright light, no cloud.  As they head back down the mountain, Jesus tells the three disciples not to speak of the experience until after he’s risen from the dead.

So…this was a big deal, mysterious, fantastic.  Special.  For all they didn’t understand about it, it makes sense that James, John, and Peter would have felt special.  Jesus asked them–not the other 9–to accompany him for this intense, holy experience.  They must have been special, right?  Why else would Jesus have asked them to go up the mountain with him?

Following Jesus’ admonition to keep quiet, the 3 did….but they must have kept thinking about it.  How could they not?  Something like that happens, it’s going to stay in the forefront of your thinking…no matter what the Son of God might be doing or teaching.

By the time we get to today’s passage, James and John can’t hold it in any longer.  They ask Jesus to sit at his right hand and his left hand in glory.  On the face of it, it seems an odd request…but if they’d been thinking about their mountaintop experience for two whole chapters…  To what other conclusion could they have come?  They were special.  Jesus wanted them with him for that significant event.  If anyone could have been considered great, it must have been them, right?  And where do the great sit?  They sit right next to the greatest.

But Jesus doesn’t get their logic.  He doesn’t say, “Yes, my special sons.  Come right on up.  You know you’re my favorites, right?”  Instead, Jesus asks them about…suffering: “Can you endure what I’m about to endure?”  They say, “Oh, yeah, sure, no prob!  We can do that!  Now, about those seats…”  That’s when Jesus says, “No can do.  That’s above my pay grade.”

That’s the point at which the rest of the disciples start complaining about James and John.  “Who do they think they are, anyway?”  You get the sense their angst is less indignation over a power grab and more regret that they didn’t think of it first.

Jesus answers all of them with his reflections on true greatness.  How does one aspire to greatness in Jesus’ eyes?  By serving others.  The one who wants to be the greatest of all will be the servant of all.

The Gospel writer doesn’t tell us what James and John thought about Jesus’ response.  I’m going to go out on a limb here and say they probably weren’t overjoyed with it.

It’s easy to do, isn’t it?  To presume a position of power, to assume our own importance, to feel slighted if we aren’t honored in ways we think we should be.  It’s so easy to focus on ourselves and miss everything else that’s happening in the world.

So, what did James and John miss while they were focusing on their own status?   They missed the first thing Jesus did as they were coming down the mountain from the Transfiguration — Jesus healing an ill child.  They missed it a few verses later when he pulled a child into their midst and said, “Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me.”  We know they missed that because when, just a couple verses later, people bring children to Jesus for a blessing, the disciples try to send the children away.  Jesus must have been like, “Did you not hear what I just said about welcoming children?”

James, John, and the other disciples also missed the conversation Jesus had with the rich man, a man who must have been considered great by the world’s standards.  They missed Jesus’ point when he told the man to sell all his possessions and give the proceeds to the poor.

When I say the disciples missed all these things, I’m not saying they weren’t present for those events.  What I am suggesting is that focusing on their own status distracted them from seeing what was going on right in front of them.  They had a front row seat to everything Jesus was teaching about greatness in God’s kindom…and they were missing it.

And what was Jesus’ lesson about greatness?  What will it take to make the church great?  Pretty much the opposite of what the world deems as great.  Greatness in God’s realm has to do with suffering and service and sacrifice.  The truly great are those who serve.

By the early 1980s, Catholic priest Henri Nouwen had achieved a fair amount of status.  A professor at Harvard University, he’d written several books and was a highly sought-after speaker.  But Henri also was exhausted.  Something about the life he was living was not giving him life.  Something was off.

About that time, he was invited to serve as chaplain at the L’Arche Daybreak community in Ontario.  L’Arche is a series of intentional communities established by Jean Vanier in the 1960s.  In these communities, people with significant physical and developmental disabilities live alongside those who care for them.

When he arrived at L’Arche, Henri was assigned to accompany a young man named Adam.  Adam was nonverbal, and had epilepsy and Cerebral Palsy.  Part of accompanying Adam for Henri, meant waking Adam up at 7:00 a.m. and spending two hours bathing him and dressing him and getting him ready for the day.

When a friend from his former life came to see Henri, he was horrified.  How could someone as important as Henri Nouwen spend all his time working with one person, a person with so many profound needs?  Wouldn’t Henri’s time be better spent writing and lecturing?

Henri writes:  “I didn’t answer my friend’s questions.  I didn’t argue or discuss his ‘issues.’  I felt deeply that I had nothing to say that would change my friend’s mind.  My daily two hours with Adam were transforming me.  In being present to him, I was hearing an inner voice of love beyond all the activities of care.  Those two hours were pure gift, a time of contemplation, during which we, together, were touching something of God.  With Adam I knew a sacred presence and I ‘saw’ the face of God…My relationship with Adam was giving me new eyes to see and new ears to hear.  I was being changed much more than I ever anticipated.” (53-54)

Adam taught Henri that Henri’s greatness lay not in achieving, but in being.  Henri writes, “While I was preoccupied with the way I was talked about or written about, Adam was quietly telling me that “God’s love is more important than the praise of people.”  While I was concerned about my individual accomplishments, Adam was reminding me that ‘doing things together is more important than doing things alone.’  Adam couldn’t produce anything, had no fame to be proud of, couldn’t brag of any award or trophy.  But by his very life, he was the most radical witness to the truth of our lives that I have ever encountered.”

“It took me a long time,” Henri writes, “to see this complete reversal of values, but once I experienced it, it was as if I was walking into completely new spiritual territory…The great paradoxes of the Gospel—that the last will be first, that those who lose their lives will gain them, that the poor are blessed, and that the gentle will inherit the kindom—all became incarnate for me in Adam.”  (Adam:  God’s Beloved, 44-65)

How do we make the church great?  We do it by serving.  We do it by acting the least of these into wellbeing.  We do it by serving breakfast in Pritchard Park or doing Laundry Love next Sunday.  We do it by purchasing Christmas gifts for children through Children First.  We make the church great when we pay attention to what’s going on around us. We make the church great when we follow Jesus in service and suffering and sacrifice.  We make the church great when we follow the path of love.

What might happen if we follow this way always?  What say we try?  Sounds like a great idea, don’t you think?

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2018

Anybody feeling hopeless today?  The Supreme Court.  The UN Climate report.  The Florida panhandle recovering from Hurricane Michael.  Residents of our own state still recovering from Hurricane Florence.  People in Indonesia continuing to recover from the typhoon.  Racism.  Sexism.  Heterosexism.  Classism.  Not to mention the complete dissolution of civility in the public square.

Gloom, despair, and agony on me.  Deep, dark depression, excessive misery.  If it weren’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all.  Gloom, despair, and agony on me.  That’s probably the first—and last—time I’ll quote Grandpa Jones from Hee Haw in a sermon.  Desperate times call for desperate measures.

The times we’re in do feel desperate, don’t they?  Those of us who want to act the world into wellbeing, we who want to be agents of good in the world, those of us who have worked tirelessly for justice all our lives—to see progress that’s been made threatened—or reversed—if we’re paying attention to what’s going on in the world, it’s hard not to feel hopeless, isn’t it?

In the face of all the daunting issues looming for the human community today, how can we nurture hope?  How do we act the world into wellbeing when all we want to do is to crawl into bed, pull the covers over our head, and sleep the years away until things get better?  As the hymn says, “how do we hope when hope seems hopeless?”

