Promise

Watching for the Morning of June 7, 2020

Year A

The Feast of the Holy Trinity

The Trinity is not an abstract concept.  It is not an attempt to define the indefinable.  It is not an ontological description of the divine.  It is a promise.  It is the promise that Jesus the crucified is the face of God.  It is a promise that the Spirit that inflames, comforts, teaches, guides, empowers, confronts, and upholds is the breath of God.  It is a promise that the birth of the world is in the same suffering, healing, forgiving, love manifest in Jesus.  It is a promise that the breath that blew over the primal waters is the same life-giving breath in us and the same breath that will, in the age to come, govern every human heart.

The Trinity is a promise.  God is not a judge on a throne waiting to weigh everyone on eternal scales; God is the mercy that lays down its life for the sheep.  God is not the prime mover, winding up the world like a newly formed watch to let it run; God is the living heartbeat that calls forth life in every nook and cranny of existence.  God is not fickle, like the gods both ancient and modern, whose favors and wraths are petty and unpredictable – bestowing bounty one moment then stealing it away.  God is five loaves feeding five thousand and an ever-flowing stream.

The Trinity is promise, promise that the sorrows we see in the world, the hates, the fears, the grieving, the thieving, the suffering, the silencing, the extinguished breath – these are not our truth.  Our truth is in the word that called forth the world, saw that it was good, and blessed it.  Our truth is in the word made flesh who brought joy to a wedding, transforming water into wine.  Our truth is in the Spirit poured out that proclaimed the praise of God in every language on earth.  Our truth is creation made whole, Babel undone, hearts of stone become living beating hearts, the tree of life, and a river flowing from the throne of God like the river of Eden.

The Trinity is promise.  And all that is to come rests in the arms of this promise.

The Prayer for June 7, 2020

O God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,
of Moses and Miriam,
of Ruth and David,
of Mary and Joseph;
God wrapped in mystery and wonder,
who breathed life into our first parents
and your Holy Spirit into all creation;
God who loves and fathers and sends
and is loved and begotten and sent;
help us to praise you rightly,
love you fully
and walk with you faithfully;
through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever.

The Texts for June 7, 2020

First Reading: Genesis 1:1 – 2:4a
“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth.” – The first chapter of Genesis tells of the creation of all things by God’s word, God’s declaration that the creation is good, God’s blessing of humanity, and their commission to care for the earth.

Psalmody: Psalm 8
“What are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?” – The psalm celebrates the majesty of God and marvels at the position of honor and responsibility God has given to humanity by entrusting God’s wondrous creation into their care.

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 13:11-13
“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.” – In his final greeting at the close of his letter to the believers in Corinth, Paul uses the familiar language that ultimately leads to the development of the doctrine of the Trinity.

Gospel: Matthew 28:16-20
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” – Following Pentecost, we return to the Gospel of Matthew, resuming here at the end of the Gospel because of the Trinitarian name: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  With these concluding words, the risen Jesus declares his abiding presence among his followers and sends them to make disciples of all nations.

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Images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pordenone_Holy_Trinity.jpg; Il Pordenone / Public domain

How majestic

For Wednesday

Psalm 8

⁹O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!

God’s name is more than the four letters known as the Tetragrammaton, the four consonantal letters that are the name of God recorded as ‘LORD’ in most translations. God’s name is his history, his deeds, his words. Just as “making a name for oneself” is more than fame – it is ‘made’ by one’s accomplishments.

Frank Lloyd Wright made a name for himself with a few houses and buildings – exquisite works of genius – but still, rather limited in scope.* God formed the Tetons and the Snake River beneath it. God formed the glories of Bryce Canyon and the giant redwoods. God formed the Andes and the Amazon basin. God formed Victoria Falls and the islands of the Pacific.

God formed the majestic blue whale and the strange creatures of the deep. God formed the flocks of storks migrating between Europe and Southern Africa, and the bar-headed goose fighting its way over the Himalayas. God formed the roly-poly bugs and the lizards darting to and fro. God formed the chipmunk and the eagle, the salmon and the bison, the crocodile and the hippo, the rhinoceros and the tiger. God formed the honeybee and the monarch butterfly in its epic journey. God formed the Narwhal and the Great White. God formed the exquisite marlin and the jerboa; the beaver and the platypus; the mountain gorilla … and all this is just our one moment in time. We haven’t spoken of the wondrous creatures of the fossil record or the rise and fall of mountains and seas and the continents that came together and drifted apart.   And all this on one small planet near a small star on the fringes of a galaxy in the vast canopy of the heavens.

God’s name is majestic because God’s work is majestic – not just the work of creation but the work of freeing a people from bondage, teaching them justice and mercy, calling forth prophets, raising and casting down nations, suffering the sorrows of the world, and summoning the world to compassion and truth.

