Sermons - 2008

January 6, 2008
Reflection: “Who are These Kings”
By Rev. James Farrell

"We three kings or orient are, bearing gifts we traverse a far. Field and fountain, moor and mountain, following yonder star." I think more than a few children want to be one of the kings in the Christmas pageants. They are some of the favourite characters in the Christmas story, other than Jesus of course. Lots of moms have had the experience of making crowns out of cardboard and tin foil. Children like dressing up like the kings and wearing a crown. It is great to watch them walk up to the manger and kneel before the baby Jesus, reach into their cloak and pull out treasure, usually either a fancy looking box or flask of some kind, and give that great treasure to Jesus, the King of Kings.

There is something about this story that is intriguing and captivating. There is something about these characters which attracts us. Christians have devoted their lives to serving this poor boy, Jesus. And it somehow trips our fancy that these kings would travel a long distance and then pass the castles and mansions of this world to go and present precious gifts to a baby in a cave.

I liked pretending I was one of the kings when I was a child. But I am an adult now. And playing pretend is, unfortunately, something of the past. I put it away with the cardboard and tin foil crowns of yesteryear. Like many adults, I find myself asking, "Who are these kings?" Where did they come from? What were they all about?

That is what I want to talk about today. Who are these kings? We usually call them "kings." Some people call them "Wise Men." The word that appears in the original Greek is magoi. That is where we get the word "magi." The word literally means a magician or it can be used of an astrologer. Some Magi were religious leaders. Some of the "magic" that they practiced was closer to what we call the natural sciences than it was to magic.

They were well known for their observations of nature. And for the wisdom they gained from observing nature. So these were probably indeed wise men, who had studied the writings of many religions and were aware of the world around them. So it is no surprise that they would find significance, for example, in observing a new star.

They were probably also men of power and wealth. They may not have actually ruled over kingdoms, but magi were often employed by Kings. One ancient writing shares that a Persian could not become a king until he had mastered the sciences of the Magi. So they would have had positions in royal courts and were probably well paid for their services.

And "Where did they come from?" All the Bible says is that they came from the East. However many believe that Isaiah was foretelling these kings arrival when he said, "the young camels of Midian and Ephah; all those from Sheba shall come. They shall bring Gold and Frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord." Whether they came from Midian and Ephah and Sheba or not is unclear. Even if there were three is unclear. The Bible doesn't actually tell how many there were. One ancient tradition said there were 12. What is clear is that the story found in Matthew portrays men coming from foreign lands in a day when long distance travel was not easy.

So "Who are these Kings?" We are encouraged to believe they were wise, learned and wealthy men who could see the darkness of the world around them. They had worked with the kings that ruled the people and we can believe such men would have seen much evil. And, since these men were observant and aware of the darkness, they were able to detect a new light when it appeared in the world.

The sense of the Christmas story is that many who were right in the same town where Christ was born missed it. But because the magi were observant they observed his star in the east and its light brought them hope.

Clearly, they were also from a distant land. They were not Jews. Yet they came a long distance to pay homage to the one who was born King of the Jews.

In this telling, most importantly, they were the first Gentiles to worship Jesus. In Matthew’s account, they are a sign to us and to the world that it was part of a divine plan to call the whole world to worship the babe’s innocence and vulnerability and to see the potential in this new life for a newly illumined leadership.

Wise ones navigating celestially shows us that this child was the light sent into the world that would draw all nations. And, of course, just as the presence of a star was seen to call those foreign men of renown to come to worship at the manger, so the divine calls the whole world to kneel with them. They represent all those Gentiles who would find the new life that is gifted in the presence of this child.

Who are these Kings? We are the Kings. In a very real sense all who have found hope and light in the infant and the grown Christ are represented by those kings.

Like them we have seen the darkness of our lives. Like them we have looked to heaven for some hope. Like them the light of divine wonder has shined in our lives and given us hope. And like them we have sought out and found the one born not only as the King of the Jews, but the king of all.

The same light which called those magi to worship Jesus calls us to do the same. Perhaps the only way we can fully appreciate who these Kings were would be to stand in their place. Maybe we should dust off those cardboard and tin foil crowns from our childhoods, and the imaginations that go with them. And like those kings, approach the baby Jesus asleep in the manger.

Oh that may be a long journey for some of us. To travel from the darkness of our disbelief to follow the light of a child's faith. But maybe then we can begin to understand the journey that these Wise Ones made from the darkness of their distant lands to the light of innocence. Then, when we arrive at the manger, we can each reach inside our royal cloaks and pull out the most precious treasure we could give. And in that moment we could lay our hearts before the gentle divine as a gift to the one in whom divinity perfectly resides.

Amen.

January 13, 2008
Reflection
By Jane Clarke

There is a thread that runs through our two lessons today. The thread is that one has been called to bring light to the world. Was Isaiah prophesying about Jesus? That is something we will never know for sure but we can speculate. It doesn’t really matter to me who Isaiah was talking about because the message for me is that we are all called to live our lives to the fullest. We are to seek justice for all and to let our lights shine.

For me to let our light shine means for us to show our love through our light. It is easy for me to allow myself to be angry and disappointed about my life. The thing I often forget is that everything that happens is for me to learn. If I can remember I ask myself “what can I learn from this”? Often times it is long after the fact that I think to ask the question!

In the gospel Jesus is baptised and when he comes out of the water his light shines. He is beginning his ministry. I’m sure long before his baptism Jesus’ light shone but he needed to do something specific to allow the Spirit within him to be reborn. The baptismal water in rabbinic literature was referred to as the womb of the word and when one came out of the water it was considered a new birth.

Today we celebrate the baptism of Jesus when Jesus was born anew to begin his ministry. Baptism is much older than the Christian church. Much older than John the Baptist and Jesus’ baptism.

Time now for a short history lesson. There is no question that the church is debtor to Judaism for its main structure including such items as Messiah, Scripture, Canon, liturgy altar, pulpit, church offices, songs, offering, the Lord’s Supper, as well as baptism itself. Since early Christianity was a part of the Judaism of Jesus’ day, it is without question that baptism in today’s church was originally Jewish. Further evidence comes from scholars like William Lasr and David Daube who tell us of the early church’s practice of baptism by self-immersion after the custom of the Jews.

At one of the educational events at Calling Lakes Centre in Ft. Qu’Appelle that James and I attended we were fortunate to hear Rabbi Marcia Prager. She is one of the best story tellers I’ve ever heard. Not only is she gifted in story telling her knowledge of both Hebrew and Christian scriptures is amazing. She told us how much of the Christian scriptures comes from the Hebrew Scriptures. After all the people who wrote the Christian Scriptures were very familiar with the Torah. Jesus himself was a Jewish person who’s whole life was steeped in the Hebrew teachings.

Therefore it only stands to reason that Jesus chose to be baptised before he began his ministry.

Rabbi Marcia told us about the term mikveh. In Hebrew mikveh literally means any gathering of waters, but is specifically used in Jewish law for the waters or bath for the ritual immersion. The building of the mikveh was so important in ancient times it was said to take precedence over the construction of a synagogue. Immersion was so important that it occurred before the High Priest conducted the service on the Day of Atonement, before the regular priests entered the Temple complex, before a scribe wrote the name of God, as well as several other occasions. There were a number of Jewish groups that observed ritual immersion every day to assure readiness for the coming of the Messiah.

There are certain rituals that go with the mikveh as well but the main reason for a mikveh is to cleanse oneself. In Leviticus 15:16 it says, “he shall wash all his flesh in the water.” There was always a witness at a person’s mikveh so they could make sure all the flesh was covered with the water. No clothing was worn so that the flesh would be thoroughly cleansed.

Marcia calls John the Baptist … Johan the Mikveh man. I like that.

If the purpose of the water is to cleanse us how must one feel when one comes out of the water? The concept of immersion in rabbinic literature is referred to as a new birth. I would think then that when one came out of the water one would feel refreshed. Maybe even glowing! So then did the cleansing come from the water or did the cleansing come from within? Was the water only a symbol of cleansing? Could it be that the desire for cleansing came from the Divine that dwells within us?

So when Jesus came to be baptized in the Jordan because of his Jewish heritage he knew that before he could begin his important role as teacher he would have to be baptized or have his mikveh. Jesus was symbolically cleansing himself for what lay ahead for him.

The baptism itself is not what changes us. There is no magical thing from outside that happens to us when we are baptised it is our intention of what we want to bring alive within us at that time. Everyday we can make a decision to let that Spirit within us be allowed to show our light. I’m sure you know people who you love to be around. They are happy, positive people who emit nothing but joy and love. It is difficult for me to be with people who are always negative and feel they have the weight of the whole world on their shoulders.

I believe that Jesus lived with his light and love aglow. I would call that living in the present. He forgave and moved on. He didn’t bring up the past because he knew that the past was gone and couldn’t be undone. He didn’t worry about tomorrow he lived for today.

Isaiah says that “the servant” will make a covenant with all people and bring light to the nations. The eyes of the blind will be open and those who sit in dark prisons will be set free. I believe that the prisons are our own prisons that we lock ourselves in. By living in the past and not the present we bring all that baggage with us and we don’t leave room for the Divine within to be allowed to free us.

In the spring when we get ready for gardening we don’t just wait and hope that flowers will grow we have cultivate the earth and prepare to plant them. We do our best to provide moisture, and try to keep the plants free of insects and disease.

In the same way, we cannot make faith grow or give it to others, we are able to take care of the gifts we have been given that hopefully will take root and grow under the guidance of Sprit. Once that happens we will be set free of our prisons.

Just as Isaiah said he heard the voice of God we too can hear that voice within us calling to us to let go and let our lights shine.

In my meditation the other day part of the reading said “When I close my eyes to the light – which is the only reality – what becomes real to me is darkness. The more I feed into this unreality of darkness the more real it becomes to me. The truth is that the light has never left; I have simply chosen not to see it. Light, love and joy are always there. I can close my eyes and be in the darkness or open my eyes to the light. At every moment I have a choice.”

That is the hope for me that I always have the choice to allow the light or not. It is also my hope the that Divine light shines all the time and it is up to me to see that or not.

When Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, he felt as though suddenly the skies opened to him and poured the beauty of the heavens over him. In that moment, he knew the depth and breadth of love and his own soul, his own journey, was affirmed. So may it be for all of us.

