May 25 ~Peace is Where the Gospel Speaks Softly and Unexpectedly, But Just of Powerfully.

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Sixth Sunday of Easter

Acts 16:9-15

Psalm 67

Revelation 21:10, 22—22:5

John 14:23-29

(The context of this sermon was 100% written in Canada by a human)

When I come across a first lesson like the one we have before us today, it stands out to me as unique. Through the New and Old Testaments, we often meet people who are over-simplified sketches -- characters that appear in a few verses and then vanish from our faith stories. All we can do is imagine their story, to fill in the blanks. We can choose how we see them, which is how theologians manage to have such lively debates. Usually, we interpret them through the lens of our own culture, and our own life experiences.

In particular, then, we are missing, with a few exceptions, about half the population in scripture. Women typically come to the surface only when a man is not present to tell the story himself. Female characters are the second-choice witnesses. The result is tragic, for while there are strong, brave women in the gospel, there are not enough. And we get little record of the conversations between women. Women in the Bible say little unless they are talking to men, or about them.

The Bible fails the Bechdel test – a term used to describe the amount of time women talk to one another in movies, where a man is not the main subject. In fact, in 15 years of “Best Picture” movies, the male characters get to speak far more than the female characters – many times more. And it’s also true in the vast majority of the Disney Cartoons our kids grow up watching – even in Mulan, a movie where the main character is female, male characters get 70 per cent of the dialogue.

This is a failing of movies, and it is a weakness in our faith stories. We cannot go back and change scripture. We can only spend time ourselves pondering that female presence when it appears, looking more intentionally for the lessons the characters have to teach.

And surely this is important, even essential to a fulsome understanding of faith – and to the words that Jesus speaks in our gospel. Jesus talks about the people who love him who will keep the Word. He cautions us to be mindful of those who speak what sounds like the Word of God but is not. And he describes the Holy Spirit who exists in the world to teach us and remind us of the gospel – and certainly to speak to us through others. “Peace be with you,” Jesus says. And yet he has also said all along that there cannot be peace when there is division, oppression, and discrimination.

And so it is interesting that tied to our gospel about peace and teaching and listening for God, we have Lydia, this interesting woman, in our first lesson. At this stage in Paul’s travels, after the death of Jesus, he finds himself in Macedonia, in the city of Philippi, a Roman colony. There, his first encounter is with a group of women, and Paul, we are told, seemingly without hesitation, sits down to talk to them.

Among them is one called Lydia, and we are given a surprising amount of information about her. She is a businesswoman who deals in purple cloth. Since purple is the colour of nobility, we can assume that she was well off, accustomed to bargaining with wealthy households, and hobnobbing with their residents. Since she carries the name of her place of birth, the Province of Lydia (what is now Western Turkey), some theologians have speculated that she was a freed slave – that’s unknown for sure, but if true, only makes her rise to entrepreneurship more impressive.

Another interesting detail about Lydia: she invites the disciples to come and stay with her, and there is no mention of a husband. She was the head of her household, which was not the norm in her day. Indeed, the lesson refers to “when she and her household were baptised.” Lydia’s household must be large, since she was able to host these followers of Jesus. What’s more, she was inviting Paul and Silas, who had just been released from prison and were foreigners on top of it. Lydia was not concerned with what others thought.

The gospel narrative refers to Lydia as a “worshipper of God,” which is meant to show that she was a Gentile who chose to practice Judaism. So Lydia is also framed as an independent thinker, one able to put tradition aside and choose what she wanted to believe. She was not born into her faith -- she picked it as an adult. We are told that God “opened her heart,” so she was someone willing to listen to different views, and take wisdom from those, as she found it. And since Paul and the disciples stayed with her for many weeks, no doubt having many discussions about faith, theologians believe she went on to be the leader of the Christian faith in Philippi.

Lydia, then, becomes an example of – at least in her time – unlikely leadership. That she is a woman makes her story stand out to us. But among the leaders we might see in the gospel, her strength stands on its own, head-to-head with any examples we have. She demonstrates the traits of independent thought by coming to her belief with consideration and choice. She presents the kind of leadership that does not worry what others think when it comes to acting in generous and giving ways to those who are different. (And in this case, notably, it is Paul who is the vulnerable person.) Through this leadership, she has earned respect in her household and presumably, in the community.

