reallifepastor

Let’s talk about moral courage.  

The term came to me when I learned of former President George W. Bush’s book, Portraits of Courage.  The book contains portraits and brief bios of soldiers wounded in armed conflicts Mr. Bush was responsible for during his presidency.  The portraits were painted by Mr. Bush.

I confess that I was not a fan of Mr. Bush’s when he was president.  But Portraits of Courage has floored me.  I’m sure all presidents give serious thought to the devastating effects of war on service men and women before ordering engagement.  But how many take the time to sit with those adversely affected by the war they approved, paint their portraits, then contribute all proceeds for the book to those most directly affected by their decisions to go to war?

I’m still making my way through Mr. Bush’s book. I look forward to becoming better acquainted with the courageous Americans represented in it.

Today, though, in the wake of our current president’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement, it’s former President Bush’s courage that most inspires me.

Moral courage.  Recognizing that my actions affect other people.  Having the strength of character to take responsibility for those actions. Doing my best to make reparations for harm done by my actions.  The moral courage of individuals is commendable.  To apply that courage to national and international arenas?  That’s what it means to be a good leader. That’s what it means to be a good human being.

Yesterday’s decision to pull the United States out of the Paris Climate Agreement was an act of moral cowardice.  

The current president’s concern for the livelihoods of some Americans is commendable.  But when that concern is divorced from any acknowledgement of the devastating impact of our country’s profligate use of fossil fuels across the globe, that concern rings hollow.  

Though China’s growth spurt the last couple of decades has moved it to the front of the line in carbon emissions currently, cumulatively, the United States has been the single greatest contributor of carbon emissions in the world’s history.  And who most suffers the effects of our conspicuous consumption?  Poor people across the globe.

Withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement was a cowardly abdication of moral responsibility.  By many accountants, the Paris Agreement only began to scratch the surface of what the planet really needs to begin its process of healing.  So much more needs to be done.  But to get nearly 200 countries to sign on to the agreement?  For 147 of those countries already to have ratified it?  The Paris Agreement reflects a near-global conversion to the reality that if our planet is to be saved, we must work together.  

I weep at the loss of all we as a nation might have contributed to that work.

My second year as your pastor, I got this feedback:  “We talk too much about spirituality.”  The statement fascinated me and has stayed with me.  Every so often, I pull it out and reflect on it.  Do we talk too much about spirituality?  We’re a church, a community.  Is there such a thing as a communal spirituality?  Or is spirituality more individual—You have yours, I have mine, and it’s probably best that we not discuss the differences?  J

Today we begin our Summer Theme:  “Building a Stronger Community.”  Between now and the end of August, we’ll look at four areas of our life together and imagine ways we might strengthen each area.  The four areas mirror some of the areas we explored week before last at the CREDO conference I attended in New Hampshire.

CREDO is a program developed by the Episcopal Church to increase the health of its clergy.  The thinking is that healthy clergy lead to healthy congregations.  After 15 years of the program, that connection has proven strong and true.

The UCC Pension Board began exploring using the model 5 years ago.  I was in the fourth group they’ve taken through the program.  I’ve participated in a lot of Continuing Ed experiences.  None has been as practical or energizing as CREDO.  That’s due, in part, to the holistic approach the program takes.  Most other continuing ed events focus only on one part of a clergy person’s life.  CREDO invites us to reflect deeply on each major aspect of our life and then to take note of how each area influences the others.

The five areas of wellness CREDO focuses on are: spiritual, vocational, mental and physical, fiscal, and relational.  For each area, we had a fair amount of homework beforehand.  At the conference, we had plenary sessions, workshops, small group conversations, and one-on-one consultations with faculty members.  By week’s end, each of us had written a CREDO covenant….think of it as an IEP for clergy.

As I prepared for CREDO, I also was thinking about our life together as a congregation.  Few things invite a community to reflect on who it is, its core values, and vision of the future like a proposed building project.  Our Growth Planning Team has been working hard the last year to come up with a plan for upgrading our current facility and replacing the Next Generation House, and doing so in a way that honors our core values and our hopes for the future.  (I heard you all had some good conversation at the Town Hall Meeting last week.  Many thanks to Bill and the Growth Planning Team for their good work on that.)

Drawing from the areas addressed by CREDO, this plan for the summer emerged.  I suspect that looking at the areas of spirituality, vocation, financial and physical/facility health will help us get even clearer about who we are and where we’re headed.  I also think, as decisions about our facility loom, attending to these areas of our life together will guide us in making the decisions that align most closely with our core values and mission as a community of Jesus’ followers.  The other thing it will do is help us to see how all the areas are connected.  What is the relationship between our spirituality and our financial life?  How is our vocational life–our core values and mission–connected with our facility?

So. Does our community have a spiritual life?  I’d love us to spend time reflecting on that question together.  For now, I invite us to focus on today’s readings from the Gospel of John.

Both passages come from what biblical scholars call Jesus’ “Farewell Discourse.”  The setting for the discourse is the Last Supper.  It’s like the last day of class for college professors—trying to cram in everything that didn’t get covered during the semester.

After speaking directly to the disciples in chapters 14-16, in John 17, Jesus directs his words to God, in hopes, no doubt, that the disciples will “overhear.”  The prayer begins with Jesus acknowledging that the work God had given to him to do has been completed.

Now that Jesus’ work has been completed, he’s handing the torch to the disciples.  If Jesus’ task was to show people God, now that task falls to the disciples.  He prays:  “I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. ⁷Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; ⁸for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. ⁹I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. ¹⁰All mine are yours, and yours are mine.”

As he prepares for his death, Jesus prays:  “Now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world. Abba God, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.”

If you look at the UCC logo, you’ll see those words.  “That they may all be one.”  I’d always thought that was included to remind people not to fight so much with each other.  Now I realize that Jesus’ words go much deeper than simply, “Let’s everybody get along, okay?”

In this prayer, Jesus is inviting his followers into the deepest kind of relationship with him and with God.  He’s not talking about one-ness of ideas.  He’s talking about a oneness that comes through deep and abiding relationship with our Abba God and with our brother Jesus.   The source of our oneness isn’t doctrine or dogma or even consensus.  The source of our oneness is our relationship with God through Jesus.  Certainly, each of us has our own personal relationship with God.  And something about our individual relationships with God has brought us here to this community.  So, while each of us is on our own spiritual journey, all of us together, as a community, as Pilgrimage United Church of Christ—our congregation is on a spiritual journey, too.  As a community, we have a relationship with God.  As a community, we discover God in our midst.  As a community, we seek to share God’s love beyond these walls.  As a community, we take the time, and the quiet, and the discernment to listen for and respond to the still-speaking God.

How is all this talk about spirituality feeling to you?  Are you feeling more comfortable that you’ve ever felt?  Or decidedly UN-comfortable?

During our Lenten Bible Study, we spent some time talking about the Holy Spirit.  A couple of folks found it very natural to talk about the moving of the Holy Spirit in their lives.  A couple of others found the language a bit confounding…. Until those who had felt the Holy Spirit started talking about those experiences.

As one person described their experiences with God’s Spirit as a palpable presence, a profound sense of wholeness, of being who God created them to be, of a sense of peace in decidedly un-peaceful circumstances, the eyes of one of the people who’d been confused lit up…and filled with tears—“Oh!  It’s like when I visit people on the oncology ward at the hospital.  I feel something present with me.  I’m able to be with those people who, many of them, are in so much pain.”  Yes.  Exactly.