Amen.

February 24, 2008
Message
By Jane Clarke

For some of you this story of the woman at the well is very familiar. Jesus, who is a Jew, talks to a Samaritan woman. Jews did not talk to Samaritans. Not only did Jews not talk to Samaritans but this Samaritan happened to be a woman and a woman alone. A man did not ever speak to a woman who was alone. If we were reading this story for the first time, and didn’t know the history of the story, that would mean nothing to us.

It is also rather odd that the woman would go to the well alone and at midday when the sun was at its hottest. There was probably a well in her town so why would she come to this well to get water? It is probably because of her troubled history with men, and because she now lives with one who is not her husband and she is not very popular with the other women. We don’t know why she has had so many husbands that is not explained to us. For all we know some could have died and the others divorced her through no fault of her own.

As Jesus and the woman speak, she finds that the traditional boundaries that have kept her isolated and under suspicion—as a woman, as a Samaritan—are broken down by Jesus. She finds acceptance with Jesus, for though he appears to know much about her, he does not condemn or reject her because of the circumstances of her life. He tells her to move on with her life and not live the past anymore.

Not only that, she becomes the first recorded apostle and evangelist—witnessing to others about the new life she has found. She leaves the well and returns to her village to spread the news of her conversation with Jesus. That new life has helped to quench her thirst for God’s love.

This past week I sat in on the study group that meets Wed. mornings. This is a group of wise women who faithfully meet and have wonderful discussions. They have many questions and are deep thinkers when it comes to trying to find answers. This group studies the readings that will be used in the service for the coming Sunday.

One of the questions that was asked that morning after reading the scripture and the background material was; “How do we experience this thirst for God’s presence in our lives and in the life of the world?” After listening to their answers which were profound and meaningful I asked the question; “could you please define for me what you mean by God – who or what is God for you. That is a very thought provoking question and not easily answered.

How would you answer that question? Have you pondered or tried to verbalize who or what God is for you?

That is a question that I have been pondering for many years. That is one of the questions that was asked during my studies. Every time I had an interview or had to write an evaluation I had to articulate who God is for me.When I talk about God I do not mean a theistic God. A being who watches over us or prevents bad things happening to us or punishes us.

For me, God is not a magician who sits in the sky and doles out good or bad. I don’t believe there is a being that actually “does” things. I believe that there is a Source, God, if you will, who began the earth. The source from where first particle came from that makes up our planet had that spirit within it and as more of the earth was created and all that lives on the earth lives has that same spirit. The essence or spirit of the particle that began the earth is part of everything that has been created. That is how we are all connected. One part cannot live without the other no matter what it is. When we are born that is what gives us life. The breath of that spirit, is our soul or God within.

That same spirit that is within me is within you and that would be what I would use the word God for. So then I have what I need within me. Living water if you will. The soul of God. I hesitate to use the word God because it often takes me back to my old belief system where I thought God was a being who controlled the earth.

All that said I am not telling you who God is for you. That is your job to define or articulate who is God for yourself.

I believe that when Jesus was talking to the woman at the well he was telling her that God was within her and that’s where she would find her answers her forgiveness. That was the Living Water Jesus was speaking of. The excitement that the woman felt was the spirit within her that she had allowed to come alive.

I believe that the readings today are talking about the living water that runs within us the essence or who we are. The Jews had another way of using the word water. They often spoke of the thirst of the soul for God; and they often spoke of quenching that thirst with living water. Water is like our faith we become thirsty for it.

Lately, there have been many discussions that have taken place at the church during week. The discussions are about questions that people are having regarding their theology. Who is God? What is prayer? How do we pray? I love all these questions! I believe it is good to ask questions. When I was young and asked my dad faith questions his answer was that I was to believe what I was taught. That was never a good answer for me but I know for some that is just what they did. Believe it because that was how it was taught. As adults many of us are afraid of questions because we may not like the answers we get.

Jesus spent time with the woman at the well and talked to her about her questions. Jesus answered questions and helped people. Jesus offered the free gift of awakening that which is within us; the Divine within. That’s what he offered the woman at the well.

As I read many of the accounts of Jesus’ interaction with people he told them to forget their passed, forgive others and themselves and move on. I believe that Jesus lived in the present, not the passed or the future. Jesus told his disciples that when he was gone they could carry on doing what he had done. He knew that the Divine within him is the Divine that is in everyone.

We just have to open that well and the living water will flow. It is the essence of who we are we just have to allow it to flow. Somehow we have been taught that nothing is free and if we receive a gift we have to give a gift back. That is not what Jesus was teaching. He gave freely of himself and his time and didn’t expect anything in return. We too ought to learn to receive knowing that we are worthy and loved. We are not wretches that need to be saved. We only need to open our wells and let the water flow.

There is a story that I received this week about a young man. This is a true story about a woman names Barbara Glanz who was hired by a supermarket chain to present a customer service program to build customer loyalty. In her presentation she said that everyone can make a difference.

After her presentation she received a call from an employee of one of the stores. He said that his name was Johnny and he was 19 years old and that he was a Down Syndrome person. He said he was only a bagger but he had an idea that he was going to try.

He wanted to put a thought for the day in everyone’s grocery order. He began by finding a thought and if he couldn’t come up with one he made one up. His dad helped him copy the thoughts and he cut them out. On the back of each piece of paper he singed his name and said “thanks for shopping with us”.

A month later the manager of the store called Barbara to say that the line ups at the check – outs where Johnny bagged were 3 times longer than the others. When he called for help on the other check out lanes no one wanted to move from where Johnny was. They loved the personal touch that he added to their shopping.

There was one woman who said she used to shop there only once a week but now every time she went by she came in.

After a time the manager called Barbara again to say that the floral department had started to keep their broken flowers and give them to senior women or little girls. The whole store had transformed and began doing special things for their customers.

Johnny’s idea came from his heart—his living water.

Johnny was following Jesus’ example of how to live equally with others. It didn’t matter who you were or what your status you received this free gift.

How do we make a difference? What are the thought and flowers that we offer to make a difference in someone’s life?

How do we open the well and have the living water flow freely?

The season of Lent is a good reminder for us to wonder about these things and to reflect and ask questions. It is a time for us to learn to live in the present and let the past go and not to worry about the future. It is a time for us to remember that the same God that was a part of Jesus is the same God that is a part of us.

I would like to close by reading what is on the back of the bulletin today inspired by the passage from John.

“Jesus, you offer living water, a spring welling up to eternal life from inner depths. Sacred energy of spring in frozen winter, Sacred hope in welling up in despair, Sacred power to begin again when all feels lost. When I am hardened in hopelessness, you cut through my frozen ground to free the source within. And again I live!”

Amen.

March 23, 2008
Message: “He Is Not Here; For He Has Been Raised”
By Rev. James Farrell

The very first Easter was centered in turmoil and punctuated with an amazing display of power…in fact, according the Matthew, an earthquake marked the occasion. Since then, turmoil has been following Easter and the resurrection ever since.

First, you must know that the Christian church in its early days, arranged its great festivals to coincide with the dates of the great pagan feasts and so to wean away the new converts from the temptation of their old pagan holidays, Christian holidays would be celebrated on days that had already been set aside as holidays in pagan practices.

This Christian practice had another benefit too. If everyone was already celebrating, it was difficult to tell who was celebrating a pagan festival and who was celebrating a Christian festival…a good practice if you want to keep your head in a world that is not sympathetic to the Christian message. Thus Christmas coincided with the Roman saturnalia, and Easter was celebrated at the time of the pagan festival of the vernal equinox and also with the Jewish Passover. Good cover, don’t you think?

Very soon, differences of date crept in, so the churches of Ephesus and those of Asia Minor decided to make an attempt at uniformity. Their decision was that Easter shall be the 14th day of the first moon in the Christian New Year, on whatever day of the week that happened. (You must remember that the moon figured prominently not only in the Jewish religion but in all other religions of the time.)

If you care to pause and think about it, you will see that such a "simple" solution could only lead to worse confusion in the course of time. It did indeed, and before a hundred years had passed there was confusion with Easter falling at different times from place to place.

For example: The real or astronomical moon is full at midnight much later in the east than in the west; therefore if we based calculations on the real moon, Easter would occur in St. John's, Nfld. weeks earlier than in Vancouver. That is why astronomers adopt what they call the "conventional full moon", and that is how the days of the moveable feasts of the church are decided.

In AD 325, the council of churches meeting at Nicea, after some profound study decreed that (1) Easter day must always be a Sunday and (2) that Sunday shall be the one which follows the Jewish Passover, which meant the first Sunday following the 14th day of the paschal full moon.

The date of Easter this year is quite early. In fact, this year is the earliest Easter any of us will ever see the rest of our lives! And only the most elderly of our population have ever seen it this early. Anyone here born before 1913? That was the last time a March 23rd Easter was celebrated.

And none of us have ever, or will ever, see it a day earlier! The next time Easter will be this early (March 23) will be the year 2228 or 220 years from now. The next time it will be a day earlier, March 22, will be in the year 2285, 277 years from now. The last time it was on March 22 was 1818. So, no one alive today has or will ever see it any earlier than it is today!

So, pinning down Easter has never been easy which is as it should be because pinning down Jesus has never been easy either.

Over the years, people have tried to get Jesus to say things that Jesus never said. Jesus has been the source of so much controversy it is mind boggling; nothing new there. But new life never gets old. And if there is one thing that in Jesus we are always ready to experience, it is new life. That we gather this day is proof of Jesus’ resurrection.

Resurrection from the thought that our lives were in the toilet…a chance to start over and leave an addiction that has been destroying our lives, along the roadside of broken dreams as we head out on the path of hope and promise knowing it is not the path of wishful thinking but the path of real possibility in Christ.

Oh he is not here for he has been raised as he said! He has been raised into countless lives! People bounce into church and many of them are hoping to find Jesus. Figuratively or literally. In some ways, I want to say, “he is not here, for he has been raised” for that is really quite true.

Jesus, you see has been raised in us empowering us to confront injustice. Raised in the life of the single mother to offer hope when sub-standard income and difficult circumstances have made it all to easy for her to spiral into despair. Jesus has been raised in us to struggle alongside our partners when communication breakdown has created the temptation to give up on the relationship.