God’s name is majestic because God’s work is majestic: bending to take flesh, healing the sick, gathering outcasts, raising the dead, laying down his life to reconcile his rebellious world to himself.

God’s name is majestic because God’s work is majestic: pouring out God’s spirit, inspiring healers and reformers, researchers and leaders, builders and artists, singers and soldiers, all the plethora of ways we are able to serve one another and grant beauty and joy to the world.

God’s name is majestic because God’s work is majestic: inspiring the laughter of children, the ecstasy of lovers, the bonds of parent and child,

God’s name is majestic because God’s work is majestic: inspiring the prayer of the mystics and the charity of the saints and the courage of the martyrs.

God’s name is majestic because God’s work is majestic.   God’s love is majestic. God’s faithfulness to his wayward world is majestic.

⁹O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!

*Note: Yes, Frank LLoyd Wright designed over a thousand building and did many other things – but still, compared to the heavens and the earth…

The photograph is in the public domain: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Natural_bridge_in_Bryce_Canyon.jpg

Tested

Watching for the Morning of February 14, 2016

Year C

The First Sunday in Lent

We are reading Luke out of order now that we have entered the festal season of Lent, going back and jumping forward (and even adding a Sunday from John) to capture themes for this season that leads us to the three days from the Last Supper on the evening of Maundy Thursday through the cross and resurrection. So where we had been reading about Jesus in Nazareth, we jumped forward to the Transfiguration last Sunday (to match the words from Jesus’ baptism at the beginning of the previous season) and now, on this first Sunday in Lent, we are looking back to the narrative of Jesus tested in the wilderness.

It’s a little disorienting and leads to the perception that the Gospels are like bags of marbles rather than dramas with a beginning, middle and end that bear a message for a time and a place. Arthur Miller’s The Crucible is not a collection of sayings from the time of the Salem Witch Trials; it is a narrative for a nation in the midst of the anticommunist witch-hunts of the McCarthy era.  It intends to help us see ourselves and our time.  It intends to change our hearts – and so, too, the Gospels.

So as we hear the Gospel read on Sunday we need to remember where we are in the story: We’ve heard of the wondrous birth of John, the angel’s message to Mary, the promise of a kingdom without end, Mary’s song of the righting of the world, John’s exhortation to begin now to live the life of the coming kingdom, and Jesus, baptized, anointed with the Spirit, with the voice from heaven declaring: “You are my son.” It is a claim that must be tested, and tested it is. The devil comes to urge him to be less than he is – to be like God’s people who clamored for bread, bowed down before the golden calf, and tested God in the wilderness.

But Jesus proves true. He does not break faith. He trusts fully in God’s word.

Created

During Lent each year our parish focuses upon one portion of the catechism – this year, the Apostles’ Creed. The themes of the coming five Sundays are: Created, Redeemed, Called, Gathered, Enlightened.

“God has created me and all that exists” is the line from Luther’s Small Catechism that guides our first week. The genius in Luther’s brief explanation to the first article of the creed is the word ‘me’. The creed does not set out a doctrine of God; it is proclaims a relationship. God has created me. God has surrounded me with all the bounty of creation. God provides me with all I need for no reason other than God’s goodness. It is all gift – and that proclamation leads to the recognition: “Therefore I surely ought to thank and praise, serve and obey him.”

It misses the point to argue creation versus evolution. What the faith confesses is not a theory of origins; the faith confesses a loving presence to whom I belong, to whom I owe fealty, to whom I owe praise and thanksgiving.

The Prayer for February 14, 2016

In the mystery of your love, O God,
you called forth the world
and formed us from the dust of the earth and the breath of your Spirit.
In the wonder of your Son, Jesus,
you show the pattern of true faithfulness.
Make us ever true to your Word
and confident of your mercy;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever.

The Texts for February 14, 2016

First Reading: Deuteronomy 26:1-11
“A wandering Aramean was my ancestor…” – When Israel enters into the land, they are to bring an offering of the first fruits, recite the story of what God has done for them, and celebrate God’s goodness.

Psalmody: Psalm 91 (appointed: 91:1-2, 9-16)
“You who live in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of the Almighty, will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress; my God, in whom I trust.” – The psalmist proclaims the protective love of God (a psalm the devil quotes in testing Jesus).

Second Reading: Romans 10:8b-13
“If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” – Paul is arguing that we are restored to a right relationship with God not by outward acts of obedience to the law, but by trusting allegiance to God’s promise.

Gospel: Luke 4:1-13
“Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil.” – Following the outpouring of God’s Spirit upon Jesus and the declaration from God “This is my Son”, the devil tests Jesus, seeking to show him unworthy of such a title.

