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Do Not Be Afraid

6/27/2017

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Genesis 21:8-21 Matthew 10:24-39

Summer has begun this past week.  Life around us is blooming with color, the chirping of birds throughout the day, and, heat, heat, heat along with the occasional thunderstorms.  I have been blessed by the presence of a cardinal hopping about in our front yard as I take the dogs for their morning walk. Summer prods us to embrace the splendor and experience of outdoor life at its finest.
However, despite the summer glory we are reminded us that not all is a beautiful experience for same people.   Sorrow and fear are a very real presence in these summer days.
Diamond Reynolds, the girlfriend of Philandro Castille --  who witnessed along with her 4 year old daughter, Dae’Anna -- Philandro  shot to death by the police, was placed handcuffed in a back of a police care.  The frightened the little girl became worried that her mother would be shot too.

"Mom, please stop cussing and screaming," she said, "I don't want you to get shooted."
The police officer who shot Philandro Castillo was exonerated of any wrong doing this past week.

Meanwhile, hundreds of people turned out last Sunday to the afternoon funeral prayer service for slain Muslim teen Nabra Hassanen, who was brutally attacked and killed with a baseball bat. A memorial for Nabra in Dupant Circle in Washington DC was torched. On this beautiful summer season, Many Muslims live in fear, wondering who will be next.

Meanwhile on the national front the Senates unveiled proposed health care plan will see Medicaid slashed beginning in 2021, people with disabilities will see their services cut, older adults will see their premiums increased five times, mental health services will be optional in some states.  Contrast to this, tax cuts on the wealthy and corporations will reach about 592 Billion dollars.  The Senate is expected to vote on this bill next week, on beautiful, summer day.

Despite the beauty of nature, it’s a time of fear for many in our country.  For some despite the beauty God has given us, the beauty God has planted in us to help one another,  humanity has created fear; fear of criminal enforcement, fear of white, non-Judeao-Christian people, fear that many will not be able to afford health care anymore.
What will happen to us?  Yet we know every historic reform, even recently as the abolishment of slavery and equality of women, and basic understanding of human rights were met by not just approval or joy, but resistance and conflict.  Change, even for the better, is messy and troubling. Can we rise above the fear to follow God’s mandate of love, justice and righteousness?

The ancient story of Hagar and Ismael, Abraham, Sarah and Isaac speaks well to our spiritual circumstance.  Our passage begins with a party in a family of promise and privilege.  They are feasting as they celebrate the weaning of Isaac (21:8), the son of Sarah and Abraham.

        It was not so long ago, if you recall, back in in chapter 16, that Sarah had despaired of bearing a child.  She took action into her own hands and gave her personal Egyptian slave, Hagar, to her husband for the express purposes of having a child for Sarah.  This was all perfectly legal.  As a slave, Hagar’s wishes were not considered. Hagar was property, to be disposed as her masters’ wish. Any children she bore would be the master’s, not hers.

So now we find in today’s passage that Sarah has given birth to, raised, and weaned the child, Isaac. Sarah’s view has changed.  No longer does she consider Ishmael her child, but an interloper. She sees the child of “Hagar the Egyptian” – the foreigner – playing in her home (21:9). And she realizes that this boy might have some claim to the inheritance she intends for her own son, Isaac (21:10).  So Sarah commands Abraham to drive them out.   Sarah cannot even bring herself to use Hagar’s or Ishmael’s name: she dehumanizes them as she calls them that “slave woman and her son.”  She refuses to acknowledge Ishmael is also Abraham’s son.       Unwilling to stand up to Sarah, Abraham complies with Sarah’s command and sends them away with minimal supplies of bread and water.  Such are the actions of our founding spiritual ancestors of faith.
 In a moment of despair, when the water and bread are finished, Hagar places her child beneath the shelter of a bush. She removes herself – the length of a bowshot – and sits, crying, opposite him, desperate not to see (21:16) the slow death of her son, in which she has no power to stop.