Jesus is not an icon that sits on some thrown in some church or temple to be adored or venerated as a remarkable piece of art. Jesus lives in the mess of life offering inspiration and sacred options that can genuinely make a difference in the lives of people who have little to cling to apart from that sacred hope.

Hope is not a chance word either… genuine hope is founded on something which affords reasonable grounds for confidence in its fulfillment. Hope means the assurance of things to come. That is what we experience in the resurrection! It is nothing short of transformational!

James Taylor, past editor of the Observer, wrote a wonderful book after cystic fibrosis claimed the life of his first born child when Stephen was about to turn 22 years of age. That was some 25 years ago. For any of you who have lost a child, you know that pain, at times, is as fresh as if it were yesterday.

But, life marches on. James’ daughter, Sharon, is now adopting an Ethiopian child, her second. Her first was a wonderful little girl who is according to James and Joan, the best ever! Grandparents: Duh!

The new arrival, a son, should be greeted this weekend in the Taylor home and Sharon plans to call him Stephen whose Ethiopian name is Tekalegn (pronounced “teck-uh-lin”). This new baby is a wonderful gift to her parents and a tribute to the memory of her older brother. But that gift also comes with an edge just the same.

In his column, Jim writes: “Over the last six months, Joan and Sharon have happily chattered about preparing for “Stephen’s” arrival. They’ve repainted “Stephen’s room.” Joan has knitted sweaters for him. Young Katherine is setting aside toys for her little brother.

But I haven’t been able to speak of him as “Stephen” yet. Something stops me. And that disturbs me.

I thought that I was over my sense of loss after our son died. Joan still has trouble talking about it, 25 years later, but me, I talked about it openly, perhaps too much. I incorporated insights from his life and death into magazine articles. Ten years later, I even wrote a book about it: “Surviving Death,” later republished as “Letters to Stephen: A Father’s Journey of Grief and Recovery.”

I thought of all these as catharsis, clearing the decks, getting on with life.

Obviously, I haven’t coped as well as I thought. There’s still something irrational inside me that wants to believe that there was only one Stephen, that there will never be another Stephen, that no one else will ever be good enough to be another Stephen.

Giving his name to a stranger feels like taking Wayne Gretzky’s number 99 down from the Hall of Fame and giving it to some upstart from the minor leagues.I know, I know -- it’s silly. And it’s not fair to Tekalegn (teck-uh-lin). It’s not fair to resent his assuming our son’s name; nor is it fair to place that burden of expectations on his tiny shoulders.

He’s my grandson, not my son.

He arrives in Edmonton this weekend, God and Air Canada willing… At that point, I have to give up nursing old wounds. I cannot penalize the one who lives, to preserve the memory of the one who died.

We gather to celebrate Jesus’ life and resurrection but all too often we aren’t prepared to allow that new life to be lived in us. We are, however, very prepared to keep what we know and experience of Jesus limited to the interpretation that we have locked in our hearts and minds that we know only from those who have written about him long after his death.

New birth means allowing new life to take root in us and to bear the fruit of wonder befitting that new life. James’ Taylor is wrestling with the implications of that this very weekend. He is juggling the bitter sweetness of the new Stephen in his life. We do too when we allow the risen Jesus to take hold of our lives and to make a difference in who we are and how we relate to our world. In those moments, we too can say Alleleuia!

One more thing! Sharon, little Stephen’s new mom, asked an Ethiopian woman in her Edmonton congregation what Tekalegn (teck-uh-lin) meant in her language.

The woman paused, and thought, and then said, “It’s hard to translate. But it means something like ‘Replacing something precious that was lost’.”

I think, to be fair to Jesus, we need to be reminded today, to allow some of what has been laid upon Jesus in the past to dissipate so that what is emanating from the risen Christ may take hold in our lives to bless us as only that gift can.

Amen.

March 16, 2008
Palm Sunday Reflection
By Rev. James Farrell

When I was a little guy our family spent intermittent time in church but, of that period I knew of three religious holidays. These were Christmas, Easter, and believe it or not Palm Sunday. Palm Sunday was the time that we sang the song which went: "Hosanna, loud hosanna the little children sang, Through pillared court and temple the lovely anthem rang." The Sunday School would make palm branches from green construction paper and march all around the church singing and shouting "Hosanna, hosanna" as if we were in that crowd on that first Palm Sunday.

Maybe this bit of history can be considered a Christian education success story. You see, we small ones, knew about Christmas because of Santa Clause. We knew about Easter because of the Easter Bunny. But we knew about Palm Sunday because of Jesus and his journey into Jerusalem on a donkey.

All in all, Palm Sunday is a very important holiday for the church. It is a time when Jesus' disciples hailed him as King. It is a chance for us as disciples of Christ today to acclaim Christ as King in a way that challenges our cultural norms and places higher value on the way Jesus turned the world upside down, than on the distortions of life that we tend to live with day by day...at least it holds out that promise for this occasion and through this occasion, perhaps the change can be nuanced into our lives more permanently.

There is also a dance that happens on Palm Sunday that is quite apart from any of the activity of children. It is the dance between the Palm Sunday lections speaking of the triumphal entry of Jesus we look at this week and the lections meant to precede Easter Sunday and the famous celebration of the resurrection.

Those lections of course are all the passages that speak of the journey to the cross and the crucifixion.

It is quite literally the dance between life and death.

For many the events of Good Friday are not on a personal religious calendar. As our understanding of God and of the person of Jesus evolves, faith doesn’t focus on the blood of Jesus as much as once it did and that is good. The mess that our world is in has more than a bit to do with an ethos that no matter what we do with ourselves, our neighborhoods or our world, the death of Jesus saves us from everything. But more realistically, the life of Jesus and the teaching of Jesus that informs our choices in life brings LIFE to the world.

Yes, Jesus’ death is mentioned…it is horrible…evil seemingly triumphant over good and all of that…and we don’t ignore it, but in our postmodern world, a world that needs to move past atonement thinking, we tend to move past the fact of Jesus death as quickly as we can to get to the promise of new life.

The truth is; we don't like to dwell on unpleasant things. Sometimes we don't even admit to ourselves that unpleasant things exist. We don't want to admit the pain and the unpleasantness of life. We would rather close our eyes to it the way we do in a scary movie and when we peek through our fingers to see a bit of what is unpleasant, it often makes us jump…an no one likes to be made to jump.

As a result, we often overlook those who are suffering and in pain because at some level they make us jump.

Oh, there is something to be said for accentuating the positive and eliminating the negative. But when it causes us to overlook those in need, the ones God is calling us to help, the fragile, the lost, the hungry, the sick, all whose lives are enhanced along with ours when we embrace each other as part of the neighbourhood, when our fear of what causes us to jump prevents us from being human, we have stepped apart from the spiritual centre that links us with the holy that we call God.

The fact is, that life with Jesus is about good and bad, about life and death, about walking the journey alongside him whether he is carrying us or whether we are contentedly shuffling or striding along beside him.

Jesus taught us how to be in community like no one ever has or ever will.

Because of this tendency to overlook the negative we sometimes overlook Jesus' suffering and death. We get all caught up in the joy of singing praises to Jesus as he triumphantly enters Jerusalem. And we forget that Jesus’ journey into Jerusalem ended in death.

So, in some ways, when we get to Holy Week we put our hands over our eyes, and say to the person next to us, “Tell me when it is all over.”

It may be unpleasant to think about, but Jesus did die. People drove nails through his wrists and feet. They nailed him to a cross as one seen to be a serious threat to society.

Jesus experienced terror and pain.

Life is joy, and life is pain. Nowhere is that more evident than in the life of Jesus. Through Jesus we learn to embrace life with joy—a joy that knows that our remembering his courage and life-offering direction and life altering hope, can live through us! The good and bad, the joy and frustration as those whose lives are reframed by the framer from Galilee—that’s who we are!

The people of whom we read today didn’t see what was coming. If they had known, as we do, how Jesus’ trip to Jerusalem would turn out, they would not be singing a song of triumph. They thought Jesus would come and take over the state. Right before this, Jesus had to correct his disciples for thinking that his kingdom would appear immediately (Luke 19:11).

The prophets had said the Messiah would come riding on a donkey. So when the people saw Jesus on that Donkey, they thought he was coming to lead an uprising. They thought he would ride right up to Herod's palace and sit on his throne. Then he would order the Romans out of his newly established kingdom.

The crowd was partially right. They expected a Messiah who would rule an earthly kingdom. Not so! But wait. When we embody Jesus, when we embrace his challenge to live courageously, loving wastefully, building neighbourhood in gentle and profound ways, Jesus lives! …And so do we!

Amen.

March 30, 2008
Message
By Jane Clarke

A golfer set up his first ball on the first tee, took a mighty swing and hit his ball into a clump of trees. He found his ball and saw an opening between two trees he thought he could hit through.

Taking out his three-wood, he took another mighty swing, the ball hit a tree, bounced back, hit him in the forehead, and killed him.

As he approached the gates of Heaven, St. Peter saw him coming, and asked, “Are you a good golfer?”

The man smirked. “Got here in two, didn’t I?”

Many churches today are celebrating Holy Humour Sunday.

“Holy Humor Sunday” or “Bright Sunday” was drawn to national attention by Harvey Cox in his book, “The Feast of Fools,” and popularized by Cal Samra through his newsletter, the “Joyful Noiseletter.”

“For centuries in Eastern Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant countries, the week following Easter Sunday, including "Bright Sunday" (the Sunday after Easter), was observed by the faithful as "days of joy and laughter" with parties and picnics to celebrate Jesus' resurrection. “Churchgoers and pastors played practical jokes on each other, drenched each other with water, told jokes, sang, and danced.

“The custom was rooted in the musings of early church theologians (like Augustine, Gregory of Nyssa, and John Chrysostom) that God played a practical joke on the devil by raising Jesus from the dead. “Risus paschalis – the “Easter laugh," the early theologians called it. “Many churches from different traditions responded enthusiastically.

So today we are observing the humourous side of life.

“Humour is not the opposite of seriousness. Humor is the opposite of despair.” Let me repeat that: “Humour is not the opposite of seriousness. Humour is the opposite of despair.” Humour is not a means of avoiding the real issues of personal life and social justice. It is one of the tools we have been given to deal with such struggles.