As I’ve reflected on that person’s epiphany, I’ve begun to wonder if it’s not so much that we’ve never had experiences of the Holy Spirit, but that we just haven’t had a name for those experiences.  If the sign of the Spirit’s presence with us is a sense of oneness like the one Jesus’ describes in his prayer, a oneness the grows out of feeling deeply connected to God, to Jesus, and to each other….Would you say we’ve had experiences of the Holy Spirit?  What are some of those experiences?  (Responses)

The mosaic cross, I think, is a great example of a communal experience of God’s Spirit.  It began by paying attention not only to the season of the church year—Lent, that time when we reflect on Jesus’ journey to the cross—but also by paying attention to an aspect of our worship space that has come to have great meaning for us—our stained glass windows.

I took the bare-bones idea of a mosaic cross to Jaime Fulsang, who took the ideas further.  We took those ideas to Bill Dischinger who created the acrylic cross.  He got in cahoots with Ric Reitz on the design and lighting.  The whole community became involved in gluing the glass onto the cross…each piece representing a deep connection to Jesus’ and others’ suffering.  Then Chris Shiver brought his engraver to the process.

And then that fateful Palm Sunday when I invited you all to fill in all the spaces and Ric Reitz raised his hand.  “Don’t we believe in the still-speaking God?  Shouldn’t we leave empty spaces for others to bring their brokenness to the cross?”

The process of creating this cross….it was a holy experience from beginning to end.  I’m not sure I’ve ever felt us so together—so at one—as a community.  Each of us came to the cross in the context of our individual relationships with God, and as we patiently waited our turn with glue and glass, our individual spiritual journeys somehow merged into a communal spiritual event.  We became one with God through our brother Jesus.  We became one with each other.

As powerful an experience as creating the mosaic cross together was, many have joined the community since then…people who do not share that particular experience of the Holy.  We’ve heard stories today of other times when we, as a community, have experienced the Holy.  How might we prepare ourselves for more experiences like those?

It’s been another eventful week.  Anybody else having trouble keeping up with the news cycle?  Tension among the various branches of government.  The specter of armed conflict looming over several places around the globe.  Four African and Middle Eastern countries on the brink of famine due, not to food production issues, but to war.  People we know and love living in fear of being deported.  Constant questions about healthcare coverage and the viability of social security.  Worries that gains made in legal rights for LGBTQ folks might be rolled back.  Worries about what will happen to the environment.

Just for fun, take a minute and write down one issue that you’re concerned about right now.  It might be something I mentioned or something else.

If, after hearing that litany, Jesus were here and tried to tell us what he told his disciples at the last supper:  “Don’t let your hearts be troubled,” I think I would groan or throw up my hands or ask, “What you talkin’ ‘bout Jesus?”  If he posted it on Facebook, it would be an un-friend-able offense.  If in these circumstances, Jesus were to tell us to “not let our hearts be troubled,” I would think he wasn’t in touch with reality and that the brand of faith he was selling was too superficial to do any good.  “Come to the church of ‘Don’t Worry, Be Happy!’”

But Jesus is Jesus, not Bobby McFerrin (although Bobby McFerrin is very cool J).  And this story comes from the Gospel of John and everywhere else in the Gospel of John, Jesus is way deep…so let’s look for a minute at the context in which Jesus tells his disciples not to let their hearts be troubled.  Maybe there’s more to it than first meets the eye.

Today’s passage introduces Jesus’ last “lecture” to the disciples before his arrest and death.  It happens as they’re celebrating the Seder meal, after Jesus has washed the disciples’ feet.  It caps off a tumultuous week that had run the gamut from cheering crowds to nasty encounters with religious authorities to death threats.  Times were tense.  The Roman government was oppressive, especially to those on the margins, as were Jesus, his disciples, and all the people flocking to hear Jesus.  Feeling threatened, the religious authorities were doubling down on their rigid interpretations of religious law.

So, maybe the circumstances the disciples found themselves in the night before Jesus died were similar to what we’re experiencing.  Perhaps they were living in times that were just as chaotic and troubling as the times in which we’re living.  Probably moreso.

I wonder if, in those circumstances, any gathered around the table that night found Jesus’ words helpful?   The religious authorities are breathing down our necks– “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”  We’re being exploited by an oppressive government– “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”  The least of these are being thrown under the bus– “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”  I am about to be killed– “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”

Let’s see how they respond to Jesus’ statement.  “Don’t let your hearts be troubled.  You have faith in God; have faith in me as well.  In God’s house there are many dwelling places; otherwise, how could I have told you that I was going to prepare a place for you?  I am indeed going to prepare a place for you, and then I will come back to take you with me, that where I am there you may be as well.  You know the way that leads to where I am going.’”

Okay.  Here’s our first response from a disciple.  It’s Thomas.  Of course.  ‘But we don’t know where you’re going, Jesus.  How can we know the way?’  Singer Susan Werner was right.  Tom is the grooviest apostle of all. 🙂  He asks the question everybody else had but were afraid to ask.  Jesus responds:  “I myself am the Way–I am Truth, and I am Life.  No one comes to Abba God but through me.  If you really knew me, you would know Abba God also.  From this point on, you know Abba God and you have seen God.”

Does that clear things up for the disciples?  Apparently not.  This time, it’s Philip who responds.  “Rabbi, show us Abba God, and that will be enough for us.’

At this point, Jesus gets a little testy.  He asks Philip:  ‘Have I been with you all this time, and still you don’t know me?  Whoever has seen me has seen Abba God.  How can you say, ‘Show us your Abba?’  Don’t you believe that I am in Abba God and God is in me?  The words I speak are not spoken of myself; it is Abba God, living in me, who is accomplishing the works of God.  Believe me that I am in God and God is in me, or else believe because of the works I do.  The truth of the matter is, anyone who has faith in me will do the works I do–and greater works besides.  Why?  Because I go to Abba God, and whatever you ask in my name I will do, so that God may be glorified in me.  Anything you ask in my name I will do.”

So, it’s the last day of class.  You’ve been teaching for all you’re worth for three years.  “I and Abba God are one.”  “If you see me, you’ve seen God.”  “If you believe in me, you believe in God.  If you believe in God, you’ll believe in me.”  You’ve been saying these things over and over, a thousand different ways, trying to get these important lessons to stick in the minds of your students.  You arrive at the last day of class thinking, “Ah! They’ve finally got it!  Today I get to see the fruit of all this work I’ve done teaching this class.”

Then one student asks a question, then another…and you get this sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach–They haven’t gotten any of it.  They’ve missed the whole point of what you’ve been trying to teach them.  The class is all but over, you’re moving to a new school, they’re moving to a new school, a school where your students are going to fail because they haven’t learned a thing you’ve taught them.

“Have I been with you all this time and still you don’t know me?  Whoever has seen me has seen Abba God.  Don’t you believe that I am in Abba God and God is in me?  The words I speak are not spoken of myself; it is Abba God, living in me, who is accomplishing the works of God.”  “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”

I don’t know about you, but sometimes when I consider everything that’s going on in the world and in our country, I get overwhelmed, terrified…hopeless.  In the context of everything that’s happening, it’s easy to forget about faith.  And when the promises of faith do come to mind, they seem a paltry—laughable—response to any of the issues we’re facing.

Healthcare.  The environment.  Discrimination for LGBTQ folks.  Rampant racism.  Mass incarceration.  Sexism.  Heterosexism.  The dwindling repute of truth.  Famine.  War.  Cyber-war.  The possibility of nuclear war.  Terrorism.  Exploitation of the vulnerable.  The rapidly widening gap between rich and poor.

I’m going to stop.  This list is getting depressing…especially because the problems seem too big for faith.  I mean, seriously.  How can being a follower of Jesus make any difference to any of these issues?

But…maybe it’s not that the problems we face are too big.  Maybe the problem is that our faith is too small.  Or too superficial.  Or too disconnected from the one we say we follow.

