Luke 15:1-3; 11b-32
1All the tax collectors and sinners were gathering around Jesus to listen to him. 2 The Pharisees and legal experts were grumbling, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

3 Jesus told them this parable:

“A certain man had two sons. 12 The younger son said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the inheritance.’ Then the father divided his estate between them. 13 Soon afterward, the younger son gathered everything together and took a trip to a land far away. There, he wasted his wealth through extravagant living.

14 “When he had used up his resources, a severe food shortage arose in that country and he began to be in need. 15 He hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to eat his fill from what the pigs ate, but no one gave him anything. 17 When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have more than enough food, but I’m starving to death! 18 I will get up and go to my father, and say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. 19 I no longer deserve to be called your son. Take me on as one of your hired hands.” ’ 20 So he got up and went to his father.

“While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with compassion. His father ran to him, hugged him, and kissed him. 21 Then his son said, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son.’ 22 But the father said to his servants, ‘Quickly, bring out the best robe and put it on him! Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet! 23 Fetch the fattened calf and slaughter it. We must celebrate with feasting 24 because this son of mine was dead and has come back to life! He was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate.

25 “Now his older son was in the field. Coming in from the field, he approached the house and heard music and dancing. 26 He called one of the servants and asked what was going on. 27 The servant replied, ‘Your brother has arrived, and your father has slaughtered the fattened calf because he received his son back safe and sound.’ 28 Then the older son was furious and didn’t want to enter in, but his father came out and begged him. 29 He answered his father, ‘Look, I’ve served you all these years, and I never disobeyed your instruction. Yet you’ve never given me as much as a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours returned, after gobbling up your estate on prostitutes, you slaughtered the fattened calf for him.’ 31 Then his father said, ‘Son, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and be glad because this brother of yours was dead and is alive. He was lost and is found.’”

Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.

Whom do you identify with in the parable of the prodigal son?

Who sees themselves in the character of the older son?

Who relates to the prodigal son?

Who relates to the parent?

I have a theory… that whether or not you like the parable depends on which character you identify with.

When I was a teenager, I identified with the prodigal son. I moved out of my parents house when I was 14 years old, because my father’s second wife thought I was the worst child ever.  I basically took my inheritance and moved in with my Great Aunt Alice.  Fortunately, Alice loved me.  She would say to me, “as good kids go, you go.”  So I did not have to “waste my inheritance in extravagant living,” although my stepmother was convinced that the ordinary expenses of cute clothes and extra-curricular fees spent on me were an utter waste!  I related to the prodigal son because I had left home in search of a better life and found acceptance with Alice and with God, so I liked the parable.

When I was a college student, I identified with the older son, so I did not like the parable!  One of my professors assigned us a monstrous research project.  I and nearly every other student in the class labored long hours in the library, writing, researching and rewriting all term long only to receive C’s and D’s.  Only one student got an A on her project.  That one student went to the Professor’s office every week and asked for help on her project because she was a single mom surviving on public assistance and couldn’t afford to get a low grade or she might lose her scholarship, so the professor helped her.  I got a C+ which was one of the higher grades for those of us who did the work on our own!  I was so mad!  I felt like she had cheated and the Professor had helped her cheat while the rest of us worked our tails off!  I related to the older son a lot.

As a mother and a Pastor, I sometimes relate to the Father.  I work long hours and I wonder if my family resent all the evenings and weekends that I have spent planning holidays for the church when I couldn’t even find the time or energy to get a Christmas tree for my own house last year? I think of all the recitals I have missed because the church had an event that night and all of the spring breaks that were also Holy Week.  So instead of going on a spring vacation with my family, I was at the church all week, while my husband used vacation time to watch our kids.  I wondered if my family felt like they were the neglected older son, who didn’t get my attention even though they are wonderful.

Jesus liked to use ordinary, familiar things as metaphors for spiritual concepts.   Things like chickens, figs, and family relationships, that the people in the first century would have been very familiar with.  But for us 21st century city dwellers, Jesus’ metaphors may seem strange and unrelated.  Then there’s the first century socio-political context that Jesus didn’t explain because everybody knew what was going on at the time, just like we can’t escape the news today.  So it takes a little research to fully understand scripture.

You’re going to want the scripture handy, so please take out your bulletin.

Most of us have families, so this is one of the more understandable parables in terms of the metaphor, so let’s take some time to unpack the socio-political context.

There’s a lot of context in verses 1 and 2.

Objectively speaking, tax collecting for the Romans was a good job.  Tax collectors were each assigned an amount that they needed to collect from their area and given the protection and support of locally stationed soldiers.  Tax collectors weren’t paid a wage, instead they kind of worked on commission.  Whatever they collected beyond their assigned amount was theirs to keep.  And this was a job that anybody could get – you didn’t need to be born into the right family or be a Roman.  Ordinary Judeans could go from poverty to comfort practically overnight by getting a job as a tax collector for Rome.

On the other hand, Rome had conquered Judea kind of like Germany conquered France in World War II, so tax collectors were viewed as collaborators — people who betrayed their country and their family for the sake of money and safety.  

So the Pharisees, who, like Jesus were called Rabbi – which means teacher.  Who also spent their time teaching people about God were were disgusted that Jesus was willing to spend time with collaborators.  They were disgusted that Jesus was willing to eat at the homes of Tax Collectors, because how can the food bought with wealth extracted from the poor of Judea at sword-point be kosher?

To put this into WWII terms, the Pharisees were basically accusing Jesus of hanging out with Nazi collaborators.

So then Jesus launches into a series of parables.

You’ll notice that we skip from verse 3 to verse 11 in today’s reading.

The two parables before the prodigal son are:

 — the parable of the lost sheep –  where a shepherd has 100 sheep and 1 goes missing so the shepherd leaves the 99 sheep to go looking for the 1 missing sheep and rejoices when he finds the one sheep.

–then the parable of the lost coin, where a poor woman cleans her whole house looking for one lost coin, and is so happy when she finds it that she invites her neighbors over to celebrate, which surely cost her more money than if she had only forgotten about the one lost coin.

–then we get to today’s story of the prodigal son.

Notice that they are all stories of wastefully and joyfully celebrating the return of what has been lost.

It seems obvious to cast the Pharisees in the role of the dutiful older son.  Here they were, trying to do everything right, and Jesus, representing God the Father, was partying with tax collectors and sinners!

I wonder if the Pharisees were thinking, “Sure, Jesus inspired Zaccheus the Tax Collector to pay back the people he had defrauded and many other sinners had changed their lives because of Jesus, but still!  We have been faithful all along!  If Jesus really represents God, then wouldn’t God celebrate our faithfulness instead of celebrating the unfaithful?”

I think the Pharisees were mad at Jesus accepting these Tax Collectors, whose hearts and lives had been changed, because they felt like their hearts and lives didn’t need changing.  But obviously their hearts and minds did need to change because they had forgotten that God is a merciful God.

My classmates and I were also stuck in the thinking of the Pharisees. We were all so mad at our Professor!  Some of my classmates who were working nights in food service and up to their necks in debt with student loans were also muttering about her getting free tuition and not having to work because she was on public assistance.  Why did she get all that help and then get an A for work she had help with, when we had worked so hard without any help?

Our Professor heard our muttering and said, “All of you should have done what she did.  I published my office hours and encouraged you to ask for help many times.  And if my office hours didn’t fit your schedule, I would have happily scheduled a time that worked for you.”  The Professor continued, “I would have been happy to help groups of you work together!  You’re studying to be social workers, to help people!  Isn’t believing in helping one another the whole reason you’re in this class?”

Isn’t helping one another the whole reason we are people of faith?

Look at verse 28.  Look at the assumptions the older son makes in verse 29 and 30.

This is a pretty gentle translation of this verse.  A more accurate translation would be, “Look, I have labored like a slave for all these years, and yet you’ve never even let me have my friends over for chips and salsa!  And now you’re throwing a steak dinner for the whole neighborhood for Your Other Son who spent all your money on prostitutes???!!!!”

Look at these assumptions:

1. First the older son has been assuming all this time that he couldn’t even have his friends over for a party.  Like his Dad was too cheap to spring for Queso!
2. Second, the older son assumes that the prodigal son has been spending his money on prostitutes — it’s kind of like that’s the worst accusation he could think of.  Because, if you look back at verse 13, all it says is that the prodigal son was living extravagantly.  It does not say that the second son was living sinfully. And when the second son runs out of money, he gets a job.  And he is willing to take the worst job ever!  He’s working for a non-Jew, because who else would raise pigs!  And is eating slop, because he doesn’t get paid enough to live!  This sounds a lot like working for the Romans to me.  Since Tax Collectors didn’t get paid other than collecting extra taxes from what they gave to those “Roman Pigs.”

But it’s the Father’s response in verse 31 that I really think needs to be unpacked.

I hear echoes of my Professor in the Father’s response in verse 31, when the Father says, “everything I have is yours.”  

Because it’s like the Father is saying, but you could have thrown a party every weekend if you wanted to!

The older son didn’t even need to ask his Dad to buy chips, his name was on all the bank accounts and he had his own Debit Card!  

He could have been enjoying a fully loaded nacho bar every dang night!

The only person who thought that the older son didn’t matter, was the older son.

Friends, I want you to hear that you matter.

No matter where you find yourself in the story of life…

God is inviting you to the party.

All you tired, all you rested, 

all you underpaid, all you with cushion in your bank accounts, 

all you heavy with burden, all you full of ease—come to the party

For together, we are the story of God’s Interconnected Love. 

Luke 13:1-9
1Some who were present on that occasion told Jesus about the Galileans whom Pilate had killed while they were offering sacrifices. 2 He replied, “Do you think the suffering of these Galileans proves that they were more sinful than all the other Galileans? 3 No, I tell you, but unless you change your hearts and lives, you will die just as they did. 4 What about those eighteen people who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them? Do you think that they were more guilty of wrongdoing than everyone else who lives in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell you, but unless you change your hearts and lives, you will die just as they did.”

6 Jesus told this parable: “A man owned a fig tree planted in his vineyard. He came looking for fruit on it and found none. 7 He said to his gardener, ‘Look, I’ve come looking for fruit on this fig tree for the past three years, and I’ve never found any. Cut it down! Why should it continue depleting the soil’s nutrients?’ 8 The gardener responded, ‘Lord, give it one more year, and I will dig around it and give it fertilizer. 9 Maybe it will produce fruit next year; if not, then you can cut it down.’”

Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.

Who likes Figs?

I love Figs!  Or at least I thought I did, because I love fig newtons.  So when I saw fig tree seedlings for sale at my local nursery, I bought one.  

I bought a desert fig.  The figs are green when ripe, and the desert fig is tolerant of drought conditions and poor soil, which was good because I had very poor soil that didn’t hold moisture in my herb garden.  And while I love planting, harvesting, and preserving, the daily grind of watering and weeding is definitely not my cup of tea.