Humour is being able to laugh at ourselves. To be able to laugh at real life situations. I love to watch reruns of Seinfeld. The show always took a real life situation and made it funny. Of course it was exaggerated but that really drives home how the simplest things in life that we take seriously can be seen as funny.

Conrad Hyers has written a number of fine books on the topic of humor and faith. He points out that humor is “a means of grace.” One, among many gifts that we receive, but one that we seriously neglect. And we need to take it seriously.

I read about a church service. The ushers had just taken up the offering. They were walking down the aisle when one of them tripped on the pile in the carpet. He didn’t fall but sent his offering plates and those of his partner flying in a flurry of envelopes, bills and loose change all over the front of the church.

The congregation sat in stunned silence.

Then the minister said the only thing that could be said. “For goodness sake, laugh.”

And they did.

Till the tears rolled down their faces. And while they laughed, they got down on their hands and knees and picked up the money, put it back on the offering plates, and carried on with the worship service.

I don’t know why but some of us think that we have to be so serious in church. Yes we can’t have a free-for-all happening but we need to have some laughter to lighten us up. Life can become far too serious if we let it.

Why aren’t elephants allowed to walk on beach? Because they walk around with their trunks down.

There is a drawing of Jesus by Willis Wheatley; Jesus with his eyes twinkling and his head back in wide-open laughter. I’m sure many of you have seen it.

Wheatley called the picture, “Jesus Christ, Liberator.” Laughter is an essential ingredient of freedom

Wheatley’s drawing always seemed to represent the opposite of the desperation Kahlil Gibran described when he said, “They shall laugh, but not all of their laughter. And they shall cry, but not all of their tears.”

In our times of desperation when we think nothing will be right again we can lift our spirits just a little when we find humour. I am reminded of times I have been with people grieving the loss of a loved one. Times when I have been holding them as they sobbed and all of a sudden we remember something about the person who has passed makes us laugh. We remember the joy and the humour that person brought to their lives. That’s when I see humour as the opposite of desperation. The humour is not disrespectful it raises up the person who is no longer with us.

Unless our stories are told with a deep, very basic sense of humor, we can easily turn them into idolatry. We can be trapped by the pride that makes us believe the stories are more important than the people who tell them or hear them; that the stories themselves are “sacred” and shouldn’t be soiled by frivolous giggling.

I’m sure some of you have read books by Robert Fulgham. One of his well known books is “Everything I Need to Know I Learned In Kindergarten”. He tells stories about everyday happenings and he always makes me laugh or at least smile. Another person who does that so well is Stuart McLean. If you listen to CBC on Sunday after church you have probably heard him. His stories of Dave and Morley and their family are always funny. The stories of them getting into messes that we would think desperate and Stuart makes them funny. These two men have a gift to see the homourous side of life. What a gift.

Humor, helps us see ourselves as essentially just a little ridiculous; helps us know that we often do dumb things and that part of our story will always be a little bit stupid and pointless. I like Paul’s term, “fools for the sake of Christ.”

What did one snowman say to the other snowman? Do you smell carrots?

“A common trait of dictators, revolutionaries and ecclesiastical authorities alike, is the refusal both to laugh at themselves or to permit others to laugh at them.” In other words, they’re afraid that if people laugh at them, they might discover their humanity and their nakedness.

Remember The Emperor’s New Clothes?

Not every time someone gets up to speak do they have to have people laughing all the time. You may very well give a deeply moving talk about a very serious subject, never drawing a smile from your audience and still show a deep sense of humor. It has far more to do with attitude than with laughter.

A paraphrase of Psalm 126 says:

Religion is a laughing matter.
And humor is a pretty religious business.
Our mouths were full of laughter
and our tongues sang aloud for joy.

Because the point of Holy Humor Sunday is not to have everyone laughing constantly, but to receive from the worship experience a way of looking at life that is at the heart of holy humor.

A sense of humor has little to do with the ability to tell jokes (which is a theatrical skill, and a good one) or making yourself look weird in front of others. It is to sense the divine ludicrousness of the life we live. It is to work hard and to live a life of faith and creativity, and through it to always enjoy and hear in the background that small gentle, loving chuckle from the Divine within.

Laughter is the best medicine. Laughter is known to be good for the heart and it also releases stress. These are only two of many things that laughter is good for. If you have a computer look up laughter on wicapedia and it will list many good reasons to laugh for your health.

Remember laughter with tears brings most healing relief. Enjoy the rest of Holy Humour Sunday. Tell jokes at coffee and tell jokes at home. Laugh yourselves into great health. May we have the gift of laughter for each day, laughter with hope to greet the coming of each dawn and faith that never dies. May we have the gift of laughter instead of sighs.

Amen.

April 13, 2008
Message: “Are We Being Saved?”
By James Farrell

I haven’t had a chance to preach for a couple of weeks…you know what that means…stuff that has built up for a while is now ready to pour out…which reminds me, the last Sunday of March, Jane preached—Holy humour Sunday, if memory serves and, in this case, I believe it does… if you were here, you may remember that Jane handed out a number of one liners and folks read them to their neighbors and then you all began to share them with others in the vicinity of your pew.

One of those notes kept finding its way back to where I was sitting and a number of you found it really important to be sure that one in particular found its way into my hands. It read: “Barbara C. remains in the hospital and needs blood donors for more transfusions. She is also having trouble sleeping and requests tapes of Pastor Jack's sermons.”

I don’t know quiet what to make of that!

Well, since I enjoy a laugh and none of you could possibly be wanting me to think that my sermons tranquilize you, I’m just going to move on…

Besides, the lesson from the Acts of the Apostles is about the church working together “with humble hearts, praising God, and enjoying the good will of all the people.” And that is really what Holy humour Sunday is all about—in fact, that’s what the church should be about: humble hearts, praising God, and enjoying the good will of all the people.

Luke doesn’t stop there, he adds, “And every day the Lord added to their group those who were being saved.”

How were they being saved?

I ask the question because a lot of how scripture has been interpreted over the years and certainly in the last few centuries is the result of taking a look back from our vantage point and reading into scripture—a term called isogesis—all those things that really come from a perspective that developed over time…not a perspective that was present at the time of writing.

For example: it would be like me making assumptions about my preaching based on a one-liner shared from the barrel of Ralph Milton’s humour file.

Sure, I could do that, but how accurate would that really be concerning events in my life today? Don’t answer that!

Saved is one of those terms that doesn’t appear in the scripture all that many times but a whole culture has evolved around it. Some of the interpretation placed upon the idea of being saved came from passages written at least 50 years after Luke wrote this piece. The writer of John for instance, doesn’t inform Luke, but builds upon what Luke said by bringing John’s own experience and interest to bear upon what he wanted to write.

“Being saved” in the context of what Luke has to say has a great deal to do with the attitude of those in the early church choosing to make a difference in the lives of their communities.

As such, “being saved” in this passage has much less to do with responding to “an altar call” that focuses on a personal audience with God than it does with a change of heart that leaves the community resting on a firmer foundation.

It is in that change that resurrection happens! A Nazi prison guard may genuinely have a change of heart. A crook can go straight. Substance abusers can be freed from their particular ball & chain. The proof is in people’s changed lives and the overwhelming encouragement that “the human heart is changeable”. This is evidenced in the new actions of those changed lives!

This is, after all, the foundation of evangelism. In following Christ, we can be saved from whatever enslaves us. Salvation, in this sense, presumes not just a new label, but a change of lifestyle, of values, of attitudes.

Two weeks ago we shared in Earth Hour throughout the country. A Time when people would shut off everything they could shut off to raise awareness of our energy use and hopefully, our overuse of it. Medicine Hat city leadership was amazingly uninterested in the program but larger centers did participate. Most of downtown Toronto did go dark. The CN Tower winked out. So did the Peace Tower in Ottawa. Official figures indicate that Ontario cut its electricity demand by almost nine per cent during that one hour, saving 900 megawatts of energy, equivalent to taking 11,000 cars off the road.

Organizers claim over 150 Canadian cities and towns joined the campaign, turning off their lights for one hour.

Raise your hand if you actively tried to reduce your power consumption during that hour on Saturday, March 29th?

We have friends who were careful to turn off the lights, light a candle and just spend time chatting…they were so proud of their efforts until they realized many hours later that they had forgotten to turn off the oven.

Well, their hearts were in the right place.

So what did the “lights out experiment” accomplish?, perhaps besides missing an hour of television? I’ve heard some explain that unlike no shopping days or no gas-buying days when people simply put off for a day the things that they would have done thereby making no real difference, Earth Hour actually did save that energy …it was a genuine savings that wouldn’t be offset by extra consumption the next day. And people learned that in some way reduction, change was do-able.

Christians, by and large, are the most consumptive group on earth…how did that happen? Our roots clearly indicate that our spiritual ancestors worked at holding things in common and doing what was necessary to provide for everyone’s needs and yet we blossomed into a religious culture of consumption and personal property, its part of the protestant work ethic.

I submit to you, ‘that legacy’ is a direct result of our interpreting scripture as a window through which we see the divine agenda as our personal agenda. The notion that God wants us healthy wealthy and wise now and forever…and that everything we do to make that “so” is sanctioned by God.

But abundance is not life abundant. For a window in time the early church understood that. From time to time we understand that. When we act out of that understanding, good things happen for the earth and for each of its inhabitants.

John’s gospel was the last written…likely a hundred years after Jesus taught his followers. Do I believe that every word of what we read in John’s gospel is without a personal agenda being shared by it’s writer? No.

Do I believe that Jesus genuinely wanted abundant life to be a legitimate part of the human experience? YES! Of course!

When those who gathered to discuss the teaching of the apostles decided, somehow, that they were following the leadership of the divine by holding their belongings “lightly” and “in common” they were connecting with something far greater than themselves. In telling their story we tell something of their faith journey.

In sharing in causes like Earth Hour we are allowing ourselves to be challenged to change. In replacing our lighting to compact fluorescents and choosing to drive less and more efficiently, we are making a choice for change.