Do you ever wonder how we got to where we are?  Like, maybe every hour of every day?  How have we gotten to the point that UN scientists have given us a single decade to get our environmental house in order before circumstances become so dire life as we know it will change forever?  How have we gotten to the point where the widening of the gap between the rich and the poor keeps speeding up instead of reversing?  How have we gotten to the point where we can no longer converse civilly with someone with whom we disagree?

Whatever it is that has gotten us to this point, is, I suspect, similar to what got the rich man to the place where he couldn’t follow Jesus.

The man comes to Jesus and, having acquired everything money could buy, asks Jesus how he might obtain the one thing he hasn’t been able to purchase—eternal life.  Jesus tells him “You know the commandments: “You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother.” Basically, treat others with justice and kindness.  “The man says, ‘Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.’

“Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him—that is, Jesus wanted to act the rich man into wellbeing—and so he told him, ‘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.’  When the man heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

What is it about material wealth that makes it hard to enter the kindom of God?  Why is it easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle…That’s likely a reference to a low gate into Jerusalem called the Needle Gate.  A camel loaded down would find it difficult to get through the gate.  A camel that had been relieved of all the packs on its back had a better chance of getting through.  So, why is it easier for a camel to go through the eye of the Needle Gate than for a rich person to enter God’s realm?  A woman’s experience at Koinonia Farm in the 1950s might shed some light on the topic.

While he was in seminary, Clarence Jordan read Acts 2 and took it literally.  That’s the passage that describes the first community of Jesus’ followers–a community where everyone had everything in common.  Believing that living in community was the literal call of Christians, Clarence and his friend, Martin England, searched for farmland in the deep South.  In 1942, with the help of a benefactor, they purchased 440 acres near Americus in southwest Georgia.  Koinonia— an interracial intentional Christian farming community—was born.

One day, an old black car “shuddered into the driveway of Koinonia Farm, coughed to a halt, and delivered a quiet, 40-year-old spinster who asked if she could remain for a visit.”

After a couple of days, she “approached Clarence and [expressed] interest in joining.  He explained what Koinonia was striving to be, how one must surrender totally to Christ, including all their earthly possessions.  At Koinonia, he said, they do this by asking everyone to enter the same way: ‘flat broke.’  Her eyebrows jerked upward in alarm.  She had questions.

“Clarence was perplexed” by the woman’s hesitation.  “‘Jesus said it would be hard for a rich person to enter the kingdom, but we’d never had one apply.’”  “Clarence asked her what difficulty there would be with relinquishing her possessions.  She had a fair-size difficulty, somewhere between $80,000 and $90,000.”  That’d be $800,000 – 900,000 in today’s dollars.

“Clarence swallowed a couple of times, then reasserted that she would have to dispose of the money to become a part of Koinonia.  How, she asked?  Give it to the poor, he said, give it to your relatives, throw it over a bridge—but you must enter the fellowship without it.

“What about giving it to Koinonia Farm, she asked?  Clarence grinned: ‘No.  If you put that money in here, we’d quit growing peanuts and start discussing theology.  That wouldn’t be healthy for us.  And, unless I miss my guess, you’re a very lonely person, and you’re lonely because you think every friend you ever had is after your money.’  She confirmed that judgment.

“Well, if you put that money in here, you’d think we courted you for your money, that we loved you for your money.  You’d get the idea you were God’s guardian angel, that you endowed the rest of us, and that all of us ought to be grateful to you for your beneficence.’  “She was listening; Clarence pressed his point: ‘Now for your sake and for our sakes, you get rid of that money and come walk this way with us.’  Tearfully, the woman replied: ‘I can’t do it.’  She packed her old car and left.”  (The Cotton Patch Evidence, 86-87)

These stories—about the woman at Koinonia and the rich man who came to Jesus—illustrate the deepest spiritual struggle human beings have:  Will we give ourselves to the common good, or will we maintain our death grip on our own personal good?  Will we act the world into wellbeing or only ourselves?

At the heart of nearly every depressing thing you can name these days—climate change, immigration, healthcare, over-development, systemic racism, exploitation of the poor, sexism—at the heart of it all is this spiritual struggle between allegiance to the common good or allegiance only to one’s own personal good.  I’m not saying we should abdicate responsibility for improving our own lives.  What I am saying is that if we work on improving our own lives without considering how improving our lives affects the lives of others, then we risk making decisions that lead to, well, the world in which we’re currently living.

Which brings us back to wanting to crawl into bed, pull the covers over our head, and go to sleep until things are better.  I know how much we’re hurting right now…how angry we are, how puzzled and bewildered and scared we are…  But, as much as we’d like to, we can’t withdraw from what’s happening in the world.  We can’t simply rage or tweet or sink into cynicism.  We can’t crawl into bed, pull the covers over our head, and wait for things to get better….

We can’t hide from the world, because the world needs us.  The world needs us.  Do you hear what I’m saying?  The world needs us –our gifts, our experiences, our passion, our faith, our vision, our imagination….The world needs us to act it into wellbeing…the world needs us to speak truth to power…the world needs us to advocate for the least of these…the world needs us to do everything in our power to transform systems that oppress women and the poor and people of color…the world needs us to vote…the world needs us to work for the common good…the world needs us to share what we’ve learned from Jesus….the world needs us to listen…the world needs us to share our hope…

Which brings us back to where we began.  How do we hope when hope seems hopeless?  How do we hope when hope seems hopeless?  We do what every one of us has done today—we gather with other people who also are struggling to hope.  The saddest part of the stories about the rich man and the woman at Koinonia is the loneliness.  Each of them chose their possessions over community.  Each of them chose their own personal good over the common good…

But here’s the thing.  When we choose the common good, we’re also contributing to our own good.  Ubuntu, right?  I am because we are.

I can preach all day about what we need to do about what’s happening in the world.  I can exegete and exposit and cajole and conjure….but the real source of our healing, the real source of our hope, the thing that’s going to make it possible for us to be God’s hope in the world is what we’ve got right here in this room:  our togetherness.

So, as we continue to do our part for the common good out there, as we vote and serve and advocate and do everything within our power to act the world out there into wellbeing, I encourage us in this community to be intentional about acting each other into wellbeing.  Let us listen to each other.  Let us encourage each other.  Let us nurture hope in each other.

Because the world needs us.  The world needs us.  The world needs us.

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2018

The title of today’s sermon is:  “Intersectionality, Ubuntu, and the Image of God.”  I told you I couldn’t wait to hear the sermon that would go with that title.  🙂  For those who weren’t here last week, the title of today’s sermon was included in last week’s bulletin.  As sometimes happens, the news cycle sent the sermon in a different direction…which was fine, but I forgot to change the sermon title in the bulletin.  So, I apologized to folks last week, then said I couldn’t wait to see what sermon I’d write to go with the title.

It was just a line to get some laughs, which it did.  But when I thought about this week’s theme–World Wide Communion Sunday–I realized, this is the week!

Intersectionality.  Ubuntu.  Image of God.  How might those three ideas come together on World Wide Communion Sunday, this day when Christians across the globe remind ourselves of all the other Christians around the globe who are reminding themselves that the Body of Christ is large and diverse and beautiful and deeply loved by God?  Let’s look at each idea.