What is the surest way to hear God, and to find our own peace? To be cautious always about the leaders we follow. To mirror the example to those who would follow us, with kind and just leadership. And to listen for the wisdom of the gospel in unexpected places, where it may speak more softly and unexpectedly, but just as powerfully. Amen

May 18 ~Love Means Taking Responsibility for Making Each Other Better.

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Fifth Sunday of Easter

Acts 11:1-18

Psalm 148

Revelation 21:1-6

John 13:31-35

(The context of this sermon was 100% written in Canada by a human)

Jesus makes it pretty easy this week, or at least he appears to do so. He spells it out for all of us – the secret to being a good person, an honest citizen, a faithful Christian. It comes down to three words, and if we all left this place this morning living out these words, the world would be a better place because of it. It is the secret to happiness, the bringer of joy, and the vehicle for peace. Three simple words: Love one another.

Jesus, and those who recorded our sacred text, understood how important this message was, because it is pretty much the last one we get from him. Jesus is going, he tells the disciples, where they cannot follow – not yet. So, he leaves them with a new commandment: “Love one another,” he says, “just as I have loved you. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

With these three words, Jesus does a very powerful thing: he moves the followers firmly away from law, and toward grace. The Old Testament gives us a set of very different commandments, ones which we have used even in these modern times to build and structure society, to maintain order. It is perhaps the story we know best of the Old Testament – how Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the stone tablets, dictated to him by God, and presented a new set of rules for God’s people. I am sure that many of you can rattle them off. I wonder in fact how many of us would remember the 11th commandment?

The commandments that Moses brought down from the mountain fell into several categories. There were the ones designed to maintain healthy community - We shall not kill, we shall not steal or covet another’s possession or tell lies about another person. There are the commandments designed to preserve family – thou shall not commit adultery and always honour your mother and father. The commandment meant to keep our lives balanced: to keep one day for rest. And the commandments meant to keep us close to God: to not take God’s name lightly, or create false idols, and to honour God above all other things that might tempt our worship. Those are all good rules—upon them we have built a great civilization, if a flawed one. But in the end, what Jesus was saying to us, is that life must go beyond following rules.

In fact, as is so often the case, Jesus was well ahead of his time. We talk about Jesus as a teacher, a preacher, a healer and a shepherd. But we should also see Jesus as psychologist, sociologist, and scientist. Thousands of years after Jesus said, “Love one another” and put it at the very top, above all other commandments, happiness researchers have reported the same finding, over and over and over again. The most essential ingredient for happiness is not money, not mindfulness, not gratitude journals, not therapy. The most essential ingredient for happiness is healthy community. This comes at the very top of all the other happiness interventions. Happiness is created when we feel supported by others, when we trust our neighbors, when we have friends we can call on in times of need.

But this makes sense -- right? What is the best way to use our money but to share it, to create experiences, to put it to good works in our community? How can we be mindful and at peace if we are anxious and alone? What do we have to be truly grateful about if we don’t trust those around us, and also act in a trustworthy way towards them? And as for therapy – well I think that is a valuable exercise – but even here the research shows that the quality of the relationship you have with a therapist is more important than any particular approach they may use. Again, what matters is a sense of community, care, and trust.

And so this commandment to “love one another” is an important guide for us. It should mark our decisions when we consider public policy, when we think about building inclusive communities, when we decide our priorities. Do they come from a place of love?

And yet these three simple words are also the most complicated commandment.

Because love, while often reduced to unicorns and rainbows, is also a complex emotion. So I want to say something about this commandment, that I think will be important for a many of you. The commandment does not come with exceptions or caveats, but the gospel calls us to consider what it truly means to “love one another.” What does it look like in the world?

Jesus would want that love to involve risks – to love those who are alone, who are poor in spirit or means, who are in danger - requires action and sacrifice and often risk, because often we cannot guarantee success.