The other day I caught the end of Leonardo DiCaprios’ The Eleventh Hour…a film /documentary on our plight as inhabitants of the earth and what we might do to move the hands of the doomsday clock in reverse. When we make such choices, we are acting on behalf “of all” not simply on behalf of ourselves. That’s the image we experience today in Luke’s writing from the Acts of the Apostles.

That is the image that Jesus offers us and it is the image which we can uphold as divine when we consider the question of abundant life.

John had something very right…in the opening passages of the gospel that bears his name, he speaks of Jesus bring the “logos” or “word” of God and when we are open to seeing the words of scripture pointing us to Jesus, the living word divinely present to us …that very same presence that challenges us to make choices that enhance community and not alienate it, then we have grasped something of the possibility of living abundantly.

Are we being saved?

In our vulnerability we are being saved from ourselves, from the self-serving choices we make and we are being released to make choices that foster life for all…life for family, for community, for nation and world, for planet and universe. Abundant life is not about “just us” but about “all of us.”

When we are open, we are being saved by the renewing of our minds. The spirit of Jesus would have us connect with ourselves and our environments in such a way that we may truly know life and have it and live it abundantly. It’s a holy act we encounter through our shared expression of generosity of spirit!

Amen.

April 20, 2008
Message: “Greater Works Than These”
By Rev. James Farrell

“The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these…”

From the very first time I read those words in John’s gospel, many years ago, I was captivated by the possibility of what that might mean. Is it really possible? Can we who follow Jesus really have that kind of power? Does it lie within us to affect that kind of hope for change? Prayerfully, can we really have power over life and death?

I remember a conversation in seminary about incarnation. The professor talked about how there are two different ways to look at Jesus: either he is completely unique in his incarnation, so that even though we all have God dwelling in us, it is only up to a point… there's no way you could embody God in the same way that Jesus did; or it's a continuum—Jesus is the one that most fully embodied God's will, but we also may grow to be like Jesus.

We can take on the kind of ministry that he did and not think we've failed before we've even started because there's “no way we can ever be like Jesus,” in actual fact, because of the sense of Jesus we encounter in John’s gospel, we know we can be like Jesus…are we willing to try? In what ways are we willing to try?

It is appreciation Sunday and a time to appreciate all the selfless gifts of those who volunteer in church and beyond to make a difference. People who for want of making a difference and for courage of stepping out and trying, truly make the words, “greater works than these” actually have meaning in our church and community.

Over the years, church folks have done incredible things to make the world a better place. Right here at Westminster, on the south wall of Memorial Hall is a list of some of the gifts that people give of themselves to make this community hum. Thank you all, and please review that important visual montage of your energies shared.

Volunteerism is a wonderful thing…one of the things that differentiates takers from givers. But, of course, we all need to be challenged from time to time and Dr. Gifford Jones’ column this past week was a challenge directed straight at preachers…perhaps an overly pointed challenge but a well placed one just the same. He wrote:

Why would I rather deal with the Mafia than some religious people? Because I hate hypocrisy above all other things. I know the mob has a code it follows strictly, such as it is, and it's crystal clear to everyone what it's all about. But religious people talk constantly about brotherly love and yet condemn fellow humans to death. It's hypocrisy at its worst.

A report in the Medical Post says that Canadians are being forced to travel to China and India to purchase heart and kidney transplants. Their only alternative is death. How can you blame people for seeking what's been labeled “transplantation tourism”, to buy an organ in a foreign land? We all share the desire to live at any cost. So put yourself in the place of those facing untimely death from organ failure. Consider the odds they face in this bountiful country.

It's unbelievable that in Canada there are only 12.8 organ donors per million persons of population. That is why every day two to three Canadians die from organ failure. In 1995 there were 2,500 people waiting for life-sustaining body parts. Today the number has increased to 4,277. So why wouldn't patients facing certain death—without a transplant—start to look at foreign lands?

But what awaits them in surgery in these countries? I wish I could give a first-hand account. But one patient described the scene to me. “It was small bare bones. It was in a row of buildings in a commercial area. Patients were standing around outside and there were overhanging wires. It was a poor area.”

And these patients are thousands of miles from family and friends realizing they may die from the transplant operation. Let's not forget the poor, naive and unfortunate person who provides the organ. It appears that some young donors in poverty-stricken countries have no idea of what the kidney does or where it's located in the body.

Dr. Francis Delmonico, professor of Surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital, in Boston, reports that 3,000 people in a Philippine slum area sold one of their kidneys. It had the dubious distinction of being called Kidneyville. Other reports claim that after losing an organ brokers either refused to pay the donor or gave them a small fraction of the money collected. It's a cruel world for these innocents while scoundrels take advantage of their unwitting donation.

The grim, grisly fact is that Canadians should not have to go shopping for organs in foreign countries. Not when, day after day, religious people bury their useful organs in caskets that could be life-saving to another human. (It's also a useless waste of trees.) Moreover, the majority of religions claim to support organ donation.

So it's high time ministers of these religions stepped up to the plate and stopped the hypocrisy. Don't preach to me about brotherly love while desperate people search in vain for life-saving organs. But I'll make a bet today. Several years ago I pleaded with religious leaders of this country to preach a sermon supporting organ donation. I'm not a graduate of any theological college. But for those who are it shouldn't require much homework to deliver the message. Yet to my knowledge not a single sermon was delivered on this matter.

I'm sure there are those in congregations, similar to my religious patients, who exclaim, “I don't want to lose an organ because I believe it's important that my body remain whole.” And yet some of these same people say they intend to be cremated. Religious preachers could surely, if they tried, reassure their flock that no one will be denied admittance to Nirvana if they're missing a leg or a kidney. Isn't it just the soul that supposedly goes to heaven?

It's time those in the pulpit rise to the occasion and deliver this Good Samaritan sermon. But hell will probably freeze over before that happens. They'll continue to preach, “Do unto others as ye would have them do unto you.” Then sit on their hands about this humanitarian matter. For shame, for shame, for shame.

Dr. Gifford-Jones is, of course, correct. [website is www.mydoctor.ca/gifford-jones]

But, as not to give the good doctor the last word, I would like to point out that, in fact, The Moderator of the United Church of Canada, is inviting United Church congregations to participate in National Organ and Tissue Donation Awareness Week between today and April 27th.

So as we celebrate those who do volunteer, donate and plan for the well-being of others, even in death, it is important to give equal time to our moderator, the Right Reverend David Giuliano as he encourages members of United Church congregations to share the message about why it is so important for individuals to consider signing a donor card.

In his message to the church last week, David Giuliano reflects on his trip last year to the Middle East and the surprising connection he discovered between supporting peace in Israel and Palestine and a conference held in Nazareth for transplant recipients, donor families, and surgeons.

Writes Giuliano, “Initially, I wondered what transplant surgery had to do with supporting peace in Israel and Palestine. Then, the penny dropped. The donations were made across ethnic divisions.

Israelis received organs donated by Palestinians, and vice versa. The surgeons were there to remind everyone that they can't tell the difference between Palestinians and Israelis in the operating room. By the end of the weekend, those who had previously been sworn enemies were bonded by shared heartache and gratitude. The lines of ethnic hatred disappeared.”

The Moderator urges church members to use National Organ and Tissue Donation Awareness Week—this coming week—as an occasion to talk with friends and family about wanting to be a donor.

“I carry a signed donor card in my wallet. I hope it will never be used. However, if there is a moment that, as I leave this wonderful world, some aspect of my physical self can be a gift to another person, I would be glad for it,” writes Giuliano.

He adds, “Perhaps knowing that some good came from my death would redeem the suffering of those who love me. My donation might not be a step toward world peace like the Nazareth project, but if it gives someone the gift of savouring this beautiful world, it is one drop in God's ocean of love in which we live.”

In English, the word martyr describes someone who is willing to die for what they believe. But in the original Greek it also means someone who witnesses what they know to be true. In the early church the two meanings could be synonymous. In today's readings we hear early Christians bear witness to Christ as their rock and refuge, sometimes at the cost of their lives.

Our deaths are not witnesses unless our lives have a story. Stephen's death was a witness to what was most important in his life: Jesus, his Rock and Refuge, his Lord and hope in Life. What do we consider worth living and dying for? To what do our lives give witness? Are we willing to invest our substance in really living and offering life to others in ways that clearly make us a witness? I trust we are! Amen.

Notes: Religious hypocrites who oppose organ donation simply heartless Posted By Gifford Jones Posted 4 days ago …this was downloaded from The Sault Star Wed. April 16th 2008. Copies of the Moderator's message and National Organ and Tissue Donation Awareness Week bulletin insert can be found on The United Church of Canada's website www.united-church.ca).

May 4, 2008
A Message: Waiting—Discovering
By Rev. James Farrell

Dietrich Bonhoeffer has been gone for a little over 60 years. He was involved in a plot to kill Hitler as early as 1939 but arrested when a paper trail exposed him as helping fund the escape of Jews from Germany to Switzerland in April 1943. Two years later in April, just a short while before Hitler committed suicide, Bonhoeffer was slowly and brutally executed in a manner not unlike crucifixion. He was 39.

He was a brilliant man, obtaining his doctorate at the age of 21, so early, in fact, that he couldn’t become a pastor as his denomination had set 25 years of age as the minimum age to become a pastor; so he went to the States for a time and did some post-doctoral work at Union Theological Seminary in New York. Germany was his home and it was to there that he returned and sought to make a difference.

Many consider Bonhoeffer a martyr. Others believe his connection with the plot to kill Hitler prevents him from ever wearing that mantle. It has a lot to do with which biography that you read as to which side of that fence you may find yourself sitting on.

We can’t tell story without offering a slant, a bias. I don’t mean that in a derogatory way. The only perspective I can offer to any conversation, even those in which I am willing to struggle to be as absolutely neutral as possible, can only be the perspective of a white, middle aged, North American male. Regardless of how I might think I can share a viewpoint on current issues in Africa, China or India, to those conversations, I’m “an outsider” whose perspective is just that, a perspective, not THE perspective.

Evaluating Bonhoeffer’s life, with all of the records and documents the past century affords us to do that, we still can only interpret the events based on our own perspectives informed by the perspectives of the keepers of the history.

By the time the writer of John’s gospel got around to recording the prayer we share today many perspectives helped influence the final product we can hold in our hand and refer to as the words of Jesus.