So I planted my little foot long fig seedling and waited for it to grow.  I did not have to wait long!  It grew and grew and grew.  It grew up and it grew out.  The roots spread sideways wider than leafy branches and very shallow,  like a cross between a spider and a centipede!  If figs are happy they will fruit twice a year, spring and late summer, and this was a happy fig, even though my soil was hard as a rock, well, my soil was mostly rocks!   Soon we were having to chop roots off to keep them from digging up our garden paths and cut back the branches that were shading out the herbs.

About the only thing that will cause a fig tree to not produce fruit, is too much nitrogen, applied too close to the base of the tree.  The excessive nitrogen will burn the bark and encourage too much leaf growth at the expense of fruit.

I soon discovered that fresh figs are wet, slimy, not very sweet, and strangely crunchy.  We’re not even going to talk about how they get pollinated.  Seriously.  Don’t look it up, or you may never eat fig newtons again.

In order to make fig newtons, you need to make the figs into jam first.  They sweeten and gel very well once you cook them down a bit!  They don’t even need pectin.

I did it!  I grew and made my own fig newtons, from scratch!

As I said last week, Jesus liked to use ordinary, familiar things as metaphors for spiritual concepts.   Things like yeast, chickens, and figs, that the people in the first century would have been very familiar with.  But for us 21st century city dwellers, Jesus’ metaphors may seem strange and unrelated.  Then there’s the first century socio-political context that Jesus didn’t explain because everybody knew what was going on at the time, just like we can’t escape the news today.  So it takes a little research to fully understand scripture.

You’re going to want the scripture handy, so please take out your bulletin.

The “occasion” referred to in verse 1 was Jesus teaching a very large crowd of people.  Luke 12:1 describes, “a crowd of thousands upon thousands… so that they were crushing each other”

In this teaching session, sometimes Jesus was teaching on what he wanted to say and sometimes Jesus was responding to questions and comments from the crowd.  Right before our reading Jesus was talking about the coming conflict, and it looks like Jesus is talking about both his crucifixion and the destruction of Jerusalem by Rome that Was coming in 69AD.  Warning them to pay attention to the political climate and that there will be consequences for the choices people were making.  Biblical scholars argue about whether Jesus was talking about the political consequences of the Jewish Rebellion against Rome, or if Jesus was talking about the hypocrisy of people who claimed to be religious but didn’t practice neighbor-love, but I think it was both.  There was a general lack of personal and social holiness all around.

So in the second half of verse one, somebody relates the story of some Galileans whom Pilate had killed while they were offering sacrifices.  In the time leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem there were several incidents like this.  Jewish rebels would attack Romans, and the Romans would hang out at the Temple and wait for these ultra-religious rebels to come make their offerings.  It made the rebels easy to find, so the Romans did it.  This in turn would fuel the rebellion because, how dare those Romans mingle the blood of “righteous men” with the blood of the sacrifice!  But it also made other people angry, because if these rebels would stop attacking the Romans then the Romans wouldn’t keep sending soldiers to the Temple to catch them.  The rebellion against Rome was a politically contentious issue, because objectively, the Romans were one of the nicest occupiers Judea had ever had!

Have you ever been to a lecture or panel when a member of the audience stands up and rambles on with no question in sight?  I’m getting the feeling that what happened in verse 2 is that Jesus managed to pull a question out of a long wondering comment!  And that question in verse 2 is pretty politically and religiously charged!

“Do you think the suffering of these Galileans proves that they were more sinful than all the other Galileans?

This question is politically charged because the rebellion against Rome was a very politically divisive topic.  It’s religiously charged because Jesus calls out the common belief that suffering is punishment for sin.

Hopefully, if you’ve been in the United Methodist Church for a while you have been taught that God is a God of Grace not of punishment!  The storms and tornadoes happening across the Bible Belt are not punishment for the horrible legislation some of those states have passed against women and Trans folks.  I mean, do we really think that the people of Alabama are any more sinful than the people of Idaho, or of Oregon?

Jesus responds, “no, I tell you,” in verse 3, but some people get confused and think that Jesus is telling people to change their hearts and lives, or else, because Jesus goes on to renew his warning about paying attention to what’s going on in the world from the end of chapter 12 because there is a chapter break in the middle of the conversation!  Remember – chapters and verses are much later additions to the Bible whose placement is pretty random.  Also, Koine Greek doesn’t have punctuation – so the placement of commas to suggest phrasing and periods to end sentences is pure conjecture by Biblical translators and editors!

Given the context of the teaching session that begins in Chapter 12 verse one, the chapter break falls in the middle of this teaching session, so it makes sense that Jesus is still on the same topic of the coming consequences for political unrest and social injustice.

The example of the tower of Siloam in verse 4 serves as reinforcement to Jesus’ response, that, no, God wasn’t punishing the Galilean rebels because the people crushed by the tower of Siloam were  innocent people who just happened to be too close to the tower when it collapsed.  They didn’t have building codes at the time, so sometimes things fell down.  The idea that sometimes shoddily constructed buildings just fall down randomly, would have been common knowledge at the time.

So Jesus’ main teaching in this passage can be summarized as:

Did God punish these people with death for their sins?  No. Just no.

And…

Will there be consequences if people don’t change their hearts and lives?  Yes.  That’s how life works.  

Most of the time we reap what we sow.

So here’s where we come to the fig tree as a metaphor for how God responds to us when we need to change our hearts and minds, starting with verse 6.

First of all, the author of Luke is very clear that this is a parable – that is, a fictional story meant to illustrate a point.  Do not take parable’s literally!

A second thing to note when interpreting parables is this question, “which character in the parable is consistent with the personality of God?

There are those who interpret the characters in this parable to be:

The Vineyard Owner is “Father God”

The Gardener is Jesus

And the Fig Tree is the sinful person.

This interpretation is primarily based on the Penal Substitutionary Theory of Atonement.  Atonement is basically another word for salvation, penal refers to punishment and substitutionary is about substitution.  The idea is that Father God, the God of the Old Testament is a super angry dude sitting on a cloud in heaven who cannot even bear the sight of sin, therefore the Angry Father sent his son to earth as a substitute for us to take the punishment we all deserve.  How many of you were taught something like this?

I like to call this the Heavenly Child Abuser Theory of Atonement.

This Atonement Theory is a fairly new invention.  It only dates back to the 1800’s, and the beginning of the Evangelical/Fundamentalist movement.

It has 4 major problems:

1. If you actually READ the Hebrew Bible, God is constantly sending prophets with messages of mercy, to the worst people!  The whole point of the book of Jonah is that God’s mercy towards Nineveh, who were Israel’s enemy, was greater than Jonoah’s mercy.  Jonah wanted the Ninivites to die, and was mad when they repented and God delivered them. 
2. The second major problem with Penal Substitutionary Atonement is Trinitarian theology.  If we believe that God is One – Creator, Christ and Spirit, then all of God has the same personality.  Speaking in Trinitarian terms, God didn’t send Their “son” as a sacrifice to God’s own anger.  Trinitarianly, God put on flesh, Godself, to bring us a message of Grace. Penal Substitutionary Atonement divides the Trinity into separate persons who separate motives, rather than One God with one motive.
3. The third major problem with Penal Substitutionary Atonement, is that, like all Atonement Theories, it is a theory that some people claim to be the truth.  All theories are attempts to explain reality.  Theories are not reality itself.  Let me say that again:  theories are attempts to explain reality.  Theories are not reality itself. The exact mechanics of Salvation is a mystery, in the mystic sense of the word mystery.  That means it’s something that we have faith in, but do not really understand.
4. The fourth major problem with Penal Substitutionary Atonement is its emphasis on the individual.  The whole concept of “personal salvation,” and Jesus dying for “my” sins is a 19th century invention.  The Hebrew Bible rarely speaks of individual sin, King David is one of the rare exceptions. Most of the time prophets were sent to Kings to speak of the sins of the whole nation.  Sins like exploiting the poor, worshiping idols, or an unfair justice system.  The Covenant of Abraham, of Moses, and of Solomon were covenants between God and the whole nation, not between God and one person.  The early church was also very communal.  With rules requiring sharing of resources within the local church and among all Christians, as Paul frequently exhorted churches in his letters to send money to support apostles and churches facing persecution.   As United Methodists we embrace the concept of personal and social holiness – the idea being that some sins are between you and God, but most sins are systemic – our current failure as a country to welcome the immigrant among us and treat them as native born, is a systemic sin – something we are all a part of, even if we disagree.  And even sins like adultery are more than just personal, because the end of a marriage affects the whole community.

Given that I am clearly not a fan of the Heavenly Child Abuser Theory of Atonement, allow me to present to you an interpretation of this parable that is more in alignment with a Methodist understanding of Grace.

A man owned a fig tree planted in his vineyard.  

I think the man is a man.  Given the context of the whole teaching session with the crowd, with people asking questions and making comments about guilt and punishment, I think the man is a human.  The owner is us.  People who think the world is ours and can all too easily get caught up in the idea that punishment is the way to enact justice.  Which can lead to questions like:   If people don’t do what they ought to do, then why doesn’t God punish them?  This is the age old question of theodicy:  

Why does God allow evildoers to prosper?  

Why doesn’t God just cut them down?  

Why does God allow evildoers to take up space and resources that could go to people who actually produce good fruit?

So I think the owner of the vineyard is all of us who have ever asked God, Why do you allow evildoers to prosper?

I think the gardener is God.  The God who gives second chances.  The God who offers mercy.  The God who so loved the world that They came down here, not to condemn the world but to save the whole world.

The God who spent a year teaching, healing, and changing hearts and lives – metaphorically fertilizing people with the gospel message of Grace, Justice and Neighbor-Love.

Jesus as the gardener is a very Methodist interpretation of this parable.

A Contextual, or historical-critical interpretation might go something like this.

What if the man was Rome?

Judea was the fig tree.

The vineyard was the Roman Empire.

And the Gardener was, once again, God. 

God who came to try to help his chosen people give up the madness of violent rebellion and instead refocus on what actually changes people’s hearts and minds – What built the popularity of Christianity to the point that Christianity became the dominant religion of Rome:  Neighbor-love.  Because the early Christians cared for the sick, fed the hungry, loaned money to those in need, welcomed strangers, were non-violent, and were compassionate to All People, Christianity conquered Rome with love.

Rome was ready to cut Judea down, and Rome did wipe Judea off the map in 69AD.

So in this interpretation, perhaps God was delaying Rome to give Jerusalem and Judea a chance to embrace neighbor-love.  Perhaps Jesus was there to fertilize the hearts and minds of the people to occupy Rome with love?