But serving those who are in pain or vulnerable does not mean putting ourselves at risk, mentally or physically. Loving one another also means loving ourselves – otherwise how can we ever truly and faithfully love anyone? Sometimes, loving one another requires boundaries and distance. These can also be acts of love done to repair relationships, or to give time for perspective, or to allow us to focus our loving action on those who need it more.

The commandment to love one another does not rob us of free will. Love can help us see the other side of a person and have empathy for them. Love is boundless, we never run out of it, and we should and must, according to the gospel, feel it even for our enemies and those who wrong us. But while our ability to love may be infinite, our time is not. We are allowed to prioritize the needs of others, and to choose where most to invest our time.

This is indeed how the commandments that Jesus places under “Love one another” serve us best. Not because they give us law from which we can never bend. But because they allow us to focus our good works. If love leads everything, then we do not universally condemn the murderer or the thief or the one who covets; we consider the context and nuance of the situation; we do not reject summarily the one who fails to honour their family or God. We seek to understand.

We can love without excusing terrible actions in principle, but love offers us a deeper understanding so that we may reach out as a caring, supportive community. There is no one version of love, and no one version of healing. Surely the diverse stories in the gospel teach us not to limit ourselves to a single definition. To do so is not love but judgement. To do so is not grace, but law.

This is the example that Jesus sets for us. The love Jesus felt for the disciples did not falter, whatever they did. But he loved them at different times in different ways – appealing to their search for meaning when he beckoned them out of the sea to fish for people, scolding Peter when he wanted Jesus to choose self-preservation over his ministry, gently counseling Mary and Martha when they squabbled over whose job was more important. Even his act of listening to the woman at the well was one of love: he saw her as a person of value, where others did not, one of the most important gifts of the loving heart.

And so we must choose love. But not the squishy kind on birthday cards. The kind of love that is unconditional but wise. A love that works hard but also sets priorities. A love that doesn’t judge but seeks to understand. Love that assumes the best of others, and a love that also sees the worst, but responds with compassion.

This commandment, then, may be the hardest all of the others. For it requires the most contemplation, the most wisdom, the most compassionate understanding on our part.

Jesus didn’t walk around those dusty roads holding the hands of his followers, talking in fluffy platitudes. He pushed them and prodded them. He forced them to see where they were going wrong, and he challenged them to make it better. Love doesn’t mean letting everyone off the hook – it means that we take responsibility for making one another better. And while “Love one another” sounds as though it’s all about serving others, it’s really also about saving ourselves.

That is all we need to do, Jesus is saying, to be known as one of the disciples. We don’t need to drag people into church, or to convince them we are right. We don’t need to force them to live by our ways. We don’t need law – we need grace. Following this commandment – the most important of commandments - is the most crucial part about Christian. I hope we all can try to remember this the next time we get a little too caught up in the rules, and our own idea of what is right, to let these three words guide our days: Love one another. Amen

May 11 ~ Happy Mother's Day!

Click above to watch a recording of Sunday's Sermon

Fourth Sunday of Easter

Acts 9:36-43

Psalm 23

Revelation 7:9-17

John 10:22-30

(The context of this sermon was 100% written in Canada by a human)

What do we think of when we hear the words Mother Nature? Perhaps you imagine the green pastures and still waters – those soothing images in the Lord Is My Shepherd. Maybe, you see in the brightness of the sun on a clear day, in the roar of a waterfall, in the steadfastness of a tree, in the bounty of a field, in the energy of the wind - the blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honour and power and might of God. Like me, you may find God speaks to you most clearly in the places where humanity’s touch is slightest – in the places where the ocean goes on forever, or the horizon never ends, and on the quiet forest trail.

Mother Nature – the idea of her – has inspired poets, and theologians and environmentalists. It’s a name that speaks of warmth and comfort, and giving life. A name that feels forever present. In art, Mother Nature is often depicted as a tranquil elderly woman or a younger, beautiful one. Her arms are often encircled around the earth or a representation of the natural world, holding it safe.

Of course, the connection to our own mothers and mothering influences in our lives is obvious: we see supportive and loving women as warm and wise and comforting, holding us safe. And we expect them to be ever present, no matter how we treat them.

