My parents have a farm that has been their retirement dream since I was a little girl. I love to help with the animals. One of my favorite things to do is help my dad open a gate for new grass. The herd kicks up their heels with excitement at this new horizon every time. (It’s not like they are starving… they actually are fed quite well..but as they say “the grass is always greener on the other side.”)


If we could just as easily accept such simple gifts with such delight.


If we could slow down and just be: trust.


I think a lot of what Jesus is saying to the pharisees in this story about the shepherd has to do with trust. The sheep hear his voice and they trust. Trust is the relationship that is natural to a loving and trustworthy God.


Today is Good Shepherd Sunday. It comes every year. We hear the famous parable that Jesus offers and we listen to Psalm 23: The Lord is my Shepherd.


It is important to remember that in the Gospel Jesus is speaking to the Pharisees just after he has healed the blind man. It isn’t clear why these two stories are separated from one another, because this passage is a continuation of the conversation Jesus is having with the pharisees on that day.


If you remember: The blind man hears Jesus voice and listens to him. Jesus and the disciples come across the blind man by the side of the road and everyone is debating what he had done to born blind - and whether his parents did something terrible for their son to have been born blind.
Jesus says neither one.


He intends to intervene, But the disciples are concerned because it is the Sabbath when no one can work. The Pharisees are appalled that Jesus would do so. He is breaking the rules…But Jesus says, while I am in the world I am the light of the world.
“6 After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. 7 “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.”


The man who was blind listened to his voice.


Jesus is impressing upon the Pharisees that life and abundance and healing is for all time and for all of us.
As the famous saying goes: “for those with ears to listen!”


In this Gospel Jesus uses a lot of metaphors to get this idea across: Sheep, Shepherds, gate keepers, gates…
The pharisees are confused… Which one is he?


I sort of think of it as Jesus trying to relate the different trusting aspects of a loving and trusting God to a shepherding metaphor …and ratcheting it up as he goes.


Eventually, he is fed up and exclaims: “don’t you get it?!
I am the gate!”


…he represents the gate to abundant life that is God’s gift to us…
…Not human made rules that wall and divide us with cruelty and judgment.






Although we associate psalm 23 with funerals, the psalm which talks about the good shepherd is about the promise of life (which is always Jesus’ first priority).


The Lord is my shepherd.
I shall not be in want.
He revives my soul
Surely his goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life


Psalm 23 is pastoral and comforting and speaks to life everlasting, but it also speaks very specifically to life now.


Abundant life is a life that is safe from predation, life that is nourishing with food and water, places to rest, places for revival and restoration.


That life is God’s promise.


The gate then in this story is almost synonymous with psalm 23s vision of abundant life… The gate provides closure for protection, for rest and revival. It also provides an opening and opportunity for newness of life, nourishment and abundance. That is its own kind of revival.
Revival is the improvement and betterment of our lives.
Jesus wants us to live into this revival.


Jesus is the gate to that life; We know him also as the light, and the way.


While he is in this world, he is the light of the world. I”m going to show you that loving way.


Jesus is not offering to construct a wall, or put a barbed wire fence, rather he is saying that he will be with the sheep building trust, for and with one another, embracing everyone. He is a guiding light, offering safe passage to a better life.


When Jesus tells this story to the pharisees who were suspicious of his healing a blind man on the sabbath, Jesus throws at them this metaphor which is a direct connection to the prophecy of Ezekial: The Lord will be Israel’s Shepherd. The Pharisees know this metaphor. Ezekiel was writing about the destruction of Israel in the 500s BCE. And Jesus is reminding these leaders that they are not being good trustworthy loving shepherds. In fact his metaphor is quite biting… because anything less than love we can recognize as thieves and bandits (stealing the joy of abundance from us).




According to Ezekiel “‘For this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. 12 As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness. … I will tend them in a good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel will be their grazing land. …16 I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice.


This is what Jesus has just modeled with the blind man. True justice. The justice of love. It is his model for how we may live with abundance. Open your ears and then your eyes may be opened.




Jesus is actually all of the metaphors he offers us in the parable…. Borrowing from writer Raj Bharat Patta : “The gate stays with his sheep as a lamb, opens the gates as a gatekeeper, and leads the sheep as a shepherd in caring for the world. As followers of ‘Jesus the gate,’ Christians are called to be a source of sanctuary, open to all people, particularly those seeking refuge(e), by offering care, trust, freedom and love. It is through such action ‘Jesus the gate’ comes alive today.


For those with ears to hear listen!…




​

This passage from John is considered part of the Farewell Discourses. It is one of the conversations that Jesus has with the Disciples on Maundy Thursday actually. So why are we hearing it again in Easter?


This is the Season when we are reading about the early church in the Acts of the Apostles. Some say Acts should be called "the Acts of the Holy Spirit" because it is the Spirit that lives through the early church …and continues to today. This is Resurrection Life.


The martyring of Steven is a grisly story that mirrors the Crucifixion of Jesus.
The early Christian Community in the Book of Acts is described as having singleness of heart. They shared their possessions - and their works were aligned with their beliefs.
The community of followers was growing, but also the way of life for the larger community at the time was being threatened on many fronts; Roman occupation, unfair taxation, different ideas. The community was not just in disagreement, but afraid and so angry that they want after Stephen as a mob.


Stephen is executed illegally for his beliefs, stoned to death by an angry mob. He was not given a hearing. The intolerance was real and it had devastating consequences. It fits with us in Easter because it is a story of the early church, but it also mirrors Jesus’s crucifixion. Stephen even repeats Jesus’s words…”While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” [Sound familiar?] Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he said this he died [Sound Familiar?].


In the Gospel of Luke Jesus says “forgive them father for they know not what they do”… and… “into thy hands I commend my spirit.”


The book of Acts reveals the Holy Spirit moving through the early church. We see it in Stephen.
The Spirit that Jesus gave them.
The Spirit of Peace
The Spirit with the power to forgive.
“Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”


Jesus says that in his father’s house there are many dwellings. I believe forgiveness is a key to these dwellings spaces.