Perhaps the parable of the Fig Tree was a warning that Rome was coming to wipe Judea off the map, and if they didn’t stop fighting Rome and start bearing the fruit of neighbor-love, then being cut down would be the natural consequences of their actions.

The irony being that a Fig Tree should thrive in a vineyard, because grapes use a lot of nitrogen from the soil and Fig Tree’s need not too much nitrogen to fruit, the first century people who heard this parable would have been confused that a fig tree, that usually fruits twice a year, and goes down to fruiting once a year if stressed,  would fail to fruit at all when planted in a vineyard.  I think this is the purpose of the metaphor of the fig tree –  to point out that there’s no reason for the fig not to fruit in its current conditions.  The Fig Tree – God’s people shouldn’t need to be fertilized in order to produce the fruits of the Spirit.

And yet, God the Gardener was willing to hold back Rome long enough to give the people a chance to change their hearts and minds.  God is willing to mediate, delay or hold back the consequences of our actions to give us another chance.

When people allow God to change our hearts and minds we “bear fruit,” in the form of helping others in meaningful ways.

Church, for many of us, the season of COVID felt like life as we knew it got cut down.  Everything changed literally overnight and we kept hoping that life would go back to the way it used to be, but by now we know that life is never going back to the way it was before.  Churches shrank.  Families are divided along political lines.  The Fig Tree of our Country that should be bearing the fruits of liberty and justice for all, clearly isn’t.  People who claim to be Christians are calling compassion a toxic idea!  There are wars and rumours of wars

But Paul wrote in the midst of Roman build up to wiping Jerusalem off the map, do not be anxious about anything.

Do not be anxious about anything.

Do not be anxious about anything.

Because God is still our Good Gardener.

Even if the Fig Tree gets cut down, God keeps gardening.

Judaism is still here.

Christianity occupied Rome with love.

When everything changes, God keeps gardening.

When a plant that is no longer producing is removed, God is making space for something better.

When we replace a big sprawling tree with a little seedling, it looks pathetic.

It’s small, and takes more effort to get it growing.

It’s easy for us to feel discouraged as we watch the Big Old Tree of mid-Twentieth-Century Church being cut down.  Cut down as more local churches close every year.  Cut down in worship attendance.  Cut down in social influence.  Cut down in financial resources.

But God is not done gardening!

I see seedlings of new life in the way Haven Dinner is growing.

Seedlings of new life in our ministry partnership with Rahab’s Sisters and Family Promise.

Seedlings of new life in our community relationships with METBA and the neighborhood association.

Worship attendance is down, but engagement with the church in other ways is up.

God is doing a new thing, it just doesn’t look like the old familiar Big Fig Tree, and  we just can’t quite see what that new seedling is going to grow into yet.

So rather than being anxious about what we don’t yet understand,  let’s lean into Paul’s advice from Philippians 4:6-7 and ground ourselves in prayer.  Tell God all our concerns and our wants and our hopes, and give thanks that God is doing something so new that we can’t quite see it yet!

Then let’s rejoice that we worship a God of Grace who is still willing to dig around our wild, wondering fig roots to change our hearts and minds so that we can be a part of what God is doing next.

Luke 13:31-35
31 At that time, some Pharisees approached Jesus and said, “Go! Get away from here, because Herod wants to kill you.”

32 Jesus said to them, “Go, tell that fox, ‘Look, I’m throwing out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will complete my work. 33 However, it’s necessary for me to travel today, tomorrow, and the next day because it’s impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.’

34 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who were sent to you! How often I have wanted to gather your people just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. But you didn’t want that. 35 Look, your house is abandoned. I tell you, you won’t see me until the time comes when you say, Blessings on the one who comes in the Lord’s name.” (Psalm 118:26)

Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.

Before we moved to Portland, we lived on a 5 acre hobby farm and had a little farm stand where we sold eggs and herbs and veggies.  We had a flock of about 35 chickens and we always kept a rooster because if we didn’t have a rooster, the hens would hear the neighbor’s rooster in the distance and leave us for the neighbor’s rooster!

Chickens are very community oriented birds.  When one chicken finds a nice patch of bugs to eat, or the humans bring feed, she will immediately make a food call to alert the rest of the flock to the presence of food.  And while roosters will fight one another for dominance, the main way they court hen’s into their flock is to scratch up a nice juicy bug, make a loud food call, then jump out of the way for the hen to eat it.  I always imagined that the roosters were saying, hey, chick, come with me and I’ll take you out for a real nice dinner!

At one point we kept Phoenix chickens, which are a fancy chicken, who are smaller and able to fly short distances, unlike most commercial layers, who are bred to be too large to fly so they will produce extra large eggs.

The Phoenix were also really good at hiding their eggs from us, so we had chicks every spring.  One spring I was outside and heard a ruckus in the chicken yard.  Chicken calls have different meanings, and if you spend enough time with chickens you start to learn the difference between a food call, a mating call, and an alarm call, and this was an alarm!  I came running to the yard and got there just in time to see a hawk swooping towards the fuzzy spring chicks.  

Two hens were spreading their wings and scooping the chicks into the lower door of the coop with their stiff flight feathers.  

A third hen launched herself from the upper door of the coop.  Flap, flap, then wings folded back, beak forward like an arrow straight at that hawk. Simultaneously, one of the roosters took off from the ground aimed himself straight at that hawk.  Unblinking those chickens played chicken with that hawk and the hawk veered off.

Jesus liked to use metaphors and stories about ordinary things that most people were familiar with to explain God.  Things like yeast, seeds, and chickens that were a part of everyday life in the first century. But here in the 21st century, most of us haven’t tended a sourdough mother, grown a mustard shrub, or kept chickens, so we hear these metaphors and we don’t quite understand what Jesus was talking about.  We lack context, not only for the socio-political context of the Roman Empire, but also the context of chicken culture.  Both are important to today’s Bible passage.  You might want to have your bulletin handy with today’s reading, so you can follow along.

Verse 31.  How many of you were taught that the Pharisees were Jesus’ enemies?  

So if you were taught that they were enemies then verse 31 is a little confusing, right?  Because some Pharisees came to warn Jesus.

It’s closer to the truth to say that Jesus was a Pharisee.  Pharisees were teachers of the word – Rabbi’s and many people called Jesus Rabbi, or teacher.  It also wasn’t unusual for Rabbis, then and now, to criticize one another.  Kind of like different colleague professors criticizing one another’s academic theories.  They criticized  him, he criticized them – for the most part that was just normal public arguments between leading theologians.  It wasn’t any more personal than, say, Einstein arguing the finer points of nuclear physics with Oppenheimer.  They enjoyed a good debate and walked away, if not friends, then at least allies in the work.

And many of the Pharisees were also pretty anti-Herod and anti-Rome, so they shared Jesus’ political leanings, even if they might disagree with his interpretations of the Torah.  So it makes sense that some of them would warn Jesus, because they were also on Herod’s hit list.

Moving on to verse 32, this is an example of Jesus being salty, as the young folks would say.  Jesus basically asks them to give Herod his schedule.  Part of the saltiness is Jesus calling out Herod for being all talk – here’s where I am, out being super popular because I’m healing people mentally and physically, so go ahead and try to arrest me — knowing that Herod knows that if Herod tries to arrest Jesus while Jesus is healing people that Herod will have a riot on his hands.

But then in verse 33 and 34, Jesus shows that he knows that he’s on his way to the cross.  Jesus knows that when he comes to Jerusalem, a place which Herod controls, that Herod will be no better and no worse than any other king of Jerusalem who killed the prophets sent to help them.

And this brings us to the metaphor about chickens.

When the hawk comes, the hens do their best to gather all the chicks under their wings, scooping and pulling the chicks sometimes tumbling them off their little feet as she gathers them up and herds the chicks towards safety.  But chicks are new to being outside.  They’re so distracted by the scattered corn and the freedom of being out of the nest that there are always chicks who are too busy eating or seeing the sky, that they wander off and don’t get gathered under the wings of safety.

Most people aren’t evil, we’re just distracted.  Distracted by the desire for wealth and popularity and power and freedom and comfort.  Sooooo distracted that we don’t notice the hawk coming for us so we don’t notice God reaching out to gather us under Her wings.  

But even when we don’t notice what’s good for us, God is still reaching out to us.

Jesus launched himself at death and destruction like that hen and rooster, playing chicken with the hawk and Jesus didn’t blink.

So that those who are distracted would be safe.

Because sometimes people don’t get it…

Sometimes we don’t get it..

Until we see the hawk coming for us.

Then, we are finally ready to say, Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord, because God still loves us when we don’t get it and keeps reaching out to gather us under Her Wings.

So when we see people making bad choices.

People who just don’t get it.

Remember that God still loves them.

That God still loves us.

And remember Philippians 4: 6-7.  Replace that anxiety with prayer and thanksgiving and seek refuge in the peace of God.

Luke 4:1-13
Jesus returned from the Jordan River full of the Holy Spirit, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. 2 There he was tempted for forty days by the devil. He ate nothing during those days and afterward Jesus was starving. 3 The devil said to him, “Since you are God’s Son, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.”

4 Jesus replied, “It’s written, People won’t live only by bread.” (Deut 8:3)

5 Next the devil led him to a high place and showed him in a single instant all the kingdoms of the world. 6 The devil said, “I will give you this whole domain and the glory of all these kingdoms. It’s been entrusted to me and I can give it to anyone I want. 7 Therefore, if you will worship me, it will all be yours.”

8 Jesus answered, “It’s written, You will worship the Lord your God and serve only him.”(Deut 6:13)

9 The devil brought him into Jerusalem and stood him at the highest point of the temple. He said to him, “Since you are God’s Son, throw yourself down from here; 10 for it’s written: He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you 11 and they will take you up in their hands so that you won’t hit your foot on a stone.”(Ps 91:11-12)

12 Jesus answered, “It’s been said, Don’t test the Lord your God.”(Deut 6:16) 13 After finishing every temptation, the devil departed from him until the next opportunity.

Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.

Today is the first Sunday in Lent.

Lent is Latin for spring, and observing the Church season of Lent began sometime around the Council of Nicaea in the year 325.  At first Lent was a time of learning and preparation for those seeking to be Baptised on Easter, and only those who were candidates for Baptism would fast.

Then in middle ages Europe, in order to prevent people from eating their livestock during the spring famines, the practice of everyone not eating meat was introduced.  Catholics not eating meat on Fridays is a relic of that practice.

Now there is a modern Lenten practice of fasting or giving something up for Lent.  Often something not very good for you, like coffee or chocolate, or fasting from social media for the duration of Lent.

This year, I’m giving up anxiety.

And I’m inviting you to give up anxiety with me.

During Lent, Christian tradition has held the view that every Sunday is a little Easter, even in the middle of Lent.  So every Sunday, just like we did today,  we will start with Confession and Absolution, and then do our prayers, so we can release all of our anxieties to God.