Intersectionality.  Have you heard that word before?  If you have, do you know what it means?  At the heart of the idea is that all of us have multiple identities.  I am a woman, but I’m not only a woman.  I am a white person, but I’m not only a white person.  I’m a person with a lot of education in my background, but that fact doesn’t define all of who I am.  I’m a Southerner… which tells you a little about me, but only a little.

Who I am is the result of all these different aspects mixing together, interacting with each other.  It’s like baking a cake.  A cake has lots of ingredients, right?  If I were a baker, I could tell you what some of those ingredients were…flour, maybe.  Sugar.  Eggs?  Lots of stuff.  If the ingredients just sit side by side on the counter, you aren’t going to get any cake.  Cake only happens when the ingredients are mixed together and baked.  (Or in my case, half-baked.)

So, if you try to define me by only one of my identities, you will miss the cake that is Kim.  If you only look at one of my ingredients, you’ll only see one small part of me.  It’s the opposite of stereotyping, right?  Stereotyping is what happens when you define a person based on only one aspect of their identity–their race or gender or sexual orientation or age or socio-economic status.

When we fail to see all of a person–the unique amalgamation of elements that makes them who they are–we can do significant harm to folks…or miss them all together.

Do you know the story of the Women’s Suffrage March in Washington, D.C., in 1913?  It’s not one of the brighter moments from our country’s history of gender justice.  As the National Woman’s Suffrage Association organized the march for women’s right to vote, they sent African American women to the back of the parade.  Even Ida B. Wells, journalist, women’s rights advocate, and foremost chronicler of lynching in our country, was excluded from the Illinois delegation, leaving the African American icon nearly in tears.

Sixty years earlier, in 1851, Sojourner Truth reminded those gathered for a Women’s Convention in Akron, Ohio, that, though her experiences were vastly different from the experiences of most white women, she was still a woman and deserved the equal rights they were discussing.  A decade before the Civil War began, Sojourner Truth said this:

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain’t I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain’t I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man – when I could get it – and bear the lash as well! And ain’t I a woman? I have borne many children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother’s grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain’t I a woman?

Sojourner knew that if she didn’t remind those gathered of the different experiences of women of color, the women’s movement would, in fact, be a white women’s movement.  As we’ve seen, that’s pretty much what it was 60 years later at the march in Washington.  In truth, white privilege—or white supremacy—is still a struggle in the women’s rights movement.

The invitation of intersectionality is to see each person in the completeness of who he or she is…at least to the extent that’s possible.

When we say it that way, the connection between intersectionality and the image of God becomes clear–if we are to see in each person the image of God, we must see them in the fullness of who they are…and seeing them in the fullness of who they are means understanding that any person’s identity is the result of many different identities coming together.

Intersectionality.  Image of God.  What of Ubuntu?

            Ubuntu is a concept that comes from Bantu culture.  Here’s how Archbishop Desmond Tutu describes a person living out of an Ubuntu way of life.  “Ubuntu speaks of the very essence of being human. We say, “Hey, so-and-so has ubuntu.”…which means you are generous, you are hospitable, you are friendly and caring and compassionate. You share what you have. It is to say, “My humanity is caught up, is inextricably bound up, in yours.”  “I am because we are.”

“A person with ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, for he or she has a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed, or treated as if they were less than who they are.”

Ubuntu isn’t a Christian term, but World Communion Sunday is a terrific opportunity for Christians to practice Ubuntu.  Today, as we come to the table, we’ll live out the belief that our humanity is inextricably caught up with every other person’s, that our faith isn’t complete until we understand it in the context of everyone else’s faith.  We are not Christians by ourselves.  It really does take a village–a world village–to follow Jesus.

Are you wondering what any of this has to do with today’s Gospel lesson?  Jesus’ admonition is a familiar one– “unless we come to God’s kindom as a child, we aren’t going to get it.”  We’ve heard the research–no one is born a racist.  No one is born a sexist.  No one is born an ageist or homophobe or nationalist.  We are born accepting others as they are.  It’s only later that we’re taught that difference is a dirty word, that the point of difference is to divide.

So, on this World Wide Communion Sunday, the invitation is to come to the table as children…accepting, loving, delighting in each other in the fullness of who each of us is.  What might that look like?  It might look like “Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal.”

Poet Naomi Shahib Nye might not be a follower of Jesus, but based on this poem, I think she understands God’s kindom.  “Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal.”

After learning my flight was detained 4 hours,

I heard the announcement:

If anyone in the vicinity of gate 4-A understands any Arabic,

Please come to the gate immediately.

Well—one pauses these days. Gate 4-A was my own gate. I went there.

An older woman in full traditional Palestinian dress,

Just like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing loudly.

Help, said the flight service person. Talk to her. What is her

Problem? we told her the flight was going to be four hours late and she

Did this.

I put my arm around her and spoke to her haltingly.

Shu dow-a, shu- biduck habibti, stani stani schway, min fadlick,

Sho bit se-wee?

The minute she heard any words she knew—however poorly used—

She stopped crying.

She thought our flight had been canceled entirely.

She needed to be in El Paso for some major medical treatment the

Following day. I said no, no, we’re fine, you’ll get there, just late,

Who is picking you up? Let’s call him and tell him.

We called her son and I spoke with him in English.

I told him I would stay with his mother till we got on the plane and

Would ride next to her—Southwest.

She talked to him. Then we called her other sons just for the fun of it.

Then we called my dad and he and she spoke for a while in Arabic and

Found out of course they had ten shared friends.

Then I thought just for the heck of it why not call some Palestinian

Poets I know and let them chat with her. This all took up about 2 hours.

She was laughing a lot by then. Telling about her life. Answering

Questions.

She had pulled a sack of homemade mamool cookies—little powdered

Sugar crumbly mounds stuffed with dates and nuts—out of her bag—

And was offering them to all the women at the gate.

To my amazement, not a single woman declined one. It was like a

Sacrament. The traveler from Argentina, the traveler from California,

The lovely woman from Laredo—we were all covered with the same

Powdered sugar. And smiling. There are no better cookies.

And then the airline broke out the free beverages from huge coolers—

Non-alcoholic—and the two little girls for our flight, one African

American, one Mexican American—ran around serving us all apple juice

And lemonade and they were covered with powdered sugar too.

And I noticed my new best friend—by now we were holding hands—

Had a potted plant poking out of her bag, some medicinal thing,

With green furry leaves. Such an old country traveling tradition. Always

Carry a plant. Always stay rooted to somewhere.

And I looked around that gate of late and weary ones and thought,

This is the world I want to live in. The shared world.

Not a single person in this gate—once the crying of confusion stopped

—has seemed apprehensive about any other person.

They took the cookies. I wanted to hug all those other women too.

This can still happen anywhere.

Not everything is lost.

Mamool cookies…

That can still happen anywhere—even here, in this place, at that table, today.  Thanks be to God!

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2018

Naomi Shihab Nye, an Arab American, who lives in San Antonio, Texas gives voice to the humanity of two cultures – revealing our traditions, our customs and ultimately, our hearts.

It’s been an intense week.  On Tuesday, Bill Cosby was sentenced for drugging and sexually assaulting a woman.  Two days later Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and Judge Brett Kavanaugh testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee about her allegations of sexual assault against the nominee.  On Friday, a sexual assault survivor cornered Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona in an elevator, begging him to listen to her story of being raped.

So many women have begun telling their stories of sexual assault.  People I have known for years have been telling stories of being raped, some of them when they were children.  I suspect many of you have been hearing—and perhaps telling—similar stories.