         As Hagar weeps an angel speaks to her. What troubles you Hagar?  Do not be afraid, says the angel. God has heard the voice of the boy (21:17), although interesting that Hagar’s voice is not heard, it is to Hagar the angel speaks.  It is Hagar’s eyes that God opens to see the water.  The angel empowers Hagar and instructs her to rise, and to lead her son to the water. Ishmael has a future. He makes his home in the wilderness of Paran – a place known elsewhere in scripture as the mountain from which God’s glory shines forth (Deuteronomy 33:2; Habakkuk 3:3). And Hagar reconnects with her own people to build a new family network for her son. God’s interventions save Hagar and Ishmael. The lives of the slave matters.  God hears the cry of the foreigner and downcast.

It is important to remember that slavery was accepted as far back as in Abraham and Sarah’s day.  Forcing a slave to be a surrogate mother was acceptable.  Banishing slave women and children when no longer useful was acceptable. Certainly these texts justified the presence of slavery in this country.  Even Jesus speaks from accepted cultural norms: “a slave is not above the master.”  But Jesus interjects a powerful point, “do not fear those who can kill the body, but not the soul.”  Fear him (God) who can kill both the body and the soul.”  There is one above all – The God of Jesus. The hairs of our head have been counted.  Not just the master’s hair – or the slave’s hair – everyone’s hair.   Jesus acknowledges that even his detractors called him “Beelzebub” – a name for the devil. So Jesus reminds us that as his disciples, as we seek to proclaim the gospel, to seek peace, justice and righteousness, we can also expect to be harassed, vilified – even considered evil – just as Jesus was.

        Despite the oppressive social conventions of Jesus’ day and of Abraham and Sarah’s time, the bible subtly reminds us of the dignity of each person before God: You are worth more than many sparrows Jesus states.  The slave mother and child have a place in God’s kingdom. In this diverse world of ours, everyone has a place at the table.  Hagar is the first woman to whom God commands, “Fear Not!”
 Although a slave, Hagar becomes the first woman in the Bible visited by a divine messenger.  Although a slave, she is the first woman to see and have a conversation with God.  Although a slave, she is the first woman to hear the announcement that she will bear a child, a forerunner of Mary who will also hear an angel tell her that she will bear a child. Hagar is the only woman in the Bible who receives a promise from God of descendants. She is the first woman in scripture to cry for her dying child. Although a slave she is the only person in all of scripture who gives God a name in Chapter 16: El Roi, which means, “the God who sees me.”  Hagar, in her enslaved state, is also our spiritual mother, as much as is Sarah.  Hagar teaches us to see what is hard in this life – what we would overlook.  Hagar teaches us to engage God in the struggle of life. Hagar teaches us to weep for children who are cast out.  Hagar is taught not to fear.  We are taught not to fear, in the midst of danger and hardship.
​
        What the future holds for us now?  The Hagars and Ishmaels of the world? The conflicts that remain between the descendants of Isaac and Ishmael? The conflicts that remain in ourselves? What fears us --that we can be mean, like Sarah?  That we can be complacent, like Abraham?  That we be controlled and manipulated by others, like Hagar?  That we can be cast aside, rejected, like Ishmael?  That we can love God, and yet do wrong? That we know what we should do --- but are to afraid to do it? So many troubles. But Hagar teaches us how to deal with trouble.  Talk to God. Pray. Weep. See and Hear. Do not be afraid– even when we do not know the future.  May this God who holds the future, who holds the sparrow in his hands -- hold us close hold all his children -- and may we have the faith and courage to follow Jesus and be faithful as he was.  Jesus proclaimed that the Good News does bring conflict, because there are many who do not want share, who call Jesus Beelzebub, a devil -  so in this beautiful summer we recognize we face the conflict of  those  to refuse the righteousness of the kingdom– so it is our task to be truthful and brave in the midst of beauty to overcome fear—because God is with us and will open our eyes to see, knowing the very hairs of our head are counted Amen.


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Summoned to Generosity

6/18/2017

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Genesis 18:1-15, (21:1-7) 
Matthew 9:35 - 10:8, (9-23)

 
On an average day 93 Americans are killed by guns
The Harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few:
11 million undocumented at risk of deportation
The Harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.
24 million risk losing their health insurance
The Harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.
14.5 million Children live in poverty
The Harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.
Close to 45% of seniors are at below twice the poverty threshold
The Harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.
39 million cannot afford their housing
The Harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few
For the hundreds of thousands people affected by voter suppression laws this past year – the first time without the protection of the Voter Protection Act
The Harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few

For the  somewhere between 23% and 28% of American adults have no religious affiliation, and these so-called “nones” are not only growing in number, but they are becoming increasingly secular in their behaviors and beliefs. What is the relevance of religion in face of all the social ills of our society, let alone personal search for meaning and truth?  Who is Jesus and the kingdom of God to these people?
The Harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers.