This passage is often read at funerals, but Jesus is not just speaking of death, but of life, and not just some far off idea of life eternal, but life eternal in the now. It is very intimate and real. It is life and life lived abundantly, it is active.

It is following in the footsteps (as the collect says)…and using "the Gate” (as Jesus says).
Do you remember last week: Jesus refers to himself as the “gate.”


Here he goes on to say no one comes to the Father except through me. Emphasis on the word through. I am the gate.


Jesus is not talking about understanding God intellectually or by “going through the (ritualistic) motions.” Jesus is talking about integrating this relationship with God experientially.


Jesus as “the way and the truth and the life” offers not simply a model of behavior, but a “gate,” an expansive opening that comes when the heart and the mind are aligned. We refer to it as “singleness of heart.”
Singleness of Heart includes a lot of forgiveness..
Singleness is both the act of giving and the act of receiving.


Jesus says that within my father’s house there are many dwelling places. Forgiveness is the key to the gate: The gate of life. It will help us recognize these spaces within the community, within one another that allow for thriving, for dwelling, for refuge (as the psalm speaks of today).


To experience life abundantly, eternal life, is to help us recognize God’s life as our life. Jesus says that I am in the father and the father is in me.


In other places he says that you are in me and I am in you and we are all in the father.
This is the “infinite presence of God - the eternal pouring itself out as the reality of ourselves.”  (James Finley)


There are many dwelling places, in each one of us. Sometimes recognizing the infinite presence of God is easiest in the Spring.


I can’t help but be reminded of God in the face of every budding flower. Each one with its own song, singing “God dwells here.”


Contemplative, Meister Ekhart said “Every creature is like a book filled with God.” [There are many dwelling places.]
“God is infinitely generous in opening the gate and giving it away…
And Meikart says “We are the act of receiving… it is not simply performative. It is what we are…”
“Our very being is God in Action giving.” (James Finley)
It is this singleness of heart that we sometimes feel in a flash when we experience something beautiful, intense, or painful, but poignant. We recognize home. Recalling: “On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.”


Jesus finally says to them, if you can’t get this just yet… if you can’t simply believe this, then “believe in me because of the works themselves.” (The goodness that we do).


It is the singleness of heart that we share when we forgive one another - and when we receive forgiveness. It is the singleness of heart that Stephen showed in his life as in his death.

It is the singleness that Jesus came to teach through his life and his death.


And Jesus says we will do even greater works than he has done.


That is the power of the Spirit…
To give and to receive…
To dwell in the presence of the Lord.
Eternal
That is the power of Easter!




​

I’ve mentioned before: The early Christians were called people of “the way.” I love this term because it expresses that we are always moving, growing, changing. We are journeying - and that involves discovery and being discovered.


When we go on a journey, or a satisfying vacation, often a piece of the experience can make one feel new. We are not only experiencing something different, we are experiencing ourselves afresh, awash with new sensations and perceptions. We fall in love with life again because we are renewed. We may discover parts of ourselves we didn’t know before. We may find we had an interest or a gift we hadn’t recognized.


Today the disciples are traveling and it can be a metaphor for our own journeys. The risen Christ accompanies them and he offers them a perspective of life and of him and of the meaning of their purpose through the scriptures. They are transported into a new understanding of the universe. They understand themselves differently, anew and they are transformed.


The revelation of the resurrection transforms us.
It changes our mind, our whole lives.


As the disciples in Acts respond to Peter: “what should we do?”


That is what the Gospel story is about. It is a story that is entirely in motion: in the motion of our response to new life as it may appear to us again and again on our path walking the way, if our eyes are opened.


When the disciples ask Jesus to “stay with them.” They were acting out Jesus’ commission to them to welcome the stranger, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me….”


They offer him hospitality… to a stranger on a night in a new village, as they are still in the midst of their own grief and turmoil. Their hope feels lost. They are in despair because their saviour has been killed. And yet they offer hospitality.


They aren’t waiting until the time is right, until all is well, until everything feels settled. They act out of the compassion of their hearts to make another traveler safe.


This is what the Gospel message is. This is Jesus’ great commission to us. Saving love. Making others safe on this  life journey. And it turns us around and we start to live differently. Like the new community of Christians: how we live, how we spend our money, who we spend our time with, what values we uphold to embody a loving life.


We want to be embodied. We want to be connected. We want to encounter the risen Christ along our paths.


In the letter from Peter Paul says,

“Now that you have purified your souls by your obedience to the truth so that you have genuine mutual love, love one another deeply from the heart…”


Now that the disciples are obedient (Meaning they recognize the truth of that greater call to love: the meaning and message of Jesus, they will have genuine mutual love.)


What should we do?


It is a deep love from the heart that we are called to.


In our reading from Acts today, 3000 people are baptized that day. They hear the call to love. They want it. And we still do.


The disciples on the road to Emmaus offer us examples of those who are beginning to follow in Jesus’ commission: They are willing to listen; disciples who are willing to engage in conversation; willing to offer hospitality.


Hospitality is not just inviting another over for dinner, but what transpires when we come into contact with one another. Hospitality is being welcoming to the other (no matter what kind of food they eat, what their traditions are (as we learn in later acts of the apostles. We will break down these false boundaries). It is also the hospitality of listening to the feelings, desires, experiences of others (even when they differ from our own).


This Gospel passage, and the early Church that we read about in Acts are about understanding the resurrection through dialogue. “What shall we do?”


We continue to ask that very living question: How should we be in community? How do we walk “the Way”?


We are in conversation. We have been for a couple of thousand years.


Today we have the added forum of social media. It is both connecting and disconnecting. It offers us a multitude of ways to understand, and yet can put us into silos of understanding (all through algorithms) that provide us with self-censoring images and ideas (unbeknownst to us often times).


