Sermons
It was minutes before the recent debate and an online meeting was ending. One of the participants said, I’m calling all angels, all the spirits, all the ancestors. She had high hopes for her candidate. And she asked if I knew the song by k.d. lang about calling all angels. I didn’t. But it’s perfect for today.
How many times, oh, before it's too late?
Calling all angels
Walk me through this world
Don't leave me alone
Calling all angels
We're tryin'
We're hopin'
But we're not sure how.
How often do we let our fear and our desire to be right get in the way of truly listening to others? How often do we demonize those with whom we disagree, instead of taking the time to understand their perspective? When we are caught in this cycle of needing to be right or superior, we are trapped by our egos.
But Jesus calls us to something different. He calls us to humble ourselves, to set aside our egos, and to approach one another with the openness and curiosity of a child. The path to greatness requires humility. It requires us to ask questions, even when doing so reveals that we don’t have everything figured out.
He lost it. She’s losing it. Who wants to do that? To lose control. To lose your temper. To have an ugly cry. I certainly don’t want to lose it. Though sometimes I do.
Peter seems to lose it when Jesus says his mission will involve suffering and death. That’s not what a Messiah does, Peter thinks. We need you to come in and overthrow Rome. Show your political and military might. We need a political strongman.
The wounds we’ve carved into the Earth do not happen in a vacuum, the wounds leech into issues of global politics, gender, and race. The pollution of water and air in the United States often coincides with red-lined neighborhoods - those are neighborhoods which the American government designated to be ghettos for black and brown people. The genocides in Palestine and Congo are rooted in a desire to tear minerals like Cobalt from the Earth, to possess or destroy or pillage land. Hawaiians call the land the ʻāina. And their connection to the land, just like all indigenous peoples, is essential to their culture, spirituality, and freedom movements.
In Gaza, Mohammad Abu Al Qumsan is grieving his two twins, Aysal and Aser, born three days before they were killed in an Israeli strike this week. Mohammed says that when he married his wife, Dr. Joumana, his joy was immense, but when he learned of his twins’ deaths, he also learned of his wife’s death. In a single day he lost everything. Yet he bore his wife’s weight, being a pallbearer for her, and then prayed at his family’s funeral. A burden too great to bear—the loss of mother and twins. This Palestinian mother had no opportunity to nurture or teach her children.
We wonder what Jesus learned from his mother. What she modeled. What she taught. What kind of advice she gave.
Jesus issues an invitation that is far more intimate and provocative when he calls himself our bread. He invites us to eat him and never be hungry again.”
What are you hungry for? Security and belonging? Meaning and purpose? Connection. Community. Intimacy. Love. An ongoing hunger for wholeness, courage or a healing of old wounds?
We can see in our world today, that these two kinds of power continue to show up. The Power of Kings could be used to create peace and stability for all people, but recently it seems like it has been used to create destruction and pain. We see the Power of Kings abused in the way a police officer killed Sonya Massey in her home after responding to her call for help. We see it abused in Israel’s continued destruction of Gaza, and in the support that its destruction has garnered. We also see the Power of Kings being used by those who are looking to save Gaza, and by those who continue to work to create justice even through broken and failing systems.
But where do we see the Power that God gives?
Sometimes it’s too much for me. The over-stimulation, the information overload, the screens everywhere.
It’s almost like a nightmare. You just want space to clear head and think. You finally close your laptop and put down your phone. And you pull into a gas station. And there is a screen babbling to you about something. You sit in the doctor’s waiting room and there’s a home remodeling show playing. You’re at your gate, waiting for a plane, and CNN is on. You get into a taxi and video clips are showing. Stop. Turn it off. It’s too much. Take me to a deserted island to get away from it all.
Jesus said, “let’s go across to the other side” and the followers of Jesus took him in the boat “just as he was”. No preparations. He was teaching the crowds and then he just got into a boat and sailed off. Imagine if right now I said “I want to go to Michigan.” and I just left church, went straight to the lake and got into a boat? Where would I go when I get there? I don’t even know how to sail! What if something happens along the way? I don’t know the tide patterns or what the weather will be like… What a dangerous thing to decide to do on a whim!
We’re invited to look at the ordinary and see the extraordinary, to be open to the mystery of God’s work in this garden, and to see the unexpected gifts in our midst that are signs of God’s presence among us now. We are encouraged to reimagine what is beautiful and ask, where do we see the sacred? Where do we see God’s presence in our daily, ordinary, sometimes boring, maybe even complicated lives?
Do you speak more than one language? I wish I did, but I don’t. Not that I haven’t tried. In 7th-8th grade, I took German as my required language course. I still have the construction paper and photo-heavy report I did on Miene Familie, but sadly, I do not recall how to speak any of it. I’ve taken Intro to Spanish classes 5 different times, but, “Hola mi amiga” is about as far as I get in a conversation.
I’m moved by the faith and determination of our Holy Trinity ancestors. Many people today have lost faith in the church as an institution. Churches are closing and many are on life support. Yet our forebears laid down their lives—gave their all—for the generations who would follow, including us.
The main point of First John is a line in today’s reading. “Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.” You may have all the goods the world offers, but God abides in those who lay down their lives for another, especially those in need. Especially those most vulnerable. Especially those marginalized.
What would Easter mean if it wasn’t just something you believe in your mind? It would be encountering God as mystery. It would be opening your hearts to something beyond yourselves. It would be letting the blossoming buds and flowers be your spiritual guides.
If you are bewildered by trying to make sense of these times and what is has to do with God. If you struggle with your faith and what you believe, there is a place for you here in this community. Together, we explore the questions of faith. We experience the resurrection through community, through acts of justice, through music and art and beauty.
Call them ailments, diseases, addictions. Hurts, grief, fears, worries. We all are carrying some kind of brokenness, it seems. That is what it means to be human. Whether by genetics. Or choice. Or chance. Whether chronic or lifelong. Or something that seems to come and go.
But what about the miraculous healings in the scriptures? Wouldn’t you like one from time to time? Our gospel says that Jesus cures people. Was this only for biblical times? Is there a difference between curing and healing? Wouldn’t you like a cure-all, a remedy to cure whatever your ailment?