Jesus looked not upon wheat or barley fields when he spoke these words but on the multitude of people, the crowds he encountered in the towns and villages as he taught in the synagogues and cured every disease and illness.  Jesus had compassion on them; a verb used at least 11 times in the gospels by Jesus in the face of human suffering.  Compassion is not an abstract concept.  It is a physical gutsy reaction, translating directly as the bowels or guts of a person; where the ancients placed the experience of care, pity, of compassion. Compassion  means “with passion,” standing with someone who is suffering. And Jesus stood with those crowds and looked at those fields of downtrodden, afflicted by poverty, oppression, illness, hunger and by the forces of evil. And Jesus had compassion. 

This is at the core of Jesus’ ministry; that compassion leads the way and dictates the response to those in need.  And one of Jesus’s response to address the suffering and need he encountered was to summon his disciples, equip them with the skills to heal, to confront evil, and preach about the goodness and righteousness of the kingdom of God. As he sent them forth Jesus taught his disciples to travel light – no bag or silver coins for the journey.  This was so in order that the disciples would  learn to be dependent on God and one with the people they were sent out to serve. This focus on mutual generosity- between the disciples and those they are sent to help.   Generosity is the common thread in all the acts of ministry.  It moves our guts to reach out and care and to make a difference in the lives of others. As disciples, we are summoned to embrace the generosity of our time, talent and resources, which are borne from compassion, the hallmark of a living faith.  Go forth into the harvest.

Our Hebrew lessons about Abraham and Sarah, and Lot, describe for significant acts of generosity for us to learn from. Our passages from Genesis suggest that the primary way we can be laborers in the Harvest of our world is through acts of generosity.

At the beginning of chapter 18 we hear about how, on one hot summer day, God appeared to Abraham in the guise of three men. Abraham’s immediate reaction was to invite these men into his dwelling.  He’s never seen these men before; they are complete strangers to him. Yet he says, “Please come into my house where I can serve you.   I’ll have some water brought, so you can wash your feet, (a cardinal act of hospitality which Jesus also performs as he washes his disciples’ feet the night before his death ) and you can rest under the tree.  Let me get you some food to give you strength before you leave.”   Abraham tells Sarah to make bread, and Abraham hurries off to pick a calf to be killed and cooked for his guests, and he himself serves his guests yogurt and milk with the meat. Imagine the time, energy and resources Abraham expended to serve three unknown visitors. Imagine if as a nation, as individuals we could expend our resources in such a generous way.

It is this elaborate act of hospitality that creates the context in which prophecy and the fulfillment of a long-cherished dream occurs.  While eating the guests foretell that within a year’s time, Sarah, Abraham’s wife with give birth to a son.   A son they had waited for 75-80 years, now surely a miracle in Sarah’s old age. The hospitality is returned in an unthinkable way. Generosity creates a cascade of good deeds that transforms lives.

After this, the men leave, and Abraham walks with them. This isn’t in our passage but it is a text that bridges to our story of Lot. During this walk, the Lord tells Abraham of their intent to visit Sodom and Gomorrah and see what is going on, and if the place is truly filled with evil acts to have that place destroyed.  Abraham in converses with the Lord, imploring on God’s mercy to save the city, first if there are 50 righteous, until Abraham gets God down to promise that if there are only 10 righteous people there in Sodom, the town won’t be destroyed.  At this point Abraham and the Lord part ways. Abraham demonstrates generosity toward his neighboring cities, knowing his nephew Lot lived in Sodom. The Lord demonstrates generosity in his willingness to not destroy Sodom if there are just a handful of righteous people.

The story continues. When the angels/men arrive at Sodom they are initially greeted by Abraham’s nephew Lot, who in turn, like Abraham offers hospitality.  Gentlemen, I am your servant, please come to my home.     You can wash your feet, spend the night and be on your way it says Lot “baked some bread, cooked a meal and they ate.”