One of the methods the anti-racism committee for instance, offers as an alternative, is to change your feed by following others who you believe are different from you to see a new perspective. Watch a news outlet that you believe you disagree with (but have never watched). Read papers from abroad. Share books with your friends who vote differently from you. And be open.


I have started watching South Korean programs on Netflix and now my offerings for cinema are very different from what they used to be. And my ability to see others who don’t look like me or speak like me, or have the same cultural references takes me on vacation (into the nuances of another culture). My algorithm changed… I see things anew. I learn about myself too.


Certainly we discover easily that we all share romance, love, intrigue, betrayal, and pain. It is all universal.
But I also find I had preconceived notions I didn’t even know I had. I also have delight and resonance in aspects of their culture that make me new.


A new perspective can blow your mind like the disciples who believed all hope was lost. Their anticipation of a messiah doesn’t seem like what they are presented with. Of course they didn’t recognize him.


But it is their action: their hospitality that enables them to see Christ clearly.


The resurrection turns us around.


The disciples minds are changed. They turn around and run back to Jerusalem to tell the others the good news.


Their minds are not changed in terms of politics and ideologies, but rather their hearts and their minds have been turned toward the reality of a living and eternal God.


The Greek term is metanoia. We turn from our old ways of understanding and operating to the new. We find and are found in this new perspective.
And that helps us be connected.


What should we do?


It doesn’t always involve going to a new place on a new vacation, It can be in this place with a new perspective. It can start wherever we are in life’s journey. Whether we are grieving a loved one, rejoicing in a new child, or just getting by… breaking the bread in community every week reminds us that we are united in the Love of God which we are commissioned to share with others.


The saving gift that calls us home to ourselves while at the same time opens us up to new forms of life and love shows up in places we don’t expect.


God comes to us like he did for Mary Magdalene in the garden, and for Thomas behind closed doors, and like the disciples on our way from one place to the next. If we allow ourselves to be open.


As Paul says, “Let our way and our hope be set on God:”


It is this constant higher power of Love that invites us again and again through the breaking of the bread to see anew.


Let God’s hospitality allow your hospitality to kindle your hearts and minds and the hearts of those we encounter on the way.

Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!”


A bit easier said than done (unless we work on it)! Peace is not something we are born with, it is something we learn, and we practice. We even have to remind ourselves to practice it again and again.


And it is Jesus’ message to us. It is the first thing he says to the disciples upon seeing them again. He has just been crucified, abandoned by his friends, betrayed by Judas Iscariot, denied by Peter - and yet his greeting is “Peace be with you.”


Today we are invited into that teaching with Jesus and his disciples. They are still hiding out after the crucifixion. Jesus manages to appear even behind locked doors.
It is in this room where we encounter Jesus, and he commissions them to go. “Jesus said to them again, 'Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’” 


He breaths the Holy Spirit upon them.


The Holy Spirit is considered God at work in the world. Jesus intends for them to carry on this work.


Not only has he given them the gift of Peace, but Jesus gives them the the deeper knowledge behind forgiving sins. He says if you forgive them they are forgiven. If you retain them they are retained.


Also easier said than done.


We aren’t born into forgiveness either, it is something we have to cultivate and practice, like Peace (again and again).


When we forgive we are released from our suffering. We stop the circle of tormenting resentments that suck away our life and joy.


When we forgive it releases others from a domino effect of reactionary activity: “tat for tat”
and "an eye for an eye.”


Jesus links these two important aspects of new community.
peace and forgiveness


It is the new community for those who have been born into the fellowship of Christ’s body.


It involves peace and forgiveness.


As the collect says, The paschal mystery established the new covenant of reconciliation.


We are brought together with one another and God through forgiveness.


It is not easy, but it does transform us.




Jesus models this for us through his life ministry, but especially here in this locked room,
We see him completely transformed post resurrection.
We see him forgiving the world and forgiving his friends.




Currently his friends are a bit stuck. Grief and fear have a way of doing that to us.


He has come back to free them from this room, from their fear, and from their guilt.


He has come to set us all free, even Thomas who thought he might be left out!  What is the phrase we use today: FOMO (fear of missing out)!


Thomas is experiencing that feeling in spades…
And even though we associate this story with the phrase, “don’t be a doubting Thomas,” Thomas is not afraid of engaging God. Thomas is not afraid to engage with the wounds Jesus had to bear either.


While we rotate our readings in a three year cycle, we read about the locked room, the fearful disciples, and Thomas every year.


I believe this is so, because all of us have doubts. And this story lets us explore them through Thomas. Thomas responds reactively because he is hurt. Why would God reveal himself to my brothers, but not to me?


But Thomas doesn’t leave the community because he is skeptical. Rather Thomas engages deeper with God. Thomas is not simply a model of doubt, but a model of honesty. He doesn’t remain a stranger to God. He says "it like it is." He isn’t afraid to engage in intimate dialogue with God.


On Palm Sunday I spoke about Simon (the carrier of the cross) being the best part of us on our very worst day.


Thomas mirrors us on a regular day; a day that requires work not to become reactionary; A day when we have to remind ourselves to be peaceful; a day when we struggle to get out and share the message of peace and forgiveness. And on those days, these regular days, we can remember that Jesus is there with his wounds. Jesus completely relates to our frailty, our suffering and our struggle.


And he says touch me.


Jesus says, “Blessed are those that Believe but have not seen.” This is us, and it is Thomas’s intimate relationship with Jesus who helps us into this space through our own pain and doubt. Thomas in his honesty and love delivers us into the moment.


Jesus shows up as resurrected in the fullness of his spirit, of God’s Spirit.


This Bodily resurrection we speak about, has to do with that fullness of Spirit…that we like Jesus will be resurrected in the fullness of our being.


As Christians we are working at growing into that fullness of our being through growing in wisdom, forgiveness and as bearers of peace (as we say in our baptismal vows).


As the body of Christ we also carry one another’s wounds. When we doubt, or struggle with our belief, another one of us, another part of the body can carry us the rest of the way. We buoy one another.
This is Christian Community.