Remember that “What Would Jesus Do?” fad a few years ago?  WWJD?  If that was helpful for you, I am grateful.  Anything that helps us reflect on our faith can be meaningful.  I confess, though, that I was kind of annoyed by the whole thing.  And then, of course, I felt guilty for feeling annoyed…because being a follower of Jesus means doing the things Jesus did, right?

But it just seemed like there wasn’t a lot of thought that went into figuring out what Jesus would do in any given instance…Like, Jesus wouldn’t cut someone off in traffic…or Jesus would share his ice cream with his sister…or Jesus would take out the trash…

Maybe it wasn’t so much the question itself I found annoying.  Maybe what concerned me was the instantaneous answers people always seemed to find.  Figuring out what Jesus would do in any context….Man, that takes a lot of work.  First, you have to learn something about the historical and political context of 1^st century Palestine.  Then you have to look at the literary context in which Jesus’ stories are told.  He does different things, acts in different ways in each of the Gospels.  Then you have to do some deep theological reflection…Everything that’s recorded in the Gospels Jesus did before the resurrection.  Any issues we might face are happening after the resurrection.  What difference might that make?

And once we’ve analyzed the historical, political, and theological contexts of Jesus, we have to analyze our own historical, political, and theological contexts.  And then we have to become poets.  By that, I mean that once the analytical work is completed, the metaphorical work begins.  The life of faith is a life of imagination.  As followers of Jesus, we are called, not to obey a set of rules, but to experience community and Jesus and Scripture then imagine how to live as people of Christian faith in the 21^st century.

Let’s try it.  Think about the issue you wrote down a minute ago.  What are the societal issues?  What are the political or economic issues?  What are the spiritual issues?  Now think about Jesus, you might want to think of a particular story of Jesus.  What was going on in his historical/political/spiritual world?  What was he trying to accomplish in the 1^st century?

Now.  In your imagination, put the two contexts together.  See what emerges.  And when whatever it is emerges, get to work acting the world or the person into wellbeing.  That’s what it means to follow Jesus in the 21^st century.  That’s how to reduce our stress level and increase our hopefulness.  That is what it will take to soothe our troubled hearts.

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

Kimberleigh Buchanan  ©2017

A few months ago, in the middle of a sermon, I got an idea for our Summer Theme.  At the time, I told you I had the idea, but not what it was.  Today is the day….to tell you that that’s not the theme we’re going with.  It was a great theme…but the Spirit had other ideas.

The first theme was–hospitality.  Hospitality–welcoming others, all others–has been part of this congregation’s life from the beginning.  It’s part of our DNA.  It’s a key reason that becoming ONA 20 years ago made so much sense.  Of course, we’ll welcome all people, no matter their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Hospitality would have been a good theme, but the process of deciding what to do about the Next Generation House has led to a different one.  Building projects always call on communities to reassess who they are, where they are on their life’s journey together, and where they feel God is leading them in the future.  What we decide about how to replace the Next Generation House and how to deal with all the long-overdue maintenance items in this building will say a lot about who we see ourselves becoming and about where we sense God is leading us as a community.  So, who are we becoming?  How do we figure out where God is leading us?

Three things will help us figure some of this out.  The first is a congregation-wide visioning process.  The planning team for that met yesterday.  You’ll be hearing more about it very soon.  Based on what we’re reading, I think it’s going to be a boatload of fun…and it’s something we’ll do together as a congregation.  Stay tuned.

A second guide for our discernment will be our worship services this summer.  Are you ready to hear the summer theme?  I’m almost ready to share it!  J

First, let me tell you about CREDO.  A week from Tuesday, I’ll fly to New Hampshire for a CREDO conference.  CREDO is a program for mid-career clergy.  In a week’s time, clergy in their early 50s assess their spiritual, vocational, financial, and health lives so they can live the last half of their ministry with intentionality.  Last Fall, I received an invitation from the UCC Pension Board to participate.  It’s part of the denomination’s ongoing support for its congregations by ensuring that clergy are as healthy as they can be.

As I’ve been filling out pre-conference paperwork, it’s struck me that our Pilgrimage community also might benefit from the kind of reflection CREDO invites.  Next year, Pilgrimage will celebrate its 40th anniversary.  We can debate whether or not that’s “middle aged,” but 40 is a great time to assess where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re headed in the future.  As we seek to live into the next phase of our community’s life, we too will benefit from reflecting on our where we are spiritually, vocationally, financially, and physically (aka our facility).  You know what else will happen?  We’ll grow stronger as a community.  How could we not?  Hence, our summer theme: “Building a Stronger Community.”

In your bulletins you’ll find a summer worship schedule.  I don’t usually share this, but this is how I do long range worship planning.  It helps me to see on one page the overall arc of worship for a season.  Planning worship is so much fun!

It’s so much fun, I want to invite you to share in the fun this summer. 🙂  The main thing I want you to see right now is the four sections.  (They’re color-coded.)  Three Sundays for each section:  our community’s spiritual life, vocational life, financial life, and facility life.  If one of those topics interests you and you’d like to help plan worship services or other activities that will help us to engage the topic, let me know.

As we reflect together about who we are, where we are, and where we’re headed as a community of Jesus’ followers, as we reflect on our community’s spiritual, vocational, financial, and facility lives and ask God’s guidance on how to strengthen all four, one Scripture text will guide us—today’s lesson from Acts 2.  That’s the third thing that will help us.

The story thus far—Jesus did his thing, teaching, preaching, showing people God’s hopes for the world…which, as you’ll recall, got him killed.  Then God raised him from the dead, Jesus spent more time with his followers, then—as we read in Acts 1—Jesus left the scene for good.

Unsure of what to do, the 11 remaining disciples turn to administrative matters—they find a replacement for Judas, voting on Matthias to join their ranks.

Shortly after that, God’s spirit shows up.  And how!  All along, Jesus has been promising his followers the gift of the Holy Spirit.  On the day of Pentecost, the gift arrives!  God’s Spirit swoops in like a mighty wind, bestows the gift of tongues, and literally lights a fire in the community.  It’s little wonder that 3,000 people joined the Jesus movement that day.

At Pentecost, there’s a fundamental shift.  Before Pentecost, Jesus’ followers had focused solely on Jesus.  But as they open themselves to the moving of God’s Spirit at Pentecost, they begin opening themselves to each other.  They come alive!  It’s like they suddenly can see the power of their togetherness.  That revelation leads to what we discover in today’s text from Acts.

The first verse describes the practices in which the community was engaging; the rest of the passage describes what resulted from those practices.  What were those post-Pentecost followers of Jesus’ doing?  Verse 42:  They were “devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”

And what resulted from the community devoting themselves to study and fellowship, to eating and praying together?  Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles. ⁴⁴All who believed were together and had all things in common; ⁴⁵they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. ⁴⁶Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, ⁴⁷praising God and having the goodwill of all the people.  And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

These few verses of Scripture are so densely packed with insight and instruction for living as a community of Jesus’ followers, we’re going to use them to guide our reflections through the entire summer.  We’ll look at other passages, too, but we’ll always go back to this one…Which means we won’t try to unpack the whole thing today.

The part I do want to point out is the last sentence:  “And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.”  That last line always blows my mind.  All the community did was study together, and fellowship, and eat, and pray together.  It doesn’t say they had some big outreach program…not that there’s anything wrong with that.  It doesn’t say they engaged a marketing guru…not that there’s anything wrong with that.  It doesn’t say they went out into the community to serve others…not that there’s anything wrong with that.

All it says is that the community studied, fellowshipped, ate, and prayed together… “and day by day God added to their number…”  The community tended well to their life as a community of Jesus’ followers…and the life they found—rooted in the moving of God’s Spirit—is what drew others to the community.

As I reflected on what to say to you all today about community, I read a devotion by Trudy Stoddert that blew me away.  It goes to the heart of what makes a community strong.