Exhaustive study on the book of John informs us that it was very important for the writer to offer an understanding of the pre-existent Jesus.

What I mean is that John had a very developed sense of Jesus living with God in a form that was “wholly other” than the form we encounter in other gospel accounts of Jesus.

Mark, for instance, just tells the story. Jesus of Nazareth was here, did this, then this happened etc. Not much embellishment of his perspective, just the account as he could share it. John, on the other hand, had the perspective of time and the evolving reality of the church to bear upon his perspective when he took pen to hand.

From that vantage point he couldn’t possibly understand a movement of the followers of Jesus evolving with the power and commitment that he was able to witness without also believing that Jesus, unlike anyone who had ever lived, was eternal. Forward and backward eternal. With God at creation…we would say, ‘there before the big bang’ and there at the end of time. Very literally the alpha and the omega…the beginning and the end.

To Mark, the man Jesus stood tall on his own merits…the merits of the activity that Mark could recall. To John, this incredible man who sired a movement that was changing the world right before him had also to have incredible roots and an incredible future yet to come…certainly a reasonable perspective from where he stood.

We know about Dietrich Bonhoeffer because of the record that has been left to inform us of his life and work and death. We know about Jesus because of the record of his life and work and death that we encounter in scripture. I didn’t know Bonhoeffer…I trust that none of you here did either, although that is not impossible.

Through Dietrich’s writing and the record of his actions and the church Dietrich Bonhoeffer helped form, known as the “Confessing Church,” we get a sense of what motivated him and the message he felt needed sharing.

Through the scriptures that have come down to us and the tradition of the church that we have received, the witness of faith that is shared by the saints that we meet and greet, we have a sense of the Jesus in whose name we gather today.

Wait a minute James, are you comparing our knowledge of Jesus to our knowledge of Bonhoeffer?

Make no mistake, as those who follow Jesus we compare Jesus to every person that has come into the human experience. That is not a bad thing…it is what we do. We catch ourselves musing, “what would Jesus do in this situation?” “why do I think Jesus would do that?” Am I demonstrating the Christ I profess in my life? Can I really demonstrate Jesus in any meaningful way? In my family? In my community? My world?

Real questions. Questions that try to take an invisible faith and place it into the physical reality of our world.

Johnny's mother looked out the window and noticed him “playing church” with their three kittens. He had the kittens sitting in a row, and he was preaching to them. Preaching to them?

She smiled and went about her work.

A while later she heard loud meowing and hissing and ran back to the open window to see Johnny baptizing the kittens in a tub of water. She called out, “Johnny, stop that! Those kittens are afraid of water! Johnny looked up at her and said, “They should have thought about that before they joined my church.”

I think that Johnny was making the mistake that many have made throughout history…he saw church as an extension of self and not the evolution of a common experience.

Although Bonhoeffer started out as a Lutheran he became frustrated with the “liberal theology” of the Church after discussing it with his dear friend Karl Barth, an eminent theologian in his own right.

Barth believed that “Liberal theology” minimized scripture, reducing it to a mere textbook of philosophy and theology. Barth and Bonhoeffer often discussed and debated liberal vs. conservative theology, and over time Barth began to win Bonhoeffer over. Although Bonhoeffer would never totally throw aside liberal theology he did feel it was too constraining, and held it in many ways responsible for the lack of relevance within the Church.

Barth was one of the challenges that helped Bonhoeffer move forward in regards to the development of the Confessing Church. You could say Barth offered him a perspective that helped round him in that direction.

No particular slant, bias, school of thought, no singular perspective captures what is needed to have rounded perspective of faithful living.

Johnny was a little young for that lesson to make an impression upon him. In his church he had no need for a rounded perspective…if he thought it, it must be so!

We, on the other hand should never stop seeking that roundedness. Bonhoeffer lived in strange times to be sure. In his book on Ethics, a work that was interrupted by his death, he wrote: “There are two guides for determining the will of God in any concrete situation: 1) the need of one's neighbour, and 2) the model of Jesus of Nazareth. There are no other guides. since Bonhoeffer denies that we can have knowledge of good and evil (Ethics, p.231)

Bonhoeffer believed, “There is no moral certainty in this world. There is no justification in advance for our conduct. Ultimately all actions must be delivered up to God for judgment, and no one can escape reliance upon God's mercy and grace. “Before God, self-justification is quite simply sin” (Ethics, p.167).”

We grow, we learn, we develop not by isolating ourselves with the kittens on the back porch declaring how it is in our world…we grow, we learn, we develop when we gather with others interested in searching their souls to discover how the holy is becoming known in each of us.

Amen.

May 11,2008
Reflection for the Day
By Rev. James Farrell

To my mind, the two spirit passages are connected today. The passage intended for the church at Corinth and the passage written much later by the writer of the gospel of John.

In the first, from the Epistle, are the words, “no one speaking by the Spirit of God ever says “Let Jesus be cursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit.”

And in the second, from the Gospel, reads, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

You could develop whole theologies around these passages and people have done it. You could say of the Corinthians passage that it proves that anyone with a foul demeanor is “so” because they haven’t the spirit in their life. It is akin to saying, not their fault as they are missing the spirit gene, or more traditionally, a kind of acquiescence to the notion that ‘the‘ devil made me do it.’

Of course, Devil talk isn't too popular today. No one would deny the reality of evil, yet linking it to a supernatural being can serve to put it at a relatively safe place - outside of ourselves.

Folks who work a lot with alcoholics can tell you that as soon as some become convinced that they have a “disease,” they often feel powerless to exercise any control over their own lives. For many it can be an excuse for excessive drinking; they can’t help it because they have this “disease” over which they are powerless.

The reality is that the urge to drink comes from within the self and once the body is detoxified, it will never need a drink again. Similarly, the doing of evil is a choice - and a very easy one to make, at that.

On this Christian Family Sunday, we all know that the home is where some of the most vicious and evil things occur. I refer, of course, to the partner abuse, whether male or female; sexual abuse; and emotional abuse of all kinds.

In the face of such evil, to counsel quiet acquiescence in the hope of eventual vindication is criminal. The beatitudes advise us to be peacemakers, not to surrender to evil and let it have its way.

Theologies that would say that evil is the work of people who don’t know better because they have not ‘received the holy spirit’ to use the language of the first century, miss the point. The spirit is not just for some!

One evening an Cherokee elder told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, “My son, the battle is between two 'wolves' inside us all.

One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment Inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.

The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “if it is a battle, “Which wolf wins?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

The second bible passage speaks of forgiveness and says, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” There are those who have extrapolated that from this passage, Christians and followers of Christ have the power to trap or release persons from their sins.

That is a dangerous assumption to make…it fits with imperialistic thinking that says we are not only the masters of our universe but the universe of anyone who is not as we are. You don’t have to be a genius to see how that plays out in world politics, and even local social welfare planning.

I think we would do better to see this passage and its affirmation more in the light of the popular line about a tree falling in the forest…you know the one, “if a tree falls in the forest and there is no one there to hear it, does it actually make a sound?”

What is the power in a person’s sin if you choose not to give it any power?

Rev. Dale Lange was speaking again this past week in Medicine Hat about forgiveness. I didn’t hear him but like many of you, I know that he has been a proponent of forgiving—genuinely forgiving—the young man who brandished a weapon carrying it into the school attended by Lange’s son, and in a confused, angry, evil outburst shot and killed Jason Lange.

It’s the 100th anniversary of the official observance of mother’s day which itself was, as I have shared before, the organized celebration of the work of mothers who, wanting to deal with the turbulent world that was the post civil war United States, pulled together to work to rebuild the injured lives of families on both sides of the conflict who had lost children to that awful war and without genuine care would have lost the injured as well.

Sure those moms hurt, but choosing to loosen and allow the chains of resentment to fall powerless to the ground, they could rebuild. If they had chosen to retain the sins of war, they could have done that too, and they could have justified retaining those sins if they chose to…had they done that, the death of the injured would have been added to the death of the slaughtered.

I believe that is exactly where Rev. Lange is coming from.

It is that model of Christian family that we regard as an extension of the spirit this Pentecost…this mother’s day, this Christian family Sunday … and in that spirit I say to everyone who has had a mother, let’s choose to feed the option within us that allows forgiveness, that finds ways to honor the holy in word and deed and that seeks always to rebuild when presented with a choice of action.

Amen.

May 18, 2008
Reflection for Baptismal Sunday
By Rev. James Farrell

Our fascination with water stems from our utter dependence upon water for our survival. The home of our spiritual ancestors centered in a dessert climate. Therefore, they appreciated all too well the importance of a life-sustaining water supply. I’m not sure that we, who live in this desert land, “get that.”

Our success with irrigation has saved our bacon over the years and great inroads have been made to irrigate more land with less or the same amount of water through the St. Mary’s river authority that nurtures our area, and that is good thing, something to be celebrated.

But we continue to water lawns and public spaces as if the increasing demand on our water supply will be met with a magically unabated source of water.

Our ancestors, and their keepers of the stories, knew the importance of water as symbol and as survival. Water was freedom…it was seen as the promise of life for another day.

When I was working on my first bachelors degree I came upon an obscure little science book that spoke about the world’s prehistory with a specific focus on a period when the earth was enwrapped by an aqueous matter ring…not too unlike the ring around Saturn in that it hung in the heavens. ‘Different’ in that it was made of water and completely encircled the entire earth.

It was to this that the writer believed the words in the book of Genesis we share today were referring. His hypothesis was that under this umbrella of moisture the earth flourished and allowed the period of dinosaur rule to take place…a huge green house, as it were, and this “greenhouse living” also allowed people to live the kind of amazingly long lives that are epitomized by Noah’s grandfather Methuselah and his 969 year life-span recorded in the fifth chapter of Genesis.

The flood stories, believed the writer of this little book, were the result of this aqueous matter ring, this moist gas bubble surrounding the earth, suddenly falling to earth causing flooding everywhere. Convoluted? Perhaps. Compelling? To some ears. It is one of the many stories we tell to explain the unexplainable.

Just sharing in human life makes us want to figure out answers to the mysteries around us…in the natural world…in the heavens…in our own homes and the lives of the little miracles that become part of our family systems.