We don’t do it alone. We live into the resurrection together one regular day at a time.


Go in Peace! To love and serve the Lord!
Amen.

Alleluia! Christ is Risen!


And we are risen with Christ! (as the Collect says “we live with him in the joy of the resurrection!”)


As my husband likes to say, Jesus wins!
The powers of darkness, injustice, deception, and oppression do not get the last word…


This is the Good News of the Gospel.


In this Topsy Turvey World, we hold onto the story of Jesus that tops everything and turns everything on its head.
The powers of darkness tried to eradicate the healing message of Jesus, but the message was planted and the Good News has endured for centuries.


As the psalmist sings:
“The Same stone which the builders rejected
Has become the chief cornerstone!”


Forgiveness, Peace, Love and Mercy, these powers are stronger than death because they are everlasting. Resurrection is not about one person named Jesus. Resurrection is about community one person at a time.


Today in our story, it is Mary who shows us a way into this greater understanding of what resurrection means for all of us. She has just spent two nights in the worst throws of grief. But she also models for us a deep relationship with God, a relationship we attain to.


Mary is the only disciple who follows Jesus from the beginning of his ministry all the way through his death and into the resurrected Christ. Her presence is made known throughout his ministry.
She is the one they say was “healed of seven demons.”Mary’s healing by Jesus sets her on a spiritual journey. Jesus brought her back into community by healing her, recognizing her.


Mary helps to show us what a spiritual path looks like…


And yet! In this passage, Mary doesn’t recognize the risen Jesus at first and confuses him for the gardener. This momentary blindness in the face of grief is actually not so unusual. We walk through a fog when we are grieving.


It is part of the process of healing that we begin to see things anew and frame things anew.


A deep and penetrating loss has the potential to open us up completely. And Mary’s walk with Jesus helps us see the hope and the meaning of this awakening for a transformed community.


Yes, Easter comes at spring time when the earth is renewed. We see new life spring! But our story with Jesus is not simply a metaphor for spring… it is about transformation for a loving world.


But here we are in the throws of Grief, or in the tumultuous chaotic world of indifference, we like Mary may not recognize Jesus.
Not until we are called by name, like her…. and that is when she turns! That is when we may be healed, re-oriented to the loving source.
When someone knows us so deeply, or when someone affirms us, recognizes us - we are healed.


As part of our walk with Christ we allow ourselves to turn like Mary to the Spirit reorienting ourselves to the source and we become more fully our whole selves.
As first century bishop Iraneus famously said, “The Glory of God is a human being fully alive!”


Mary’s recognition of God’s voice (Rabbouni/teacher) represents her awakening. It may be the first time she recognizes that she is Loved by the Spirit of God!


Painfully, Jesus says “Do not hold onto me” (translated also as “Don’t cling to me,” “Don’t touch me”). Jesus says “I have not yet ascended to the Father.” Jesus seems to be saying that he is in a transitional state.
But this command from Jesus is more than just about his transitional state. Her faith to go on to tell the story represents that this moment in the garden is precisely about their transitional state.
It is relational. It is about the relationship between God and Mary (as well as about us and our relationship with God).


Mary in the garden experiences for the first time,
Jesus the man, Christ the Crucified God, and the Holy Spirit acting as One.
Through this story, Mary is the first to encounter this three dimensional aspect of God we call the Trinity.


Yet, Don’t cling to me he says…“What Jesus is really doing is redirecting Mary’s desire for union with himself from his physical or earthly body… to …his presence in the world, that is, the community of his brothers and sisters, the disciples.” (us) [1]


Mary Magdalene’s witness and her prophetic voice, “I have seen the Lord” is all intended for the sake of the community.


Like John the Baptist, she participates in the prophetic tradition. She becomes the voice that directs us to the risen Christ: to the incarnation that is not merely conceptual but can be acted out through mercy and love in new patterns for communal relationship. [2] 


In this Gospel, Mary came to the tomb while it was still dark. In another version, she sits vigil across from the tomb, and still in another she shows up with other women and spices to dress the body… Mary Magdalene models for us what it means to abide in the dark times of our lives and the willingness to make that abiding journey through to the dawn and expectation of resurrection and new life.
Mary stands in this place with the risen Christ, a place we all long to stand in. It is the place we also wish to touch… And we do this ritualistically every Sunday when we take communion. When we take communion we recognize that we are seeking to join in the union of that forgiving God, that loving humanity, and that life-giving spirit in company with others.


Sharing this Trinitarian understanding of God begins to set new patterns for community based in forgiveness and healing.
“To abide in love with others is to live together in a community that works to overcome alienation and isolation, individualism and hierarchy.” [3]


In this wold today, that is really Good News. Aleluia!



Thank you to the following authors who helped lend language and depth to my inquiry:

1. Schneiders, “John 20:11-18: The Encounter of the Easter Jesus with Mary Magdalene – A Transformative Feminist Reading,” 164-165.
2. McIntosh, Discernment and Truth, 148.
3. Amy-Jill Levine, Marianne Blickenstaff, and Dorothy Lee,“Abiding in the Fourth Gospel: A Case Study in Feminist Biblical Theology,” 75.

This morning feels a bit like whiplash. We enter into the bright morning crying "Hosanna in the Highest" only to find ourselves half way through the service crying and beating our breasts with grief.


The Passion Narrative takes us through the trial of Jesus as the awful events unfold. It is a familiar story to us. Yet it is always painful as we reenact the betrayal of Jesus, the mob mentality, the complicity of Pilate to cave to the crowd (even as both he and Herod found nothing in Jesus worthy of the death sentence) and finally the withdrawal of the apostles. The utter abandonment. It is unfathomable. Where is the sympathy and compassion that Jesus held out to so many? It is a complex story with many facets and many characters. But there is one character, seemingly a stranger, I want to focus on:
Simon.


Who is Simon?
Simon is mentioned in Mark, Matthew, and Luke.