I’m glad so many people are telling their stories.  Telling the story of one’s assault is a key part of the healing process…In many ways, though, it’s only the beginning.  The process of healing from sexual assault is so complex and so intense and takes so long… It’s hard to take in just how much pain people are in right now.  I suspect there’s a tremendous amount of pain in this room this morning.

So, what good news is there for us today?  In light of all the pain that’s surfaced this week, what word from Scripture might give us hope?

I’m pretty sure it’s NOT the word we get from today’s passage from Genesis 2.  Today is the last Sunday in the Season of Creation.  We’ve looked at the planet, humanity, sky, and mountains.  Today’s theme is animals.  With everything in the news this week, I considered completely changing today’s worship service to focus on issues related to gender justice.

Then I read Genesis 2 and realized this story of origins in our Judeo-Christian tradition is a primary source of sexism in many cultures.  This text has contributed to the diminishment of women for millenia.  So, maybe it’s the perfect text to offer insight on this week’s events.

Once upon a time, God created a man.  When the man got lonesome, God set out to make “AN help meet” for him.  But instead of creating AN help meet, God created a bunch of animals, which seems kind of odd.  If you say you’re going to create “an help meet,” why create literally every other creature on Earth first?  What’s going on with that?  Is it a literary device meant to create drama that leads up to the creation of woman?   The cat wasn’t an help meet, the horse wasn’t an help meet, neither were the rhino, giraffe, ground grub, or peacock.  But oh, finally, at long last!  Here’s the perfect help meet (Drum roll, please)—woman!

Did you catch what the man says when God presents his help meet to him?  “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman, for out of Man this one was taken.”  This one?  This one, as opposed to the other ones…the other animals?  Is that what the man is saying?  That a woman is just another one of the animals?

The creation of human beings in Genesis 1 is exceedingly egalitarian.  In Genesis 1, women and men, people of all genders are created in the image of God.

But here in Genesis 2?  Man is created first, then his help meet is built out of his rib (Who in the world thought that up?), is presented as a gift to the man, and then is named by the man.  Did you notice that the woman is completely passive?  Every action that occurs is done to her.  Yeah.  I don’t think we’re going to get any good news from this text today.

There is one Scripture story, though, that has come to mind several times this week.  The parallels with the process with Dr. Blasey Ford’s testimony are striking.

Have you heard of Queen Vashti?  Have you heard of Esther?  Esther is the Jewish woman who saved all the Jewish people in 5^th c BCE…She did it when King Ahasuerus needed a new wife.  Because the Jewish people were oppressed in that society, Esther didn’t tell the king up front that she was a Jew.  She kept that information under her hat until an opportune time.

Do you know how Esther became queen, why there was an opening for queen in the first place?  That’s where Vashti—Esther’s predecessor—comes in.

Vashti was the spouse of King Ahasuerus.  As kings are wont to do, Ahasuerus threw a BIG banquet for all his officials and ministers.  “The army of Persia and Media and the nobles and governors of the provinces were present, while he displayed the great wealth of his kingdom and the splendor and pomp of his majesty for many days, one hundred and eighty days in all.”

At the end of that six month long party, another party was thrown just for the people who lived in the capital city of Susa.  At the palace, there were “white cotton curtains and blue hangings tied with cords of fine linen and purple to silver rings and marble pillars. There were couches of gold and silver on a mosaic pavement of porphyry, marble, mother-of-pearl, and colored stones.  Drinks were served in golden goblets, and the royal wine was lavished in accordance with the bounty of the king.  Drinking was by flagons, without restraint; for the king had given orders to all the officials of his palace to do as each one desired.”  At the same time, “Queen Vashti gave a banquet for the women in the palace of King Ahasuerus.”

“On the seventh day, when the king was merry with wine, he commanded that Queen Vashti come before the king, wearing the royal crown, in order to show the peoples and the officials her beauty; for she was fair to behold.”

Do you know what Vashti did?  She refused.  She refused to be paraded out like a piece of property, an object.  She refused to wear the king’s crown.  She refused the king’s attempt to diminish her and “put her in her place.”  She refused to let the king name her.

How did Ahasuerus respond to Vashti’s refusal to do his bidding?  “At this the king was enraged, and his anger burned within him.”  He immediately consulted his legal team.  Here’s what they told him.

“‘Not only has Queen Vashti done wrong to the king, but also to all the officials and all the peoples who are in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus.  For this deed of the queen will be made known to all women, causing them to look with contempt on their husbands, since they will say, “King Ahasuerus commanded Queen Vashti to be brought before him, and she did not come.”  This very day the noble ladies of Persia and Media who have heard of the queen’s behavior will rebel against the king’s officials, and there will be no end of contempt and wrath!

“If it pleases the king, let a royal order go out from him, and let it be written among the laws of the Persians and the Medes so that it may not be altered, that Vashti is never again to come before King Ahasuerus; and let the king give her royal position to another who is better than she.  So when the decree made by the king is proclaimed throughout all his kingdom, vast as it is, all women will give honor to their husbands, high and low alike.’

“This advice pleased the king and the officials, and the king did as was proposed; he sent letters to all the royal provinces, to every province in its own script and to every people in its own language, declaring that every man should be master in his own house.”

Vashti spoke her truth…and the people in power quaked in their sandals.  Determined to prevent their own #metoo movement, they wrote and enacted a law against Vashti.  Maybe they called it “Vashti’s Law.”  Then look what happened—Vashti left the biblical scene for good.  The title of the book isn’t Vashti, is it?  No, it’s the Book of Esther.

A colleague who served as a religious educator at a synagogue in Milwaukee told me about teaching this story to a class of children.  When they got to the end, my friend asked what the children thought.  One girl said this: “Vashti was the only person in the story who told the truth.”  And what was Vashti’s reward for telling the truth?  She was written out of the story.

Do you see the title of the sermon listed in the bulletin?  “Intersectionality, Ubuntu, and the Image of God.”  On Wednesday, that seemed like a terrific title.  Someday, I might even write a terrific sermon to go with it.

Here’s the title I propose for THIS sermon—“The Book of Vashti.”  The Book of Esther is about a woman of some courage…but it’s also the story of a woman who played the game.  She was selected by the king to be his queen based on her appearance.  She tried to get what she wanted from the king by being a good wife and/or by deception.

The Book of Vashti is a different story.  It’s about a woman who speaks her truth, who does not let others define her reality…it’s about a woman who will not allow herself to be diminished by others.  The Book of Vashti—the Book of Christine, the book of every woman who has ever been objectified or abused or assaulted or excluded from full personhood by the laws of the land…These are the books we are writing.

These are the stories that are empowering us and that will empower girls and women for generations to come.  The Book of Vashti, too, will be a story of origins—the story of how women of every color, every station in life, every ethnicity, every religion…the story of how women everywhere learned to speak their truth—in the halls of Congress, in the quiet of a therapist’s office, in the confines of an elevator…The Book of Vashti is the story of women learning to speak their truth to power and in the process becoming who God is creating them to be—beloved, strong, brave.  The Book of Vashti is our story….the story of how we all became whole.  May it be a story we tell over and over and over again.