        Because of the depravity of the people, Genesis tells us that Sodom and Gomorrah were ultimately destroyed, not because the residents were homosexual as it has been often erroneously taught for centuries, but because the town people failed the laws of hospitality. They were violent, self-absorbed, cruel, and they lacked compassion.  They sought to violate and hurt the guests who had come under Lot’s house.  They threatened Lot and attempted to break into his house. Their judgement was ultimately that they were not a generous people, which was an affront to God.  Because God summons us to be generous.  God summons us to see the harvest waiting to be gathered. God summons us to feel compassion and respond.

What we are allowed to see is that generosity opens the door to questions long held, prayers long lifted up.  Abraham and Sarah got their child.  Lot and his family was saved from destruction.  This is why Jesus gives authority to his disciples to go forth into the harvest.  Hospitality widens the heart to receive the Divine dream of peace and justice on earth. 

What we are allowed to see is that our God likes to be hidden seen through the traveler, the foreigner, and the guest who appears at our doorstep or the homeless on our streets, the immigrant who appears at our border. Those are moments when we are challenged like Abraham and Lot to open our doors wide.
 God desires our generosity, our hospitality, to enter our homes, to walk with us, to dialogue with us, and to engage us in the welfare of the world. And our Hospitality, our prayers our acts of kindness can create change in how people think and act, can mitigate, can heal and can confront evil.  Generosity is the basis of justice, for it calls us to be laborers for the needy and the strangers.

        As we stand amidst the fields heavy with, the Rev. Dr. William Barber, pastor, the leader of the “Moral Monday” movements in Raliegh NC, which was organized to oppose voter rights restrictions and other repressive policies that affect the poor and marginalized -- talks about the “theological malpractice” when we ignore the 2000 plus verses in the Bible that speak out against the poor, the orphan & widow and foreigner. His Forward Together movement is reaching laborers for the Harvest across the country.   And the laborers are springing up across the nation in many grassroots way:  Through the Repairers of the Breech movement, sanctuary coalitions, Matthew 25 movement whose pledge is this:  “I Pledge to protect and defend vulnerable people in the name of Jesus.”  The laborers are coming forward because of compassion stirring within – laborers of every creed, color, age, sexual orientation.

       Today we too are summoned to reach out with holy hospitality to the stranger like Abraham and Sarah did, like Lot did. We are summoned by Jesus to see the crowds who are suffering, like sheep without a shepherd.  We are summoned to experience compassion in the depths of our being for the suffering, for those ignorant of God’s love for them. In the name of Jesus, we have authority to confront evil, to work for the cure of the illness that plagues our people.  We are Laborers, and although there are few, still we are summoned, and we are summoned to share the compassion of Jesus –the hospitality of Abraham, Sarah and Lot: call forth the compassion that kindles within us that proclaims:  “I pledge to protect and defend the vulnerable in the name of Jesus.”
Go forth, and proclaim in your good deeds the prophetic words:  for the Kingdom of God is near.
​Because the harvest is plentiful all around us, and the laborers are few. May the Lord of the harvest send us forth. Amen.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/phil-zuckerman/religion-declining-secula_b_9889398.html
 
 
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Trinity Sunday: God, Three-in-One

6/14/2017

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Picture
​ John 16:12-15

Today is Trinity Sunday, and I’d like to start with a silly joke since humor is as good as any way for us to approach this daunting topic:

The Trinity was planning a holiday. The Spirit, manifesting the creative part of the divine nature, was coming up with the ideas. "Let's go to New York City," he suggested.  "No, no, no," said the Father, "They're all so liberated, they'll spend the whole time calling me 'Mother' and it will just do my head in."


       So the Spirit sat back and thought. "I know, what about Jerusalem?" he said. "It's beautiful and then there's the history and everything."


         "No way!" the Son declared. "After what happened to me the last time, I'm never going there again!"  At this point, the Spirit got annoyed and went off in a huff. Sometime later he returned and found that the Father and Son had had an idea they both thought was excellent:


      "Why don't we do a tour of church headquarters?  Like we could go to Rome for the Catholics, Canterbury, England for the Anglicans; Constantinople for the Orthodox, Nashville to see the Southern Baptists and Louisville, Kentucky to visit the Presbyterians?" said the Son.  "Perfect!" cried the Holy Spirit. "I've never been to any of those places before!"


