But now

Thomas Kleinert

There was a time when you were only known as “the baby.” Your parents, your siblings, really anyone who dreamed or knew about you — they only spoke of you as “the baby.” They spoke with joy, certainly, and with anticipation and hope, but you were still just “the baby,” a tiny mystery of a person. Depending on the year of your birth or how much confidence your parents had in blurry ultrasound images, they may not even have known if you were a boy or a girl, or if there were more than one of you.

At some point during the pregnancy, your family started making lists of possible names for “the baby;” girls’ names, boys’ names, names that aren’t gender specific. They may have listed grandparents, aunts and uncles, best friends and favorite characters, names that would go well with the family name or start with the same letter as your siblings’ first names, or names that capture courage, kindness, or whatever other trait they hoped you would embody. And as the due date drew closer, the list got shorter. Eventually the moment came when they looked at you and they just knew what your name was going to be, and they spoke it. For the very first time, you were called by your name. You were no longer just “the baby,” you were somebody.

Mary and Joseph didn’t start with a list. The angel told Mary, according to Luke, “You will name him Jesus,” and according to Matthew, it was Joseph who was told by an angel, “You are to name him Jesus.”[1] So that was settled months before Mary even started to show.

The two readings we heard today are powerful, beautiful affirmations of identity, and in each, God is speaking in the first person singular, addressing somebody directly, through the voice of the prophet or a voice from heaven.

“I have called you by name,” says the creator-of-you, Jacob, the shaper-of-you, Israel, “You are mine.”

“You are my beloved son, I delight in you,” says the voice from heaven to Jesus, who’s just been baptized and anointed with the Holy Spirit for his mission.

I love that we get to hear these words of affirmation at the beginning of the year, this year in particular, when we mustn’t forget who and whose we are, and who it is we follow on the way to God’s reign.

Isaiah gives us exuberant poetry, addressed to a people stuck in desolation. In Isaiah’s message, the Babylonian exile is described as a punishment, or at least a consequence, of the people’s failure to honor God’s commandments, God’s torah, God’s instruction for faithful living. God, says Isaiah, turned away from them. God gave up Jacob to the spoiler, and poured upon him the heat of this anger and the fury of war; but [Jacob] did not take it to heart. Isaiah vividly describes the exiles as a people robbed and plundered, all of them trapped in holes and hidden in prisons. They are sinking in hopelessness, and there’s no one to rescue. There’s no one, says Isaiah, to say, “Restore!”[2] No one.

And in that desolate landscape of devastating silence, Isaiah stands and proclaims the new word, the word of the One who makes all things new. “But now,” shouts Isaiah — now there is someone to say, “Restore!” Now God speaks the new word declaring an end to judgment and captivity, and the promise of homecoming rises like a song in the morning.

Oh, we’ve heard the prophet tell us of the Lord, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it,[3] but now he speaks of us, he speaks of God’s people and who we are:

Thus says the Lord, the One who created you, O Jacob, who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are mine.

Rise up, stand up, remember who you are. Remember, you have been created, shaped, called, claimed and redeemed for a purpose: you are the children of Abraham and Sarah, countless as the stars — I have called you by name; you are mine, the people whom I formed for myself so that they might declare my praise.[4]

In Isaiah’s proclamation, the Creator of heaven and earth speaks to God’s people “like a lover,” as Anathea Portier-Young put it, “whose heart is bursting, who has waited an eternity just to say their name.”[5] And the Holy One of Israel will do all that is necessary to secure their release and homecoming. Why?

Because you are precious in my sight and honored and I love you.

These words are spoken first and foremost and irrevocably to the Jewish people who have lived as people of the promise since the days of Abraham and Sarah. And we are invited to hear them addressed also to us, to all whom Jesus Christ has embraced as his siblings, all who pray with him for the coming of God’s reign, all who follow him on the way and enact with him at his table “the great ingathering of God’s beloved from all of God’s creation.”[6] For the end will be what God has spoken from the beginning: the feast of life when all will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well. In the company of Jesus, we dare to hope that when God says “everyone” it means everyone: everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made. Home from our exiles, all of us scattered ones who forget so easily.

Today we celebrate that Jesus gets in the water with us. It may seem counterintuitive to step into the river of repentance when the oceans are rising and powerful storms are flooding the land. But when fires rage bigger, faster, and hotter than anytime on record, stepping into the river of repentance feels like the saving proposition it is. Today we celebrate the gift of this river, and that Jesus steps into it with us, not because he needs to, but because he wants to. He wants to be where we are, so we can be where he is. We step into the river of repentance with our sins and regrets, our guilt and shame and fear, and we pray that like water, grace is washing it all away, until we are who we were made to be, until we know who we are.

And Jesus steps into that very river in deep solidarity with us — and he drowns in it, drowns in our sin, in our helpless brokenness, in our fear and ready violence, in all the heavy lovelessness we carry. All of it. Drowns in it.

And you’ve heard the story, you know he rises, and you know the heaven is opened and the Holy Spirit descends, but now the voice from heaven speaks, and he hears it, he knows it, and he only hopes that we hear it too:“You are my Son, the Beloved, in whom I delight.” He knows this; this is the song in his heart. He hopes we hear the words as addressed not only to him, but to all of us.

In Luke’s narration of the gospel, the scene by the river is followed by a lengthy genealogy: name after name, generation after generation, the whole long line that makes Jesus who he is, going back all the way to Adam and Eve — but the voice from heaven has already declared who he is, has already spoken his true name.

We are all deeply shaped by our ancestors and what they have done and left undone, by the legacy of their dreams and the pain of their trauma, but Jesus reveals who we are: God’s beloved in whom God delights. This relationship is the one that shapes and heals and fulfills all the others that make us who we are.

God’s love for us is the one relationship in life we can’t screw up. We can deny it, sure; we can ignore it, neglect it, forget it, and run away from it, but we cannot end it. Nothing we do or refuse to do will change who we are: God’s own, God’s beloved, God’s delight.

Often we forget. We may forget because we’re busy making a name for ourselves. We may forget because others have convinced us that we are not worthy of love, too insignificant for any kind of attention. We may forget because pain and shame have buried our sense of self as God’s own.

What are we to do about our forgetfulness? We follow Jesus, he’ll remind us. We pray, and at least occasionally we let God do all the talking. And again and again we gather at the homecoming table for the feast of life, the great ingathering of God’s beloved from all of God’s creation.

There was a time when you were only known as “the baby.” Yet long before anyone would think of what to call you, God named you: God’s own, God’s beloved, God’s delight.

Do not fear, for I am with you, says the Lord. I will bring your offspring from the east, and from the west I will gather you. I will say to the north, Give them up, and to the south, Do not withhold. Bring my sons from far away and my daughters from the end of the earth — everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.

[1] Luke 1:32; Matthew 1:21

[2] See Isaiah 42:22-25

[3] Isaiah 42:5

[4] Isaiah 43:21

[5] Anathea Portier-Young https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/baptism-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-isaiah-431-7

[6] Walter Brueggemann, Isaiah 40-66 (WBC), 54.

What is Your Word?

Margie Quinn

A few weeks ago, I told a story at the communion table that I’d like to share again. It’s one that Anne Lamott claims she tells her Sunday school kids every year, and of which they never tire, though she thinks that has something to do with her weekly distribution of snacks. 

“A young girl is having a hard time falling asleep one night,” Anne recounts, “and calls out for her mother. Her mother comes in and gently tucks her in again and assures her that Jesus is there in the room with her, so she needn’t be afraid. This goes on and on, each time the increasingly annoyed mother saying basically the same thing until finally, in the dark, the little girl says plaintively, “I need someone with skin on.” 

“This,” Anne writes, “ is the main instruction I would leave my family in my swag bag of spiritual truth: be goodness with skin on. 

Be goodness with skin on. 

All four gospels begin very differently. Matthew, our resident historian, starts with an account of the birth story that begins with a breakdown of Jesus’ family tree. Mark, our energizer bunny, jumps right into describing our locust and honey-eating friend, John the Baptist, who is already running around in the wilderness and baptizing people. Luke, Mr. Justttt Right, tells us that he has decided, after investigating everything carefully, to write an orderly account of what happened regarding the birth of Jesus (which he does very comprehensively). And John, our final gospel author and resident artist, (you know the type– one walking around in the woods and pointing at beautiful lichen or intricate flower pattern, waxing poetic on life’s beauty), begins his gospel like this: 

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.” 

Such a poet. 

“All things came into being through him and, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” 

Isn’t he a beautiful writer? Isn’t it all just a little hard to follow? Which is why we should lean in a little closer and bask in his telling. John goes on to describe Jesus as the true light, who enlightens everyone, who is in the world even though the world doesn’t always know him, who has the glory of someone full of grace and truth. 

Light. Glory. Grace. Truth.  

Those are nice words, words we have heard a lot in the church. But I find myself, like the young girl calling out for her mother, needing words with skin on. Luckily, John tells me that this is exactly what happened with the Word: It became flesh and lived among us. 

The word went from being this intangible light, glory, grace and truth to embodying them in the three or so decades he had with us. The Word became goodness with skin on. 