But this soothing presence is an incomplete image of Mother Nature. She is also fierce – bringing us hurricanes and tornadoes. She is also resilient – resurrecting life from the ground we clear cut and contaminate with chemicals. She is hard-working, always changing with the seasons, never pausing. And she is innovative and clever – always finding new ways to evolve, alternate paths for the plants and animals of the earth, even as we, the smartest animals upon it, carelessly destroy their homes and habitats.

Surely these words also describe the women we lovingly remember and honour today, who raised us, and advised us, and spoke up for us, when we could not do it for ourselves. The mother I had, the mothering influences I have today, the mother of my own children were and are all fierce, resilient, hard-working, and innovative – each in their own unique way. I am blessed to have their presence in my life.

And Mother Nature and the women who are our mothering influences share other commonalities: a history of judgement, abuse and neglect. We have assumed that we can mistreat Mother Nature – ravage her forests, wipe out her animals, poison her ocean – and she will always remain, as she is. So society has with mothers, for most of history, expecting these women to give us life and care for us, from making them virtual slaves, voiceless to change the society they are raising, denying them, for so long, the right to own land, to vote, to even escape dangerous situations.

We have also neglected Mother Nature – perhaps not actively destroying her bounty, but also not repairing the harm we have caused, and not supporting her in a way that we should, to help her thrive.

So we have acted as though climate change is not a problem, or will somehow solve itself, and we have not done enough to mitigate the effect of climate change, to save the species that are disappearing. In the same way – although in Canada we have certainly made important strides - we have not often given women who are mothering influences the support they need - child-care, care-giving respite, equal pay, health care that recognizes their complete journey as women, the kind of investment that recognizes their true value.

Instead, societies have restricted a mother’s freedom and her free will, even when it comes to her own body, and in many parts of the world, this terrible injustice continues, and or is creeping back. We have cast blame upon them for every social ill: at different stages of the last century, mothers have been blamed for crime, for autism, for poor test results, for entire generations that are too dependent, for entire generations that are too entitled.

As with Mother nature, we have failed, as a society, to see the larger picture, to recognize all the forces that weigh heavy, and our own part in the consequences. Mother Nature and mothers exist to give us life; only the most foolish of animals would treat them in this way.

What is the lesson we take from this? First, I would remind us of our confirmation classes that taught us clearly that God created humanity to have dominion with the created world—not to destroy it. And that the fourth commandment clearly states that we are to honour our father and mother. Second, I believe it is as the Gospel of Jesus Christ reminds us, that we are all interconnected, not only to each other but also with nature. How we treat each other relates to how we treat Mother Nature. If we, as a society, value people over products, equality and moderation over status and greed, we would automatically improve conditions for Mother Nature. And if we treasured our forests and our air and our water above wealth, cracked down on those who profit by destroying them, and cooperated across borders to remedy our harm – those choices, I believe, would lead to a world that is kinder and more other-centred, a better place for mothers, and for all of us.

This weekend we have seen our own community take a stand to create this kind of world, with Pilgrimage for the Planet organized by the Eastern Synod of the ELCIC. Some of the pilgrims who cycled from Montreal to Ottawa are here with us this morning. And tomorrow on Parliament Hill we will all have an opportunity put our faith into action with a peaceful demonstration.

The gospel is, unfortunately, a story dominated by men. Women such as Dorcas, who is lifted up in our first lesson as a good and efficient philanthropist, appear far less often than they should. And yet, at the same time, the gospel itself espouses the very qualities that lead us to hold mothering women in such high esteem: compassion, hope, and love.

Perhaps, you are sitting here saying, yes it’s Mother Day, but what about the good men and the good dads? In fact, I say, what about them, what about me? Our role, in this just push for progress, is important: to be faithful allies to the women in our lives. Not only for their sake, but for our own. A society that treats mothers better will also improve the world for daughters and sons and fathers. A society that treats Mother Nature better improves the world for the life upon it, including us. Indeed, a society that protects and preserves the life-giving and loving presence in the world, will surely save itself. Amen