Trinity Sunday is the only Sunday where, the belief in the triune God, is celebrated.   We note major events like Christmas, Easter and Pentecost and special seasons like Lent and Advent.  We celebrate the saints triumphant on All Saints Day and the body of Christ on World Communion Sunday. We lift up specific events in Jesus’ life like his baptism, transfiguration and Second Coming of Christ on Christ the King Sunday.  However, today the church has seen fit to have us wrestle with the doctrine of the Trinity.  Not specific characteristics of God, like God as Creator, God as Love, or merciful Judge --- although we do commonly speak of God as Father, the Son the Redeemer, and Holy Spirit throughout our ordinary worship.  Today we focus exclusively on the Triune God – God, Three-in-One; One-in-Three.


After years of observing this wonderful feast day, Trinity Sunday, I appreciate the challenge, but sometimes wonder about its wisdom.   Author Madeleine L’Engle talks about the danger of a creative enterprise is like trying to pull all the petals off a flower in order to analyze it, only ending up having destroyed the flower.   I highly doubt we will do much damage to the Trinity by our poking and prodding; even if we don’t get far except for perhaps banging our heads against the wall.


So there is always something lost in the translation when we try to pull the petals off.   We are a monotheistic religion that believes in a Triune God, whereas other monotheistic religions look at us askance, and wonder how we think we get away with it.  The Trinitarian formula appears in scripture only once, in Matthew 28, which we call the great Commission.   Jesus commands the disciple’s to go forth, baptizing in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. But the doctrine of the Trinity does not appear in the Bible. It is a doctrine that has inspired us over centuries, and has caused great divisions and wars in the process.


  The earliest Christian creeds, the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed describe God the Father Almighty, Jesus God of God, light of Light true God from True God, of one Being with the Father...and the Holy Spirit the Lord and Giver of Life who proceeds from the Father and the Son and with the Father and the Son is to be worshiped and glorified.  The earliest believers thought and fought long and hard on the subject and these words, and these forms the backbone of our faith.


 Some of the early church theologians thought it out this way.   “The number 1 is as no number at all because it had no diversity.  It possessed no discernible strength.   The number 2 was weak as well in that it was only a dualism.  At best, it could only be two sides of the same coin. The number 3, then, was considered the first real 'number' in that it had an innate stability, a complexity; diversity, if you will, which made it durable and strong."  What better number to contain the mystery and complexity of belief in God and our faith?   The symbol of diversity and community, present within the Godhead itself, gives form and shape to human life and all creation.  The Trinity is the most ancient archetype, a blueprint, and the DNA for human life.


So how do we get at Trinity?  Saint Patrick is said to have explained the Trinity to the Celts by using a shamrock, three individual leaves, yet still one plant.  Augustine said the Trinity was best understood as the Lover, the Beloved, and the love which exists between them. Tertullian, another giant of the Early Church, used the metaphor of The Trinity as a plant, with the Father as the deep root, the Son as the shoot that breaks forth into the world, and the Spirit as the force which spreads beauty and fragrance on the earth.  There are endless ways to describe Trinity:  Three in one, One in Three.  To an extreme end, some youth pastors have even referred to the example of the “Three in one” shampoo.    Martin Luther put it this way:  “to try and deny the Trinity is to risk your salvation.   To try to understand the Trinity is to risk your sanity.”  So where does that leave us?   Saved lunatics?


Brazilian theologian Leonardo Buff describes Trinity it as a primal community; "just and equal ...and, therefore, a model for human society."    So the Trinity models the communal life to which we are called; a life together marked by justice and peace, creativity, a place for all marked by equality and held together by love.


 Others have tried to capture nuances of the trinity in the natural world.  Some say our own human beings, composed of body, mind and spirit, reflect a Trinity of sorts.  Others look to the world of atoms and their basic particles of protons, electrons and neutrons.  Some say it is fire that needs heat, fuel and oxygen to exist. Or Water, that can take the shape of ice, steam or liquid.  Others point to light, that three primary colors blue, red and green produce a white light.  The world is alive and inspired with Trinitarian imagery.