Jesus embodied Light by going into dark caves to heal people that everyone else had given up on. He embodied Glory through his resurrection, triumphing over sin and evil. He embodied Grace, washing the feet of friends who would deny him, abandon him, and betray him. And he embodied Truth, fighting the systems of power that spread lies of scarcity while he showed us a more honest way to live. 

That’s all well and good, Jesus being these big words with flesh on, but what does this have to do with us? Is Jesus the only one who gets to embody these lofty words? 

Episcopal Priest and author Barbara Brown Taylor says this: 

“Almost everyone has a word that he or she has a gift for bringing to life. For one person the word is ‘compassion.’ For another it is ‘justice.’ For someone else the word is ‘generosity.’ For another it is ‘patience.’ 

Until someone acts upon these words, they remain abstract concepts–very good ideas that few people have ever seen. The moment someone acts on them, the words become flesh. They live among us, so we can see their glory.”

I love this. Everyone has a word that we have a gift for bringing to life. When we act on these words, they go from being swirly concepts to being goodness, or patience, or justice…with skin on. 

Last night, I asked my boyfriend, Collin, what my word was.. He said “open-hearted.” That was very nice of him. My friend Mariah says that I am a “Walking-Exclamation-Point.” That’s three words but I’m hyphenating. I’d like to think I have a few other words, maybe “authenticity” or “humor,” or as my nephew called me once when I chopped all of my hair while living in Seattle, “Cool Uncle.” I think, I hope, I bring these words to life. 

At my sister-in-law, Tallu’s, funeral, her dear friend, Priest Scott Owings, shared what he viewed as Tallu’s “God-Word.” “Her God-Word was Bread,” he said. She was good at baking it, breaking it and sharing it. She nourished people with it and fed them, which became her life’s calling, starting the “Nashville Food Project” to grow, cook and share delicious food with our community. “Bread” is a word that Tallu made come to life. 

After Eva’s funeral yesterday, I wondered if her word might be “Flower,” not only because she loved them, or because she smelled good, but because she made everything more colorful and more beautiful. She bloomed when she saw you. What a good word to embody. 

Open-hearted. Bread. Flower. These are nice words. Sometimes though, we don’t love the words we embody. As we enter the New Year, I can already feel myself starting to put skin on words like “Busy” or “Weary” or “Hopeless.” In those moments, I wonder if it’s most helpful to ask the people who love us what our word is. 

What’s your word? What abstract concept do you bring to life simply by being who you are? 

Perhaps Vine Street also has a word it embodies. Perhaps we are “Music” with skin on. Or “Service.” Or “Welcome.” What do you hope our word could be this year? What are the words you hope visitors from our church leave with? It is never too late for us as a church to bring one of God’s life-giving words to life. 

In the final verses of this passage, John claims that no one has ever seen God, but in Jesus, we have. We have seen God with skin on. We have seen a man who took these abstract words like grace, truth, glory and light and embodied them so that we may have a better idea of how to be those things ourselves. And at a time when many people feel like the young girl who has a hard time falling asleep, who needs someone with skin on, we get to be witnesses,  as John the Baptist said, “to testify to the Light made known in Jesus.” We testify to his light not  just by talking about or reading about him, but by living like him. Out loud. Embodied. With skin on. 

This New Year, I’m not making a list of resolutions or goals. I’m just going to try to be goodness with skin on. And, like St. Francis of Assisi encouraged, I’m going to try to “preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary, to use words.” 

After the service, ask someone who loves you what your word is. Tell me, or Thomas, or write it on a notecard and stick it on your mirror. Let’s live life out loud, embodying these abstract words by making them real, fleshy, and present. 

May it be so. 

Now what?

Thomas Kleinert

We have heard the story and told it, the story of God and the baby. We have sung the old carols and hummed along with the holiday playlists. We have lit the candles, lots of candles held high as a witness to the light that shines in the darkness, defiantly hopeful that the darkness will not overcome it.

We have celebrated the birth of Jesus, and in many homes the days revolved around a big dining table, surrounded by people of all ages, in a sea of torn wrapping paper — gifts, smiles, thank-yous, and an abundance of good food and holiday cheer. Some of us even missed the half-time show with Beyoncé. All because of the wondrous story of God and this baby. Now what?

“Well, so that is that,” says the narrator in W. H. Auden’s Christmas Oratorio,

Now we must dismantle the tree,

Putting the decorations back into their cardboard boxes—

Some have got broken—and carrying them up to the attic.

The holly and the mistletoe must be taken down and burnt,

And the children got ready for school. There are enough

Left-overs to do, warmed-up, for the rest of the week—

Not that we have much appetite, having drunk such a lot,

Stayed up so late, attempted—quite unsuccessfully—

To love all of our relatives, and in general

Grossly overestimated our powers. Once again

As in previous years we have seen the actual Vision and failed

To do more than entertain it as an agreeable

Possibility, once again we have sent Him away,

Begging though to remain His disobedient servant,

The promising child who cannot keep His word for long.[1]

How very grown-up this voice sounds. How little room it leaves for wide-eyed wonder. “Once again,” the voice declares with a regretful tone, “once again, as in previous years, we have seen the actual Vision – and failed to do more than entertain it as an agreeable possibility; once again we have sent Him away.”

I think it’s a little early for Auden’s reflective earnestness, though, and you and I wouldn’t be here on the first Sunday after, if the light of that night had not started a little fire in our hearts. So here are, just for contrast, the words of Sharon, as told by John Shea:

She was five, sure of the facts, and recited them with slow solemnity, convinced every word was revelation. She said, “They were so poor they had only peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to eat and they went a long way from home without getting lost. The lady rode a donkey, the man walked, and the baby was inside the lady. They had to stay in a stable with an ox and an ass … , but the Three Rich Men found them because a star lighted the roof. Shepherds came and you could pet the sheep but not feed them. Then the baby was borned. And do you know who he was?” Her quarter eyes inflated to silver dollars. “The baby was God.” And she jumped in the air, whirled around, dove into the sofa and buried her head under the cushion, which is the only proper response to the Good News of the Incarnation.[2]

The good news of the incarnation is a lot to take in. For five-year-old Sharon it takes careful retelling, and she can’t tell it without jumping and whirling around, and then some sofa-diving. She knows what an awesome thing it is to say, “The baby was God.” It changes profoundly how we think about God, heaven and earth, sun and moon and stars, and every baby born into this world where rich men rarely come bearing gifts without an agenda and wise men and women are worried. The Word became flesh and lived among us and we have seen his glory, and he has changed everything. The baby was God, and all the possibilities we see in the eyes of the infant unfolded into the particular life of Jesus.

Jesus is our childhood’s pattern, 

Day by day like us he grew.

He was little, weak and helpless, 

Tears and smiles like us he knew.

Thus he feels for all our sadness, 

And he shares in all our gladness.[3]

Luke’s story of the 12-year-old Jesus in the temple is the only incident in the biblical gospels about the life of Jesus between infancy and the beginning of his ministry as an adult. “Jesus is twelve years old, a signal to the original audience,” writes Wesley Allen, “that he is on the cusp of adulthood as defined in the ancient world … His actions on this occasion, then, foreshadow his ministry and especially his relationship with God.”[4] Just as the adult Jesus will make one trip to Jerusalem on Passover, where he will encounter the teachers in the temple and finally give his life in obedience to God’s will, so the boy Jesus, near the end of his childhood, makes one trip to the temple, on Passover, where he encounters the teachers. To his family, he appears to be lost, but he knows he is exactly where he needs to be. It’s not hard to imagine him sounding just like any sassy pre-teen in this scene. "Why were you searching for me?” he says to his parents. “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?" Day by day like us he grew, and he grew into his own. But isn’t it a little early to think about 12-year old Jesus just four days after Christmas Day? Doesn’t it feel a little rushed?

I don’t own a Christmas sweater. Several years ago, though, I picked up a pair of Christmas socks at Target. Black, with little green Christmas trees and a fat, jolly Santa. Every year, I wear them once, maybe twice, and then they go in the laundry basket and eventually back in the far back of the sock drawer until next year.

Why am I talking about Christmas socks? Because they fit the category of seasonal accessory, and because the wonderful passage from Colossians talks about getting dressed. The baby was God. The Word became flesh. We have seen the glory of God in the face of Jesus. Now what?

As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

The baby was God, and with the Magi from the East and Sharon’s Three Rich Men we come to adore him and to offer our gifts—only to discover that Christmas is a reverse baby shower: new threads for us.

Three-year-old Liam got Batman sheets for Christmas, and he may still wear his Spiderman pyjamas, but he’s outgrowing his Paw Patrol undies. He’s a big boy now.

We’re invited to let ourselves be clothed in layer upon layer of all that Jesus embodies—his compassion and kindness, his humility and patience, his forgiveness, his peace, and above all, the fullness of God’s love he enfleshed.