“Community. That’s what we’ve been hearing about in Kim’s sermons for some time now. And it’s for good reason. There are tons of references to community in the bible. Even Jesus knew the importance of community. He didn’t just go around by himself teaching folks about God. He brought his posse with him, knowing that spending time with them would help keep his fire burning, would help give him strength to keep on spreading the Good Word, and to keep going when times got tough. He was leading us by example in this regard.

“We need community to keep our fires burning, too. Community feeds our soul in so many ways.  Not only does community make us glad…glad to see our friends and to have fun with them, it also helps us when things seem overwhelming. When thinking about living our life as the best Christian we can be, helping those less fortunate than us, helping those struggling in this world, it seems like it is just too much. It’s too big a task for us to take on ourselves. How can we ever make a difference in the world? But when we come together with the same purpose, we can do so much to make a difference, each of us doing our small part. Then when we step back and see what we have done as a community, it is not so overwhelming anymore.

“Community also helps us see the light that we sometimes lose sight of.  When we’re struggling with our faith or our happiness, engaging with our community can help us stave off the doubt or the unhappiness. Through our community, we can see our God working, hear our God speaking, feel our God loving. Simply spending time with others or coming together with others to make a difference in the world can work wonders to cast away our doubt and our unhappiness. When we need to hear from God, we may just need to look to our community to hear or see the answer.”

Through our community, we see God working, hear God speaking, feel God loving.  Through community, we grow stronger in faith and good works.  Through community, we act each other and the world into wellbeing.  Through community we meet God.  Through community, so many good and positive and necessary things happen.  What say we work together this summer to make this community just as strong as it can be?

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

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2017

We are an Easter people!  I mean, we must be.  Everybody’s here!  Some of you have bought new clothes or dressed up.  (Your sacrifice is duly noted.  🙂  The choir–God bless them–is singing at both services.  Here’s the real proof we’re an Easter people–the Parish Life Team has been working for weeks on an Egg Hunt that will be completed in 27 seconds flat.  See what I mean?  We take this Easter business seriously!  Because we are an Easter people!  We are an Easter people!

We are an ….Does anybody know what it means to be an Easter people?  Did anybody Google that before you came this morning?  I’m starting to wish I had.

Just kidding.  Why Google when you can Gospel?  Let’s look at today’s Gospel story and see what the original Easter people—Mary, Peter, and the disciple Jesus loved—can teach us.

Mary goes to the tomb early Sunday morning.  We aren’t told why she goes.  Maybe it’s to mourn.  Maybe it’s to prepare Jesus’ body for burial.  Maybe it’s because she doesn’t know what else to do.  Whatever the reason, we do know this:  Mary believed that Jesus was dead.  Why else visit a tomb?  As devastating as the events of the previous week had been, Mary didn’t try to gloss over what had happened.  She knew that Jesus had died.

How tempting it is sometimes to gloss over reality…to turn our heads when an obviously hungry person asks for money…to change the channel when the news reports yet another mass shooting or terrorist attack…to avoid sections of the paper that detail famine in African nations, or child sex-trafficking in Atlanta, or the plight of millions of refugees worldwide.

But Mary shows us that Easter people don’t ignore or gloss over reality.  Easter people look at the world as it really is.  They see the pain.  They see the suffering.  They see the death.  They are present to it.  They sit vigil with it.  They do not turn away from it….

…and they are affected by it.  Later, when Mary returns to the tomb, she stands outside it weeping.  Not only has Mary looked at reality with her eyes wide open, not only has she seen the pain, suffering, and death…she also has allowed herself to be affected by what she sees.

Whenever we look at pain, suffering, and death in the world—the little Syrian boy covered in dust and blood, buckled into the seat on the cargo plane, staring ahead, dazed; the skeletal figures of people starving in South Sudan; the stories of our Muslim friends who live in fear of exclusion or violence—whenever we look at pain, suffering, and death in the world and allow ourselves to be affected by it, we, like Mary, are Easter people.

What does Peter show us about being Easter people?  Ah, Peter.  He who speaks before he thinks, he of the good intention and the spotty follow-through, Peter–who tries to follow Jesus, but often fails….the one thing Peter is not is reticent.  Everything Peter does he does with 110% effort– whether it’s declaring Jesus to be the Messiah or denying him with an oath, Peter acts with decisiveness.

On that first Easter morning, Peter is true to form.  The minute he hears Mary’s news, he drops what he’s doing and heads for the empty tomb.  The other disciple gets there first, but stops at the entrance.  Peter, though slower than the other guy–If he’d had a Seder meal on Maundy Thursday like the Seder meal we had this past Maundy Thursday, I’d be sluggish, too.  J  Anyway, the other guy is faster, but doesn’t go in.  Peter doesn’t hesitate.  Peter doesn’t tiptoe around the resurrection.  He doesn’t lurk around the edges of it, like the other disciple does.  Peter plows right in and faces resurrection head-on.

Let me be clear.  Peter doesn’t have a clue what it means.  John tells us… “for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that Jesus must rise from the dead.”   Doesn’t matter.  Even clueless, Peter is fearless in facing the resurrection.

Friday night, I had the best Good Friday ever!  The youth let me hang out with them at Wayne’s house to watch a movie about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection.  In the discussion after the movie, someone asked:  “So, Pastor Kim, what really happened to Jesus’ body?  I mean, yeah.  Okay.  Jesus’ spirit was raised, but wouldn’t his body still be there?”  You want to know what I said?  I said what I always say:  “I don’t know.  What do you think?”

Getting the bodily resurrection of Jesus figured out with our 21^st century scientific brains is a losing cause.  But Peter’s rush into the empty tomb shows us that understanding resurrection and facing it are two different things.  Something happened after Jesus died; there are too many accounts of his appearing to disciples after his death to ignore them.  Resurrection is a key part of our Christian story.  It’s the reason billions of people have come to faith over the last 2,000 years.  If we’re going to be followers of Jesus, we’ve got to deal with the resurrection, whether we understand it or not.  That’s what Peter teaches us about being Easter people.

So, from Mary we learn that Easter people have a clear-eyed view of reality and that we are affected by the pain, suffering, and death we see in the world.  From Peter we learn that Easter people face resurrection head on, even when we don’t understand it.  What might the disciple whom Jesus loved teach us about being Easter people?

First, a word about this disciple’s name.  Tradition identifies it as John, one of the 12, who possibly wrote the Gospel of John.  Though it would have significantly reduced his word count to write “I,” the author seems to be making a point by referring to himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”  It’s probably not that Jesus loved him and no one else, like the refrigerator magnet someone gave me that says, “Jesus loves everyone, but I’m his favorite.”  No, it’s more like the disciple is still trying to wrap his mind around the fact that Jesus loved him….that Jesus loved him.  Many of you have told me how important it is to hear the words every week “that God has loved you, loves you now, and will always love you.”  Calling himself “the disciple whom Jesus loved”–It’s like that.  (I wonder what might happen if we all changed our name tags to read, “the disciple whom Jesus loves?”)

What might the disciple Jesus loved teach us about being Easter people?  Just as passionate as Peter, the disciple runs to the empty tomb when he hears Mary’s news…but unlike Peter, he stops at the door.  After Peter plows in, the other disciple follows.  As soon as he enters and sees Jesus’ death shroud lying there, the disciple Jesus loved believes.  Despite the fact that he “did not yet understand that Jesus must rise from the dead,” he believes in resurrection.  He doesn’t understand it, but he believes in it.

So, are we an Easter people?  If like Mary, we have a clear-eyed view of reality and allow ourselves to be affected by the pain, suffering, and death we see in the world, then yes, we are an Easter people.  If, like Peter, we face the resurrection head-on, even without understanding it, then yes, we are an Easter people.  If, like the disciple whom Jesus loved, we believe in resurrection, even without understanding it, then yes, we are an Easter people.