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  ©2018

(Astronaut Ricky Arnold snapped a photo of Hurricane Florence from the International Space Station.NASA)

I looked at Earth— it was chaos and emptiness.  I looked to the heavens— their light was gone. I looked to the mountains— they quaked, and the hills swayed back and forth. I looked— I saw no one.  Nothing!  All the birds had flown away. I looked— the fertile land was desert. All its towns laid waste before Yhwh.

Though these sound like the words of someone watching their newsfeed this weekend, they’re from a prophet who lived 2700 years ago.  Using the metaphorical language prophets prefer, Jeremiah describes the cataclysmic devastation he sees coming for the people of Judah if they don’t change course immediately in their worship of God and their treatment of the poor.

Jeremiah used images of environmental devastation to send a message to the people of Judah.  What message might the images we’re seeing from Hurricane Florence be sending to us?  Might what we’re seeing be calling us to an immediate course change?

In 2014, Allen and I traveled to Ireland.  On a day trip to check out some ruins, an archaeologist talked to us about the place we were visiting.  In his musings, he used a phrase that intrigued me:  storm archaeology, the study of ancient artifacts uncovered by fierce storms….

…like the ancient human remains uncovered last year by Hurricane Ophelia in Forlorn Point, Ireland.  The year before that, an 8th century carving of a Pictish dragon was found by an archaeologist passing by a cliff face in Orkney, Scotland following bad weather.

Storm archaeology…the study of things that remain hidden until cataclysmic weather events reveal them.

In August 2005, journalists Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky were attending a conference in New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina hit.  Stuck in the city when martial law was imposed, they began doing what journalists do–researching for an article on the hurricane.

Last year, the same authors wrote another article titled, “Lesson of Katrina that Haven’t Been Learned.”  In the wake of the destruction in Houston from Hurricane Harvey last September, the authors compared four effects of Katrina with those of Harvey to see if we’d learned anything in the intervening 12 years.  Ready for a little journalistic storm archaeology?

The first set of effects they considered were those resulting from poor human choices, in particular, those regarding infrastructure and climate change.

Poor infrastructure choices in New Orleans led to “shoddy work and delayed maintenance of the levee systems.”  As you’ll recall, the biggest catastrophe of Katrina was broken levees.  Similarly, in Houston much of the destruction came “because the flood mitigation and control systems created after several disastrous floods were shelved” when they interfered with Houston’s plan for rapid growth.

Regarding climate change, two effects directly impact the behavior of hurricanes–higher sea levels and hotter water temperatures.  The Gulf of Mexico has risen more than 8 inches in the last 50 years.  When Hurricane Harvey hit last year, the water temperature had risen 1 degree Celsius after the hottest month ever recorded, July 2017.  That higher temperature freed up more water to be distributed by the storm.  The effects of flooding in Houston were devastating.

A second effect of the storms is determined by poverty.  In any major weather event, the poor suffer disproportionately.  Bradshaw and Slonsky note that “during Hurricane Katrina, levels of mortality and suffering were directly linked to structural inequality, race, and class. Statisticians calculate that African Americans had a two to four times greater chance of dying during or immediately after Katrina.”  In Houston, “who lives on flood plains, who can afford flood insurance, and who lives near the petrochemical industry is tied to race and class.”  Think about our own region.  Who tends to live on tops of the mountains; who lives down below?

Poverty and low wages also can be a death sentence for many trying to flee a disaster like Harvey or Katrina.  Who has a car, or credit card, or money in the bank to pay for a hotel, can determine who is able to heed an evacuation order.

A third effect of cataclysmic weather events is exploitative practices in the aftermath…practices like price-gouging and using the storm to push through exploiatative business policies and legislation. Re-building, of course, is good and important work.  It’s vital, though, to take note of who is involved in these activities and who benefits from them.

For instance, “despite federal aid totaling $120 billion for reconstruction in New Orleans, the poverty rate for Black children in 2017 remained 50 percent.  Despite a construction boom and an unemployment rate of 52 percent for Black men at the same time, only 4 percent of workers hired on city construction projects were African American.”

Which leads us to a fourth dynamic where the effects of Hurricanes Katrina and Harvey are evident:  racism.  While most of the effects of the two hurricanes were similar, one thing differed—media coverage of altruism in the wake of each storm.

The authors note that media coverage of Houston was generous in recognizing and reporting stories of ordinary people coming to the aid of others.

Katrina, like most disasters, also was full of altruism, but it mostly went unreported.  When Bradshaw and Slonsky published their piece recounting stories of everyday folks helping each other during and after Katrina, it went viral. They suspect that happened because their “firsthand account of solidarity, sharing, and collaboration in the midst of dire conditions” was a part of the Katrina story that wasn’t being told.  “Acts of courage and compassion were playing out in New Orleans and all over the Gulf Coast, but were being drowned out by racist and sensationalist stories of criminal elements, gangs, child rapes in the Superdome and snipers shooting at rescue helicopters.

“Those stereotypes and rumors were later shown to be fabrications, but at the time, they provided the rationale to absolve the failure of the federal, state and local governments to provide food, water, medical aid and evacuation to thousands of stranded New Orleanians.”

Major storms like the one we’re in right now reveal a lot of things we don’t notice when the skies are blue and we’re focused on living our everyday lives.  Fierce storms uncover ancient systems and practices and inequities we thought were long past, but that are still there just beneath the surface.

Here’s the thing about archaeology—when ancient artifacts are found, they aren’t left in the ground.  When that archeologist in 2016 discovered the 8^th c pictograph of a dragon after a big storm, after the next big storm, a crew came in and removed the piece so they could take it and study it.  And once it was determined that the skeletal remains found at Forlorn Point, Ireland, weren’t a 21^st century storm victim, scholars conducted tests to discover just how ancient the bones were.  That bit of data is leading to more study about the people who lived in the area a thousand years ago.

Another thing about archaeology:  It’s not only about getting clearer about what happened in the past.  As we gain clarity about what happened in the past, it informs who we are in the present.  And sometimes new things we learn about the past necessitate changes in what we’re doing in the present.  Sometimes new understandings of the past make us re-think who we are all together.

I don’t know about you, but whenever I think about what’s happening to our planet, what we’re doing to Earth through action and inaction, I go to a dark place, a place of little hope.  In fact, the resource that suggested interweaving Psalm 19 and Jeremiah 4 said, If you want a more positive spin, end the reading with the Psalm.  If you want a more somber spin, end with Jeremiah.  I didn’t even have to think about it.  You’ll notice we ended with Jeremiah.

But even in Jeremiah’s jeremiad, there’s a tiny sliver of hope.  Thus says Yhwh:

“The whole land will be desolate, but I will not completely destroy it.” Even when it feels like the literal end of the world, even then, it will not be completely destroyed.  Even when we’re overwhelmed by the disproportionate suffering poor people face, especially during major weather events, that need not be the end of the story.

Why not?  Because we have the power to change course.  We have the power to change some aspects of climate change.  We have the power to work at changing social systems that ignore—or prey on—the least of these.  We have the power to look around us in the coming days and weeks to see what ancient artifacts and practices are revealed by this storm…to dislodge them from the places they’ve been hidden, take them out, study them, see what they tell us about the past, and what they suggest about how we might move forward into the future.

The theme for this third Sunday of creation—Sky—was determined a long time ago.  I’m not sure how the timing could be more perfect.  We’ve been looking at pictures of the sky all week long.