Your Christmas sweater may already be back in the closet until next year, together with the left-over wrapping paper and all the decorations in the attic. But the birth of Jesus isn’t just about decorations, it truly is about God’s incarnation: the complete enfleshment of God’s fullness in a human being. We know Jesus didn’t come so we could have a day or two or three of merriment and memories—beautiful and life-giving as such days are. He came to reclaim and fulfill all our days. He came to free us from sin, from our self-absorption and greed, and from the ugliness of thought and speech that holds us captive. He came to bind us together for good in the love of God. And you know how much this land and every land needs communities of compassion and people who seek to make room in their hearts and their neighborhoods for the peace of Christ to rule. It begins with you and me and our willingness to wear these new clothes year-round. It begins with our willingness to let the word of Christ not just come and visit, but dwell within and among us.

The baby was God, and I am thankful for Sharon who gives voice to an exuberance that can’t contain itself and calls on heaven and earth, sun and moon and all living things to praise the One who loves all things into being.

The baby was God, and I am thankful also for Auden whose narrator gives voice to the shadow experience of this exuberance:

Once again we have attempted—quite unsuccessfully—to love all of our relatives, and in general grossly overestimated our powers.

But even this very grown-up and somber voice of after-Christmas pensiveness points to our child-like dependence on the One who comes to us in the baby.

Once again, as in previous years, … we have sent Him away, begging though to remain His disobedient servant, the promising child who cannot keep His word for long.

We know Jesus came to reclaim and redeem our every day. We have sent him away, again and again, because the love that found us demands so much of us, and we are slow to change. But “begging … to remain His disobedient servant” we wrap ourselves in Christ’s compassion, kindness, and patience, and we get a little closer to wearing them year-round.

May the fire God has kindled in our hearts burn brightly, bright enough for us to trust that even though we “cannot keep His word for long,” the word enfleshed in Jesus keeps us for good.

[1] For the Time Being, in: W. H. Auden, Collected Poems, ed. Edward Mendelson (New York: Vintage International, 1991), 399.

[2] John Shea, The Hour of the Unexpected (Allan, TX: Argus Communications, 1977), 68.

[3] Cecil F. Alexander, “Once in David’s Royal City,” Chalice Hymnal No. 165.

[4] O. Wesley Allen Jr. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/first-sunday-of-christmas-3/commentary-on-luke-241-52-5

Change

Thomas Kleinert

There’s a reason they don’t pay prophets to design inspirational cards for the Advent season. You just can’t make embossed, heavy cardstock, color print and extra glitter work with a line like “The ax is lying at the root of the trees!” or the classic holiday greeting, “Merry Christmas, you brood of vipers!” But on the road to Christmas, there’s no good way to avoid John the Baptizer down by the Jordan, no matter how much we might prefer staying at the month-long Christmas party that started the day after Thanksgiving, just dipping gingerbread cookies into our egg nog. There’s no good way to avoid John, and he’s on fire.

“Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” he yells, sounding like one of the prophets of old: furious, single-minded, borderline obsessive. The people have come to receive his baptism in the river. It’s a powerful ritual of making a fresh start, of going back to the beginning: God’s people crossing the river to enter the promised land anew. But John won’t let them get away with thinking that a water ritual would make them presentable on the day of the Lord, or that some other symbolic action like putting on sackcloth and ashes would do, or that they could always fall back on being children of Abraham with whom God had made the covenant that included all his descendants. John slams all those exit doors shut until it is just the crowd and this ancient and urgent demand: “Bear fruits worthy of repentance.”

And amazingly, most of them don’t leave to find a more accommodating prophet. They get it. “What then are we to do?” they ask.

Repentance is one of those churchy words we may get tired of hearing. Some think it’s something like reallyfeeling really sorry, with thick layers of religious overtones and tears of contrition. Not really. What it means is both very simple and very hard: to stop doing what I’m doing and to start doing what I was made to do. The term in Hebrew literally means turning around, as in returning to the ways of God. And the Greek term literally means change of mind, indicating a complete turn-around in one’s thinking that effects a change of direction in one’s life. It doesn’t matter if you typically think your way into a new way of acting or act your way into a new way of thinking. Repentance is a fundamental reorientation of your life, a reorientation that becomes visible, tangible, and, hopefully, durable. All this is to say is that repentance may well be a churchy-sounding word, but it’s one we just can’t do without.

“What then are we to do?” folks ask. “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none,” says John; “and whoever has food must do likewise.” It doesn’t get any more everyday than the clothes on your back and the food on your plate. Bearing good fruit, it turns out, is neither spectacular nor heroic; it’s rather ordinary. John reminds me that in the divine economy, if I have more than what I need to sustain my life, the neighbor who does not have such abundance has a claim on it. And I can’t even tell him how many pairs of pants are hanging in my closet.

The last time I spoke with Father Strobel before he joined the saints in heaven, I was driving the van to pick up a group of guests from the Room in the Inn campus. The line was short that night. I pulled right up and got out of the van. I saw a man who looked familiar, despite the surgical mask covering much of his face. “Charlie, is it you? I haven’t seen you in what feels like ages! It’s Thomas from Vine Street. It’s so good to see you! How are you?” Even in the dark, I could see Charlie’s eyes light up with a smile. He told me he was doing OK, mentioned his health problems, but that wasn’t what he wanted to chat about. He couldn’t stand staying at home, he told me. He needed to be where he was, at the campus, with the folks who didn’t have housing, people he knew to be his siblings and his friends.

“The real problem,” he said, and I’m paraphrasing, “the real problem is private property. There’s nothing wrong with owning things, but the way I understand Jesus, he tells us, ‘This is yours, enjoy it. It’s yours until someone else needs it.’”

I laughed and said, “That’ll preach, Charlie!” On the way back to the church, I kept thinking, who but this man would skip the chit-chat about the weather or some sports team and go right to the heart of the matter? A lifetime of prayer and loving service condensed into a simple, incredibly challenging statement, offered with humility and the warmest smile:

The way I understand Jesus, he tells us, “This is yours, enjoy it. It’s yours until someone else needs it.”

“Love your neighbor” is not a religious way to spell charity; it’s the most challenging way to spell justice. It is the challenge to take my neighbor’s need as seriously as I take my own. Moses and the prophets teach it. John declared it. Jesus lived it. And in the fourth century, Bishop Basil of Caesarea said in a homily, “When someone steals another’s clothes, we call them a thief. Should we not give the same name to one who couldclothe the naked and does not?” And the bishop continued,

The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry; the coat hanging unused in your closet belongs to the one who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the one who has no shoes; the money which you hoard up belongs to the poor. You do wrong to everyone you could help, but fail to help.

Or as James put it, If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,” and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.[1] And in the First Letter of John we read, How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?[2] Or as Charlie paraphrased Jesus’ teaching, “This is yours, enjoy it. It’s yours until someone else needs it.” Love of neighbor is a golden thread woven into the texts of our tradition, and we need to weave it into our lives with continual repentance, continual conversion to the vision and purposes of God.

Little we do in this weekly worship gathering ever strikes us as revolutionary. Our liturgy is not designed with radical, global change in mind, but we do what we do, all that we do, in the light of God’s coming reign. We practice confession and forgiveness, we practice gratitude and praise, we practice saying our small yes to God’s great and eternal Yes, we practice saying, “Jesus Christ is Lord!”, and we trust that by letting those practices become habitual we are changed into subversive change-makers.

The tax-collectors in the crowd ask John, “What are we to do?” and John doesn’t tell them to walk away from their jobs, because the system of taxation is corrupt and unjust. He does tell them, though, not to take more than they are authorized to take.

And John doesn’t tell the soldiers in the crowd to quit service in the Roman military, because they are collaborating with an unjust and corrupt system — we all are. He does tell them, though, not to extort money from anyone through threats or false accusations. Again, nothing heroic, nothing spectacular, just a commitment to act with justice within the social structure, a commitment to let love of neighbor become visible and tangible in everyday situations.

John tells the people of the coming one who is more powerful than he, who will baptize them with the Holy Spirit and with fire. “His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” Just moments before, John talked about trees getting cut down and thrown into the fire, so it’s quite understandable when some folks wonder if wheat and chaff represent two groups of people—perhaps those who bear the fruit God expects to find and those who don’t?

No. The point is rather that until harvest time, every grain of wheat is wrapped in a husk. After threshing, all those precious wheat berries are mixed in with a dusty mess of husk parts called chaff. And to this day, farmers around the world make use of the wind to separate the chaff from the grain—a small portion of the messy mix is tossed up into the air, the chaff is blown away some distance, and the wheat kernels fall back to the ground. And the point, of course, is to save every last grain, not merely some.

The image suggests a view of judgment that is liberating rather than punishing: We experience life as a mix of good and evil impulses and actions; they are often frustratingly intermingled; combinations of good intentions and bad outcomes; poor judgments we can’t forget and compromises that haunt us; too many choices where we had to pick the lesser of two evils — and the judgment John announces as the work of the coming one is a judgment. But it’s not a judgment of division and elimination. It’s a judgment of cleansing and gathering. It’s the judgment of fiery love that burns away all the bits that keep us from being who we were made to be, all the bits that trap us in self-absorption and apathy, all the bits our practice of repentance didn’t help us shed, all that gets in the way of our life as God’s people.