Looking at what’s happening in the world around us…sometimes I think believing in the bodily resurrection of Jesus 2000 years ago is easier than believing in resurrection and new life today.  There is so much pain, so much suffering, so much death.  Hope often eludes us.

But if we are to be Easter people, we will cling to hope.  As an Easter people, even in the midst of death, we will believe in the life that is waiting to emerge from that death.  As Easter people, we’ll believe in resurrection, even when we don’t see how it could possibly happen.  That’s what we’ve learned from Mary, Peter, and the disciple Jesus loved.  I’ve got one more story to tell about more Easter person–Claudio.

Pastor Heidi Neumark and her husband Gregorio, traveled to Gregorio’s native Argentina to visit his 12 siblings and myriad other family members.  It was a long trip.

After visits to the homes of several relatives, Heidi and Gregorio traveled to nephew Hugo’s house, where they had been promised a surprise.  The surprise turned out to be Hugo’s brother, Claudio.

When Heidi and Gregorio arrived, they found Claudio immersed in the clutch of his loving family—happy recipient of hugs and kisses and abundant food and drink.

Why the special treatment?  Claudio was nearing the end of a prison sentence for a murder he’d committed when he was 20.  “In Argentina, an inmate in his final year of prison gets to go home on monthly visits.  The first visit is for 12 hours, the second for 36, and the next for 48.  Claudio had scheduled his two-day visit to coincide with Heidi and Gregorio’s visit.”

As she looked around at those gathered, Pastor Heidi said it looked like the group had “emerged straight from a parable of Jesus.  Two people were missing eyes, one due to a fight and one due to untreated diabetes.  One person needed a cane to walk, while another sat in a rickety, homemade wheelchair.  They were seated at the table with ‘the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind,’ and the burnished place of honor belonged to Claudio.”

Pastor Heidi notes that “prison has changed Claudio.  He is no longer the cheerful, outgoing, funny boy [she remembers] from a previous visit.  He’s withdrawn and traumatized—so the family told [her] as they lavished him with love.  When [she] asked Claudio about his experience inside, he didn’t want to discuss it.  ‘I’m surviving,’ was all he said.  And then, lifting up his downcast eyes, looking at the people around him, he said, ‘This is what matters.’”  (Chr. Cent., 4/12/17)

Even as he experiences pain and suffering and death…even though he might not understand it…even in the midst of the harshest of circumstances… Claudio clings to hope, he nurtures life even in the midst of death, he receives the love lavished on him by his family and knows himself to be the one they love….And because of all of this, Claudio believes.  He believes in resurrection.  Claudio is an Easter person.   Are you?

As we’ve followed Jesus to the cross this Lent, we’ve picked up some companions along the way:  Nicodemus, the woman at the well, and the man born blind.  Today, we pick up one more — Lazarus.  (In his UCC devotion this week, Pastor Quinn Caldwell wrote about a five year old in their church who answers every question with a single response:  “Zombies!”  If that child comes to Children’s Time today, his answer will be pretty close to right.  J)

Did anybody else grow up in a church where memorizing Scripture was a regular–and public–practice?  The churches I attended as a child didn’t have the requirement, but my grandmother’s church did.  During opening assembly for Sunday school, they’d go down the line and every person–to the youngest child–was asked to recite a verse of Scripture from memory.  Of course, I never remembered to memorize anything.  I can’t count the number of times John 11:35—“Jesus wept.”—saved my bacon.

It’s a short verse, but not an easy one.  Commentators have spilled much ink over Jesus’ tears.  Some assume Jesus cried out of sadness at the death of his friend.  Certainly, Jesus was sad.  A part of what it means to be human is to grieve the loss of loved ones.

But let’s think about this a minute.  If Jesus’ tears are only a sign of his sadness at a personal loss, then his raising of Lazarus must also be a personal act.  Did Jesus raise Lazarus solely because he was sad he’d died?  Or was it something more?

Looking at the larger context of the story will help us figure some of this out.

When Jesus is told about Lazarus’ illness, rather than dropping everything and running to his friend’s side, he stays two days longer in the town where he and his disciples are working.  Why?  Because what he will do later, he tells them, will be for the “glory of God.”

A couple of days later, when Jesus and his disciples arrive at Lazarus’ tomb and he sees Mary and the others weeping at their loss, John tells us that Jesus was “greatly disturbed.”  After weeping, he again will be “greatly disturbed” or “agitated.”  The Greek word used in these verses contains an element of anger.

That hint of anger has led some commentators to see Jesus’ tears as a sign of deep frustration that people have not understood what he’s been trying to tell them—that he is the best glimpse of God we’ll ever see, that God is love, that death now holds no power over us.

It’s tempting sometimes to sentimentalize faith, to make everything we read in Scripture only about our own personal journey.  Certainly, faith does bring us personal comfort.  But I suspect that in this story, Jesus is trying to show us that it’s much more than that.  Yes, God has loved us, loves us now, and will always love us…but God also loves the world!  Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead…what might that mean for the world?

What might it mean for the Earth?  

When Jesus meets Martha as he approaches Bethany, she tells him, “If you had been here, my brother would not have died!”  When Jesus assures her that Lazarus will rise again, Martha says, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”  Jesus responds:  “I am the resurrection and the life.  Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”

So, here’s what I wonder.  Does Jesus being the “resurrection and the life” also extend to earth?  Can our faith in Jesus empower us to act our struggling planet into wellbeing?  Can Jesus—or we, his followers—raise Lazarus Earth?

In response to this week’s executive order rolling back environmental protections, UCC leaders wrote a letter calling on all UCC congregations to support climate stabilization efforts.  “It is time to join our voices and our bodies as we witness on behalf of the thousands of climate scientists whose findings over the past 50 years have led to the unassailable conclusion that climate change is real and is caused by humans.  Our generation will either embrace profound change, or life as we have known it will be unknown to our children’s children.”

The letter ended with a call to members of UCC churches to gather for a Climate March in Washington, D.C., on April 29.  (Some of our folks will be participating in the March for Science here in Atlanta the weekend before.)

An article about the Climate March on the UCC website includes an interview with Massachusetts Conference Minister, Jim Antal.  Four years ago, I heard Jim speak at a gathering here in Atlanta.  He said something that, at the time, I found startling.  As time passes, though, I’m beginning to see the truth in it.  He said that pastors should preach at least once a month on creation care.  “If we don’t do that now, the time will come soon when the environment will be in such crisis that we’ll have no choice but to address environmental concerns in every sermon.”

A longtime advocate of environmental justice, Antal believes “people of faith need to recognize that preserving the gift of God’s creation is now a core vocation of the church.”  So, you see, our Christian faith not only guides us in our climate stabilization work; it compels us to engage in that work.

UCC Minister for Environmental Justice, Brooks Berndt, says this:  “An outdated view of climate focuses solely on endangered polar bears, melting ice caps, and scientific studies about global impacts that are universal in nature.  An updated view emphasizes a lived climate reality that disproportionately impacts the poor, communities of color, and nations in the Global South. This updated view focuses on frontline communities that suffer in multiple ways.  On the one hand, these communities get hit with severe weather events or pollution from fossil fuel extraction. On the other hand, these same communities frequently contend already with a number of ills ranging from high unemployment to poor health indicators.  Suffering compounds suffering as climate becomes a threat multiplier.”

Antal adds:  “The millions of Syrian refugees whose desperation has overwhelmed the international community are a small fraction of the pending refugee crisis that the rising oceans will soon trigger.”