We could go on with examples or refute the examples already given.  We come to the same conclusion.  Our attempts to capture Trinity always elude us.  Trinity is the ultimate kaon, a riddle to forever set our hearts and minds to churning, without ever being captured or understood. Perhaps this is one reason for the Trinity.  To pull us in, engage us, without ever being fully comprehended. To ignite our longing and point us always to that something more.  Perhaps this is why no matter how close we get, how wonderful an example we conjure up, we will always fall short.   We cannot comprehend God, especially a Triune God.  We can barely comprehend ourselves, let alone someone we love.  We can only enter the part of the mystery that is ours to behold.  We can only love God, and in those loving experiences truths become evident to our hearts.  


        Jesus told the disciples the night before he died “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.  But when the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth.”   This means that God always has something to say to us, and is always working to mold us into loving and just beings.  It is God who is in charge of revelation, the bringer of grace, who understands us and prompt us in every day and age how to live as the body of Christ.   Our understanding of civil rights, our life of caring together,  our inter-connectedness with each other and the environment, has only come from the ongoing revelation of the Holy Spirit; acting on the justice of Jesus and the creative power of the Father: the source of love and life that is Trinity.   We are reminded we don’t know everything.   God has something new to say to us every moment of our lives – even if it is “I love you,” “I believe in you,”  “I cherish you.”  “Behold, I am doing a new thing.”  This is good news, as the church faces an apparent decline in membership and interest, as the world faces terrorism and unbridled greed, we face uncertainties in our own lives; God has something to say.  


So the Triune God – perfect community of love– seeks communion with us.  So with faith and courage we can be open to new ways and new visions, because of our dynamic, Three-in-One God who loves us and is always there for us.  It is a mystery, a riddle yes, which helps us engage the mystery in ourselves and all around us. Ultimately we are called to respond: in deed but in worship and praise, as we recall the words of St. Patrick:
I bind unto myself today 
The strong name of the Trinity,
By invocation of the same,
The Three in One and One in Three.     


With faith, hope and love, we bind ourselves to the strong name of the Trinity. Amen, Amen, Amen!

http://day1.org/4759-what_kind_of_math_is_this

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Profit for All

6/4/2017

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Acts 2:1-21; 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 

If people would have been asked in 1968 which nation would dominate the world in watch making during the 1990s and into the twenty-first century the answer would have been uniform: Switzerland. Why? Because Switzerland had dominated the world of watch making for the previous sixty years.

     The Swiss made the best watches in the world and were committed to constant refinement of their expertise. It was the Swiss who came forward with the minute hand and the second hand. They led the world in discovering better ways to manufacture the gears, hearings, and mainsprings of watches. They even led the way in waterproofing techniques and self-winding models. By 1968, the Swiss made 65 percent of all watches sold in the world and laid claim to as much as 90 percent of the profits.

       By 1980, however, they had laid off thousands of watch-makers and controlled less than 10 percent of the world market. Their profit domination dropped to less than 20 percent. Why? The Swiss had refused to consider a new development—the—the Quartz movement—ironically, invented by a Swiss. Because it had no main-spring or knob, it was rejected. It was too much of a paradigm shift for them to embrace. Seiko, on the other hand, accepted it and, along with a few other companies, became the leader in the watch industry.

      The lesson of the Swiss watchmakers is profound. A past that was so secure, so profitable, so dominant was destroyed by an unwillingness to consider the future. It was an inability to re-think how they did business. Past success had blinded them to the importance of seeing the implications of the changing world and to admit that past accomplishment was no guarantee of future success.

        Today we celebrate Pentecost – one of the major feast days of the church that seeks to open us to the future, to change and new life. Pentecost reminds us we live in a changing world, and God calls us, enables us to stay ahead of the game. Pentecost challenges us to let go of the past and embrace the future – in how churches serve our neighbors, how we worship, how we understand the scriptures. The Holy Spirit, on Pentecost,  gives us the ability to see the implications of a changing world and to re-think how we are to share the variety of gifts we have with all those around us.
 Pentecost reminds us of those timid disciples who were transformed through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Remember those timid disciples who the Spirit led out into the street to preach the good News of Jesus Christ?  Pentecost, through those disciples, were opened to a new future --- and those disciples proclaimed a new message – a message of God’s salvation in Christ that over16 nationalities understood in their own language.  They were stunned, how is it that we hear this? They gasped.  Pentecost is the new change, opening the gates to the future.