So, yes, it’s good to meet John on the road to Christmas. And it’s good to make it a habit to repent and rejoice. The Lord is near! And that you can write on your Christmas card, can’t you?

[1] James 2:15-17

[2] 1 John 3:17

The Middle of the Wilderness

Margie Quinn

It has been four hundred years since God has spoken to God’s people; four centuries of silence in which no one has heard from God. Right after Malachi gives us a proclamation that there will be a prophet to come, we hear nothing from our Creator. 

A lot happens in those four hundred years. There is destruction, war, devastation, exile, and deep suffering. When the Israelites hope to hear from an angel, a prophet, heck we will even take a burning bush again, they don’t hear from anyone. 

And then in this passage, for the first time in four hundred years, we hear from God. Here’s how it goes down: In the fifteenth year of the reign of a really important Emperor, when this really important guy was a Governor and a really important guy was a Ruler (and his brother was also a Ruler and his friend was a Ruler, and there were a couple of high priests who had a lot of power)... in that time, the word of God came to…John. Did you catch that? We begin our passage with a political roll call of the ruling class, the people who hold the highest seats of power. And we quickly discover that the word of God came to…not him or him or him or him, but him. The him in this story is John the Baptist. Y’all remember John the Baptist? He’s this strangely dressed guy who feasts on a diet of locusts and honey, who would have definitely would have been bullied growing up for the way that he looked. We learn that, after this successive string of men, the word of God is coming to…him? 

Yep. After four hundred years of silence, God decides to turn  the world right-side-up again, and finds John. God doesn’t just find him anywhere. He’s not at the urban city center in this story. He’s not sitting in some office at his desk or in an executive chamber. He’s in the wilderness. He could not be further away from noise of Caesar’s world. We don’t know why he’s out there. Maybe he is running from something or running to something. All we know is that this is where God finds him that day: smack dab in the middle of a wasteland, perhaps prepared, perhaps not, to receive a word from a God that has been pretty dang quiet for four hundred years.

The first thing we learn about this word that God sends to John is that it so animates John, it so empowers and encourages him that the first thing he does once he receives the word is to go all around the region of the Jordan proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Think about it:  God’s word could have animated John to do a lot of different things in that moment. We could have learned that, “The word of God came to John, who ran straight into the city and ran for office, and had a position of power for the rest of his life.” But no, we learn here in Luke 3 that the word of God inspired John to preach repentance and forgiveness.

I want to break those words down. Repentance, metanoia, just means the changing of one’s mind, the reorienting of one’s heart, the transformation of one’s own agenda from that of Caesar to that of God. Repentance means to turn away from selfishness and shame, resentment and hatred, and to turn toward love, again and again. That is what the word of God did to John that day. It made him get up and start walking around and teaching people about metanoia, about reorienting our hearts.

When the word of God came to John, it made him want to talk about forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness: the Greek translation of “forgiveness” just means, “to let go.” Isn’t that beautiful? That the word of God when animated in John encouraged him to tell people that you can let go. You can let go of all of that hatred you feel toward that person that you don’t even know. You can let go of all of the shame you feel about yourself when you look in the mirror. You can let go of all of that pain and tension within your family and trust it to someone else. You can let go. 

That is what this strangely-dressed, locust-eating guy is doing in the wilderness that day. 

“I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness,” he continues. “Prepare the way of the Lord.” Prepare the way of the Lord.  John could have done a lot of things to prepare for Jesus’ coming that, to me, would have made a lot more sense. In my own life, my preparation for this Advent season has looked like picking out the perfect tree, stringing lights in my house and sweeping for the first time in a while. It looks like anxiously and frantically making sure that my house looks welcoming and spirited to reflect the season. Those are the ways that I’ve prepared for the coming of Christ.

 And this guy, who I’m sure if I saw him on the street today I’d look the other way, is preparing by walking around a region that is known as a place of great pain and great freedom and simply saying to people, “Someone is coming. I’m not him. I’m pointing to him. Someone is coming that is going to set you free and help you experience a kind of love you can’t imagine. That’s what’s coming, and I’m here to prepare you and myself for it.” All of this coming from a man in the middle of the wilderness. 

If the word of God can meet John in the wilderness, maybe it can come to me, not when I feel like I’m on top of my life but when I feel the most vulnerable to it. And perhaps in being a vulnerable recipient, in throwing my hands up and laying myself bare, perhaps that’s when I could most clearly hear what a loving voice might have to say. 

That loving voice could meet us when our hearts are broken. When we are in between jobs. When we can’t seem to heal that persistent injury. When we are timidly trying out a new medication. When we have lost someone we dearly love. When we feel out of place at school. When we  can’t shake the depressive fog. When we are scared of what’s next. When we wish we were a lot skinnier, or a lot stronger. When we are waiting to hear back from that college. When we don’t feel close to God. When we go through the motions of our lives but don’t feel passion anymore. When we find ourselves in the middle of the wilderness.

The promise in this story is not necessarily the word itself, but who the word comes to and where the word comes. The word finds itself in a wasteland and picks a wild prophet who is stripped down and open to what is coming. God picks a man who is open to preparing a way, with a different kind of preparation than what the world at that time (or this time) is used to. 

So, I don’t know how to prepare for Jesus this season. But if I look to John, if I look to the way that God came to speak to God’s people, it points me somewhere in the direction of openness, of throwing up my arms and saying, “Help.” In the places in my life that feel most wild, perhaps that’s where God wants to meet me most. So, I don’t want to run away from the wilderness. I don’t want to look at it as exile or devastation or that I’m missing some part of this greater faith thing. I think, like John, it could be exactly where we are supposed to be this Advent season. John invites us to prepare for Jesus in a different kind of way, a way where we are invited to change our hearts, our minds, and to let go.

May it be so. 

Beware

Thomas Kleinert

Those who saw the temple in Jerusalem say it was a magnificent structure. Newly rebuilt under Herod the Great, and still under construction during Jesus’ lifetime, it occupied a platform twice as large as the Roman Forum with its many temples and four times the size of the Acropolis in Athens with the famous Parthenon. The massive retaining walls that supported the complex, including the famous Western wall that remains today, were built with enormous blocks of stone, some of them 40 feet long. The front of the temple itself was a square of sculpted rock, 150 feet by 150 feet, much of it decorated with silver and gold. First-century historian Josephus wrote that the gold “effected so fierce a blaze of fire that those who tried to look at it were forced to turn away. Jerusalem and the temple seemed in the distance like a mountain covered in snow, for any part not covered in gold was dazzling white.” The combination of the temple mount, the platform of huge retaining stones, and the large building of the temple itself raised the temple complex to a height that could be seen from miles away, and in bright sunlight, it shone like a luminous city come down from heaven. This was the House of God – this was, in the minds of many, the center of the world. This was the very presence of God with God’s people, the ancient promise rendered in stone. It was holy ground, a sanctuary where rituals of atonement and purification along with festivals of liberation and thanksgiving sustained a people seeking to live faithfully with their God. The temple was an essential institution of Jewish life.

Jesus had come to the temple every day since he came to Jerusalem, and tensions between him and the temple leadership had been growing. Now he and the disciples are leaving, and one of them says, perhaps with his fingers tracing the seam between two of the colossal blocks, “Look, teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” He is dazzled, but he doesn’t see what Jesus sees. I wonder if he actually saw what Jesus wanted us to see just moments ago when he drew our attention to the poor widow putting her last little coin in the temple treasury – if this disciple saw her, she didn’t leave a lasting impression; not like the massive walls. “Not one stone will be left here upon another,” Jesus tells the stunned disciple. “All will be thrown down.” Nothing suggests he meant it as a threat; just a simple announcement. The words sound very matter-of-fact, spoken in passing. The beauty would fade, the majesty fall, the power crumble and collapse.

In the next scene, Jesus and four of the disciples are sitting on the Mount of Olives with its spectacular view of the Temple Mount, and they ask him some follow-up questions about all will be thrown down. They’re not curious as to why or how, only when this would be — as though the why were a given and the how irrelevant, and everything now was just a matter of time. In the apocalyptic imagination, the announcement that “not one stone will be left here upon another” is a given — the burning question is, when will the present age crumble under the weight of evil and give way to the kingdom of God? When will this be and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?

The Gospel of Mark was composed and first heard in a time of great uncertainty. In the 60’s of the first century, the weight of Roman occupation of Judea became too much to bear. Mob violence was disrupting life in Jerusalem. Assassins attacked and murdered people, including one high priest, in broad daylight, and kidnapped officials who collaborated with Rome. Gangs of roaming robbers burned and looted villages.[1] Prophets delivered oracles of doom, and daily the news seemed to confirm their words. Jerusalem was a tinderbox in those tumultuous years, with revolutionary sentiments mounting and finally catapulting Judea into open rebellion against Rome. “Deceivers and impostors, under the pretense of divine inspiration, fostering revolutionary changes,” wrote the historian Josephus, “they persuaded the masses to act like madmen and led them out into the desert in the belief that God would give them signs of deliverance.”[2] Insurgents took control of the city, but not for long. Roman troops under the command of Titus laid siege to Jerusalem, and in the summer of the year 70, the city fell and the temple was destroyed — only seven years after construction had finally been completed.