The quintessential sky text in Scripture is the first few verses of Psalm 19.  It reads:  The heavens herald your glory, O God, and the skies display your handiwork.  Day after day they tell their story, and night after night they reveal the depth of their understanding.  Without speech, without words, without even an audible voice, their cry echoes through all the world, and their message reaches the ends of the earth.

“Day after day the skies tell their story…”  Will we listen to the story they tell?  How will we respond?  Will we, through our compassionate, justice-seeking action in the world, also herald God’s glory?

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  ©2018

Have you ever been in a place where you didn’t feel like you were being seen?  Like people were looking past you…or were looking at you but wishing you were something or someone different from who you are?

Have you ever been in a place where you have been fully seen?  Have you felt known and loved and appreciated for being exactly who you are?

Nothing feels worse than not feeling seen.  And I suspect few things feel as good as being seen and loved.

Seeing each other for who we are, as we are, and fully appreciating each other–that’s at the heart of today’s Scripture lesson.

Last week, we looked at the first 5½ days of creation, when, at God’s invitation, light, sea, land, sun, moon, plants, insects, fish and animals came into being.  Today, the final creatures appear—human beings.

We talked some last week about how God’s speaking in the act of creation suggests God’s desire to be in relationship with creation.  God’s speech on the second half of Day Six demonstrates God’s desire to be in relationship with human beings.

There is one place where God’s invitation to humankind differs from the invitations to the rest of creation.  This time, the writer of Genesis tells us, “Humankind was created as God’s reflection: in the divine image God created them…”  What might it mean to be created in God’s image?  If the impetus behind God’s creating was relationship, I wonder if THAT—relationship—is what most reflects our divine likeness?  Might living “godly” lives be not so much about measuring up to some arbitrary spiritual standard, but more about living in relationship with the rest of creation…even the people part of creation?  God blessed all  humankind, right?  So, if every human being is created in the image of God, then it sounds like it’s pretty much our job as human beings to live our connection to every other human being, to love every person, to do everything we can to act every person into wellbeing.

Which sounds good in theory–“God loves everybody! And so do I!”  In practice, though–maybe this is just me–it’s not so easy to love every other human being.  It’s like a Quaker once said of his fellow community member, “I love that of God in him, but not much else.”

So, how do we do it?  How do we live our connection with every other person on the planet?  How do we act other human beings into wellbeing?  All relationships with other human beings, all actions we take in behalf of their wellbeing, begin with seeing in every person the image of God.  In our Sunday School reflections on radical hospitality this summer, we realized that hospitality begins with the understanding that every person is a human being beloved of God.  When you think about it, most meanness in the world seems to begin with the assumption that another person is NOT fully human, doesn’t it?

A quick look at human history reveals any number of horrific events that stem from an inability to see other people as human beings created in the image of God.  The Holocaust.  The treatment of the Rohingya people in Myanmar.  Slavery.

Perhaps the most shocking thing in reading about our country’s cruel history of lynching is the complete de-humanization of those who were lynched.  Victims of lynching were not seen as human beings; they were considered animals.  [I’m so glad that kind of rhetoric has been relegated to the history books.  (Pause)]  That kind of rhetoric, as we’ve seen too many times, leads to the cruelest of actions–not only the murdering of people for no reason, but announcing in the newspaper when the murders would take place, making a spectacle of murders that would be attended by thousands, taking pictures of hanged and burned corpses, and selling those pictures as postcards.  If we see other people as human beings created in the image of God, atrocities like lynching would never, could never occur.

I suspect many of us—or people we love—have had our humanity diminished.  It was a very good day when marriage equality became the law of the land.  But regarding full acceptance of people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or gender non-conforming…we’ve got a long way to go on that.

Last year, I attended a Braves game with a friend who happens to be trans.  My friend is a big baseball buff and knows the new Braves stadium well.  We had a great time looking at all the exhibits, grabbing a meal before the game, enjoying the beautiful weather.

Everything was fine until I had to use the facilities.  Understand…I had preached about the bathroom issue, about what those crazy legislators in North Carolina had done; I had even chastised a group of songwriting buddies for writing joke songs about those same legislators, reminding them of the humiliation the law had caused for people who are trans…but until I needed the facilities in a public venue, I’d never really thought about what it means for a person who is trans to negotiate how to tend to the most primary of human functions in a public space.

I waited a long time to go, getting increasingly fearful for my friend.  Realizing that all I had to do—without thinking—was find the restroom with stick figure wearing a dress and do what I needed to do.  Aware that if my friend had drunk as much Coke at supper as I had, she would have to think about it.

When I couldn’t wait any longer, I told my friend I needed a bathroom.  We found one.  Afterward, I asked my friend, first, if I could ask an awkward question.  The whole time I’ve known her, my friend has answered any questions I’ve ever had about her experience as a trans person.  Her answer this time?  “Oh, I just use the women’s restroom.  No problem.”  As you might imagine, I felt great relief at the response.

I also felt great relief when this same friend told me a few months ago that, after many years of teaching middle school in her other persona, this year, she is teaching as herself.  I also remember the day she got her driver’s license…and the day she got her birth certificate.  Those were days of deep joy for my friend.

Why?  Because she was being seen for who she really is.  It seems such a simple thing—to simply walk around the world as yourself.  But if the world doesn’t understand you or is afraid of you or refuses to see that of God in you, the world can be a terrifying and dangerous place.

As it was for 9 year old Jamel Myles, who took his own life week before last out in Colorado.  Nine years old.  When I first saw the story about Jamel on Facebook, I kept scrolling past it, hoping, perhaps, that if I didn’t see it, if I didn’t take it in, it wouldn’t be true.  About the fourth time I saw it, it did hit me–after a year of bullying at school, in part because he was gay, a 9-year-old child took his own life.  How could that happen?  How can a 9- year-old child possibly have given up all hope at such a tender age?

Jamel’s mom, Leia Pierce, said:  “We need to be more loving, more caring, more accepting of each other.  My heart breaks every second.”  Ms. Pierce’s mother, Jacque Miller, said she could not blame the school for her grandson’s death. “The statement that it takes a village to raise a child is true,” she said. “And the village is broken.”  (New York Times, 8/28/18)

How do we fix the village?  We do it by living our creation theology.  We live as if we are connected to every part of, every person in creation.  We live as if every person who exists bears the image of God.  We act every part of, every person in creation into wellbeing.  We do what we can to help every part of creation become who God creates her, him, or it to be.

We’re going to end today by reflecting on hymn #585, O God, We Bear the Imprint of Your Face.  As Kevin plays, you’re invited silently to read and reflect on the words.  How might the world change if we see imprinted on our own faces—and on the faces of others—the face of God?   Let us pray.

O God, we bear the imprint of your face:  the colors of our skin are your design,

And what we have of beauty in our race as man or woman, you alone define,

Who stretched a living fabric on our frame and gave to each a language and a name.

Where we are torn and pulled apart by hate, because our race, our skin is not the same,

While we are judged unequal by the state and victims made because we own our name,

Humanity reduced to little worth, dishonored is your living face on earth.

O God, we share the image of the One whose flesh and blood are ours, whatever skin;

In Christ’s humanity we find our own, and in your family our proper kin:

Jesus our brother we still crucify; love is the language we must learn, or die.

(Words by Shirley Erena Murray, 1981, rev. 1994)

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2018

So…did you enjoy playing God?  What power!  “Let there be light!”  And there was light!  Let there be sky, land, sea, animals, creepy crawly things…and there were!  