Another UCC minister, Laura Martin, says, “We believe that climate change is real and one of the greatest theological issues of our time.  If we truly believe that we are to love one another, then we must commit to honoring the conditions that lead to fullness of life.  All of the impacts of climate change–increasing diseases, increased asthma and allergies, droughts, floods, famines—already are disrupting lives and leading to physical and spiritual deaths.  We have a moral and theological obligation to respond.”

The article concludes with Jim Antal’s summation:  “People of faith need to start acting like ‘the earth is the Lord’s.’  We cannot stand idly by in the face of the current assault.” http://www.ucc.org/news_ucc_creation_care_advocates_to_peoples_climate_march_washington_d_c_03272017

Ten years ago, in our prior Growth Planning process, the congregation made the decision to stay on this property.  If there comes a time when we outgrow the property, we decided, rather than seeking a larger piece of land, we’ll seed another church.  Working through that discernment process, we had come to realize just how connected we are to this part of creation.

The church has been focused on responsible stewardship of creation from the beginning.  This building was built to be energy efficient; the widows were designed that way to allow in passive heat during the winter months.  And our first cross was created by a church member from a tree cleared from the property to make way for this building.  What I’ve come to realize recently is that creation justice is in this congregation’s DNA.

The point has been brought home again by the good work being done by the climate change group that began meeting last month.  They already are working at efforts to stabilize the climate, efforts that focus on lobbying legislators.  Why is that their focus?  Because the dire circumstances we’re in now require large-scale reductions in greenhouse gases.  Large scale reductions in greenhouse gases require limiting the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere.  Even if every person on the planet drastically reduced his or her carbon footprint, the effect would be negligible.  The kinds of changes that must be made must be made at the national and global levels.  The only way to make those changes happen is to convince legislators how vital those changes are so that they can enact laws that will support climate stabilization…which is why lobbying is our climate group’s main focus.

It’s a step….a tiny step.  What else might we do?  Can Lazarus Earth be raised?  Can shifting climates be stabilized?  Can carbon emissions be reduced?  Is Jesus weeping in frustration that his followers have forgotten that he is the resurrection and the life for all of creation?

Will we have the courage—and the will—to dry Jesus’ tears?

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

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2017

        Once upon a time, we had a presidential election.  Things changed.  Now we’re trying to figure out how to inhabit this new reality.  We’re having to re-think almost everything.

Had the election turned out differently, I doubt we’d be re-thinking anything…because the administration that would have resulted from that outcome would have been very much like previous administrations.  I suspect that as a church we’d carry on like we always had—with a few of us doing justice work, all of us doing charity work, and not really having to think a whole lot about how to be the church.  Had the election gone differently, I suspect here at church it would have been business as usual.

The gift of the new reality we’re inhabiting since the election is the way it’s calling us to rethink how we do church.  It’s become clear that so many things we’ve taken for granted for so long, so many battles we’ve already fought—and thought we’d won—are still raging….  The battles of racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, and the wholesale assault on human dignity.

Human dignity.  Remember when that was something we could assume?  Do you find yourself constantly appalled these days by things public figures and even ordinary Americans are saying to and about each other?  The vitriol people are spewing at each other….how has this happened?  How has it become okay to cut each other down with our words?

And it’s not just words.  Words create reality.  It’s not a coincidence that as hateful rhetoric has risen, so have hate crimes—attacks on mosques and synagogues, bomb threats called in to Jewish Community centers across the country, the desecration of Jewish cemeteries in St. Louis and Philadelphia.  Have you seen the pictures?  Knocking down all those headstones—over 100 in each cemetery—took a lot of sustained effort.  It wasn’t just painting derogatory words on a wall and running away.  How could someone engage in all that activity and not once think, Hey, maybe I don’t want to do this?

Crimes against women, lesbian gay bisexual and, especially, transgender people are up.  Race-based crimes are up.  The proposed federal budget cuts out programs that feed school children and the elderly.  There is proposed legislation in our own state that will give adoption agencies the right to bar gay couples from adopting.  What is going on?  Since when did it become okay to throw the least of these under the bus?

The hateful rhetoric to which we Americans have given free rein in the last year—if we haven’t spoken against it, we’ve endorsed it—has led us to this place where the dignity of all human beings can no longer be assumed….and yes, I’m also talking about Facebook posts and informal conversations.  Dehumanization is dehumanization, regardless of your politics.

If there is hope for our country, we must reclaim our commitment to decency.  If there is hope for our country, we must recover our belief in the dignity of every person.  If there is hope for our country, we must recommit ourselves to working for the common good.

And if there is hope for our country, the church must learn to be church in new ways.

In every age, societal shifts call on the church to re-envision and reimagine what it means to follow Jesus for that time.  What does it mean for us to follow Jesus for this time?  What does it mean for us as Pilgrimage United Church of Christ to follow Jesus in this new reality?  How do we as followers of Jesus act the world into wellbeing now?

The current circumstances are calling us to be church in a new way.  What might that new way involve?  I’m not sure.  That’s something we’ll need to figure out together as a community.  I do have a sense, though, of where we must begin.  It’s where any plan for acting the world into wellbeing must begin—by reaffirming the inherent dignity of every human being.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus’ whole purpose is to show us God…so that we might come to believe.  So what do Jesus’ actions in today’s Gospel story reveal to us about God?

First, Jesus shows us that God isn’t as interested in societal and religious rules as we might suppose.  Jesus speaks to a woman.  A Samaritan woman.  A Samaritan woman of, perhaps, questionable morals.

Had Jesus abided by social and religious rules of the day, he would have stayed as far away from this woman as possible.  He would have seen or sensed all the strikes against her and drawn his own water from the well.

But Jesus saw the person beyond the labels.  He didn’t see just a woman, he didn’t see just a Samaritan, he didn’t see just a person with questionable morals—he saw a human being, a beloved child of God, a person desperately thirsty for living water.  And so, for no other reason than that she was a human being who needed it, Jesus gave her living water.

And once the woman received it, she came to life.  She set down her jug—all it held was H2O…she was now the container for the living water Jesus had given her—she ran back to her village and shared the life she had received from Jesus.  Because of her, an entire village came to believe.

What if Jesus had dismissed the woman at the well, as societal and religious rules dictated?  If he had dismissed her, if he had diminished her, if he had not looked past the labels society and religious institutions had placed on her and seen her as the beautiful child of God she was, a whole village would have missed the gift of life.

I worry that in our country right now we have begun to lose our ability—and perhaps our will—to look beyond labels…of nationality… skin color…gender…economic status… sexual orientation… political affiliation…  It seems like with each passing day, we become more deeply entrenched in an us-and-them mindset.  By doing so, I wonder how much life we are missing?

A church in Connecticut found life looking beyond labels.  The church in East Lyme “was next door to a group home for adults.”  Pastor Erica Wimber Avena writes, “One day one of them came in and sat down before worship, uninvited.  She was painfully overweight and wearing clothing that didn’t fit.  She hadn’t bathed and wasn’t able to breathe or move comfortably.  She wouldn’t speak or make eye contact with anyone.

“From the beginning, she tried our patience.  More than once she forgot where she was and lit up a cigarette right there in the pew.  Her medication prevented her from being able to follow the order of worship.  She fell asleep during sermons.  Her breathing problems escalated and became loud snoring problems.

“You can imagine the conversations we had at council meetings:  ‘She doesn’t belong here; she couldn’t possibly be getting anything out of it so heavily medicated.’  Some tried financial tactics:  ‘I’m tithing to this church, and she’s just giving pennies…she shouldn’t be allowed to ruin it for everyone.’  Some observed that she ate too many cookies at coffee hour.  They worried that she was a deterrent to other visitors.  I worried about everyone.

“Finally, an exasperated council member said she’d had enough of all this talk.  She announced that she would make a friend out of our troubled visitor and would hereafter be sitting next to her in church.  Understand:  this means that after more than 25 years sitting in one pew, she moved…to a different pew.  When the snoring started, the council member gave a gentle nudge; she helped our visitor find the right hymn to sing; she reminded her to put her cigarettes away and limited her to no more than three cookies in the fellowship hall.