The Gospel of Mark was composed and first heard in a time of wars and rumors of wars. There were Christian prophets whose words were honored by the assemblies of believers as the words of the risen Lord, and some of those prophets were certain that the catastrophic events unfolding in Jerusalem could only mean that the return of Jesus in power and glory was imminent.

In Mark’s community, however, the words of the living Lord were words of caution and encouragement. “Beware that no one leads you astray.” To the prophets, teachers, and preachers of Mark’s community, the bewilderment, the desolation, and the chaos so many of us are experiencing — Simon Dein calls it the “paralyzing anxiety that the world is dissolving”[3] — was familiar territory. It’s from those depths that they proclaim to us a message of resilient hope. Beware that no one leads you astray, says the Lord. Beware that no one leads you astray, when truth is shaken, when nations make war and people flee in terror, when the silent tsunami of famine inundates the devastated land, when impostors preach alluring sermons of fear, resentment, and weaponized grievance. Don’t despair. Beware. Resist the pull of cynicism. Cultivate hope. Cultivate wonder. Cultivate gratitude. Practice faithful commitment. Be alert. Stay awake. Laugh. Live the love that is the way of Jesus.

Adrienne Maree Brown wrote in 2016, under the Black Lives Matter hashtag, “Things are not getting worse, they are getting uncovered. We must hold each other tight and continue to pull back the veil.”[4] A few years later, in the summer of 2022, she wrote,

I have to revise that. Things are getting worse for most of us, between mass shootings, climate catastrophe, regressive sociopolitical battles and an ongoing global pandemic. It’s an overwhelming, terrifying and grief-stricken time.

After naming several of the losses we haven’t had the time or the emotional capacity to fully process, she adds,

This palpable, active, ongoing grief is a non-negotiable part of this period of immense change. Grief is one of the most beautiful and difficult ways we love. As we grieve we feel our humanity and connection to each other.[5]

We are people called to live the love that is the way of Jesus, and this grief settling into our bones is part of it. We are called to lean forward into the promise of a world redeemed by the love of God.

“When you hear of wars and rumors of wars,” Jesus says, “do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come.” And then he speaks of birth pangs. For many of us it does feel like the end of the world when every day just seems to add layer upon layer of loss. Some of it is disillusionment, which is painful, but it frees us to see with greater clarity and live more honestly and truthfully — and certainly disillusionment is the kind of loss most of us would welcome as we hold each other tight and continue to pull back the veil.

But Jesus speaks to the whole messy experience of losses piling up and weighing us down — the tears, the worries, the bad dreams and the sleepless nights, the knot in the stomach, the shoulders that feel like they’ll never relax again. He sees our reality and he knows it; knows it and bears it. And he speaks of labor pains. He tells us that the world is in labor, and the suffering of creation will be healed and fulfilled in the joy of birth.

How long is this labor, we ask, of course we ask, how long must we wait? When will we laugh with tears in our eyes and cry no more?

He doesn’t know when. What he does know is that something is struggling to be born, and he calls us to lean into the promise, and breathe through the pain, and follow him on the way.

The English historian Eric Hobsbawm, born in 1917, grew up in Vienna and, after the death of his parents, with an aunt in Berlin. Berlin was not a good place to live for a Jewish teenager in those years. He was fifteen years old when one day in January 1933, as he was walking his little sister home from school, he saw the headline at a newsstand, “Adolph Hitler Appointed Chancellor of Germany.” Reflecting on those years Hobsbawm later wrote,

We were on the Titanic, and everyone knew it was hitting the iceberg. … It is difficult for those who have not experienced the ‘Age of Catastrophe’ of the twentieth century in central Europe to see what it meant to live in a world that was simply not expected to last, in something that could not really even be described as a world, but merely as a provisional waystation between a dead past and a future not yet born.[6]

Now it’s our turn to live in something that cannot really even be described as a world; it’s our turn to live in this in-between time, so hard to describe, so difficult to understand, so exhausting to navigate. Yet amid all the endings pointing to a non-world ruled by autocrats, something is struggling to be born, Jesus assures us: a world where God and creation are at home.

We believe that the Spirit of God is at work among us, unresting, unhasting, breathing with us through the pain, building a new temple, one that isn’t modeled on imperial architecture, but a living temple where God is at home in the world. A temple that isn’t overwhelming in its heavy, gold-plated magnitude, but one that shines with the glory of God. A temple made entirely of human beings who are fully alive and are finally one with the love that made us.[7]

[1] See Josephus, Jewish War, 2.254-56; Antiquities 20.185-88; 208-10

[2] Josephus, Jewish War, 2.258

[3] Cited by Amanda Brobst-Renaud https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-33-2/commentary-on-mark-131-8-5

[4] https://www.instagram.com/adriennemareebrown/p/BHqlZ57jbBT/

[5] https://adriennemareebrown.net/2022/06/07/an-emergent-strategy-response-to-mass-shootings/

[6] Tony Judt, Reappraisals: Reflections on the forgotten twentieth century (New York: Penguin, 2008), 117.

[7] My thanks to Debie Thomas whose writing and voice continue to help me say what I believe needs to be said, especially https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2010-not-one-stone

Two widows

Thomas Kleinert

Two widows. One of them we know as the widow of Zarephath. Jesus talked about her when, early in his ministry, he preached a sermon at the synagogue at home in Nazareth.

“There were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months and there was a severe famine over all the land, yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon.” And when they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage, and they were ready to kill him.[1]

It’s a kind of jealousy we’re familiar with. We gotta take care of our own first, we say, sometimes quite emphatically. And when we’re filled with rage, we have a hard time remaining receptive to others, or at least curious about them. Most of us today aren’t filled with rage, though. Talking with folks over the past few days, I heard of disappointment and bewilderment, and there’s been considerable numbness and worry, but not much rage. So perhaps we can be receptive to the nameless widow from the other side and her gifts.

Elijah the Tishbite, the man of God, is introduced in the first book of Kings, chapter 17. He steps on the scene during the reign of King Ahab of Samaria, a king infamous for exploring other options than the Lord God as divine guarantors of the land’s fertility and hence the king’s power. Ahab had married a Sidonian princess, Jezebel, and in the book of Kings she is blamed for the fact that Ahab abandoned the worship of the Lord God of Israel and instead erected an altar for Baal in the house of Baal which he built in Samaria. We’re presented with a mighty clash of theopolitical systems: Who gives life to people, Baal or the Lord?

Elijah stepped on the scene and told Ahab, “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” And that was the beginning of the long drought. After a while, the Lord told Elijah, “Go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon (you know, Jezebel’s home town) and live there; for I have commanded a widow there to feed you.” When Elijah came to the gate of the town, he saw her. She and her son were one meal away from starvation, and she was gathering some wood so she could prepare their last supper. She also saw him, the stranger who asked her for a drink and something to eat. She gave him a drink of water and she told him times were hard, recalling for him how little meal was left in the jar, and how little oil in the jug. And the stranger said to her, “Do not be afraid. Make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for yourself and your son.”

Why say, Do not be afraid? Why would she be afraid? Ashamed perhaps for not being able to show proper hospitality to the stranger. Or heart-broken, knowing that there would be no more food the next day for her child, or the stranger, or herself. “Do not be afraid,” said the stranger. “I have a word from the Lord God of Israel: The jar of meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that the Lord sends rain on the earth.”

“Do not be afraid to trust the promise of the Lord God,” is what he was saying, inviting her — the Sidonian widow who had so little food left, and yet she had more than he did — inviting her to trust and share. And she did. She went and prepared three little cakes — and for as long as the drought continued in Israel, the story goes, the jar of meal in this widow’s household was not emptied, neither did the jug of oil fail.

We can hear this story as a colorful affirmation of the Lord God of Israel as the true life-giver, a story told with great delight in the villages of Israel while Ahab and Jezebel in the capital were pushing hard to remake the realm with Baal as the source of their power. We can hear this story as the first round in the clash between the prophet and the king, and the prophet didn’t just win, he scored a major victory on the opposing team’s home field in Sidon. What easily gets lost, though, in this triumphant take on the story, is the unnamed foreign widow who showed hospitality to the stranger from Israel, and whose trust in the promise of the Lord God unlocked blessings beyond anything our drought stricken minds can imagine.

I’m not starving for lack of food, there’s plenty for most of us in this country, thank God. I hunger for understanding, I thirst for truth and a renewed sense of community, and what I’m craving more than anything is the spark of courage the widow of Zarephath showed — whether she struck that spark herself or whether it simply came to her in the encounter. She’s the one who unlocked blessing for the stranger and her child and every guest who would come knocking on her door during the drought years. She’s the one who inspires me to trust the promise of God.

Now Jesus draws our attention to the other widow. We don’t know her name either. Had they had an annual temple report listing the names of major donors, hers wouldn’t have been in it.