Our sacred Scriptures begin where the sacred texts of most religions begin–with the story of how we got here….or in our case, the stories of how we got here.  In Genesis 2, we get the story of Adam—literally, Earth man….how he’s lonely so God creates animals, and how when that doesn’t help, God creates a “helper” out of Adam’s rib…yeah.  We’ll deal with THAT text another day.

Today, our focus is the other version of creation, the one found in Genesis 1.  As we read just now, did you feel the rhythm of the passage?  God said, ‘Let there be’….  And there was.  And as soon as it was, God named it–sky, land, sea.  Then, “God saw that it was good.”  “There was evening and there was morning, the first day.”  “The second day.”  “The third day.”

The rhythm of the passage suggests it was written for a worship service.  It’s similar to what we do during prayer time when we say “God in your mercy, Hear our prayer.”  The rhythm of the response, the structure it creates helps us organize our prayers.  The structure also frees us to open our hearts, minds and souls to whatever God is doing in the moment.

That’s what we get in Genesis 1–we get a rhythm, a structure that helps us open our minds and hearts to what God is doing in the midst of creation.

So, what is God doing in the midst of creation?  In Genesis 1, how does God create?  You just played God in the reading a minute ago.  So, God, how did you create?

“God said…”  That’s God’s primary action in Genesis 1: speech.  “God said…”  It doesn’t say God created these things; it says, “God said, let there be light.” And there was light.  In Genesis 1, creation happens in response to a word spoken by God.

What’s the significance of telling the creation story in this way?  What’s the significance of God inviting creation to be through speech? 

Allen and I talk a lot in the car.  He drives most of the time.  I help in whatever ways I can, mostly through speech.  Like this past Friday.  Allen, kind soul that he is, was driving me to get some bloodwork done.  Fasting bloodwork.  No food.  No caffeinated beverages.  You get the picture.

So, we get to the traffic circle up here at College and Allen pulls into the circle at a point that was CLEARLY too soon.  I used my speech to inform him of this fact.

As Allen often does when I use my speech to offer helpful insights, he used his speech to explain that he had done a quick calculation and had ascertained that there was plenty of time to enter the traffic circle in complete safety for all concerned.  To which I replied:  “I haven’t had my coffee yet!  Please factor that into your driving!”

Let’s analyze this “speech event.”  Why did I speak?  First, I wanted to connect with my beloved spouse.  Once that connection was made, I hoped to communicate a specific intention to him.  I’m pretty sure I was successful on that point.

So, I wanted to connect with Allen and I wanted to communicate a specific intention to him.  In addition to connecting with him and sharing my intention with him, I confess that I also was hoping for Allen to respond in a specific way.  My way.   But we’ve been married a long time.  In that time I’ve learned that I can say whatever I like, I can hope for whatever response I want to hope for from my wonderful spouse, but at the end of the day, he’s going to respond how he responds.  So, in addition to my words helping me connect with Allen and revealing my intention to him, they also placed me in a vulnerable position—Allen could change his driving behavior.  Or not.

So, per this meticulous scientific study, we can conclude three things about speech.  Speech reveals, first, a desire to connect with the one addressed, second, the speaker’s intention, and, third, vulnerability on the part of the speaker.

Divine speech in the act of creation reveals the same things.  By speaking an invitation to creation, God reveals a desire to connect with something other than God’s self.  And when God says, “Let there be light,” God reveals God’s intention that light happen.  Notice that God doesn’t command light to be.  “Light–BE!”  No, God says “Let there be.”  God’s word comes not as command but as invitation.

By inviting light–or anything else—into being, the Creator creates room for creation to respond.  And if creation is free to respond, it is free to say yes or no.  Which means that, when God invites creation to be, God chooses to be vulnerable.  God’s got ideas about how creation will emerge…but if creation has other ideas, God’s best aims for creation will miss the mark.  If creation declines the invitation, God’s intention won’t be fulfilled.

But God’s God, right?  God can do anything!  So why in the world would God choose to be vulnerable?  Why would God create space for creation to say no?  Why would the divine creator depend on fallible creatures (which includes fallible human beings) to nurture creation into being?  Surely, there must have been a more efficient means of creating!

But maybe God’s point in inviting creation into being isn’t efficiency.  Maybe God speaks the invitation to creation because God wants to connect with something other than Godself.  Maybe God speaks the invitation to creation because God chooses no longer to be alone.  Maybe God speaks the invitation to creation because… that’s what love does.  Love doesn’t tell someone who they are or command them to be a certain way.  Love listens and creates space for the beloved to become their best selves.  As the lion Aslan says in the Chronicles of Narnia, “Creatures, I give you yourselves.”

Creation isn’t something God does TO us.  Creation is a dance God invites us to join.  God invites creation into being—“Let there be light”—then waits for creation to respond.  Once creation responds—“And there was light”—God responds to the response.  Creation isn’t a straight line trajectory.  Creation is a conversation between God and creation.  We—God and creation—create together.  And we do it out of love.

As we begin the season of creation today—which we’ll do every September—the insight we gain from God’s speech in Genesis 1 is the foundation for everything else that will come.  God wants to connect with creation, God has hopeful intentions for creation, but God will not force creation to become itself.  No matter what part of creation we’re looking at—humanity, the sky, mountains, or animals—God only invites us to become who God hopes we will become.

God invites, then waits for us to respond.  Looking at the state of creation these days, I suspect God is getting a little antsy waiting on us to respond.  By this point, God might even be tapping the divine foot.  Maybe God’s rethinking this whole thing of counting on us to respond.

Maybe…but I don’t think so.  Why would God choose to give creation a choice about becoming itself if not because God believes we can and trusts us to make the right choices?  And by “right,” I mean choices that will act creation into wellbeing, choices that will help all creation become who it is created to be?

We have so much more power than we know.  Our words have so much more power than we know.  God’s not the only one whose speech can invite creation to be who it is created to be.  Our speech can do that, too.  Our speech is powerful enough to nurture creation into being.  Of course, our speech also is powerful enough to kill creation.  And our silence.

I don’t know about you, but in the last two years, I’ve begun to doubt the power of my speech to do anything to help nurture creation.  Shortly after the current administration began its work, my U.S. representative back in Georgia introduced a bill to abolish the EPA.  I know legislators introduce all kinds of bills all the time.  But abolish the EPA?  Who could possibly think that was a good idea?

Apparently more people than just my representative.  This summer, we’ve seen the effects of climate change rachet up significantly—more and more intense wildfires, significant flooding across the globe, glaciers melting, more and more intense storms, rising oceans….  And how is our government responding to this alarming evidence of climate change?  By rolling back environmental standards that were kind of pitiful to begin with.  Anybody else feeling powerless?  And voiceless?

And yet, as Pete Seeger once sang, “God’s counting on me, God’s counting on you.”  That’s the message of Genesis 1 for us even today…especially today.  When it comes to acting creation into wellbeing, God’s counting on us to use our speech to invite creation to become who it is meant to become.

Sing:  We’ve got the whole world in our hands, we’ve got the whole world in our hands, we’ve got the whole world in our hands, we’ve got the whole world in our hands.

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for the wholeness of all creation.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  ©2018

Did you hear?  Back in May, 14-year-old Karthik Nemmani of McKinney, Texas won the Scripps National Spelling Bee.  His winning word?  Koinonia!  Koinonia wins!