Simon is employed to carry the cross for Jesus when Jesus is perhaps at the frailest expression of his humanity.


But by the time this Gospel story is shared, its original audience, and we, know that Simon also carried the cross for our risen Christ.


Simon both carries the cross to help a particular human Jesus…
And Simon carries the cross following behind the Christ, in its cosmic scope:
He carries the cross for God and for all of humanity.


Simon is yanked into the now: Into the particular horrific suffering of the crucifixion…But we know this burden is also his privileged participation in God’s unending story of resurrection.


Simon arrives late into the city for the Passover festivities.
And he was not at the last supper. We don’t know whether he was a follower of Jesus when he arrived in the city.


Mark’s Gospel tells us he was the father of Rufus and Alexander well-known to the Christian community, leaders by that date… (probably about 40 years after the crucifixion).


Did Rufus and Alexander become followers as children because of Simon?
Was Simon converted to a follower by carrying the cross for Jesus?
Was his family converted?


All we know is that on that day he entered into Jesus' human suffering… Suffering at the hands of other humans.


Who is Simon?
We are Simon…


Either through birth or conversion, whether through infant or adult baptism we have been called to carry this love for humanity ...and to not be filled ourselves until this universal sacrificial love is shared with everyone.


Simon doesn't ask for this. Simon is drawn in by the divisive and unjust worldly powers (manifested in the Roman guards).


Simon shows us active participation in overcoming these worldly powers on behalf of God, for and with God. He reminds us that this burden is also a privilege…
…to act in ways to help one another through each particular suffering.
Doing this requires us to enter into immediate relationship, to meet the human frailty in one another.


Like Simon, we are transformed from observer into participant.


To follow the cross means, we agree to be yanked into the NOW: into relationship when we encounter divisiveness and suffering.


It isn’t always comfortable and we don’t always want it. Our society tells us to protect ourselves and to be tough and independent. But Christianity asks us to be open, communal, to meet the suffering in others.


This past week the horrific school shootings are also the anniversary of another School shooting and teacher’s death. A few years ago in this same season, she went into work on her day off for a quick meeting with other school social workers. A gunman came to the School and shot and killed her.
Her name was Christine. We had never met, but she was very close to a friend of mine; a friend who told me all about her over a series of conversations.


At the funeral the friends and family shared stories of Christine’s generous spirit.


One unique story was from someone Christine had met at her favorite "take out" spot. They stuck up a friendship from that first night when this particular woman was devastated and could not even control her weeping at the restaurant.
Christine didn't know her, but apparently was moved to go to her. The woman had recently been diagnosed with an illness and her husband had walked out on her.
Christine went over, sat down and listened. She entered into relationship with someone she didn't know, and who was obviously suffering.
The woman said at the funeral, by connecting with her at this vulnerable time, Christine literally saved her life.


These healing moments of connection, personal recognition, recollect the miracles of Jesus ministry (his other passion): The miracles that Jesus demonstrated over and over again by engaging with particular people not just some idea or philosophy…


Participating in Resurrection life is a daily undertaking. It isn’t just about going to church, engaging in theological pursuits or working on your prayer life. It is those things, but above all, like Jesus, it is about engaging sympathetically and compassionately with others,
one person at a time, re-collecting us all into the body of God…


Simon reminds us of our call into the now- to bear the burden and the privilege of participating with God - to counteract the divisiveness of our society and unjust world, the indifference, the meanness, the sense of abandonment by engaging the suffering.


We can do this at anytime. It is never too late. We can show up, even late like Simon.

Who is Simon?


We don’t know very much. But I love this character who appears in each of the passion narratives. I love this stranger, because to me Simon represents us at our best.


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These readings today are not just appropriate to the end of Lent and the new breath of Easter, but feel very specific to our community. Two funerals this past week for Gerry Knechtel and Gerry Haight and Terri Ghee passed away yesterday. It is a lot for our hearts to absorb. We may feel rung out. It is easy to feel parched and heavy like the valley of the dry bones.


Our reading from Ezekiel may sound uncomfortable with all of that rattling of bones. It can also be cathartic in that we may feel as exhausted and parched as that valley. And while as a child I found it quite terrifying, Ezekiel’s vision is actually empowering and it is hopeful.


Ezekiel prophesied at a time when the people of Israel were in exile in Babylon. During the diaspora after the
destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E.
the people were conquered, scattered and displaced.
The people were lost. “They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.’”


But the story is a hopeful message.
The valley of the dry bones is the people of Israel.
God essentially tells Ezekiel to give them hope.
He says, tell them, I will raise them up and put the Spirit of life in them, and they shall live.


It is about resurrection life… not the final resurrection but resurrection life that still comes to us from God after a tragedy, or death, or loss.


There is rebuilding of places, and things, and hearts, but sometimes we have to go through the valley of dry bones, the grief, and letting go completely, before we can find the strength to rattle our bones off of the couch, out of the ditch, or from the valley we find ourselves in.
The story of Lazarus is also about this process. It is unique in the miracle stories, in that there is so much spoken about what is happening before the miracle in that difficult and dry space. The Gospel takes us through the story of grief. We hear the questioning and the pain.


Since we know how the story ends, we may forget to listen anew and hear the words, but “When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days.”
Mary and Martha ask Jesus, Where were you? The community asks, couldn’t you have prevented this?


Isn’t this what we ask of God at these times?


There is weeping. Martha and Mary and their friends are weeping. Jesus is weeping. His humanity is on full display here in a way that is very moving.


The Gospel is assuring us:
We do not meet resurrection in this life or in the life to come without tears and grief. We often do not meet change without some form of grief.


This morning our Prayers of the People will be a special litany that the Bishop has asked all our churches to participate in. It is an apology for slavery - specifically for the Diocese’s historic role as it benefited from slavery. Yesterday we had a service in the cathedral. I was unable to go down because of Gerry’s Haight’s burial yesterday. I watched most of it on FB. It was a moving service. I encourage you to go on the Cathedral’s website and if you can’t watch the service at least listen to Bishop Dietsche’s sermon.