And I would like all of you to memorize this verse:

Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.

So maybe you take your bulletin home and cut out Philippians 4:6-7 and tape it to your bathroom mirror.  Or take a picture and read it every time you start to feel anxious.

So why fast from anxiety?

Anxiety is actually a useful part of our nervous system’s alert system.

If you’re in a situation that feels unsafe, that’s anxiety telling you to escape the danger.

However, our brains cannot tell the difference between the immediate need to get out of traffic, and the existential dread inspired by current events.

Anxiety that is for immediate threats that require immediate action is healthy and very necessary to keep ourselves safe.

It’s the anxiety that is for long term creeping dread that we can’t necessarily take immediate action on, that I’m giving up for Lent.

Because that long term creeping dread with no clear actions, kind of anxiety, can be overwhelming to the point that we kind of shut down and stop caring.

And we cannot stop caring and still be obedient to God’s call to love our neighbors.

So I guess, you could say that I’m inviting you to give up, giving up for Lent!

This awful ongoing anxiety is usually rooted in 3 basic human desires.  And it just so happens that these 3 desires are exactly what Jesus was tempted with in today’s reading from Luke chapter 4.  So please open your bulletin and keep the scripture handy!

So after Jesus’ baptism, Jesus does a full 40 day, Lent style fast.  Which is why this scripture is so often used for the first Sunday of Lent.

Jesus has been fasting, so the first temptation is bread.

In the Lord’s prayer, and just generally in the Christian tradition, the phrase, our daily bread, is often used to represent our basic physical needs.  Give us this day our daily bread – means more than just bread, it means food, water, shelter, clothing — the things we need to keep body and soul on speaking terms!

The reason our daily bread, that is, our basic needs are a temptation, is because the idea of not having our basic needs met feels like a pretty immediate threat, doesn’t it?  When the price of groceries goes up, we start to wonder if we will have enough to feed our families.  Then we start to feel like maybe we can’t afford to share.  

And if things get bad enough, desperate people tend to react in one of two ways:

1. Some people will say, everyone for themselves. and do whatever they think they can get away with to get their needs met.
2. Other people form community and work together to share what we have and create more resources together.  

I like to call this the Star Trek option.  Since I just returned from Star Trek the Cruise!  There’s an episode of Star Trek Voyager where a bunch of ships are trapped in a space bubble.  The ships who choose the, every ship for themselves path, resort to pirating every new ship to come through the entrance.  Captain Kathryn Janeway takes the second path and forms a Federation of ships where they all share their resources and ideas for the good of everyone in the group.  Guess which group succeeds at breaking out of the space bubble?  The Federation.

I think that is exactly Jesus’ point when he quotes Deuteronomy 8:3 “People won’t live only by bread.” That whole section of Deuteronomy is about how God saved the people when they were escaping slavery in Egypt, and that we should continue to keep the commandments of God by walking in God’s ways… The Way that Jesus taught us.  The Way of sharing resources, welcoming the immigrant among you as if they are native born, (that’s Leviticus 19:33-34) and continuing to invite people into Beloved Community with us.  

Those who are seeking to do evil things for profit want us to be afraid and be selfish.  They want us to believe that there is not enough to share and that strangers are enemies.

God wants us to share the joy of being in community together.

The second temptation is Power and Popularity. Look at verse 6

6 The devil said, “I will give you this whole domain and the glory of all these kingdoms. It’s been entrusted to me and I can give it to anyone I want. 7 Therefore, if you will worship me, it will all be yours.”

Domain and glory.  Domain as in dominion and domination — that’s power.
Glory – that’s popularity.

Once again, power and popularity in and of themselves are not bad things.  Power can be used for good and popularity can be leveraged to elevate the voices of marginalized communities, like when a celebrity backs a charity.  Power and popularity are how we get things done in this world.  So power and popularity can feel like a need.  We can become anxious if we feel like our power to defend our rights is being threatened, or if our reputation is being slandered.  We may even be tempted to collaborate with evil in order to have access to power and popularity.  Or even to just keep our heads down and go along to get along, but look at how Jesus responds in verse 8.

“It’s written, You will worship the Lord your God and serve only him.”(Deut 6:13)

Once again, Jesus is quoting Deuteronomy in another passage about not forgetting to obey God after moving into the promised land after escaping slavery in Egypt.  To Jesus’ Jewish audience this would have been a very serious reminder of their covenant relationship to God.  God their savior… God our savior, is reminding us all, that our Most Important Ally in life is God.  And God commands us to love one another.  Not throw one another under the bus to curry favor with villains. 

Those who want to do evil, want us to be afraid of them and seek their favor.

God is telling us the only one whose favor we need is God.

And we’re already popular with God!

So don’t be afraid, God’s got us!

The third temptation is about safety, starting in verse 9.

Notice how the devil uses scripture out of context!  Psalm 91 is a song praising God for all the ways that God holistically saves us – in body and spirit, instructing us to “not be afraid” and “take refuge in God our fortress.”  There’s nothing in Psalm 91 that specifically says that God will preserve the Messiah from all harm.  It’s just not in there!

Like most people who take scripture out of context to manipulate others, the devil has used one verse taken out of context to say something that the whole Psalm was never meant to say!

God has never guaranteed any of us that nothing bad will ever happen.

Jesus specifically said in the sermon on the Mount from the gospel of Matthew, chapter 5,  verse 45, that God,

“Makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous.”

And the context of that verse is talking about loving our enemies, “ 45 so that you will be acting as children of your Father who is in heaven. He makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous.”

We all want to be safe.  Nothing is more anxiety producing than feeling unsafe.  

Or feeling that our loved ones are unsafe.

What wouldn’t we do to protect the people we love the most?

But look at Jesus’ response in verse 12

12 Jesus answered, “It’s been said, Don’t test the Lord your God.”(Deut 6:16)

Which is from Deuteronomy chapter 6 again.  Again talking about how to live after escaping from slavery.  But the specific context of Deuteronomy 6:16 is a warning about not following other God’s.  There’s nothing in Deuteronomy 6:16 about avoiding risk.  And this is so interesting to me because growing up, what I was taught in Sunday School and heard in sermons, was that don’t put God to the test, meant don’t try dangerous things to test if God would save you.  But that isn’t the context for Deuteronomy 6:16 at all!  The context for Deuteronomy 6:16 is don’t test God’s patience by following other Gods!  And perhaps this could be understood in this context of: don’t test God’s patience by following those who misuse scripture to manipulate you.

Which reminds me of the way my Black clergy sisters will say, “don’t test me!”  or “Not today, Satan!”

Because the truth is that nobody is actually safe in this world.

God, “Makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous.”

Bad things happen.  People get cancer.  People lose jobs.  People die in completely unexpected accidents.

But if you look like me, you may have grown up with the expectation that most of the time, you will be mostly safe.  Most of the time, the law is on your side.  Most of the time life feels mostly fair.

But for people who don’t look like me, for many minoritized groups in this country: 

• for physically disabled people, 
• for those with mental illness and addiction disorders, 
• For people of color
• For LGBTQ+ folks, especially trans folks

Most of the time the law has not been on their side.

Most of the time life is demonstrably unfair.

They grew up with an expectation that life was not mostly safe.

And yet, you will never experience anything more joyful than Sunday morning in a Black Church.  They sing with JOY about God’s salvation and deliverance as if God’s Kingdom has already come and God’s will is currently being done here on earth as it is in Heaven.

They have JOY because for one day a week, at least on Sundays, they fast from anxiety.

Look at Philippians 4:6-7 in your bulletin as you follow along.

They rejoice in the Lord every Sunday because they choose to not be anxious about anything, but instead bring their prayers and petitions and thanksgivings before God.  And Trust that God is really going to do something good!

In these anxious times, I’m asking you to fast from anxiety with me every dang Sunday and as much as you can in the weeks between.  When evil tries to crush us with its onslaught of lies and doom, we will rejoice in the Lord!

Everytime we feel anxious. Stop and pray.

And if you’re struggling to pray, phone a friend or your Pastor and we’ll pray together.  Because sometimes we don’t have enough faith in us, but Matthew 18:19-20 tells us that whenever two or more are gathered in God’s name Jesus is with us.

Friends, we need God to keep our hearts and minds safe for the joyful work of being the Federation of Beloveds who share both our needs and our resources in these crazy times.  So let’s rejoice and be glad!

Luke 6:17-26
He came down with them and stood on a level place with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon. 18 They had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases, and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. 19 And everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him, for power came out from him and healed all of them.

20 Then he looked up at his disciples and said:

“Blessed are you who are poor,
    for yours is the kingdom of God.
21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now,
    for you will be filled.
“Blessed are you who weep now,
  for you will laugh.

22 “Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. 23 Rejoice on that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven, for that is how their ancestors treated the prophets.
24 “But woe to you who are rich,
  for you have received your consolation.
25 “Woe to you who are full now,
  for you will be hungry.
“Woe to you who are laughing now,
  for you will mourn and weep.
26 “Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.

 

Please open up your bulletin to the scripture, because we are going to walk through this together, because I want you to see just how “weird” and offensive the teachings of Jesus were to his first century people.

Our reading begins with a little context.  Jesus has just “officially” chosen the 12 disciples, so the disciples are the “them” who came down with Him and stood on the level place with the great crowd of disciples, because it wasn’t just the 12 who followed Jesus around everywhere.  And there was also a great multitude of people from the nearby places:  not just Jews from Judea and Jerusalem, but also people from Tyre and Sidon, which are in modern day Lebanon and were not Jewish cities, they were Syrophoenician cities.  I point this out because, in the gospel of Luke, Jesus’ ministry is for All people, not just Jewish people, from the very beginning!  This is different from the gospels of Mark and Matthew, where Jesus calls the Syrophoenician or Canaanite woman a dog stealing food from the children of Israel. (Mark 7:26 Matthew 15:22)

The idea of God being for All People, is one of the central shifts in belief from first century Judaism, to Christianity.  Before the first Century every nation had their own personal deity, but in the first century the Roman roads brought immigrants from everywhere and people began to explore other religions.  Christianity was one of the first religions to promote the idea that God loves people of All Nations.  The idea that anybody, from any and all nations could become a Christian was absolutely radical at the time! 

Luke/Acts were written as a 2 book set for all of us theophilus-es, which is Greek for God-lover, who were born after the death of the apostles. (Acts 1:1-2)  By the time Luke/Acts were written, the theology of One God for All Nations has been firmly established in Christianity.  All of the Theology in Luke/Acts is more *formed,* especially in comparison to the gospel of Mark, where the disciples are constantly confused – reflecting the confusion that many of the earliest Chrstians felt at how strange and new the teachings of Jesus felt to them.