Initially, I thought I’d share with you some of the other words spelled and missed in the final rounds of the spelling bee.  Wouldn’t that be great in an intro?  Unfortunately, the only word from the list I can pronounce is koinonia.  So, there you go.  Koinonia wins!

Koinonia.  It’s a Greek word that means “community.”  It’s the word used in Acts 2 that describes the church at its inception, the passage the children and I just looked at.

I find the description of intentional community fascinating.  All those people living together, getting along, staying in a general state of awe because of all the wonders and signs being birthed out of their togetherness?  It sounds like magic, doesn’t it?

Maybe it was growing up as an only child.  Large groups of people living together did seem magical to me.  I loved all those TV shows with lots of children in them….The Brady Bunch, Eight Is Enough, The Facts of Life, The Waltons.  So much love and togetherness.  The adults were always so wise.  And all conflicts were resolved in under an hour!  Magical.

It was in talking with one of my Catholic friends–the oldest of ten children–that I began to understand just how complicated having all those children in one family could be.  Binge-watching the Waltons a few years back, I noticed that in the first season, the children didn’t yet have strongly-defined individual characters.  In fact, for most of the season, they all kind of ran around in a pack.

That’s how I envisioned large families…as a pack of people running around, everyone having a similar personality.

Talking with my friend, though, hearing about her relationship with each of her siblings, of just how different from each other they were, it hit me.  They’re, like, individual, complete, autonomous human beings, each with his or her unique personality!  And all those diverse people were trying to live together under one roof.

Which begged the question:  How did such a large number of completely unique people live together?  And more important, How did they not kill each other in the process?

Those questions become even more pointed when considering communities of people who aren’t related.  With family, at least you have that blood-relation thing going on.  But in church?  Yikes.  How do we as a group of completely unique individuals live together?  And how do we not kill each other in the process?

Living in community is hard.  And with the advent of all things personal–i-thises and i-thats…I don’t see it getting easier.  Back in the day, people had to figure out how to live together in communities.  It was a matter of survival.  These days?  We can get by just fine without anyone’s help, especially those of us living in the middle class.  If we can meet all our own needs, why bother with trying to live in community with others?

The hardest part of community, I think, is compromise.  If we live in community, we have to give up some of our autonomy.  If we don’t do that, we’re just a bunch of individuals, each clamoring to get our own way.  Of course, wanting to get our own way is human nature.  And it’s certainly part of our current American cultural ethos.

Living in community is counter-cultural.  What we do here each week is counter-cultural.  Choosing to live in community, to work together for the common good, to act each other into wellbeing…That happens in very few other places in our culture these days.  Maybe 12 steps groups.

So why do it?  Why choose to be part of a community?  Why choose to rein in some of our autonomy for the sake of a larger group of people, some of whom–let me just say it–we don’t really like?  The rate at which people are opting out of organized religion continues to skyrocket.  We don’t have to do this.  We can get by just fine without doing this.  So why do it?

We do it because, as it’s described in the Acts 2 passage, something wondrous and awe-inspiring happens when we are together.  There’s something about choosing to live our lives together, there’s something about intentionally working at being community, there’s something about koinonia, k-o-i-n-o-n-i-a, koinonia that helps us encounter the divine.

As wondrous and awe-inspiring as the passage in Acts 2 sounds, that era of good feeling didn’t last long.  Later in Acts, sharp tensions between Paul and Peter lead to a heated church business meeting.  Of course.  And in nearly every one of Paul’s letters included in the New Testament, we see over and over just how conflicted the new church communities were.  The honeymoon was great while it lasted.

But honeymoons don’t last forever.  At some point, you have to consciously decide to commit to the marriage…even after you’ve seen what each other looks like in the morning.  Yeah…relationships that work when things are all sweetness and light…that feels really good.  But the real joy comes when we’re able to love each other and help each other and be together in covenant relationship even after we’ve seen each other’s less-than-pretty sides.

But sometimes, when we show our less-than-pretty-sides, we need help working things through.  Which is where passages like Paul’s words from Ephesians come in.

I have—maybe you can relate—I’ve spent a lot of my life being mad at the Apostle Paul.   Theologically, he and I often are in different places.  And all those statements about women?  Yeah.  I boycotted Paul’s epistles for the better part of a decade after seminary.

The longer I pastor, though, the more I’m drawn to Paul.  You read through many of his letters and you see that most of them can be boiled down to this:  “Be nice to each other!”  Twenty years into my own work of ministry, I hear in Paul’s letters frustration, yes, but a frustration born out of a pastor’s deep love for his people.

Our theme this summer is radical hospitality.  We’ve talked about extending hospitality to others outside this community.  Last week in Sunday School we talked about extending hospitality to ourselves.

Paul’s words to the church at Ephesus serve as a primer on how to extend hospitality to each other within the community.  Good words to guide us as we get me installed this afternoon.

As our honeymoon is winding down here at FCUCC, as we begin settling into the hard–and joyous–everyday work of being community, as we seek to extend hospitality to each other, hear again these words of Paul:

Let us then be children no longer, tossed here and there, carried about by every wind of doctrine, or by human trickery or crafty, deceitful schemes.  Rather, let us speak the truth in love, and grow to the full maturity of Christ, the head.  Through Christ, the whole body grows.  With the proper functioning of each member, firmly joined together by each supporting ligament, the body builds itself up in love.

Therefore, let’s have no more lies.  Speak truthfully to each other, for we are all members of one body.  When you get angry, don’t let it become a sin.  Don’t let the sun set on your anger, or you will give an opening to evil.

You who have been stealing, stop stealing. Go to work.  Do something useful with your hands, so you can have something to share with the needy.   Be on your guard against foul talk.  Say only what will build others up at that moment.  Say only what will give grace to your listeners.  Don’t grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Get rid of all bitterness, all rage and anger, all harsh words, slander and malice of every kind.  In place of these, be kind to one another, compassionate and mutually forgiving, just as God has forgiven you in Christ. Try, then, to imitate God as beloved children.  Walk in love as Christ loved us, and offered himself in sacrifice to God for us, a gift of pleasing fragrance.

So, here’s my erudite commentary on the passage:  Yeah.  Do that.

Or do what Pastor Nadia Bolz Weber suggests to new members when they join the church she pastors in Colorado.  She assures them that the church “community will disappoint them.  It’s a matter of when, not if.  We will let them down or I [as pastor] will say something stupid and hurt their feelings.  I then invite them on this side of their inevitable disappointment to decide if they’ll stick around after it happens.  If they choose to leave when we don’t meet their expectations, they won’t get to see how the grace of God can come in and fill the holes left by our community’s failure, and that’s just too beautiful and too real to miss.”

Oh yes.  Honeymoons are euphoric…and oh so much fun.  It is wonderful to bask in that euphoria for a time.  And parties like the one this afternoon are important, and necessary.  But what happens AFTER the party, after the bags from the honeymoon trip have been unpacked is even more crucial and, in the end, more rewarding.

If we continue extending hospitality to each other, if we continue to working hard at building this community, if we continue acting each other into wellbeing and—together—acting the world into wellbeing…If we do these things, I feel certain that, once again, here at First Congregational, koinonia, k-o-i-n-o-n-i-a, koinonia will win.  Koinonia wins!

In the name of our God, who creates us, redeems us, sustains us, and hopes for our wholeness.  Amen.

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2018