The Diocese has been working on anti racism for thirty years and reparations for twenty years. We’ve been working up to this service of apology for five years. This beautiful Diocese was built on slavery. Yesterday and today we stand here as the Body of Christ and as a voice for the Diocese. This Diocese, this Body of Christ includes individuals, and voices, and emotions of a multitude.
While some of those emotions may not feel specific to you, they are specific to us if we recognize we are all united in Christ.
Our collective body is rattling its bones to healing. And it is uncomfortable.


Participating in a collective apology and a collective grief opens us up to the healing breath of God for the whole body.


Ezekiel’s vision of the dry bones as the People of Jerusalem is communal. The divine breath of God infusing the whole community is the basis for a new community based in life and not death.
In Romans, Paul too speaks to this new community of Christians being alive in the Spirit:
to “set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.”




Both Ezekiel’s prophetic vision and the story of Lazarus are premonitions of the resurrection of Jesus into the Christ.


As the Body of Christ, Paul reminds us:


“If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.”


Life and Peace and Joy are the promises of our hope and faith as Christians.


While our mortal bodies may question and grieve, our Spirits are held in those promises.


Resurrection is always meant for the entire community. That is the good news of the Gospel.
Resurrection life is not meant for Jesus alone.
It is not meant for ourselves and our loved ones.
It is meant for the whole world:


The basis of a new community: Life and Hope and Joy.


As the Collect states today,
Let us pray:


Grant your people that among the swift and varied changes of the world,
our hearts may surely there be fixed where
true joys are to be found.
Amen.

There’s a lot of themes about water lately. That beautiful Spiritual: Wade in the Water…
Today We have Moses bringing water from a rock, the site of the well of Jacob, and Jesus’ pronouncement of living water.


Last week Father Masud Syedullah spoke about water as creation, and remembering that we are born out of water -we arrive in an amniotic fluid, which breaks as we enter into the world. It’s like Genesis, where God divided the waters from above and below, and made the heavens and the Earth and all that’s in it. New Creation. Children.


Today, the children will be doing a workshop with Maribel which will include water and the structure of snowflakes. Snowflakes are made of hexagons the most common shape intrinsic in nature. And yet we also know that no snowflake is ever alike. They are each unique as we are.


Through the new and old testament water is used as a symbol of wisdom. It flows; it navigates gracefully; it is a creative force that adapts and changes, can transform, and like a stream will move toward the source, to the powerful ocean.


Wisdom: It’s something that we thirst for; it’s something that we desire; it is something that we seek.
And indeed something we require for life.


So water is nuanced both spiritually as well as literally in our stories.


The people in their exodus from Egypt, in their thirst wonder is “The Lord with us, or not?”!


It is our question when we are struggling…


it is the question of the Samaritan woman…


and it is the mission of Jesus to say: yes, God is with you.


In the Gospel story today there is a lot about thirst, and seeking and wisdom. It’s about bonding - having this deep conversation: a deep theological conversation between two people from different cultures. It’s one of the longest recorded conversations Jesus has with another in the Bible…and it’s deep as the well is deep.


Jesus has come through Samaria, not because it is necessary physically to get from point A to point B (we know from maps), but spiritually it is necessary for him to enter Samaria: To bring the message as he says to his disciples …to that “field that is ripe.” Ripe for harvesting. The people are ready… and perhaps we are ready to reach across the divide.


Jesus comes and engages a woman in conversation who is completely surprised by his presence and this bold address from a Jewish man. She is in the midst of her daily routine drawing water.


And the water of the well as symbolic of wisdom, gives us  two levels of meaning here…she has also come to this space that represents part of her spiritual identity. It’s not any old well of water. She’s come to the well of Jacob, where her ancestors have been worshiping for a long time upon this mountain.


Now Samaria is made up of people that have been brought together in this region through resettlement after the Babylonian war.


The King of Assyria captured the Israelites of Samaria and deported them to Assyria, and, not only that - but brought in peoples from five different Babylonian cities to resettle Samaria, worshipping their five different Gods… The original Samaritans who were not replaced worship Yahweh, but believe Mt. Gerizim, the place of Jacob’s well is the holiest place, not Jerusalem. But by Jesus time, Samaria is also made up of individuals who have brought five other gods that they have been praying to and sacrificing to.


The region is not of the one God, Yahweh, who had originally made a covenant with the people before the Babylonian war.


So this is very interesting to me, and this is why I think the Gospel of John is so brilliant because he’s talking to us on two levels…about revelation and conversion of a whole region explaining one larger version of history through metaphor… and through a very personal connection between a woman, seeking wisdom and depth who encounters the Messiah in that process.


She says to him but you say that we have to go to Jerusalem for one God, and he says to her, I’m not saying you have to go to Jerusalem. I am saying that God is found in spirit and in truth not in any one location.
“God is Spirit, and His worshipers must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”


That God is available to you wherever you are. That is radical good news.


John’s message is wrapped up on the personal level through a story that conceives her as having had five husbands. This is John’s brilliant way of talking about that covenant relationship of God to his peoples. In both the Old Testament and the New we hear of the metaphor of Israel often as a woman and God as her bride groom. A bond. And this is what’s happening for Samaria.


Jesus has entered Samaria and positions himself at the well with an encounter with a woman. Well-encounters are found in famous stories from our patriarchs and matriarchs. They remind us of, Jacob and Rachel, Isaac and Rebekah, of Moses and Zipporah.


These encounters between men and women at wells, are about marriage. So we have the symbol of the bride and groom. John is telling us about a particular encounter with the grander message that God, the bridegroom of Israel, is and has always been the bridegroom of Samaria: One God for all people. A covenant relationship God means for the whole world.


Jesus’ successfully conveys to her that God is a God of Spirit who is not found in one location and is meant to be living water, and that is a saving message for the whole world.


The Samaritan woman runs to share her experience with the town. And upon meeting Jesus, there is a conversion of the entire Samaritan village who come to believe Jesus is the Messiah.