So in Luke, Jesus is healing and teaching all kinds of people, Greeks, Romans, and Syrophoenicians who used to be called Canaanites  — in other words – Jesus is showing love to the enemies of Israel.  This indiscriminate love is offensive, because, then as now, this world teaches us that we should only show compassion to those who “deserve,” it.  But Jesus showed compassion to everybody.

Verse 20, “Then he looked up at his disciples and said:”

Notice that Jesus isn’t looking at the crowd when he starts teaching.  Jesus is looking at the people who have already said yes to God. Jesus is looking right through the souls of his disciples, all the way through history, and straight into us, who claim to follow him now.

“Blessed are you who are poor,
    for yours is the kingdom of God.
21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now,
    for you will be filled.
“Blessed are you who weep now,
  for you will laugh.

I know many of you have heard this passage all your life.  Maybe you had Sunday School worksheets covered in yellow bees for the Bee-Attitudes.  But look more deeply, because this teaching is weird.

Is it a blessing, to be poor, hungry and grieving?
Shall we go outside and ask our houseless neighbors if they experience poverty and hunger as a blessing?

Is it a blessing, to be hated, excluded, reviled, and defamed?
Personally, I don’t enjoy it when angry neighbors call the church and yell at me,  “you better not be giving out food or anything to those homeless people!”

Even when it’s for all the right reasons, I don’t enjoy being yelled at, do you?

I want you to notice that the Bee-Attitudes are weird. 
They are upside down and backwards from the way the world works.

Look at verses 24 – 26.

Woe to you – is a classic Hebrew prophet style of saying, God is NOT pleased!

The main goals of our culture are to become rich, have plenty of yummy things to enjoy, to be laughing out loud happy, and to be popular and well thought of, right?

I mean, our country has codified, “the pursuit of happiness” into our bill of rights! 
And the original version was “the pursuit of wealth.”

Jesus just stared us down through the ages and told us that everything that we think is bad, is actually good and everything we think is good is actually woeful!

Why? Look at verses 23 and 26, and remember that Jesus is looking straight at his Disciples – the people who become the Leadership and the Clergy of the Church.

 Jesus explains that false prophets are rewarded with wealth, good food, happiness, and popularity, because they are saying what the rich and powerful want to hear.

And true prophets are often poor, hungry, grieving, hated, excluded, reviled, and defamed for daring to preach the gospel of Love for All people.

So, rejoice with Eccumenical Ministries of Oregon, that the current administration has cut off their federal grants, because this is what the corrupt kings of the past did to the prophets.

Rejoice when neighbors yell at us for sharing our building with Rahab’s Sisters, because surely our reward in Heaven will be great for taking this risk.

Rejoice that we are a small poor church, who serves the poor, because we really are acting like citizens of the Kingdom of God!

Rejoice, because this IS a place where our weeping is transformed into laughter.

Rejoice, because even though right now, it feels like everything good is being crucified – we know — we believe — we believe beyond believing– that Resurrection is Coming!

So let us celebrate at God’s table, where the hungry will be filled.

Luke 5:1-11
One day Jesus was standing beside Lake Gennesaret when the crowd pressed in around him to hear God’s word. 2 Jesus saw two boats sitting by the lake. The fishermen had gone ashore and were washing their nets. 3 Jesus boarded one of the boats, the one that belonged to Simon, then asked him to row out a little distance from the shore. Jesus sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. 4 When he finished speaking to the crowds, he said to Simon, “Row out farther, into the deep water, and drop your nets for a catch.”

5 Simon replied, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and caught nothing. But because you say so, I’ll drop the nets.”

6 So they dropped the nets and their catch was so huge that their nets were splitting. 7 They signaled for their partners in the other boat to come and help them. They filled both boats so full that they were about to sink. 8 When Simon Peter saw the catch, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Leave me, Lord, for I’m a sinner!” 9 Peter and those with him were overcome with amazement because of the number of fish they caught. 10 James and John, Zebedee’s sons, were Simon’s partners and they were amazed too.

Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid. From now on, you will be fishing for people.” 11 As soon as they brought the boats to the shore, they left everything and followed Jesus.

We’re continuing our “kind of a Baptismal Vows Series” this week, so you can go ahead and bookmark page 38 in the hymnal now if you like!  

 The first week we read the story of the Baptism of Jesus alongside our Baptismal Vows and noticed how there was real risk, for John the Baptist, in accepting the freedom and power God gives us to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.  With freedom and power comes risk and responsibility.  Maybe we’re uncomfortable with risk, but we trust God enough to accept the risk.

Then, we visited the uncomfortable verses about evil doers from Psalm 36, revisited the English translation of the Apostle’s Creed, watched a little Star Wars, and pulled this all together to say that Resistance is about saying Yes to Love.

Then we did our annual, Book of Discipline Mandated review of our Safe Sanctuary Policy, because our Congregational Vow to the Baptised includes our promise to provide a community where they may grow in their trust of God.

And I reviewed with you how to report a clergy person who does harm.  Look up the Oregon Idaho UMC webpage and use the staff page to find the Bishop and District Superintendent’s contact info. 

Last week, we turned the page in our hymnal to p36 in Baptismal Covenant 1, looked at how Thanksgivings in Baptism and Communion liturgies are stories of God’s salvation and that the word that Jesus used that we translate as, “Salvation,” is Sozo – which means salvation in this world and the next.  And we remembered that in our Baptism we recognize that this Spirit of the Lord is upon us.

Today we’re going to start with our Bible reading, so you can keep that handy.  It’s in the inside of your bulletin.

In today’s reading, Jesus is just beginning his public ministry.  Jesus has been traveling around teaching and healing people, so he’s starting to draw a crowd of people desperately in need of help.  And when people are desperate, they can get a little pushy, so Jesus is about to get pushed right into the lake!

So Jesus just climbs on into Simon’s boat and asks him to row away a little and proceeds to use Simon’s boat as his pulpit.

So, imagine you are just getting off work, and some preacher hops into the back of your work truck, asks you to pull up onto the sidewalk and starts preaching.  I’m not sure I would have been as accommodating as Simon, after working all night!

But Simon is totally willing to help out, so when Jesus is done preaching he tells Simon to try fishing again, as a way of repaying Simon for his time.

But Simon is exhausted because they’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything.

If you’ve got a pencil or something handy, underline verse 5 where it reads,

“Master, we’ve worked hard all night and caught nothing. But because you say so, I’ll drop the nets.”

This verse made me think of you.  All of you, the faithful remnant of this church, who have worked so hard…

• all through COVID, 
• You worked hard to hold the church together through absent clergy, 
• in an aging building, 
• Working so hard to try to hold things together with broken systems and a shrinking budget
• Working so hard, even when you have been tired and worn out
• Working so hard while your beloved congregation shrinks

You have worked so hard and seen so little results for so long, and yet, when I came here two and a half years ago, you were willing to try again.

Not because of your faith in me, but because of your faith in God.

As it should be!  I’m not Jesus, I just work for him!
It is Jesus, not me, who has called us 

• to go farther than before
• To row out beyond our depth and trust God to do what we cannot do on our own
• To drop our nets into the community, even though we don’t expect to catch  anything

And I have felt just as out of my depths as you have!

I mean, does anybody know how to do Church in this post-COVID, post-Christian, post-modern world?

But, like Simon, you have listened deeply to Spirit and despite your doubts you have rowed out into deep water and cast your nets and here’s what you have caught.

Because you were willing to try:

• Two Pacific Islander Churches have a place to worship, fellowship and share their culture with the next generation.  
• Our Daily Bread Express has been able to feed a multitude of meals to people living with HIV/AIDS, because you were willing to do the deep work of sharing your kitchen.
• Imagine Theater – a children’s theater company who split off from an Evangelical organization in order to welcome lGBTA+ families, has a climate controlled space to store their costume collection, in our basement.
• Because of your willingness to dig deep and share your space – even give up the Library and offices, Rahab’s Sisters has been able to expand their work in our neighborhood to serve even more Fem, Trans, and Queer folks.  And they have been so helpful for some of our Haven Dinner folks who have needed more help than I have been able to provide!
• Haven Dinner, our Queer Young Adult group has doubled in size and even though you don’t often see them on Sunday morning, they claim you as their church!
• Family promise Metro East is growing and serving more families, many of whom are now sleeping in their own beds that you raised the money to pay for!
• A POD Village, transitional shelter is opening soon just 2 blocks away, and we were able to negotiate priority for people living on the streets in our neighborhood and currently being served by Rahab’s Sisters and PDX Saints Love, because you have supported your Pastor in doing community advocacy, have showed up for public meetings to say, Yes In My Back Yard, and have hosted public meetings here in our Sanctuary.
• Our church now has a voice in the Montavilla East Tabor Business Association, and because you supported me in doing this kind of “outside the church” work, I’m now on the Events Committee, which means I have a voice in how future community fundraisers are run!  So we can do charity that helps instead of charity that hurts.
• And none of those flashy things would be possible if not for the tireless labor that quietly happens behind the scenes Every. Dang. Week. by you.  The quiet labor of our Board Members, our Finance Team, our Mission Team.  Did you know that we don’t have a Facilities Manager anymore?  We have Jorja organizing a handful of volunteers, usually the same few people, who show up to meet the contractors that sometimes fix things and sometimes tell us things that we really don’t want to hear!  Alton vacuums and keeps the toilet paper stocked and takes out the trash and many other little things.  Tom and Larry fix things for no pay.  A few volunteers set up and bring things for coffee hour… and so much, so much more work that keeps our nets mended and our ship afloat!

Because of you!  Because of the hours and hours and hours of unseen labor we’re able to do life-changing things like, help a Haven member get his food handlers card so he can get a job.

So Thank You!  No matter how small, or invisible, insignificant you think your part in this congregation is, what you do matters so much, because our community needs us so much right now.

You are making a difference!  Thank you!

Take a look at verses 6 -10.  God filled their nets to overflowing. 
So many fish that their nets were splitting.
So many fish that their boat was sinking.
So many fish that they had to call for help!

They were so overwhelmed that Simon fell to his knees in his sinking, fish-filled boat, and cried at Jesus,  Leave me alone!  I’m just a sinner!

Haven’t we felt that too!

Haven’t we felt that our building was too full?
Haven’t we said, I know that this is selfish, but I’m tired of sharing all our space?
Haven’t we felt overwhelmed by our houseless neighbors, the building, the finances, the paperwork, the political situation we are in?
Haven’t we felt like our ship was sinking and there was only one little boat available to come help us?

And in the midst of it all, Jesus turns to us and says do not be afraid.

Do Not Be Afraid.

Do Not Be Afraid.

For I will make you fishers of people.

And it’s not going to look like how people joined the church in the before times.