“That small act was all our visitor needed.  Soon I witnessed her talking to people; she made eye contact and learned to shake my hand at the door after worship; her first words to me were ‘bless you.’

“Some months later I received a phone call from the woman’s social worker.  He told me that she had never been accepted by any group or able to sustain a single positive relationship until she started coming to our church.  ‘Thank you for welcoming her,’ he said to me.  ‘I have never been to your church, but I know it is an exceptional place.’  After I hung up the phone I sat for a moment.  ‘Exceptional?’

“Empowered now, the woman went on to make friends with the others in her group home and brought them all with her to church.  She had gained her whole life back, put her demons behind her, and told anyone who would listen what the Lord had done for her.”  (Erica Wimber Avena, in Christian Century, January 4, 2017.  Used by permission.)

In this new reality we’ve entered in our country, God is calling us to be church in new ways.  I don’t know what all those ways are.  Through prayer, study, and conversation, we’ll figure all that out together.

Here’s what I do know, here’s what I believe with all my heart, mind, and soul, here’s what I believe it means to follow the Jesus who met the woman at the well… Whatever plan we come up with for being church in 2017, we must begin by honoring the dignity of every person we encounter—family, friends, acquaintances, foes, the least of these, each other …  If we begin by honoring the dignity of every human being, the rest of the plan of acting the world into wellbeing will become clear.  Jesus began with a Samaritan woman’s dignity and a village was transformed.  Who or what might be transformed if we do the same?

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

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2017

Several years ago as part of a renovation of our sanctuary, stained glass windows were installed.  As the sun makes its “pilgrimage” across the sky each day, vibrant rainbows of color journey across our worship space.  Our sanctuary is modest by many standards, but those colors!  The space itself becomes magical, holy when the colors make their trek across the room..  One person was so inspired by the colors she said, “I hope to die in the sanctuary when the colors are shining brightly.”

I was so inspired by the colors that I asked one of the crafty people in the congregation if we might create a mosaic cross.  “Sure!” she said.  We talked about something small, perhaps to place on the communion table.  “Just get some plexiglass, some mosaic tiles or colored glass, and E-6000 glue.  For the plexiglass, you’ll need someone with a circular saw.”

I talked to a church member who I knew had a circular saw.  (I later learned he has two circular saws.  J)  As we talked about size, the cross grew from 2 feet to 6 feet.  Bill purchased a couple of pieces of acrylic, cut and glued, and set the resulting cross on a folding table in the front of the sanctuary.

For my part, I bought a few packs of sea glass and a tube of E-6000 glue from Michael’s, set them on the table, and wrote a sermon for the first Sunday of Lent that ended with the line, “Bring your brokenness to the cross.”

After that first service, I knew the project had captured congregants’ imaginations.  The seriousness with which they processed to the cross, shared glue, and placed the bits of glass on the cross…it was holy.

The experience was holy, but the cross didn’t stand up too well.  Bill worried that, once we installed the cross, it might break.  So he went back to the store and bought a thicker sheet of acrylic, cut it, set it on the table in the sanctuary, and glued new pieces of sea glass into the approximate places congregants had placed them the Sunday before.

With each passing week, congregants began taking ownership of the cross.  After each sermon, when invited to “bring their brokenness to the cross,” they came forward in great reverence and focus.

After the third week, another church member came to me and said he had an engraver.  “Maybe we can engrave names on the glass.”  Beginning the fourth week, we invited people to write on slips of paper  names, words, and phrases they’d like to be engraved on the glass.

By week 5 of Lent, we knew something special was happening.

Then came week 6—Palm Sunday.  Each week leading up to Palm Sunday, I warned people only to put one piece of glass on the cross.  I didn’t want us to run out of space on the cross before the last Sunday.  So, in the invitation to “bring your brokenness to the cross” on Palm Sunday, I joyfully gave permission for folks to fill up all the spaces.

A member raised his hand….which, for a pastor, is a little unnerving in the midst of a worship service.  But he did raise it politely.  “Yes, Ric?”

“I’m wondering if we really want to fill up all the spaces.”

“Why’s that?” I asked.

“Well, don’t we worship the still-speaking God?  Don’t we talk all the time about staying open to what God might be doing in our midst?”

I stood there stunned for a minute.  Had my sermon just been hijacked?  With a more sound theology?  Um, yes.  Sometimes sermons come from the pulpit; other times they’re delivered to the pulpit.

So, we left blank spaces, or in artistic terms, “negative space” between the glass pieces.  After a year of looking at the cross, I realize just how right Ric was.  The glass speaks volumes… the spaces speak even more loudly sometimes.

Ric also is the person who thought of back-lighting the cross.  The string of LED lights—and the dimmer switch Bill installed—add a whole other layer of beauty to the cross.

So, that’s the story of the mosaic cross at Pilgrimage United Church of Christ.  When asked “Whose idea was that?” I always say, “The community’s.”  Then I tell the story.   No one envisioned the cross as it now stands.  The cross as it now stands grew out of an open collaboration of congregants.  Because everyone remained open to the process, open to God’s spirit, and open to each other, creative ideas were able to emerge.  To date, it’s the most profoundly communal experience I’ve ever had as a pastor.  I continue to be humbled by the project.

A picture of the cross in process from last year popped up in my FB feed a few days ago.  A couple of people commented on.  Here’s what they said:

*“I am not sure we will ever come up with another idea that was as meaningful as this one was.  Every week it brings me a sense of community and peace.”

*“Every time I look at that cross I fondly think of my deceased sister who is no longer suffering.”

*“When I see ‘our cross,’ I think of each person adding a piece of glass, and that they were probably thinking of someone special to them, or perhaps themselves, and I believe the whole finished product is infused with the gamut of human emotion.  It’s the most beautiful cross I’ve ever seen.”

Amen and amen.

And so our Lenten journey begins…where it always begins—with Jesus in the wilderness being tempted by the evil one.  The story thus far:  Jesus is born, grows up, works until he’s 30, then makes his way to the Jordan River where his cousin John baptizes him.  Immediately after his baptism, maybe even before his clothes have dried, Matthew tells us that “Jesus is led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.”

Wow.  Most baptisms these days are followed by celebrations, a big meal or a reception with a cake.  But heading into the wilderness for forty days of fasting then a time of temptation?  Doesn’t sound like much of a celebration to me.

So, what’s up with this temptation thing?  And why does it follow so closely on the heels of Jesus’ baptism?

Let’s think about it for minute.  You’re Jesus, right?  (Just imagine!)  All your life you’ve sensed that God has something special for you to do, something really special, so special that the people around you can’t imagine that thing for you.  Even so, you carry this sense of calling with you until one day it becomes so powerful, you head down to the river to be baptized.  You approach the river, wade into the water, face your baptizer, then shift to the side and let him lower you into the water.

One of the things we miss with our baptismal practice of sprinkling, is the moment of submersion, that couple of seconds when you’re under water–the trust of it, the silence of it…then the, yes, the breaking of the water, as we are raised up and born again.  In Jesus’ new birth, as he emerges from the baptismal waters, he has both an optic and an aural revelation of God.  First, he sees the spirit descend from heaven like a dove; then he hears a voice:  “This is my son, the Beloved, with whom I am well-pleased.”

So in that moment, everything Jesus had sensed about his life is confirmed.  He is claimed by God.  Jesus learns that he really is called to something special—he is to be God’s proxy on earth.  It makes sense that Jesus would want to spend some time thinking about that calling; heading to the wilderness for some prayer and reflection makes sense.