We have a radical bonding of peoples that have been estranged from one another.


For us today, we may not think of the Messiah as having been brave, but the human Jesus and his disciples were quite brave in entering the Samaritan territory.


The Samaritan woman was also brave in her conversation with Jesus. They each were willing to brave the gap.


She is willing to express her own beliefs and he is willing to listen. He takes the conversation from the literal to the spiritual, and she keeps up. They are both listening closely to one another. Their conversation is a model for all of us. There is mutual give and take.


They model that in our very intimate encounter with the Messiah, we will find that like the Samaritan Woman “we are fully known.”


God incarnate in Jesus shows us the willingness to reach beyond our human made boundaries; that God in Spirit and Truth will repair and reconcile us to ourselves. There will be no lost remnant….


That relationship is always available, God as Love incarnate is the well from which we may draw ceaselessly because the well is not simply deep, it is living water that flows …in Spirit and in Truth.


“the savior for the whole world" brings the radical and healing message that we are all the Spiritual children of a Living Loving God.


For each and every one of us is unique as snowflakes and marvelously made!


And our mission is to reach across divides to love others, to be brave in our conversations, to be loving in our listening, to be wise…


to be Wise: adaptive like water, to be graceful in our encounters, to remember that we always flow from and toward the source, we name God.





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This morning we have the cross veiled for Lent. It is not required in the Episcopal Church, although I am accustomed to it. There seem to be a variety of historical, theological and mystical reasons given for why we may do this.


Simply it is a reminder that it is Lent. All year long we  look to the bright cross, as the manifestation of our deliverance, our redemption…but during Lent, we especially spend time contemplating our mortality.


Part of our mortal nature…in this life ..is that we struggle to see clearly into the mystery of life and God. As Paul tells us in a passage from 1 Corinthians: We only see “dimly.” The true nature of God and reality is veiled.


He says,
For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.




And while things may seem veiled to us in this life… the veiled cross can also be a reminder that we are hidden in God.


As the psalmist sings today: “You are my hiding-place.”


Then you forgave me the guilt of my sin.
You are my hiding-place;
you preserve me from trouble; *
you surround me with shouts of deliverance.




There’s a lot that’s happening between Genesis and Matthew today. They are readings that ask us to compare Adam and Jesus. And Paul also does this through his complex letter to the Romans.
The lessons point us to this concept of harm entering into the world, how we respond to it - and how Love entering into the World (in the model of Jesus) responds to it.


Matthew’s gospel is very archetypal in terms of looking at three channels through which we can experience temptation, and it can be very subtle.


What’s interesting is that the earliest of writers who wrote Genesis are the ones that point us to that subtlety…that harm can be very simple. It’s very alluring: like the apple.
What is harmful is sometimes masked by what seems pleasing, good and right… what may even seem logical or just.


And in Matthew, the devil for example, quotes scripture: psalm 91, in his conniving test of Jesus…






“For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.” 


The devil cleverly uses what seems right and good and pleasing to tempt Jesus away from his true self.




The story of Adam and Eve is our archetypal story for humanity. It identifies deep questions. Why are we conscious of our mortality unlike other animals? These questions are unanswerable of course. This is an origin story based in archetypal relationships. The big bang theory does not do that for us.


Survival as humankind is based in relationships and trust.


Trust is something humans alone have - and have the ability to mutually nurture and develop.


These lessons are about human nature and primarily about relationship.


Jesus is in the desert to have his own vision quest, to discern these things.


being in the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights was a way for Jesus to be in relationship with God: for coming into an understanding of his own humanity. To trust.




He goes into the wilderness, through this trial, before he goes out into the world. That is the hero’s journey.


And what happens?
He is tempted not to believe he is the beloved Son of God.


This experience shows his own courage to stand alone and to have personal integrity, faith and keen perception. To Trust. This experience and test is affirmation of his identity and belovedness.


He must go through this trial in order to be that model, to be a presence that is in communion (right relationship) with the divine. To know his veiled identity as the beloved.


Not only that, but every answer Jesus gives to the Devil comes from Deuteronomy 6-8.
After surviving forty years in the wilderness…just as they are about to enter the Promised land, the people of Israel hear these instructions:


One does not live by bread alone,
but by every word
that comes from the mouth of God.’”




‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”




Worship the Lord your God,
and serve only him.’”
Jesus’ trial is directly related to the trial of his people and also our deepest questions about redemption for humanity and our own lives…
In Lent we spend these forty days in reflection of that…


Do you trust your own belovedness?
Who are you.. hidden in God?


This time for Jesus in the wilderness comes directly following his Baptism. The Spirit leads him there.
And his experience is mirrored in our own baptismal covenant and the prayer that we say over the newly baptized…that was said over each one of us:


Let us pray…
Heavenly Father, we thank you that by water and the Holy
Spirit you have bestowed upon these your servants the
forgiveness of sin, and have raised them to the new life of
grace.
Sustain them, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit.
Give them an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works. 
Jesus models this for us. That’s who we are hidden in him.


There is a lot going on in our world right now. These questions about harm and evil, and what is right and what is just, and how to discern through the madness of war weighs on us. We are flooded by the news and feel out of control.


But this is a spiritual sermon. We also have a lot going on in our own lives; trouble and despair and fear on more personal levels. So I invite you to spend this Lent focusing on your lives and those you love, to retreat from the television…(not to bury your head in the sand) but to invite the love of Christ into your intimate World to sustain you.
That is the message of our readings, that God will sustain us through the trials. That we can trust we are redeemed by Love; and to remember the words of Paul, that you have been fully known.


While we see only dimly, as life events -  and world events unfold, hold unto Christ who knows you, and is hidden in the cave of your hearts.


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In this week’s readings we hear the story of Moses’ time on the mountain with God. Did you remember: like Jesus, Moses also spent forty days and forty nights in communion with God. Moses ascended Mt. Sinai, the sacred mountain, symbolically considered the navel of the earth. axis mundi. Here was a space thought to connect this world to the next.