But Haven Dinner has doubled in size, and they are inviting their friends to come see this Church who,  and I quote, “is very good at getting resources for people who need them.”

In the year 125AD, a Greek philosopher Aristides attempted to explain Christianity to the Roman Emperor Hadrian.  He wrote:

“They love one another.  They never fail to help widows. They save orphans from those who would hurt them.  If they have something, they give freely to the one who has nothing. If they see an immigrant, they take him into their homes and rejoice over him as a brother.”

There are those who say that very few people would say this about Churches today.  But according to the members of Haven Dinner, you are the church who “is very good at getting resources for people who need them.”

On page 38 of the hymnal, under Reception into the local Congregation, are your membership vows.

I’m supposed to ask you if you will faithfully participate in the ministries of the Church by your prayers, your presence, your gifts, your witness (we added witness in the 2012 book of Discipline) and your service.

But I already know that your answer has been and continues to be yes.

Luke 4:14-21

We’re continuing our “kind of a Baptismal Vows Series” this week, so you can go ahead and bookmark page 36 in the hymnal now if you like!  36 not 34, it’s so exciting, we’ve turned the page! 

 The first week we read the story of the Baptism of Jesus alongside our Baptismal Vows and noticed how there was real risk, for John the Baptist, in accepting the freedom and power God gives us to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.  With freedom and power comes risk and responsibility.  Maybe we’re uncomfortable with risk, but we trust God enough to accept the risk.

Then, we visited the uncomfortable verses about evil doers from Psalm 36, revisited the English translation of the Apostle’s Creed, watched a little Star Wars, and pulled this all together to say that Resistance is about saying Yes to Love.

Last week we did our annual, Book of Discipline Mandated review of our Safe Sanctuary Policy, because our Congregational Vow to the Baptised includes our promise to provide a community where they may grow in their trust of God.

And I reviewed with you how to report a clergy person who does harm.  Look up the Oregon Idaho UMC webpage and use the staff page to find the Bishop and District Superintendent’s contact info. 

Today, we are turning the page in our hymnal to p36 in Baptismal Covenant 1, Thanksgiving Over The Water.  So go ahead and get out your hymnals and turn to page 36.

If you are a theology nerd like me, you might notice that the Thanksgiving Over The Water is very similar to The Great Thanksgiving in our Communion Liturgy,  if you’re curious, there is an example of a Great Thanksgiving on page 9 of the hymnal, if you would like to bookmark that as well.

You may have noticed that I seldom use a printed Communion Liturgy, or a printed Thanksgiving Over The Water, not because I don’t have respect for our liturgy, but because I have such deep respect for Christian liturgy that I have internalized its form.

You see, both of these Thanksgivings fall under the category of what us theology nerds call, a Salvation History.  That is, a summary of the story of God’s mercy towards humanity from creation through resurrection.  

Both of these Salvation Histories 

• begin with creation,
•  then mention how God continued to love us when humanity sinned
• Then mention the exodus story as an example of God delivering us
• Then the story shifts to the birth, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus.
• And finally into the birth of the Church.

Many clergy write their own Thanksgiving, following this format of a Salvation History.  I just don’t write mine down, because I was taught that it’s easier to listen to someone when they aren’t reading at you.

If you look at page 9, the bottom of page 9, you will find the part of today’s reading where Jesus reads from the scroll of Isaiah chapter 61 verses 1-2, has been used by the author of this particular Great Thanksgiving as a summary of the ministry of Jesus.

“Your Spirit anointed him
to preach good news to the poor,
to proclaim release to the captivesand recovering of sight to the blind,

to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
and to announce that the time had come
when you would save your people”????

Saving people is the intent of proclaiming the year of the Lord’s favor, but the Year of the Lord’s Favor, also known as the Jubilee Year, means more than a ticket to heaven.

So first of all, let me say clearly that I believe in an afterlife where as Paul wrote, *and we do think that this was the original Paul,* who wrote in 1 Corinthians 13:12, that “we will see God face-to-face and know and be known completely.” (paraphrased)

I believe that salvation includes an afterlife where we are with God.

I also know that the Greek word Sozo, that Jesus commonly used, means more than just admission to heaven.  Sozo also means, safety, deliverance, and just general well-being:  physically, emotionally, mentally, economically, socially, and spiritually, well.

The Salvation that Jesus talked about was for us to be safe and whole in this life and the next.

The Year of the Lord’s Favor – the Jubilee Year is described in Leviticus chapter 25, verses 8-55.  Every 50th year, all debts are canceled, all bound laborers set free,  and there will be a year of Sabbath for everyone, where we only do what is necessary to support life.

So between the deeper meaning of the word sozo and the full economic Sabbath of the year of Jubilee,  you can see that Jesus’ call to ministry is a *challenge* to the way the world currently is.  

Because, if you open your bulletin to look at Luke 4:18-19 you will see Jesus proclaiming:

• Good news to the poor, which may not feel like good news to the rich
• Release of prisoners, which can be controversial
• Recovery of sight to the blind that can be interpreted 2 ways
  • Physical healing, which is challenging for those who profit off of illness… not challenging for healthcare professionals who want to help people heal, but the for-profit healthcare industry and the peddlers of useless “wellness” products
  • Or recovery of sight can mean, opening our eyes to the truth – waking up to see the injustice around us — what is commonly called “being Woke.”  Wokeness is a challenge to evildoers.
• Liberation of the oppressed, which will deprive the oppressors of their profits, because, remember, evil is rarely done for evil’s sake, oppressing people with low wages, denial of health care, lack of civil rights,  unsafe conditions and so on, is profitable!
• And The Year of the Lord’s Favor – the Jubilee year…. Honestly, Jubilee is so different from what we have now that I can’t even imagine how that would work!?  But it is definitely a challenge to our current economic system!

It’s time to read the second half of our scripture.

(Luke 4:22-30)

Here in this second part of the reading is where Jesus does what Bishop Mariann Budde did.  

At first they’re fine with Jesus reading scripture and proclaiming good news FOR THEM.

They’re expecting their hometown boy to make life better for them in Nazareth, and Jesus calls them out!

Starting in verse 23, let’s take this apart. Scripture is in your bulletin!

When Jesus says, 

“Undoubtedly, you will quote this saying to me: ‘Doctor, heal yourself. Do here in your hometown what we’ve heard you did in Capernaum.’” 

Jesus is saying what they’re thinking.  They want their hometown boy to take care of his own people.  Jesus has healed people in the Roman city of Capernaum, and they are a little offended that a prophet of God (because they thought Jesus was a prophet), a Prophet of Israel has healed non-Jews!  They felt that Jesus should take care of his fellow Jews, not go around healing non-Jewish people.  We still hear this kind of thinking today, don’t we?  I hear people saying things like, “we need to take care of Americans first.”  But Jesus disagrees.

Look at verses 25 – 27.  

You see, the city of Zarephath in the region of Sidon, is the modern city of As-Sarafand in southern Lebanon, which in the time of Elijah was a Phoenician city.  The Phoenicians were a loose confederation of city states who developed out of the old Canaanite civilization – one of the historic enemies of Israel.

Naaman the Syrian was a general in the army of the king of Syria who suffered from leprosy.  While Naaman was leading the attack against Israel, the prophet Elisha healed him.

Jesus, by citing the stories of Elisha and Naaman and Elijah and the widow of Sidon, is telling them that God does not agree with their Israel-first point of view.  God sent two of the greatest prophets EVER to heal non-Jewish people, so God must be OK with Jesus healing people in Capernaum.

Jesus was telling them that God is the God of All Peoples, All Nations, All of us.

The God of Elijah and Elisha.
The God who is Creator, Christ and Spirit has mercy for all people and calls us to have mercy for all people.

This is the gospel truth.

I think Bishop Budde said it well,

All of us, including, and perhaps especially, our leaders, are called to have mercy.

Here’s what she said, that made our President so mad.

Play video Starting at 12:15 to the end. 1.21.25 Sermon by The Right Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwwaEuDeqM8 

28 When they heard this, everyone in the synagogue was filled with anger. 

“I assure you that no prophet is welcome in the prophet’s hometown.”

When I have the great privilege to baptize someone, I lay my hand upon their head I speak this baptismal blessing from the top of page 37:

The Holy Spirit is at work within you, 

And yes, I edit that, because our Wesleyan understanding of Prevenient Grace proclaims that God is at work in us before we come to know God!

The Holy Spirit is at work within you,
that being born through water and Spirit,
you may be a faithful disciple of Jesus Christ.

Friends, the Spirit of God is at work within you, whether you are baptized or not.

The Spirit of God is upon you.
Calling you to be a faithful disciple of Jesus Christ.

Sending us all to

preach good news to the poor,
    to proclaim release to the prisoners
    and recovery of sight to the blind,
    to liberate the oppressed,
19 and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Will you accept the Spirit’s call?

I invite you to say, the Spirit is upon me, 3 times and let the truth of these words sink in.

We’re continuing our “kind of a Baptismal Vows Series” this week, so you can go ahead and bookmark page 34 in the hymnal now if you like!  

 The first week we read the story of the Baptism of Jesus alongside our Baptismal Vows and noticed how there was real risk, for John the Baptist, in accepting the freedom and power God gives us to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.  With freedom and power comes risk and responsibility.  Maybe we’re uncomfortable with risk, but we trust God enough to accept the risk.

Last week, we visited the uncomfortable verses about evil doers from Psalm 36, revisited the English translation of the Apostle’s Creed, watched a little Star Wars, and pulled this all together to say that Resistance is about saying Yes to Love.

This week we’re doing our annual, Book of Discipline Mandated review of our Safe Sanctuary Policy.

As someone who formerly held the job of youth and children’s ministry, today’s Bible reading is every family ministry worker’s worst nightmare!

To put this story in Modern Methodist terms, it’s like the whole church went to Camp Junaluska together, and Jesus didn’t get on the buses to take us from the Camp to the airport.  Then, Not even Jesus’ parents made sure that he had actually boarded the plane with us, until we reached our layover at Dallas Fort Worth Airport in Texas!  (Camp Junaluska is in North Carolina, just fyi – I thought it was in Alaska when I first became a Methodist!)

So we’re in Texas when Mary and Joseph realize that their weird, long haired kid is missing, and we don’t know where we lost track of Jesus, but he’s not here, so Mary and Joseph run to the ticket counter, beg the gate agent to exchange their ticket and fly back to North Carolina where they find Jesus giving a lecture to the Council of Bishops.  So of course, after they hug Jesus, they absolutely lose it on him!  Like, how could you do this to us! And Jesus is not even a little bit sorry!  He’s all, “of course I’m here!”  

Any other parents ever had their child say, “but I knew where I was!”

Stories like this one are half of why we have Safe Sanctuary Policies in our churches and Camps!