 

Image: Briton Rivière – The Temptation in the Wilderness [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Image 2: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AHeavens_Above_Her.jpg  By Ian Norman (http://www.lonelyspeck.com) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

The authority to speak

Ludolf Backhuysen, Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee, 1695

Watching for the Morning of June 21, 2015

Year B

The Fourth Sunday after Pentecost:
Proper 07 / Lectionary 12

The stilling of the storm is one of those troubling stories that challenges our modern understanding of what is possible given the laws of nature. But Jesus’ command of the wind and waves is not only conceivable to the people of his time; it is filled with dramatic significance.

Out of the stormy chaos of a raging sea, mighty wind, and darkness, God speaks to create the world. At the time of Noah, God opens the floodgates in the heavens to allow the sea that destroys all life to pour in. God drives back the waters of the Red Sea by a mighty wind, and by his word sets limits the sea cannot pass. God even sends a storm to oppose Jonah in his flight from his ministry in Nineveh.

We hear some of this in Sunday’s other readings.  When God breaks his silence and questions Job, God asks Job where was he when God constrained and set limits for the sea. The psalmist sings of Gods deliverance of sailors at sea. They cry out in terror before God stills the waves. All of this reverberates through this narrative of Jesus rising from sleep to command the sea.

What confronts the followers of Jesus, struggling in their frail boat, is the authority of Jesus to speak God’s word of command over the primal forces of chaos. It is not a “miracle”, a dramatic show of Jesus’ divine power. It is the authoritative proclamation of one commissioned to speak on behalf of the God who called all things into being. And we are as the disciples in the boat: He who has authority to speak God’s word to the sea, speaks God’s word also to us.

The Prayer June 21, 2015

God of all creation,
who brought forth the earth and all its creatures
and set the bounds of the sea,
come to the aid of your church, beset by storms and danger,
granting us faith that your will and purpose to redeem all things cannot be overthrown;
through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Texts for June 21, 2015

First Reading: Job 38:1-11
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.” – God responds to Job’s persistent demand for God to explain his innocent suffering.

Psalmody: Psalm 107:1-3, 23-32
“Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he brought them out from their distress; he made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed.” – The psalmist sings of the steadfast love of God who delivers those in distress.

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 6:1-13
“We urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain.” – The ministry of Paul was attacked in Corinth by new teachers who came after he left, saying he lacked the proper credentials and his teaching was self-serving. Paul urges the community in Corinth not turn away from the message he brought them – and the favor of God to which it testifies – and cites his endurance despite many trials as evidence of the worth and validity of his teaching.

Gospel: Mark 4:35-41
“A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion.” – The disciples, though experienced sailors, are terrified by a hostile wind, while Jesus is at peace, asleep. Their loyalty to Jesus and his message of the dawning reign of God is shaken by this attack, but Jesus rises to command the sea to be still.

Majesty and mercy

Watching for the morning of February 8

Year B

The Fifth Sunday after Epiphany

Majesty and mercy echo through the readings for this Sunday. Jesus leaves the synagogue for Peter’s home (across the street) where he brings God’s healing to Peter’s mother-in-law. When evening comes and Sabbath is over, the town brings all their sick and troubled to Jesus and they are healed.

Such authority to heal and renew belongs to God of course, and of this power and grace the prophet and the psalmist sing. With memorable poetry, Isaiah declares to the exiles in Babylon that God is creator and lord over all creation and will bring deliverance to the people. And in one of the five ‘Hallel’ psalms that conclude the psalter – psalms beginning with Hallelujah, “Praise the Lord” – the poet sings of God’s majesty and mercy: gathering the exiles, rebuilding Jerusalem, and reigning over all creation and every heavenly power.

Majesty and mercy, power and grace, Lord of all and tender healer of the brokenhearted, God knows every star by name – and the name of each one of us.

The people of Capernaum would like to keep such a wonder-worker close at hand, but there is a mission to be fulfilled in the world.

The Prayer for February 8, 2015

Almighty God, healer of all our sorrows,
grant that we might not seek to possess you for ourselves,
but joyfully bear your word and grace to all people;
through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Texts for February 8, 2015

First Reading: Isaiah 40:21-31
“Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” – The prophet addresses the exiles with a promise that the God who laid the foundations of the earth has not forgotten this people but will restore them:

Psalmody: Psalm 147:1-11, 20c
“Praise the Lord! How good it is to sing praises to our God.” – A psalm of praise proclaiming God’s power and grace as revealed in God’s work of creation and in his mercy to Israel.

Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 9:16-23
“I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some.” – In the middle of Paul’s response to the question whether believers can partake of meat that has been offered in sacrifice to other gods – a response that begins with the necessity of not acting in a way that derails another person’s faith – Paul offers himself as an example of serving others in love.

Gospel: Mark 1:29-39
“Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.” – Having summoned Simon, Andrew, James and John, and astounded the crowds in Capernaum with his teaching and authority over the unclean spirits, Jesus dispenses the gifts of God, healing Peter’s mother-in-law and many others in the community. The next morning he announces that they must take this message and ministry to all the towns and villages in Israel.