In the church, when we talk about life…water is always a part of the conversation. Spiritual life invites us to uphold the mystery of water and its power over the powerful …water changes rock like no hammer can. Water creates and destroys…in the last few weeks, alone, our psyches have been jostled by the conflicting images of water that we encountered in our country alone.

Welcomed moisture to get spring crops underway in our area is contrasted by excessive runoff that has left our New Brunswick neighbours dealing with flooding unlike anything they have seen for nearly a hundred years.

Too much, too little… real… symbolic… sustainable… threatened …our dance with the realities of water never seem to end.

The water of baptism is the stuff of mystery for us this day. We pour it with ceremony and we focus together as a precious few drops anoint the treasured lives of two wee ones whose arrival in our world causes such celebration that the only thing that makes sense is to gather at the house of God and share that joy with others who embrace mystery and trust that God too is as delighted and transfixed as we are in these arrivals.

In our tradition, the option for families to choose baby dedication has existed throughout all the years of my ministry. It is biblical, like Jesus coming to temple as an infant and being presented at the house of God. In dedication, no water is used and “the action of baptism” becomes an option that may be exercised at a later date when the child grows to an age of reason and stands for himself.

Funny thing is that in 22 years of ministry, no one has ever sought that option. There is something in the mystery of the ceremony of water baptism that parents feel drawn to.

I have no problem with that. I think it would be interesting for a child to choose to be baptized as an adolescent and to have that option as a result of choices made by parents years before…but I also respect the mystery that draws parents to choose the path we walk today.

I can’t tell you what happens in the action of baptism… I can’t say what spiritual realities are given flight through our willingness to take this action with these few drops of water… but I know that the families of Nash and Gavin have caught something of the mystery of presenting these young ones for water baptism … seeking the presence of the Holy that they have already felt long before we ever gathered on this chancel.

Today, again, we seek to be faithful in our action as those called upon to foster discipleship and as we do, we encounter again the holy and we trust that in these moments of faithfulness we are all better for the experience…and, isn’t that, lived in the face of mystery, what matters of faith are all about?

Amen.

May 25, 2008
Reflection: “Living in the Now” from "Free as a Bird"
By Rev. James Farrell

Jesus said, ‘Consider the birds of the air, they don't worry about food so don't you worry either.’ Well that is just fine if you're a sparrow. They don't even know how to sow or reap so why should they worry about it. They don't have car payments and house payments. They don't have college loans to pay off. They don't have to pay for medical insurance and such.

Then Jesus says, ‘Consider the flowers of the field, they don't work or sew.’ Well, that's fine if you are a dandelion. They don't have to worry about their children. They just send them off on the next breeze to populate some other lawn.

The birds and the flowers may not have anything to worry about, but as for most people there is plenty. Young families with bikes and braces and broken arms and the need to bank for college expenses. Most have mortgage payments, insurance, taxes and such. Along with a family there are responsibilities galore. Who can be carefree like the birds of the air and the lilies of the field?

Of course Jesus is not saying that we should be carefree. He is not saying we are or should be like the birds or the lilies. That's impossible. We have brains and in God’s economy we are expected to use them. Humans are endowed with the ability to sow and reap and gather and plan for the future. The God we meet in scripture doesn't expect us to just turn those abilities off and return to nature, or pretend we have no responsibilities.

It would be irresponsible to act like the birds of the air and the lilies of the field. It would be unfaithful for us not to plan for the future and work toward it. We have to toil and work and plan because we have been called to do that. To not use those God given abilities responsibly is bad stewardship.

So what does Jesus mean when he says "consider" the lilies of the field and the birds of the air? The point in considering the birds and the flowers is that God cares for them. They are unable to think and plan ahead. So the creator cares for them. The birds can't grow their own seeds so God provides seeds for them to eat. The flowers are incapable of producing clothing so God clothes them marvellously.

And if God cares for them how much more will God care for us. This is one of the cornerstones of Christian Stewardship. I know you usually think of "Stewardship" as giving. But "Provision" is a part of Stewardship too. If God provides for birds which are a dime a dozen and wild flowers that wilt and die with the first frost, then our creator will certainly care for us who are created in the image of the divine.

That doesn't mean we don't think and plan ahead. We still have to act responsibly. But we don't have to worry. Not because we are oblivious like the birds or the flowers, but because we know that part of living in God’s economy is to trust that we walk alongside God and that whatever happens in life, happens in the presence of God. Knowing that, we also trust in an innate element of provision. We plan and work but we don't worry because we trust in that divine provision…not as the foolish who think treasure will drop from heaven but as those who trust that being in a stewards relationship with God allow for daily life that has the possibility and the promise of that day being all it can and being anointed with all that is necessary.

That's a liberating realization - I can think of the future but I don't have to worry about it! It may be liberating, but it is not easy to come by. The uncertainty of life has almost programmed us to worry!

Living free requires that we make that journey that allows us to live in the “kingdom” as it were, right now…not in some distant future. Living free is possible when we understand that no matter what happens, at any given moment, we are in the presence and the cradle of God’s love. So whether we are walking down the road and life is gone in an instant from a helicopter that falls out of the sky and lands directly upon us, or whether we live to 100 years of age spending half those years in a nursing home…there is no moment that is lived outside of the love of God.

The dance, of course, is to find the courage and the strength and the differentiation to be able to plan and work and be responsible and yet to trust that in the great scheme of things at this very moment, there is nothing that I can do that will make me more loved by God, nothing that will jettison me more completely into the presence of God than I already am.

I’m not being naïve, I realize that is a difficult dance. To calm down, to understand the special relationship that every human has with the divine is a challenge. It may be the ultimate human challenge. But to not engage the challenge…to not ask oneself, “how can I breathe myself into a place of peace and accept the love of the divine that encircles my life?” and to not do that is to live tragically.

The God who cares for the birds and the flowers has already provided for us. Yes, It may appear on paper that it's the company you work for or whoever it is that sends you a check every week or month that provides for your needs. But ultimately that employer or those investments do not hold your life…you are so much more than that. You are held by the divine and anything else is really just situational. God is the one who has already provided.

Perhaps we can all find it in our core to agree with that in our heads, but it is a little harder to affirm it in our hearts - even for ministers, we all share a common cup of life and we all struggle with common dilemmas. That we do share that struggle, should be our encouragement to share with one another, not just the substance of material that we have but the substance of heart that we have been divinely given. To do so is part of the economy of God that has been entrusted to us and it is our reasonable stewardship as sharers in the human condition to so share what is in and within our lives to share.

Which brings us back to something else Jesus said. He said “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth ... but store up treasures in heaven.” If God, and not the bank account or job, is the true source of our provision, then shouldn't that be the place we invest ourselves. I'm not just talking money here. Shouldn't our hearts and lives be invested in experiencing the kingdom of God here and now? It is in that place that freedom can take flight in our lives.

Jesus points out that what is invested in this world will pass away. In this world moths and rust and the whims of the market can take our investments away. But what we invest in “learning to recognize” and “in sharing the realm of the divine” endures for eternity. It is passed to and through generations allowing people to develop the spiritual skill that can help make us truly, and fully human.

When you give to the church you are investing in the tradition of engaging that journey. Don't think of what you pledge as an amount of money you are giving away. Think of it as an investment in furthering the awareness of the divine, of the kingdom if that language works for you.

Sometimes we are a rag-tag bunch of folks who seem to be hunting for direction but, in the church, I believe, we have the ongoing evidence of a community committed to struggling to live out the dynamics of what it means to embrace the pursuit of living free in the presence of the divine.

So let us all, without worry, invest in that pursuit!

Like Jesus said “You can't have two masters - You can't serve God and wealth.” If you serve wealth you will always be worried about what you will eat and what you will drink and what you will wear. But if you invest your life and energy in being at home with the divine…that place of peace…that place of holding resources lightly…that place of sharing what God has shared already with us; in that we can live as freely as the birds and the flowers. It's your choice. Will you invest in God being revealed in you or wealth be accumulated for you?

Amen.

June 1, 2008
Lection Reflection
By Rev. James Farrell

What is the stuff that we right on our minds and hearts? What is the stuff that we hang up on the walls of our houses?

What informs our beings?

Our ancient ancestors turned instruction into physical practice. Those who were committed to Judaism responded to these words in Deuteronomy and the words in Exodus (13:16) which say, “It shall serve as a sign on your hand and as an emblem on your forehead that by strength of hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt.”

So they developed “Frontlets” which were Either of two small leather boxes, each containing strips of parchment inscribed with quotations from the Hebrew Scriptures, one of which is strapped to the forehead and the other to the left arm; traditionally worn by Jewish men during morning worship, except on the Sabbath and holidays.

These small receptacles acted as An amulet or as a reminder of the journey the people had made from Egypt.

By new Testament times the Greek and Latin words phulaktērion and phylactērium, referring to guard's post, or safeguard, gave rise to the word phylactery, to which we find Jesus referring a little later in Matthew’s gospel.

Phylacteries were bound with thongs to the forehead, though some phylacteries were worn on the upper arm so that when a person crossed his arms the Scriptures contained in the phylactery would be close to the heart.

Jesus condemned individuals who called attention to themselves by wearing larger than usual phylacteries (Matt. 23:5).

The lessons today are like so many of the lessons we visit in the bible…when properly balanced they create enough confusion to give us cause for pause.

Taken by themselves they can be used to develop whole theologies; but taken as part of a balanced diet we can be more rounded folks, people who live moderate lives and seek to be an influence for justice, compassion, equity and people who pursuit sustainable plans for living in community with one another.

Good stuff I hope you would agree!

The writer of Deuteronomy was on to good things…if it is worth knowing, if it is worth upholding, keep it close, get it on your head and your heart. Taking that and making it into an object of reminder is not a bad thing either, but using that created object, that is to be a reminder of a spiritual reality and turning that into a show of pomposity runs way past where things should be.

It’s the same reason I am put off by clergy folks who where a huge cross around their neck…what is the message…if the message is really the message of Jesus I will see that message in a life lived not in an object worn.

People are people, we have good days and bad, we have inspirational moments and moments that are clearly not our finest moments and all of those moments get lived out in the community we find ourselves in. We are all in need of the forgiveness of the community but communities are funny…communities will forgive a trucker more quickly than a clergy person so there isn’t a lot of reason to hang a target around your neck unless you are looking to get shot at.