Our Safe Sanctuary Policies ensure that all Camp staff, camp volunteers, Church staff and volunteers, and all Clergy, including our Bishops have been background checked and are following basic safety rules such as:

1. Required training for all persons having direct contact with children, youth, and vulnerable adults. Training that includes an annual orientation that includes information about the local ministry setting abuse prevention policy. Paid staff who are required to attend these trainings should be

compensated for their time

2. Our standard practice is that all children, youth, and vulnerable adults will be

supervised by at least 2 unrelated adults and that no adult will be alone with

children, youth, or vulnerable adult(s) out of sight of other adults

The minimum standard is an open space (open door, window, etc.) such that activities can be observed and an adult who is assigned to periodically observe the activities.

3. No person shall supervise any age group of children or youth unless they are AT

LEAST 5 years older than the children or youth.

That’s our policy.  We background check, and people with a record of crimes against persons are excluded from ministry with vulnerable persons, youth,  and children.

We require training of all staff and volunteers who work with children or vulnerable adults.  And we’ll be sending out links to the online training soon!

We do not allow 1-1 interactions between one child and one adult and the standard is 2 unrelated adults who are at least 5 years older than the children or youth.  Unrelated adults is the rule because if you are spouses or otherwise related you may not be willing to testify in court against one another, or you may be more tolerant of wrong behavior. 

What this means for our story is that even though Jesus got left behind at Camp Junaluska, all the Camp Staff, volunteers and the Bishops would be background checked, trained, and be making sure that there were never any 1-1 meetings between an adult and young Jesus and at least 2 of the adults with Jesus would be unrelated.  So Jesus would have been safe.

And we have codified this priority for protecting children, youth and vulnerable adults into our United Methodist Documents. 

General Conference Resolution 3084, “Reducing the Risk of Child Sexual Abuse in

the Church, pg. 240, 2012 Book of Resolutions states:

As Christians we must take our responsibilities to our children, youth, and vulnerable adults very seriously. While policies alone may not be able to completely prevent all harm, sexual abuse can be prevented. We as the people of the United Methodist Church are dedicated to preventing all forms of abuse within our ministry and within our community.

And we define abuse: 

• Abuse: (is) intentional, negligent, or reckless behavior by a volunteer or staff

person that is harmful, injurious, or offensive. Abuse takes many forms and

includes, but is not limited to: physical abuse, neglect, self-neglect, abandonment, verbal and emotional abuse, financial exploitation, sexual abuse, involuntary seclusion, and wrongful restraint.

• Child Abuse:(is) an act committed by anyone which is not accidental and which harms or threatens a child’s physical or mental health or a child’s welfare.
• Physical Abuse: (is) when an adult injures a child other than by accident; including, but not limited to: assault, battery, shaking, slapping, burning, scalding, kicking and strangling.

Sexual Abuse: (is defined as)

1. any sexual contact or sexually explicit behavior initiated by an adult, youth or child toward a child;
2. any sexual contact or sexually explicit sexual behavior initiated by an adult toward a youth;
3. any nonconsensual sexual contact or nonconsensual sexually explicit behavior initiated by a youth toward another youth including, but not limited to sexual harassment; [and] any sexual behavior by a youth toward another youth younger than 14 and where the initiating youth is three years older;
4. any sexual contact by anyone (outside a recognized, committed, intimate partnership) toward a vulnerable adult, or sexually explicit behavior by anyone toward a vulnerable adult where the vulnerable adult is unable to provide meaningful consent.

• Emotional Abuse: (is) verbal assault or emotional cruelty.

Sexual Harassment and rape of non-vulnerable adults is also not OK, but the reporting rules are different, so that is not in this policy.  However our sexual harrassment or rape by our clergy is absolutely not tolerated and that is included in separate documents about clergy behavior.  

All clergy are mandated reporters in the state of Oregon, so I must report knowledge of childabuse and elder abuse.  There is no such thing as a seal of confession for United Methodist Clergy, when it comes to abuse. 

 I don’t have to report other crimes that are not against persons.

I also want you to know how to report abuse, including spiritual abuse by a Pastor, Deacon, or Certified Lay Minister.  When something happens, your Pastor should be a person whom you can trust to help you and to assist you with reporting abuse.  But sometimes an abuser will slip past our background check process, and our psychological evaluation and will try to do some harm.

If your pastor crosses a line, even if you aren’t sure if it’s abuse, please report us.

Here’s how!

Go to UMOI.org or  just search for Oregon Idaho UMC and that will take you to this webpage:  umoi.org

Yes, I always have that many tabs open!

Then scroll down to the very bottom

Which looks like this.  Do you see the word Staff across from the little bird and right above “Privacy & Terms of Use”?  Click on the word Staff

You see the picture of the Bishop, yes?  Scroll down a little bit more and you’ll see the contact info for the Bishop.

Scroll down further and you’ll see the District Superintendents.

All of Portland is in the Columbia District, so my Boss is Rev Karen Hernandez.  If you ever have any concerns about my behavior she is who you share your concerns with.

If you have concerns about a District Superintendent’s behavior, you can share them with a different Superintendent, or the Bishop.

If you have Concerns about the Bishop you can share those with a Superintendent, or your local Pastor, or you can google UMC Council of Bishops and report it to them.

I want you to know that there are consequences for clergy who do harm.  

Clergy who abuse anyone, spiritually, financially, physically, or sexually, will lose our ordination or licensing.  The policy of the United Methodist Church is that we turn in our clergy to law enforcement if they break the law by harming people.  We prioritize the protection of children, youth and vulnerable people over the reputation of our denomination.

Why?  Because protecting the vulnerable is a part of our Baptismal Vows.

Pick up your hymnal and turn to page 34.  Page 34, not hymn 34, there is no hymn 34. 

Not only do we vow to ‘accept the freedom and power God gives us to resist evil, injustice, and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.”  

Not only do the sponsors and family now to nurture the baptized, in Christ’s holy church,

But look at the top of p35.

The clergy person asks the whole congregation to take a vow to care for the Baptized.

I’ll read my part and then let’s all read your part together.

Will you nurture one another in the Christian faith and life and include these persons now before you in your care?

With God’s help we will proclaim the good news 

and live according to the example of Christ.

We will surround these persons 

with a community of love and forgiveness,

that they may grow in their trust of God,

and be found faithful in their service to others.

We will pray for them,

that they may be truth disciples

who walk in the way that leads to life.

Notice what you have vowed to do as a congregation:

Let’s bring up our online friends and get the handheld mic,  so we can list this out together.

What do we as a congregation vow to do?

What do you see in these vows?

• To proclaim the good news
• Live according to the example of Christ – to be an example for the baptized
• Surround them with a community of love and forgiveness
• That grows their trust in God
• And teaches them to be faithful in service to others
• Pray for them
• Help them become disciples

Thank you!  Yes!  Let’s take down our online friends now, so we aren’t staring at them!

We are vowing to care for one another.

To surround one another with a community of love and forgiveness.

To create a place safe enough to grow trust.

Creating a safe place where love and trust can grow, requires us to center the needs of the vulnerable.

It’s more expensive to hire 2 nursery workers instead of 1.  But we must prioritize safety and abuse prevention over money.

There is room for forgiveness for abusers.  But they will not be allowed to volunteer or work with children, youth or other vulnerable people.  And we require that abusers be accompanied by a person of the church’s choosing at all times to make sure they don’t try anything.  Honestly, as a clergy person who has had convicted abusers ask me if they can attend church, they usually don’t attend after I let them know they will be supervised at all times.

If someone is taking advantage of a vulnerable adult, it’s our job, each one of us, as the church, to say something.  Whether that means reporting abuse to the appropriate agency, or that means, telling your friend that the very nice person they met online who is asking them to send money is a scammer.

If a Pastor is doing harm, we must report it.  And sometimes we need to hold our Bishops and District Superintendents accountable for making sure that clergy who do harm aren’t allowed to negotiate their way out of losing their ordination by retiring then using their ordination in retirement to get another ministry position where they can harm others.

And I think, that if young Jesus was left behind at Camp Junaluska with the Council of Bishops, Jesus would lecture them about caring for the vulnerable, and using their positions of power to do justice and act with mercy and humility.  

To be servants of God, rather than Chaplains of Empire.

To not be afraid of doing and saying what is right.

Pretty much EVERY clergywoman, myself included, hates the song, “Mary Did You Know” because it is the most biblically inaccurate Christmas Song ever!

I mean… I mean… just listen to this schlock!

Mary, did you know That your baby boy Is the Lord of all creation?

Mary, did you know That your baby boy Will one day rule the nations?

Did you know That your baby boy Was heaven’s perfect Lamb?

And the sleeping Child you’re holdin’ Is the Great I Am!

It’s so inaccurate that fellow clergywoman, Megan Westra rewrote the lyrics in response.https://heatherprincedoss.com/mary-freaking-knew/

Mary freaking knew, that her baby boy would one day rule the nations.

Mary freaking knew, that her baby boy was Lord of all creation.

Yes she knew! Read Luke 1, you fool, she sang about it then;

It helps, if when you’re reading,

you listen to the

WOMENNNNNNNN!

The man who wrote “Mary Did You Know” is the sort of conservative Christian who doesn’t believe that women can be Pastors, much less prophets, so it makes sense that his view of Mary is of an ignorant and submissive girl who has no idea what she is getting into.

https://religionnews.com/2021/12/17/mary-did-you-know-songwriter-mark-lowry-remains-grateful-despite-controversy-mainsplain-theology-pentatonix-christmas/

As Ruth said, when we sang O Little Town of Bethlehem on December 1st, only a man would think that Mary was silent about the birth of Jesus!

Ruth definitely identified the source of the problem!

Because as I read commentaries on today’s Bible readings, there were definitely two very different views of this story.  Male scholars typically took the view that Mary was an unwed teenage mother who was helpless, vulnerable, meek, and ignorant.

Female scholars, especially those of us who have had the experience of giving birth and parenting teenage girls,  view Mary’s experience as powerful.

First of all, teenage girls are not silent!

Anybody else here raised a teen girl?  Not silent!

Teenage girls carry within them a powerful rage because they see so clearly the injustice of the patriarchy, in the way their own bodily autonomy is objectified into what is appealing to men.  Even in the Gospel of Luke, the Messenger Gabriel doesn’t ask Mary if she’s willing to Mother the Messiah, he just tells her her body is about to be used.  But Mary, in true teenage girl fashion, intelligently questions Gabriel, asking, “and… this will happen how?  Because I’ve never had sex with a man.” (Luke 1:34)  And after getting her question answered, teenaged Mary, gets the last word, by taking back her agency and saying yes, even though nobody asked for her consent.