But 40 days!  After 40 days of thinking about being God’s son, after 40 days of eating no food…in that weakened state, it’d be pretty easy to start thinking some wild, maybe grandiose thoughts about being THE Son of God.  That’s when the temptations start—when Jesus is full of himself and empty of food, when he’s spiritually strong and physically weak.

Have you given up anything for Lent—TV or ice cream or Facebook?  So, what have you been thinking about, dreaming about, obsessing about since Wednesday?  What are you thinking about right now?  Yes.  When you’re tempted—and resist the temptation—it’s natural to obsess on the thing you’ve given up.

But if you can resist the temptation—and keep on resisting it—you can learn a lot about yourself.  You might, for instance, learn about an unhealthy dependence on ice cream or TV or Facebook.  Once in touch with that dependence, you can explore the causes for it.  What is it that makes me feel like I’m not complete without this thing I’ve given up?  Why does this substance or experience have so much power in my life?

What tempted Jesus?  He didn’t need to explore his relationship with ice cream or TV or Facebook.  None of those things existed yet.  So, what tempted Jesus?

Across the centuries, there has been lots of speculation about Jesus’ temptations.  Why these three?  Why in this order?  What does each temptation represent?  Turning stone to bread, taking a header off the temple, world domination… What is the significance of Jesus’ temptations?  Theologian John Douglas Hall suggests that “there are not really three temptations, but three variations on the same basic theme.  The devil has a one-track mind…from the beginning, he tempts his victims to go for power.”  (FW, 44)

Taking this tack, each temptation Jesus confronts is a question about how he will use his power as the Son of God:  Will he use it to do a self-serving miracle (turning a stone into bread)?  Will he use it to make a spectacle of himself (taking a header off the temple)?  Will he use his God-given power to gain political power (world domination if he worships the tempter)?

Here’s one thing I wonder.  I wonder if Jesus knew how he would respond to temptation before he was tempted.   Do you think he knew before the tempter came along that he would pass the temptation tests?  Were the temptations written up so that we could see how Jesus would respond, or—here’s my real question–did the temptations happen so that Jesus could see how Jesus would respond?  Did Jesus know for certain how he would use his power before the temptations, or did the temptations help him get clear about how he would use his power?

Maybe at heart, that’s what all temptations test—our relationship with power.  What will we allow to have power in our lives?  How will we use the power we have been given?

Power often gets a bad rap, like it is, in and of itself, bad.  But power’s not inherently bad; power is neutral.  Power becomes good or bad in how we choose to use it.

Psychologist Rollo May talked about five kinds of power.  Every human being has the potential to use all five kinds, he said.  It’s up to us to choose how we’ll use our power.  Exploitative power, the first of May’s five, is used to cause others suffering; manipulative power tries to control others.  Competitive power—that’s like a fight between equals.  Nutritive power…that’s using our power to nurture others.  And finally, integrative power combines our own power with that of others for the common good.  Exploitative, manipulative, competitive, nutritive, and integrative…Helpful ways of looking at power.

Applying May’s five types of power to Jesus’ experience of temptation in the wilderness, you see that the tempter entices Jesus to use his God-given power to exploit and manipulate.  The temptations themselves are a form of competition between the tempter and Jesus.  In the end, Jesus resists the temptation to use his power for exploitation, manipulation, or competition.  He instead chooses to use his God-given power to nurture and integrate, to give life, not squelch it.

That’s how Jesus used his experience of being tempted to reflect on how he would use his power.  How about you?  How do you use your power? …as a parent?  A teacher?  A spouse?  A boss?  A follower of Jesus?  Do you use your power to manipulate or compete?  Or do you use it to nurture and to work with others for the common good?

A few years back there was a TV show called “Secret Millionaire.”  One episode followed a millionaire for a week as she visited organizations that help a community near Knoxville, Tennessee.  The premise of the show is that a millionaire finds organizations that are doing good in a community, “infiltrates” the organization(s), then at the end of the week, awards the organizations with sizable donations.

Part of the draw of the show for me is that I secretly want to be a secret millionaire.  I’d love to have a lot of money to give away to help others who help others.  In the Knoxville episode, the happiest person by far seemed to be the millionaire as she distributed checks to three very deserving organizations and one deserving family.  It was obvious that using her wealth–her power–for good made her happy.  Very happy.

But I don’t have the kind of power that millionaire has.  I’m not in the position to go write checks for 10, 20, $40,000.  Great for the secret millionaires…but I can’t do anything like that.  I don’t have that kind of power.

Which really isn’t the point, is it?  The whole question of power, as we’ve learned from Rollo May, isn’t how much we have, but how we use it.  What kind of power do you have?  How are you using it?

The other draw of the Secret Millionaire show was seeing the dedication of the people who started and run the three organizations that were featured on the show—twin elderly sisters, Ellen and Helen who run the “Love Kitchen,” a food service for the poverty-stricken;

a former orchestra conductor who started a music school for under-privileged children;

a bedroom-decorating service that caters to children who are critically ill.

Those folks didn’t have money; in fact, two of the three organizations were close to closing.   Didn’t matter.  The people used the power they had to do what they could do.  And when they got access to more power through the generous donations of the millionaire?  The first response of every recipient was, “I can use this to help so many more people.”  A beautiful testament to nutritive and integrative power.

What holds power in your life—TV, ice cream, Facebook, competition?  What gives you power—a sense of accomplishment, creativity, your relationship with others, your relationship with God?  How do you use your power?  Do you use your power for good, or for other things?  How might you use your power to help build God’s kin-dom on earth?  Just one of the many questions that will accompany us on our journey to the cross this Lent.  How will we answer?

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

Kimberleigh Buchanan  © 2017 (2011)

A few days ago in my Facebook feed, a year-ago memory popped up—it was a picture from our mosaic cross in process last Lent.  A few people commented.

One person said, “I am not sure we will ever come up with another idea that was as meaningful as this one was.  Every week it brings me a sense of community and peace.”  Another said, “Every time I look at that cross I fondly think of my deceased sister who is no longer suffering.”  Another:  “When I see ‘our cross,’ I think of each person adding a piece of glass, and that they were probably thinking of someone special to them, or perhaps themselves, and I believe the whole finished product is infused with the gamut of human emotion.  It’s the most beautiful cross I’ve ever seen.”

Then I realized this is the first Lent we’ll have the completed cross to guide us in worship.

What does it mean for us, this broken cross, on Ash Wednesday?  Ash Wednesday, a day of penitence, a day of contrition, a day when we acknowledge just how incomplete and un-whole we are?  The day we receive the ashes and remember our mortality—from dust we have come and to dust we shall return.

Perhaps this mosaic cross offers us a visual reminder of our brokenness….and of the fact that we are not alone in our brokenness… and perhaps it will remind us that, even in brokenness, there is beauty.  As confess our sin—our brokenness—may we find in this beautiful creation, comfort and challenge and peace.

Our theme for Lent is journeying to the cross with Jesus.  I worried when we installed the mosaic cross that it would feel redundant.  We’ve already got a beautiful cross in the space, one created by a member of the congregation when the church was built.

As we begin our Lenten journey today, though, I’m liking the visual…it’s almost like we’ll be journeying from this broken cross to the cross of resurrection.  It won’t be an easy journey.  It will be hard.  And painful.  And exhausting.

But, if we’re able to sit with the brokenness and the pain and the exhaustion, from that brokenness will emerge deep healing and comfort and hope and joy.

And the journey begins with the ritual of the imposition of the ashes.  The reminder that from dust we have come and to dust we shall return….  From nothing we have come to nothing we shall go…we begin life as a speck; we end it as less than a speck…but if we’re mindful, if we seek to live wide-awake and fully present to every part of our lives, even the hard parts, we might just discover in the beautiful in between a holiness that heals and comforts and makes us whole.