While Pentecost commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles and other followers of Jesus, they and multitudes of Jews were in Jerusalem celebrating the Jewish holiday of Shavuot – which is Hebrew for "Weeks.”  Shavuot commemorates not only the wheat harvest, but more importantly, it celebrates God’s giving of the Law at Mount Sinai, 50 days after the second day of Passover – seven weeks; just as Pentecost is seven weeks after Easter.  On Shavuot the Israelites were give the Law which bound them to God, and gave them an identity as the people of God.  The law that forged them into a community and gave them the guidelines and foundation of freedom. 

        So like Shavuot, Pentecost unites people of all nations of the world based on the gospel poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.  It is the new future God is calling us into.

Pentecost is in a way the fulfillment of Shavuot it moves it into the future. For on Pentecost there was the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, as tongues of fire which alighted upon the followers of Jesus.  People found themselves emboldened with a new law written on their hearts, and proclaimed the gospel fearlessly in the streets, and were understood by people of many lands.  Pentecost lifted up the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus, and proclaimed the diversity of gifts in the word, the differences of ministries, but one Lord.  Pentecost took Shavuot to a future development that it is the same God who works in all for all.  Community was broadened, the future made grander, one body through Jesus Christ.

        Pentecost is the powerful entry of the Holy Spirit to turn our world upside down and rearrange it in surprising ways.  Language and culture are not erased, but welcomed. People are given different gifts but not for selfish means, but for the profit of all.    Suddenly the differences between peoples of the world are not something to fear but something to celebrate.  Pentecost gives us all a new name: beloved child of God, in which each person is listened to and each person has a voice.  Pentecost brings us God’s point of view, where every person’s gifts are expressed and shared for the betterment of all; where speaking and hearing are done with mutuality and respect.  Such is the foundation of the church founded by Jesus and confirmed by the Holy Spirit.
        Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  Reminds us of this Pentecost mutuality:

“It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied together into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. We are made to live together because of the interrelated structure of reality . . . Before you finish eating breakfast in the morning, you’ve depended on more than half the world. This is the way our universe is structured, this is its interrelated quality. We aren’t going to have peace on Earth until we recognize the basic fact of the interrelated structure of all reality. “

This is Pentecost thinking.  Because more and more, we live in a web of mutuality and it is becoming harder to ignore the imbalances in this system.   Pentecost will not allow us to do so. 

There is great dismay this past week over our President’s rejection of the Paris Climate Agreement, ratified by 196 countries. The Spirit of Pentecost was torn, as a country that is the second greatest polluter in the world, turned its back on global cooperation.   We should be the leader in clean energy –just as we have been world leaders in so many areas.  As Judeo-Christians, and people of faith, we should take seriously the commandment to be stewards of the earth. Yet instead of seeking to apply our formidable gifts for the profit of all, as Paul calls us to; we apply our energy to the profit of the wealthy few who benefit from withdrawing from this accord.  Will we fall behind as a world leader because of our lack of vision – or can we turn this around?  We stand with two other countries now who haven’t signed this accord.  Yet since this Trump signed the withdrawal on June 1, dozens of cities and states are standing with the Paris Climate Accord. Individuals are pledging money, and our Stated Clerk, Rev. J. Herbert Nelson II, spoke on our behalf:

“The president’s statement was a disappointment and represents a setback to our work as well as the work of other interfaith and ecumenical groups on the issue of the environment. But we will not be deterred. We will continue to work toward an environmentally safe world, creating jobs in a new economy based on clean air and based on building an environmentally safe nation." - J. Herbert Nelson II, Stated Clerk of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

        It is appropriate that this stance and actions comes on Pentecost – the feast of change, of dreamers and visionaries. We recall that Shavuot made the Israelite people into a nation based on the Law given on Mount Sinai.  Pentecost unites people of all nations of the world based on the gospel poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.  It is the new future God is calling us into.
​
        Let us not fall behind let ourselves be comfortable with old habits and beliefs.  We are called to new dreams, new visions, to share our Holy Spirit gifts for the prophet of all, so we can create a world of gospel values, not held back by former success, but pushed forward by holy dreams and visions that will bind us as one people, one globe, many the gifts at the service of all.



Read more at http://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/onecity/2010/01/martin-luther-king-jr-on-interdependence-buddhist-quote-of-the-day.html#3jAORSKkptWwczls.99
James Enery White, Rethinking The Church, Baker Books, 1998, p. 20
 
 

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