Second of All, Pregnancy is powerful.  Cis Men talk about Mary being vulnerable and helpless because they have no idea how much energy it takes to grow a whole human inside of you.  Men view birth as helpless and vulnerable because there’s nothing they can do to protect us from it.  But the muscles and sheer effort that it takes to give birth requires a marathon level of energy.

But I think perhaps the most significant difference in view is our views of power.

The “traditional,” patriarchal view of the world defines power almost exclusively as the power to destroy.

• The country with the biggest military is the most powerful.
• The corporation who can extract the most labor and resources for the least expense is the most powerful.
• The ruler who can impose their will over the most people, whether they like it or not, especially if they don’t like, is the most powerful.
• The biggest city with the most wealthy people is the most powerful, even though that same city will usually have many more people living in poverty.
• The bully with the scariest, “or else,” is the most powerful.

This is how we’ve been taught to define power.

Power as, “power over.”  Power as the ability to enforce your will on others.

Power as the ability to destroy and dominate.

The Prophet Micah offers us the beginning of glimpses of a different kind of power: Generative Power, that is the power of creation.

Micah, like Mary, came from a small town, rural, working class family.  Micah worked as a prophet around 730 years before the first Christmas.  Micah went from small town boy to court prophet to 3 kings of Judah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, but he never forgot his hometown roots among the small-time farmers and shepherds in the foothills of the central highlands of Palestine.

You will probably recognize Micah by his most famous quote, Micah 6:8

“God has told you, O mortal, what is good:

and what does the LORD require of you

but to do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?”

The reason Micah was calling for justice and mercy and humility was because the Kings and local leaders were foreclosing on small farms and homesteads, tossing whole families into the street and dooming their children to starvation. (Micah 2:2; 9)

Micah’s calling as a prophet was to proclaim that God cares about the little people.  That the God of Jacob, is the defender of shepherds and poor farmers.  That God favors those whose daily labor is tending life.  The life of plants, the life of livestock, the life of the people who eat the food and wear the clothes woven from the wool and the flax.

In today’s reading, it’s inside the bulletin, if you want to follow along,  Micah is proclaiming that God has had it with the Big Kings from the Big Cities of Samaria and Jerusalem.

Next time, God is going to raise up a leader from backwater little Bethlehem.

A leader who will act like a good shepherd and take care of the people.

A leader who will bring security to their lives.

A leader who will understand that peace is far more powerful than war.

A leader who understands that real power is the kind of creative power that nurtures life.

We’ve been focusing this Advent on Room.

On Making Room for the Holy in our lives, just as the mysterious Inn Keeper made room for the Holy Family.

On Making Room for Joy by saying no to the myth of scarcity and yes to God’s abundance.

On Making Room at the Table for All of God’s Beloveds, because it’s God’s Table, it’s God’s Church, it’s God’s world.  We are limited in what we have and what we can do, But God is unlimited!

Today we are Making Room for a View.

Not the romanticized view of the Star of Bethlehem shining over an open fronted barn with a silent Mary and a baby Jesus who never cries.

Today we are Making Room for a different view of Mary and a different view of Power.

Generative Power.

The power to create and to tend life, not the power to destroy and oppress life.

Look at what the women said.

• Listen to Elizabeth talking about the power of a fetus leaping with joy.
• Listen to teenage Mary singing forth joy from the depths of her being when the whole world is telling her to be ashamed!
• Listen to Mary echoing Micah – talking about taking out the Big City Kings and raising up the lowly.
• Listen to Mary talking about a world where the hungry get the good stuff, and the rich walk away empty handed because they don’t get to steal from the poor anymore.

Mary was a teenage Prophet.

Mary was an Apostle – one of Jesus’ original followers who was there for the whole story.

Mary was a Leader in the early church.

Mary had a vision of the way the world could be if we embraced God’s Generative/Creative definition of Power.

• A View of Power as the daily labor of tending life.
• A View of Power as tending what we love, instead of fighting what we hate.
• A View of Power as reclaiming our agency from those who seek to dominate and oppress,
• A View of Power as saying yes to God’s vision of what the world could be if God’s will was done here on earth as it is in Heaven.

Teenage Mary, and small town Micah lived in a world very much like our own.

A world where Bullies, whether they be Kings or Corporate CEO’s seek to enrich themselves by denying God’s call to care for the Lowly.

Teenage Mary, and small town Micah were not powerful people from important families.  They were small town, working class folks who found their voices, and shared a view of what the world *could be* in the face of what the world is.

There are those who say that God’s Reign of Generative Power will never come here on earth as it is in heaven.  But I don’t particularly care how right they may  or may not be.

Because like Mary, my inner teenager has a few things to say about justice and mercy.

And I would rather be wrong about believing in the Power of God’s Love than be right about the Power of destruction and oppression.

A Place at the Table.  Peace
Montavilla United Methodist
December 15, 2024
Rev Heather Riggs

You can hear in my voice that I am still recovering from the flu!

I am so grateful for every single one of you who have pulled together to handle all the things while I was sick last week!

I’m so grateful for the time to be able to rest and heal that I’m going to echo Paul, and scholars do believe this letter to the Christians in Philippi was written by the actual Paul in the mid-50s, so like Paul…

I thank God for you in my prayers.

I’m so thankful for all of you.  You have brought joy back into ministry for me.

I love the way you have been real partners in ministry!

My crystal ball is broken, I don’t understand what’s going on in the world, or how exactly we’re going to get through all of this…

But I’m sure about this:

God is at work within us and God will stay with us in this work through the beginning of whatever it is that God is doing next in God’s Church.

You are all my partners in God’s grace, both while I was out sick, and while I am present.

The way you showed up, signed up, said yes, AND said no when you needed to instead of doing too much and becoming resentful, means a lot to me.

This is my prayer for you: that your love might become even more and more rich with knowledge and all kinds of insight. I pray this so that you will be able to decide what really matters, because, boy howdy, do we have some decisions to make! 

 I pray that your choices will lead to you being filled with the fruit of righteousness, which comes from Jesus Christ, in order to give glory and praise to God.

Paul wrote this letter to the Philippians while he was in prison in Ephesus, knowing that his appeal as a Roman citizen was most likely going to lead to his execution for treason, because he refused to worship the Emperor.  So Paul had no right to be this happy!  Paul should have been scared out of his mind, and there were probably times that he was overcome with fear.  But in the moments that he was writing this letter, Paul was at peace with his future, because he trusted that God would continue to be at work in the lives of the people whom Paul was in ministry with, long after Paul was gone.

Christ came into the world during tumultuous times.

49 years before the first Christmas Julius Caesar ended the Roman Republic by declaring himself Emperor.  The transition from Republic to Empire eroded the civil rights of the citizens and non-citizens of Rome, increased taxes on the poor to fund the excesses of the Emperor, and set off an endless cycle of wars of expansion that in in the time of Christ they had the sheer gall to call the Pax Romana — that is, the Roman Peace.

Into this Empire, in the days of Caesar Augustus, the Emperor sent out a command to all the people to return to the city of their birth to be counted in a census, so that he would know how many people he had available to tax.

And because in the Roman Empire, women didn’t really count as people, Joseph and Mary had to travel to Bethlehem, Joseph’s hometown.

And maybe they delayed their departure because it looked like Mary was ready to pop any day and they hoped to travel after the baby was born.  But Jesus didn’t cooperate with that plan, so by the time Joseph and Mary made it to Bethlehem, Joseph’s family were all packed into every conceivable space.  So all they had left was the barn.

But when you’re family, it doesn’t matter how small the house is or how small the table is, or if all the chairs are already filled.  You find a way to make room.  You get out the card table.  You pull the sawhorses out of the garage and lay a tablecloth over a piece of plywood. You turn over a bucket and put a pillow on it to make a chair.

Love will find a way to make another place at the table.

Love will find a way to make sure that there is enough on the table for everyone.

There’s no such thing as a table that is too small.  

There’s only hearts that are too small.

But we live in a Western Culture that was shaped by the Roman Empire.  A culture that tells us that there is never enough.  A Culture that tells us that there are only so many seats at the table.

A culture that the original Paul challenged.  The original Paul, not the authors of the pseudo-pauline letters who told us that women should be submissive to their husbands, but the Paul who left women in charge of local churches.

The Paul who in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 verses 17-33 gave us some instructions on how to share God’s Table.

Paul was mad at the Corinthians because they were acting like Romans of Empire at God’s table.  The rich, who didn’t need to work late and could show up early for their gatherings of the Lord’s Supper would bring food and wine and they would often eat and drink till stuffed and drunk and leave nothing for the poor members of the Church who had nothing to bring to the Lord’s Table.

They had this attitude that those who donate the most should get the most out of the church.  But Paul told them that this is not the way of the Body of Christ.

Paul told them that at God’s table, we wait for one another.  At God’s table there are no factions.  Or as the authentic Paul said in Galatians 3:28:

There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither slave nor free; nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

This is why we are sharing our Advent Offering with Rahab’s Sisters and why we will give away 100% of our Christmas Eve offering to Family Promise, even though our 2025 budget plan is still substantially in the red!  We’re working on it, but it’s going to take God’s abundance to make this work! 

 Choosing to share is a choice.

It’s a choice to trust in God’s Empire of abundance, rather than the Roman Empires tradition of grasping scarcity.

Sharing our building and our resources is like sharing a table.

It’s saying that there is room in this building.

There is room in our hearts.

There is room at this table, because it is God’s Table.

 When we are grounded in God’s abundance there is more than enough  at the Table.  

More than enough space.  

More than enough resources. 

More than enough love to go around.

 It’s when we get stuck in thinking that there isn’t enough to go around.  

When we forget that this is God’s Table…God’s building…God’s Beloved Community.   

When we start thinking that this is our Table, our building, our resources, our money, our little group of friends.. That’s when we start to think that we don’t have a big enough table to share and we’re right!    

If the table is my table, there isn’t enough, because my resources are limited!  

I’m limited!

God is not limited.

And there is peace and joy and hope in placing our trust in God’s unlimited grace.

A peace and joy and hope that is far bigger than our circumstances.

God’s grace invites us through the Prophet Baruch, to find joy, peace and hope in the midst of the worst of times.

Baruch was a secretary of the leaders who had been carried away to be held captive in the Babylonian court.  He was a nobody, who wrote a couple of things and sent them to his friend, Jeremiah in Jerusalem.  He’s such a nobody that his writings are not included in the official Bible, but we still have them in the apocrypha, along with the story of Hannuka. 

Baruch reminds us to rejoice in the face of hard times.

To take off our mourning clothes and refuse to be oppressed.

To dress ourselves in the dignity of God.

To wrap ourselves in justice.

To trust God to shine through us in our darkest hours.

To remember that peace comes from justice.

And respect comes not from the wealth of Empires, but from the Grace of God.

So get up, church!

Be on the lookout for what God is doing!

See the people gathered at God’s table, and rejoice that God is still with us all.