“Beware of the scribes,” Jesus taught the crowd. He didn’t mean the scribes in general, but the ones who liked to walk around in long robes. The ones who liked to be seen, strutting around like peacocks spreading their tails, craving attention and seats of honor. The ones who never tired of reciting long, elaborate prayers so all would see and hear and recognize them — the ones who, famous for their piety, were nevertheless capable of devouring widows’ homes and livelihoods.

Ostentatious piety was one thing, but exploiting widows was a serious charge. Scribes enjoyed great respect as teachers of the Torah, and caring for widows, orphans, and strangers was known to be a central concern of God’s commandments. The law was clear:

You shall not abuse any widow or orphan. You shall not deprive a resident alien or an orphan of justice; you shall not take a widow’s garment in pledge.[2]

The prophets were equally clear, and the Psalms also reflected that sacred commitment to caring for the most vulnerable people by declaring,

The Lord watches over the strangers; he upholds the orphan and the widow, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.[3]

Jesus was teaching in the temple, at the heart of an institution established to the glory of God and for the flourishing of God’s people, but one that was used and abused for the worst of very human ends: vanity, self-promotion, and exploitation.

Jesus sat down opposite the treasury and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. Nobody was paying attention to the poor widow who put in two small copper coins. Compared to the gifts of the rich, is was like nothing, like a penny in the parking lot nobody bothers to even pick up. To her, it was everything.

Nobody was paying attention to her, but Jesus points her out to us. He notices her because his eyes, as Debie Thomas put it, “are ever on the small, the insignificant, the hidden.”[4] Jesus wants us to see what he sees, be attentive to what he notices.

“Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

So much attention for those who gave much, so little for her who gave everything. Everything. Are we supposed to cheer or weep? Jesus doesn’t applaud or commend her, nor does he tell us to go and do likewise. All he does is describe the scene. And there’s no hint in the text to let us know if he speaks with joy in his voice about this woman’s act of complete devotion to God, or if he speaks with anger because he is witnessing how a corrupt institution that is supposed to glorify the God who upholds the orphan and the widow, takes a poor widow’s last coin like some shameless TV preacher.

The day after Jesus and the disciples had come to Jerusalem, he entered the temple and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the stalls of those who sold doves. For a moment, he practically shut down the entire temple operation. “Is it not written,” he shouted, quoting Isaiah and Jeremiah“‘my house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.”[5]

When the poor widow left the temple, Jesus left it as well. One of the disciples, awed by the magnificent architecture, pointed out some of the details, inviting Jesus to admire them with him. Jesus’ response was quick and short: “Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”[6] He had just watched a poor woman give her all to an indefensible institution, one whose leaders refused to honor God by protecting the poor. No edifice steeped in such injustice will stand.[7]

Tossing her last coin into the temple treasury that day may not have been an act of devotion at all, but of judgment. An act of prophetic judgment against leaders who would take her last coin, but not see her, not recognize her dignity as a member of God’s household.

So much is uncertain as we try to imagine the months and years ahead. But trusting the promise of God, and letting ourselves be made into God’s dwelling place on earth together, we can assure each other that numbness will again give way to loving attention and sparks of courage, and no structure steeped in injustice will stand.

[1] Luke 4:25-28

[2] See Exodus 22:22 and Deuteronomy 24:17

[3] Psalm 146:9

[4] Debie Thomas https://www.journeywithjesus.net/theeighthday/446-the-widowed-prophet

[5] Mark 11:15-17

[6] Mark 13:1-2

[7] Debie Thomas, see note 4.

The world at home

Thomas Kleinert

I have seen beauty to make my heart sing. I have seen it along the river, in the woods, by the side of the road and even in the parking lot at Target. I have seen hornbeams and maples with their crowns on fire, blazing red, yellow and gold against the bluest blue of the October sky. I have walked, driven and paddled in this beauty, and I have wished I could fly in its glory like a dancing sparrow, singing my thank yous.

But unfailingly, a heavy reluctance takes hold of me. More sudden, heavy, deadly flooding, this time in Spain. War in Ukraine, Gaza, Lebanon, and Sudan, no end in sight. And the grave uncertainty what kind of country this will be after this week. I often think about the German writer and verse smith Bert Brecht who fled in 1933 when the Nazis set fire to the Reichstag, the German parliament, and accused the communists of arson. Brecht wrote in 1939, in exile in Denmark,

Truly, I live in dark times!
An artless word is foolish. A smooth forehead
Points to insensitivity. He who laughs
Has not yet received
The terrible news.

What times are these, in which
A conversation about trees is almost a crime
For in doing so we maintain our silence about so much wrongdoing![1]

How can you talk about trees on November 3, 2024, I ask myself — and a couple of breaths later I ask, “How can I not speak of the glory of trees, when ugliness, violence, grief and foreboding are creeping in from all sides? How can I not sing of the beauty and wisdom of God’s creation when chaos is seeping up from the ground?” I’m grateful I’m not alone in resisting the pull of despair. I’m grateful for voices affirming the faithfulness of God in dark times.

“In broad sweep, the story told in the book of Isaiah is the long account of Israel’s life in the midst of a demanding sequence of imperial powers,” Walter Brueggemann writes, a sequence stretching from the 8th to the 4th century B.C.E. First the Assyrian Empire, then the Babylonian Empire, and eventually the Persian Empire. But Isaiah has no interest in telling the story of the rise and fall of empires. Isaiah draws our attention to what we might not see at first glance: how, amid the whirl of history, perceived and redescribed in the prophet’s heart and mind, the purposes of God unfold. In the prophet’s vision, any human decision – whether by Judean kings or by imperial overlords or by any other powerful figures – is always penultimate. What is ultimate is the holy resolve and the capacity of God to do something utterly new. God is the creator of heaven and earth, and God is faithful.

At the center of God’s faithful attentiveness, according to Isaiah, is a city. Jerusalem is the seat of the world’s best hope for well-being, and the site of the most profound disobedience and recalcitrance. And so Jerusalem is the recipient of God’s judgment and of God’s renewing comfort and mercy.[2] In the prophet’s vision all of heaven and earth can be and will be undone, except Jerusalem. The moon will be abashed and the sun ashamed, but the Lord of hosts will reign on Mount Zion.[3] And on this mountain the Lord of hosts will make a great feast for all peoples.

And the Lord will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the covering that is spread over all nations; the Lord will swallow up death forever.

I am powerfully drawn to this image of God consuming and thus eliminating for good the deathly shroud cast over all peoples. More than anytime before I am drawn to it in this season when ugliness, violence, grief and foreboding are creeping in from all sides. It does feel like a pall to me, like a dark, chilling blanket, smothering life and joy and hope. It is Death with a capital D. Death that doesn’t make room for new life, but only moves to counter and cancel and prevent fullness of life, leaving nothing but absence in its wake. And Isaiah declares, and the way I hear these words, he sings and shouts them, “The Lord will swallow up death forever.” Anything that wants to bring creation to a standstill, anything that wants to unleash chaos and formless void, anything that wants to swallow life, will be swallowed up by God the creator of heaven and earth. It’s not just the actions of those who hold imperial power that are penultimate; anything that keeps life from flourishing is penultimate. What is ultimate are the purposes of God. What is ultimate is the mountain feast for all peoples. What is ultimate is their joy, our joy, in God’s salvation.

John, of course, knew that tune very well. He was a Christian leader, banned by order of Rome, yet another empire, to the island of Patmos. Jerusalem was gone. The Romans, tired of the protests and revolts in the volatile province of Judaea, had destroyed the city and demolished the temple — a pile of rubble was all that was left. They had finally succeeded in bringing peace to the troubled region, their variety of peace, that is, PAX ROMANA. To those peacemakers, followers of Jesus were suspect, because of their reluctance or outright refusal to honor the gods of the empire. Violent persecution of the church wasn’t the norm, but many Christian leaders were being executed or imprisoned, or, as in John’s case, banned.

He found himself far from home, a prisoner on the small island of Patmos, off the coast of Turkey, in the Aegean Sea. The world around him was falling to pieces, and he knew that in the cities of Asia Minor, arrests and executions were continuing. His friends were losing hope. Roman imperial culture made demands on them that turned their acts of faithfulness to the risen Lord into acts of rebellion. How could they possibly acclaim the emperor as “Lord and Son of God” when they had come to know Jesus as Lord? How could they praise the emperor as “Savior of the World” when that honor belonged to God alone?

John wrote them a pastoral letter to tell them what he saw amid the whirl of violent tensions, oppression, and immobilizing fear. Much like the prophets whose imagery and language shaped his own, John looked beyond the horizon defined by Rome’s imperial reach, and he saw a city coming down out of heaven from God. He saw a city for all peoples, a city of peace.

Biblical scholar John Barton has noted, that “apocalyptic poetry and historical prose are usually not commensurate. When Scripture says, ‘The stars will fall from heaven and the sun will cease its shining; the moon will be turned to blood and fire mingled with hail will fall from the heavens,’ we don’t expect the next phrase to be ‘the rest of the country will be partly cloudy with scattered showers.’”[4] When John speaks of the holy city descending from heaven, we don’t expect the next paragraph to give us GPS coordinates or driving directions. We are given a vision of life when all that is penultimate is past. The deathly powers that have kept life from flourishing are no more: injustice and oppression are gone, terror and fear have passed away, death has been swallowed up.