Moses was a mystical character himself. Part of a tradition of rich Jewish mysticism: He sees signs, discerns voices, has visions, you might say, vision quests. He is a man of conviction, a leader - and deeply spiritual. But I would say, (like for most of us) it is with a little hesitance and reluctance at first that Moses responds to all of these calls from God…


Moses is pretty human in that regard. He says, “Who me?” But whether or not he deems himself worthy, he does what I’ve spoken about in other sermons… “He feels the fear and does it anyway.” He goes up even though “the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain.” But he stays there for forty days and forty nights communing with God.


And when he comes down he has been transformed: His face glowed - and he came down from the mountain bringing us the first commandments.




In our Gospel story today, what we describe as the Transfiguration, Jesus also goes up a mountain, Mt. Tabor… and “His face shown like the sun.”


He takes with him Peter and James and John. Peter recognizes this moment as symbolic of their tradition. He wants to build tents for Jesus, Moses and Elijah to stay there and meditate with God. But …


While he was still speaking,
suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them,
and from the cloud a voice said,
“This is my Son, the Beloved;
with him I am well pleased;
listen to him!”


These are the same words we hear at Jesus’ baptism.


As soon as Jesus was baptized, He went up out of the water. Suddenly the heavens were opened,d and He sawe the Spirit of God descending like a dove and resting on Him. 17And a voice from heaven said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!”


Jesus was baptized by the Spirit; The Spirit that we understand as God working in the world.




Today we are celebrating the baptism of Liam Michael. And once again the voice resonates:
This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased!




Baptism is about God working in the world.




Peter wishes to make a very special and significant offering to the ancestors, but the voice from Heaven we understand to be God’s voice, interrupts and says, “listen to him.” The activity of the Spirit working in the world is present now. Wake up… or “Keep awake!” As Jesus tells us often:


God is working in the world.




We are at the end of Epiphany, when the Magi came to offer gifts to a tiny child, the one they anticipated would be the messiah. At the time this gospel is written the Matthean community who Matthew is writing to was struggling because Jesus was not the messiah they were anticipating… a strong King to win all of their battles through force. What’s happened?


Instead we know that the messiah turns everything on its head: our notion of what is strong.
Jesus came to teach us that the nature of God is love and Love is the most powerful force on earth.


The Transfiguration points Matthew’s community, and us toward the fuller story of the crucifixion and the resurrection. To remember …


The Transfiguration happens only after Jesus started revealing to the disciples that he is going to suffer and that this suffering is part of a larger story about what God is doing in this world. The shape of compassion and forgiveness, the shape of true power, the pattern of God is much richer than worldly power.


The pattern of the Spirit working in the world will be one of sacrifice for those we love; of healing and compassion for those we encounter; forgiveness that requires a surrender of our ego. This is Jesus’ way.


Early Christians were called followers of the way. A way that engenders a flow of love. Following the way is a wisdom path. It is a path that asks us to keep awake.


Christianity is not just a belief system. It is a way of participating in the World. Having Christ as our higher power asks us to operate on two levels which are symbolized in the cross. To keep awake to one another on a horizontal plane while holding a vertical relationship with the holy one. To stand in that space of two worlds.


The shape of the cross is transfiguring. It is transformational. The words that Jesus hears: This is my Beloved Son, are important for us, and his friends, but also so important for Jesus’ own strength as he enters into the most scary realization of his human life: that he will suffer.


These words, “You are my beloved” are a reminder that God is with him.


Jesus goes up the mountain to be reminded that God is the source of life. Like Moses, symbolically communing with God at the navel of the earth (the axis of two worlds) we can be present to both worlds. This is the epiphany of the Transfiguration!


Being present and awake on a vertical plane and a horizontal plane are not two different perspectives, but one enlightened way. As the author states in 2nd Peter today:


Pay attention to this message:
as to a lamp shining in a dark place,
until the day dawns
and the morning star rises in your hearts.


Keep awake.


In Baptism we say we are born again, because we recognize we are part of the transfiguration, transformation and the resurrection: part of the body of Christ, meaning we do not live only for ourselves, but we live for the benefit of all human kind, for justice and peace, for the thriving of community that respects the dignity of every human being. We strive to love one another as ourselves.


The water of Baptism symbolizes life: water of creation. It is our most ancient of relationships…with the Spirit moving over the waters of creation to bring life to the world.




When we speak to dying with Christ in the water of Baptism we are talking about dying to selfishness. Being immersed in the real world, in the chaos of creation; yet rising up through the living water into the knowledge that we are beloved by God and gifted for making a difference in the lives of others in this world.


We cannot be a Christian in isolation. It is always a path for the the community’s sake…


The water of Baptism symbolizes freedom. In the rite we will pray this, by returning to the story of Moses and our liberation from slavery in Egypt through the parting of the water.


Our readings today remind us that Moses and Jesus each spent significant time alone in dialogue with their creator. Their prayer must’ve been full of questions. Their days were dedicated to seeking, discerning and surrender. But this alone-time was not meant to secure private privileged relationship with God. Both Moses and Jesus come down from the mountain with missions, messages and responsibilities for the community. They remind us that God is always working through us for the benefit of others.


We say that Holy Baptism is an outward sign of an inward spiritual grace. We make it public because that grace is recognized by and through the community. It is a ritual that says, we believe that Liam is a beloved child of God, with the free will to make choices, but blessed by being part of the body of Christ (us) and with the Holy Spirit (God at work in the world). And all of this together will help him grow into wisdom and Love.


In the gift of Baptism we pray to be given an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage and will to persevere.


And today we pray that Liam will also be given the gift of joy and wonder in all God’s works.


In the renewal of our own baptismal vows, today Remember that each one of you is a beloved child of God. And in you God is well pleased.


And with Moses and Jesus…


“The LORD bless you and keep you; The LORD make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The LORD lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.” 




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