John reminds his first hearers, that even Rome’s considerable power will not be able to stand against the purposes of God. And he reminds us that no project of ultimate domination will ever prevent the coming of God’s reign.

Our hope is not for the solitary bliss of some home-delivery paradise, or for acceptance to a small, exclusive club of the faithful few, or however insular we might imagine fullness of life in this culture steeped in individualism. The church of the saints hopes for an inclusive city for all peoples where God is at home.

During exile in Babylon, the prophet Ezekiel had spoken of the new Jerusalem. He declared that the name of the city would be, The Lord is There.[5] “My dwelling place shall be with them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”[6] John picks up the ancient theme, but the vision is no longer for a single people, but for a community of peoples: “He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them.” The ultimate future is not one tribe’s final triumph over all the others. Nor is it the fulfillment of any nation’s or any individual’s imperial aspirations — the ultimate horizon of the world’s hope, according to John, is a city for all peoples, where God is at home; a city where death is no more, where mourning, crying, and pain are no more — because the old order has passed away. And the one seated on the throne says, “See, I am making all things new.”

What are we to do with such a vision? Neither Isaiah nor John offer us a program for realizing these ancient hopes. But they offer us their inspired attempts to imagine all things made new, hoping that we too might yield in our present, as they did in theirs, “to the assurances given for God’s future,”[7] and that we might seek this peace and pursue it with our every breath, thought, word, and deed. What we do with such a vision, is lean into it. We let it shape our own inspired attempts at faithful living in response to God’s life-giving and hope-sustaining work.

The late William Stringfellow described saints as “those men and women who relish the event of life as a gift and who realize that the only way to honor such a gift is to give it away” — much like the trees that, just when we think they have given all they can give over a long, hot summer, give themselves to shorter days and longer nights — and to us — with such glorious beauty.[8]

Keep alert; stand firm in the faith; be courageous.[9] Our God is faithful.

[1] An die Nachgeborenen, translated by Scott Horton https://harpers.org/2008/01/brecht-to-those-who-follow-in-our-wake/

[2] See Walter Brueggemann, Isaiah 1-39, WBC, 1998, 1-2.

[3] Isaiah 24:21-23

[4] Cited in Thomas G. Long, “Imagine There’s No Heaven: The Loss of Eschatology in American Preaching,” Journal for Preachers, Vol. XXX, No. 1, Advent 2006, 23.

[5] Ezekiel 48:35

[6] Ezekiel 37:27

[7] Brueggemann, 200.

[8] For the Stringfellow quote see F. Dean Lueking, “Saints in the Making,” The Christian Century, October 21, 1998, 965. https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2012-03/saints-making

[9] 1 Corinthians 16:13

Seeing all

Thomas Kleinert

I Watched It All On My Radio is a song co-written by Don Schlitz and Lionel Cartwright. I didn’t hear it when it was released in 1990; I heard Don sing it one night, downstairs in Fellowship Hall, about the boy who hid a six transistor under his pillow.

When the lights went out and no one could see

Over the airwaves, the world came to me.

It’s a lovely song about the magic of radio, about a boy who went through the stations at night ‘til he found a game, about the sluggers hitting homers and the pitchers throwing smoke:

At the crack of the bat, I knew how far it’d go

And I watched it all on my radio

I loved that song the moment I first heard it: I could see the boy sitting up under the covers of his bed, with the world coming to him so vividly, he watched ballgames and Opry shows from his seat on the very front row.[1]

All the Light We Cannot See isn’t a song; it’ a story about a French girl, Marie-Laure, and a German boy, Werner, whose paths converge during the Second World War in Saint Malo on the coast of Normandie. It’s a story about a cursed diamond, about children growing up during the years of Nazi rule, about fear, and bombs, and kindness, and it’s about the radio and its use as both an instrument of oppression and liberation. When the author, Anthony Doerr was asked what the title, All the Light We Cannot See meant, he said

It’s a reference first and foremost to all the light we literally cannot see: that is, the wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum that are beyond the ability of human eyes to detect (radio waves, of course, being the most relevant). It’s also a metaphorical suggestion that there are countless invisible stories still buried within the Second World War — that stories of ordinary children, for example, are a kind of light we do not typically see. Ultimately, the title is intended as a suggestion that we spend too much time focused on only a small slice of the spectrum of possibility.[2]

I watched tv as a kid, but I wouldn’t say I grew up with it. I grew up with radio, and I loved it, still do. And I know I’m biased, but some things are better seen on the radio than on any kind of screen. Hearing the story, say of Moses on Mount Sinai, stirs the imagination and allows you to build a world around the words. But once you’ve seen Charlton Heston with the tablets, it’s hard to see anything else when the story is told; it’s like your imagination has been colonized. I’m glad I haven’t seen Bartimaeus, the movie.

Seeing and not seeing, visibility and invisibility are important themes in the Gospel of Mark. Jesus steps on the scene, declaring, “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”[3] He calls disciples, he heals, he teaches, and he feeds people with his words and with bread. The disciples see it all unfold, they watch, they participate, but they are slow to grasp what they are observing. “Do you have eyes, and fail to see?” Jesus says to them at one point; you can hear the frustration in his voice.[4]

The journey continues. Jesus turns south, following the old road that leads to Jerusalem. In Bethsaida, people bring a blind man to him and beg him to touch him. Mark writes, “Jesus laid his hands on his eyes … and his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.”[5] The disciples are slow to understand who Jesus is, and what discipleship is about, and I wonder why Jesus can’t just lay his hands on them, or on us, for that matter, until we see “everything clearly.”

Instead, he continues to Jerusalem and we follow on the way. And he continues to teach about the power of faith and the demands of discipleship; he talks to us about serving one another and being attentive to little ones – but much of the time we find ourselves slipping and stumbling, hardly what we’d call “following.” Remember last week? “What is it you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked James and John, and they responded, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”[6] Jesus speaks of servanthood and loving self-denial, but we dream of greatness, power and privilege.

Now the journey takes us to Jericho, down in the Jordan valley. This is the last stop for travelers and pilgrims on the way to Jerusalem. From here on, it’s uphill all the way. And there, sitting by the roadside, is Bartimaeus, calling out to passersby to have mercy and toss him a coin or two. It’s a pretty good spot, especially before Passover when many pilgrims come to Jerusalem for the holidays. One day around Passover can make up for weeks when most people simply ignore him, when travelers, farmers, and merchants come and go, too busy to pay attention to a beggar.

Every day, he sits by the roadside just outside the city gate, clutching his cloak. By day, he spreads it out in his lap to catch the coins that people toss his way and by night that same cloak is his bed and blanket.

When Bartimaeus hears that Jesus of Nazareth is in the crowd coming up the road, he starts shouting, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Many in the crowd, including some of us who should know better, tell him to hush and be quiet: Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, he’s an important man on such an important mission, and he mustn’t be distracted. Children and beggars need to stay quiet and invisible. But Bartimaeus cries out even more loudly, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

You know, nobody has called him that yet, Son of David. It’s a royal title charged with expectation. It appears the blind man can see and name what no one else so far could, except for Peter who called Jesus Messiah, and he didn’t know what he was saying.[7]

Jesus stops and says, “Call him here.” You know he could have just walked over to the side of the road, but he wants us to be involved in this moment, he wants us to be participants, not merely onlookers. Some of us turn to Bartimaeus and call him, saying, “Take heart; get up, he is calling you.” You notice, don’t you, when they say ‘take heart; get up’ they sound almost like Jesus himself. There’s kindness in their voices, compassion and encouragement, and not a trace of condescension.

And now watch this scene very closely: This blind man who has already shown that he sees more clearly than many of us who have 20/20 vision, this blind man, throwing off his cloak, jumps up and comes to Jesus. You see that cloak? It’s about the same color as the dirt by the side of the road, isn’t it? You notice the patches, and the holes? You wonder why Mark would tell us that detail, don’t you? Why draw our attention to Bartimaeus throwing off his cloak?

When Jesus called Peter, James and John, they left their nets. They were fishermen. When Jesus called Levi, he left his toll station. He was a tax collector. When Jesus called the rich man who had kept every commandment since his youth, the man walked away grieving. The fisherman has nets. The farmer has a plow. The carpenter has an ax and chisel. The rich man has a good-size house, closets full of clothes for all seasons and occasions, a bed with a soft mattress and silky covers. The beggar has his cloak. This old cloak is all he has – it’s his coat, his coin catcher, his shelter, his bed. Bartimaeus does what the rich man found himself unable to do. He throws off what has defined him up to this moment of calling. He sheds his comfort and security, he drops what he owns, he leaves everything and comes to Jesus. And Jesus asks him, “What do you want me to do for you?” — which is exactly the same question he asked James and John. And Bartimaeus asks for his vision to be restored. Bartimaeus wants to see not just a small slice, but the full spectrum of possibility of life. He wants to see the full spectrum of spiritual, social, and material realities made possible when God reigns. That’s why he insisted loudly, against all who wished to silence him, and persistently, against all who wished he’d just stop: he insisted that this fullness of vision, this full depth of life is what Jesus came to open for us. All the light we cannot see.

Sometimes I hear the story of Bartimaeus and it calls me not to close my eyes to the ones sitting by the side of the road, the ones outside the city gates, marginalized, overlooked, rendered invisible. The story calls me to see them, and to turn to them and say, “Take heart; get up; he’s calling you; he’s calling us.”

And sometimes I hear the story of Bartimaeus and it invites me to see myself sitting by the side of the road, clutching my cloak, a blind beggar holding on to his familiar life with all the strength left in him, whispering, “Lord, have mercy.” And Bartimaeus says to me, “Take heart; get up; he hears our cries for mercy; he’s calling you; he’s calling us.”

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asks.

“I want to see all that you want to show me, all of it. I want to see this wounded world through your eyes, and I want to be part of healing it. I want to be with you on the way. I want to see you.”

[1] https://open.spotify.com/track/0grUMpXBnOHYnXem4NlcX8?si=b5c744100ace4e28

[2] https://www.anthonydoerr.com/all-the-light-we-cannot-see

[3] Mark 1:14f

[4] Mark 8:18

[5] Mark 8:25

[6] Mark 10:36

[7] Mark 8:29

Kingdom Activity

Margie Quinn

This morning, we get another round of what I’d like to call the “Hard Words from Jesus.” We’ve heard about divorce and about tearing out our eyes or cutting off our limbs if we are tempted to sin, but now… we get what might be one of the hardest things Jesus says. Because there’s really no way around it. 

So, let’s get into it. There is a young man, a certain ruler, who kneels before Jesus. That’s a good start, right? He shows humility toward Jesus, the Son of God. He then addresses Jesus as “Good Teacher.” “Good Teacher,” he says with reverence, “what do I have to do to be saved, to inherit eternal life?” He goes on, “I have followed the law, obeyed the commandments, and have been a good student. I haven’t stolen anything or cheated on my spouse, I have honored my parents, I haven’t murdered or committed fraud.” And Jesus, looking at him, seeing him, and loving him, answers: “You lack one thing. Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. THEN, come follow me.” 

In this moment, Jesus requires an action that is even more extreme than the commandments our ruler had so obediently followed. 

A lot of preachers and scholars have tried to explain this passage away, wanting to leave their listeners feeling heartened, but I don’t think Jesus minces words in the gospel of Mark. He says what he says. 

And when the young ruler hears what Jesus has to say, he is shocked and goes away grieving, “for he had many possessions.” 

After the young guy leaves, Jesus starts talking to the disciples, who are probably scratching their heads as they often are, and says, “It’s gonna be really hard for those with wealth to enter the kingdom of God.” Notice here: he doesn’t say, “It’s gonna be hard for someone with wealth to inherit eternal life.” He is not thinking about the then and there. He’s thinking about the here and now. He says it two more times: “It’s gonna be hard to enter the kingdom of God, y’all. It’s gonna be easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” Jesus makes his point three times because sometimes we don’t want to hear it the first time, or even the second time. He makes his point clear: I’m not talking about the future, I’m talking about the present, real, kingdom of God, which is near, as scripture tells us, and it is happening all around us. 

This is a tough one for the disciples to grasp, so they ask Jesus the same kind of question that the rich man did, “Okay then who can be saved?” 

“It’s impossible for you to be saved on your own,” Jesus responds, “You’ve got to rely on God to help you with that.” Peter gives him a little back-talk. “Look, we have left everything behind and followed you.” “Nice work,” Jesus reassures him, “because if you follow me, you know better than anyone that the first are gonna be last, and the last first.” 

According to this story, I am delivering the bad news this morning: It’s gonna be pretty hard for those of us with wealth to participate in and stay near to the kingdom of God at work around us. 

But let me be clear: I don’t think this story is intended to guilt-trip those of us who are economically or materially privileged. I don’t think Jesus is calling the young ruler evil. We aren’t evil for having economic privilege. This isn’t a story about hating the rich. In fact, this is the only time in the gospel of Mark where someone is being singled out as being loved by Jesus. And as someone deeply seen and loved by Jesus, Jesus trusts him enough to tell him some hard news; some news that, if taken seriously, will transform this man’s character, his relationships, and his life. 

I want to tell you a story. When I lived in Seattle after college, working in policy advocacy for affordable housing, I met a man named Rex Hohlebin. Rex was an architect in Seattle who designed million-dollar homes. His office looked out onto a popular walking and biking path in the city. There were several benches along the path for people to sit and rest. Rex biked down this path every day on his way to work, zooming past countless women and men sleeping outside and on benches lining the path. One day, Rex saw a man sleeping on a bench and, for whatever reason that day, got off of his bike and just said hello. The man’s name was Chiaka. He was a prolific painter who had severe mental health issues and had been living outside for a long time. Rex talked with him for a while and, to Rex’s surprise, asked if Chiaka wanted to come into his office for a cup of tea. An hour later, Chiaka did just that. They sat for a while, swapping stories. It was one of the most meaningful conversations that Rex had ever had, he told me. Then, Rex asked something else that surprised him, “Would you like to sleep in the shed next to my office?” This began a friendship between Rex and Chiaka, who started sharing more and more cups of tea together. 

Rex quickly realized that he wanted to share and sell Chiaka’s paintings. He began taking pictures of these paintings and sharing them on Facebook. Very quickly, people started buying Chiaka’s art. And very quickly, some people living on the street heard about this architect who let people use his bathroom and sit in a warm office for a while. Rex’s architecture projects started falling by the wayside as he sat with people, listening to their stories. He began taking photographs of people and sharing their needs, whether for a pair of boots or a sleeping bag, on a new Facebook page he named, “Homeless in Seattle.”

I met and started working for Rex around the time that the Facebook page took off. He decided to ditch his architecture practice and start a non-profit out of a Methodist church called “Facing Homelessness.” Rex would meet people living outside, take their picture and post their needs. Then, people all over the city–girl scouts and businessmen and church ladies and families–would bring in those items, sometimes interfacing with the very person or people in the picture. In my time working with Rex, every single need he posted was met. 

Rex walked away from designing million-dollar homes to pursue a life in relationship with people who didn’t have homes. Rex didn’t give away everything he owned, but his life and the relationships in it were immediately transformed when he just said hello. Rex was a stand-up guy before he met Chiaka. He was a law-abiding citizen, just like the young ruler. Something in Rex moved him to look beyond the money he made and see the person sitting right outside of his office. 

We have been lied to, church. We have been told that our success in this life is not measured by what we give away, but by what we own, what we accumulate. The goal as I see it, is the older we get, the more we should acquire, gain and even hoard. And that lie is not just coming from one political party that a lot of us see as the enemy, though it’s easy to point fingers. No, all of us fall prey to this myth of meritocracy. 

In 2024, I have been encouraged by the more frequent conversations we are having about race, gender and sexuality. But, I am convinced that we still don’t know how to talk about money. We don’t know how to talk about it, because we don’t want to address it. It is, perhaps, the greatest systemic sin in our country and world: the belief that we have a right to our wealth. And yet, in one of the hardest passages in scripture, in which a very earnest young man kneels at the feet of Jesus, exclaiming that he has followed the law, Jesus requires him to perform an action that we later learn leaves him shocked and grieving. 

Church, if the gospel isn’t making us feel shocked and grieving, if it isn’t challenging us to take a good hard look at our wealth, then we are not listening to the words of Jesus. We are not hearing the good news, which is always a little bit of bad news for those of us who find ourselves on the more comfy side of things. Because, and I think all of us know this deep down, the more we have, the harder it is to give. 

This passage actually gives me hope at the same time that it challenges me. It gives me hope that Jesus, in talking about the here and now, is anticipating and dreaming about the kingdom of God, where people share resources, have each other’s backs, want to upend class systems, and take care of each other. It’s a kingdom that wants to call out the lie that we worship Empire, not God. It’s a kingdom that wants us to worry less about being “saved” and more about joining Jesus in what one scholar calls “kingdom activity.” 

Kingdom activity, like an architect in Seattle whose life has been transformed from a simple “hello.” Kingdom activity, like the community grants that we give out to organizations serving the direct needs of the poor. Kingdom activity, like going to Target right after the service to purchase the supplies we need to serve our brothers and sisters who are living unhoused, because of the lack of affordable housing in this city, because of the lack of resources, because of the abuse happening in the homes they had to flee. Kingdom activity, which isn’t just about one-off charity donations, although that’s a great place to start, but a kingdom activity that is about looking our city in the eye, our country in the eye, with love, and seeing it and saying, “we can do better than this.” Kingdom activity, which is desperately trying to free us from captivity, (and yes it is a captivity), of wealth. Kingdom activity, which wants us to believe, really believe, that we are a part of co-creating a new life, in Jesus. 

In Jesus’ kingdom, he promises new life. A life that, if we follow him, calls for a transformation of character. We may walk away from this interaction with Jesus shocked and grieving, but hopefully we also walk away from this interaction feeling seen and loved, too, by a God who loves us enough to say some hard things to us in the hopes that we give up our stuff and follow him. 

May it be so.