Think about it; it’s that “tallest nail gets hit by the hammer” syndrome. So what’s the balance?

Jesus’ rebuke of those who took pride in wearing large phylacteries as if to say, ‘my prayer box is bigger than yours so I’m more holy than you’ is consistent with the rebuke he offered to those who paraded their outward signs for the praise of the community but for whom Jesus said, the community ought not be in awe or praise “at all.”

That was the end result of a good idea that was offered in early Hebrew times that developed over the centuries to its unfortunate logical human conclusion. They took a good lesson for living and turned it into a religious practice.

The lesson from the gospel, however, upholds the obvious importance of keeping those gems that we encounter in the life of Christ, close to our hearts; they will be the stuff that keeps us from slip sliding away in difficult times. We don’t need to become people who try to pin down religious instruction into some difficult and heartless system of structure…that was never what Jesus was about…to the contrary, “life-affirming faith” is not about ritual but about the freedom to live into a situation the blessing that is already there for us to encounter. Not easy, perhaps; but the only way to move through life’s ups and downs with faultless integrity…and if we can’t aspire to that, what’s the point?

This past week a young woman was among those who died in Calgary in a disturbing and twisted outburst of violence. I was busy with the tasks of the week and hadn’t heard the story on the news so I was surprised when the National Post called me from Toronto to discuss my awareness of and connection with Amber Bowerman, the tenant who was the first one murdered in that multiple murder in Calgary and who lived as a boarder in the basement of the Lall home. Amber Bowerman was the Assistant Publisher of the Alberta views magazine a couple of years back.

A couple of years ago, next week, I quoted Amber in a sermon. She had been telling her story of one person’s not so fine moments, she said,

"When I was 19 years old, I worked as a waitress at a pizzeria and bar. One night, I was working in the lounge by myself; the bartender and other waitress had called in sick. I was already run off my feet when a party of 10 came in and ordered a round of drinks. My boss, who was playing pool with one of the regulars, informed me I'd better "pick up the pace."

Not wanting to upset him, I loaded my small tray with drinks for the table of 10. When I arrived at the table, I dropped the tray, shattering the glasses and soaking the group with beer.

My boss was livid. As I scrambled to clean up the mess and apologize to the customers, he shouted at me, calling me stupid. He told me the cost of the beer and the broken pint glasses would be deducted from my paycheque. Then he turned to the men and said, "She's a useless broad." I snapped. I threw the tray at him, grabbed my jacket and stormed out.

I was lucky. I had no student loan and no family to support. It was easy to walk away. But what would I have done if I'd had children to feed and clothe? There was no one to stand up and defend my rights." (p. 4 May, 2006)

Amber, this past week, found herself without anyone to defend her rights yet again, as a recent marriage separation caused her to live at the Lall home as a boarder turned into a situation that ultimately cost her ‘her life’.

Life throws curve balls, things can change in an instant.

The odds are that it is inevitable that we shall face difficult times in our lives. The feeling can be very unnerving and unsettling. It can feel very unsafe and unpredictable. Yet, when we seek to connect with the holy that seeks to connect with us, when we plant ourselves firmly on that rock, we may trust in our hearts that all will be ultimately well, no matter what we go through.

Ordeals like Amber’s make us doubt that!

If tragedy can strike anyone at any time you might want to embrace the instruction of Job’s comforters who told him to “curse God and die”. But, to live in that space is to live on shifting sands to be sure and to live as one who embraces the integrity and sincerity that Jesus offered and continues to offer “the reflective” is a solid alternative no matter what happens in life. And for that, we need to be thankful!

Amen.

July 6, 2008
Reflection
By Jane Clarke

Those of you who are visiting today may not know that I have been on sabbatical for the past three months. This is my first Sunday back at work. I spent a lot of my time over the three months reading, learning, meditating and most importantly nourishing my soul. I spent most of the month of May in Fernie thanks to Dale and Lenora for their kindness, I stayed at their town house. Fernie is a fabulous place for me to nourish my soul. I was surrounded by majestic mountains, walking paths along a rushing river. Oh yes, I should mention that my one and only grandchild lives in Fernie. She always makes my soul sing and makes me live in the present. I had wonderful visits with my family there.

While there I watched nature wake from its winter rest. There is a bush right outside the kitchen window where I stayed and I watched as the tiny buds grew into leaves. That is always a miracle for me to watch nature spring into action and come alive every year.

What better way is there to relax and rejuvenate than to be wrapped and nurtured in the arms of Mother Nature?

The Scripture reading for today was perfect for what I experienced on my Sabbatical. Jesus offers himself as the source of strength for the disciples and the source of rest from their burdens. Jesus shows us all through scripture how to rest and renew ourselves. He tells us to not become burdened by life. Take time to rest to live in the present. The past is gone and we can’t change it. No matter how much we worry about the future our worry won’t change the outcome. Be present, stay focused, take time to just “BE.” Truly that is what I experience.

While on sabbatical I really did rest and I got rid of some of the “old junk” that has been floating around in my head. It is a wonderful feeling. A new lease on life!

Sometimes we allow our lives to become cluttered with “stuff”. That could be anything from holding on to past memories that cause us to be burdened or maybe we clutter with worries about things that could go wrong. That is one thing that I notice about nature … it has no worries about what if’s. If you watch animals they are a great example.

There is a story about two ducks. They are in a pond together and they get their feathers all ruffled and begin to peck at each other. They fight for a while. Finally, they each go their own way. They flap their wings to get rid of the tension and settle back into the pond going in different directions. They continue on in peace and quiet. They don’t continue squawking and finding other ducks to complain to or to say “did you just see what happened to me? Did you see that bully duck trying to take over the pond?” They just go on with their lives forgetting their fight. We could learn a lot from that couldn’t we?

How often do I go home after being cut off by a driver and tell James my tale of woe? You should have seen what happened to me. I could have been in an accident! I just keep the past alive by telling it over and over. It is past, done, get over it and carry on. Don’t carry the burden put it on the yoke and let it go.

Other ways we clutter our lives is with “Things”.

No one likes moving.

James and I have moved many times in our years of marriage. The first two times, we rented a small u-haul. Since then, we’ve relied on moving companies.

The last time we moved, we resolved to sort our possessions before packing. We would get rid of the unnecessary stuff, and only move the stuff we really wanted.

Ha! Moving day arrived far too soon. We did get rid of some stuff but not everything that we could have parted with.

Ralph Milton recommends moving every five years, whether you need to or not. “A house move,” he suggests, “is to your physical environment what a 15-day silent retreat is to the soul, or one of those hot mineral-spring spas is to your body. You purge the system of all the useless and unnecessary stuff, and hopefully some of the baggage that slows you down.”

He’s only half kidding.

When we do down-size as we are calling it these days it does feel good. I wonder why we collect so much “stuff”?

I find it fairly east to get rid of “things” but I find it harder to clean out my clothes closet. I have some kilts that I just love but I have to lose more than a few pounds to fit into them. Every year I say that I am going to move the buttons over so they will fit. Hopefully there is enough material left to move the buttons!!! If not I guess they may have to go. What are the chances that I will ever be that size again?

When I think about my closet I was thinking it could be the same with my heads. If a concept, an idea, hasn’t been useful in shaping our lives and understanding for the last five years, why should I expect it to apply in the next five?

Why do we keep cluttering up our thought processes with it? Perhaps we need a better mental filing system. I go through my filing cabinet every now and again and shred the old documents that aren’t relevant any longer. I need to do that with some of the old documents in my brain. Jesus is always telling people to leave their past and get on with life. I guess I need to keep reminding myself to do the same.

House moving pushes us to clear out our physical closets and storage rooms. Sometimes we need to clear our mental closets too.

While pondering what yoke could ease our burdens I thought of all the people who are here to help us. We have friends, family members, counselors who listen to us and help us sort things out. We just need to remember to ask for help. Maybe I need to ask someone to help me with my clothes. It is always easier to throw out someone else’s “stuff” isn’t it?

Our congregation has a knitting group and we make prayer shawls for those who are struggling, so that whenever a person wraps the shawl around them, they feel a bit of warmth from this church community.

There is something special about wrapping a warm prayer of compassion around your shoulders that says, “You’re not alone. We will carry our burdens together.”

We have learned from Christ’s leading. It is easier to carry on the work of serving with a yoke that does not weary and a rest that renews. In what ways does this strengthen us to serve?

Where do we find sacred rest?

How are we able to share the burdens of other disciples and lead them to rest?

As you are down-sizing or cleaning out your closets or getting ready for a move. Think of the possible clutter in your thoughts that may be causing you to be tired and heavy laden. Challenge yourself to get rid of those pesky items. Choose someone or something that can make the journey a little easier.

Jesus beckons all in the community of disciples to seek moments of sacred rest. When we labour without recognizing Christ among others and even within us, we may overlook the peace that is promised to us. Let us trust that we may know wholeness and peace.

Amen.

July 13, 2008
Reflection for the Day
By Rev. James Farrell

Last week Jane was speaking about the "cleaning out" that needs to happen in life…even the cleaning out of old ideas that don't serve us well. Dispelling the old is something on the minds of many people. Some folks from a congregation we served in Manitoba dropped by recently and they got to talking about "the fun" and I say "fun" with tongue in cheek, they have been having trying to work with an aged parent as they deal with the stuff that needs to be removed from the home. It is a universal reality, it seems, that people who lived through the dirty thirties find it difficult to part with the simplest and most unnecessary of items. Broken coffee makers that are cheaper to replace than to repair came to mind as they were chatting with us.

Times change…people who live through those times find change a little more difficult to deal with. That's not a bad thing, it just is what it is. For those who are more willing to move with change, however, the journey alongside folks for whom change is difficult, can make for a bumpy road for sure.

I remember hearing many years ago a message about the parable of the sower that focused on a very imperialistic understanding of Christianity. The seeds of God are meant for certain folks and if you are not one of them, the devil with stop you from sharing in that growth and harvest. Too bad, so sad…was really the tone of that message. You're in or you're out, that's it!

So often, the view that we have of the holy is really a look at what things would look like if we were the 'holy one.' Vengeance may belong to the God of your understanding and if you exchanged thrones you might choose to exercise that vengeance too. Not the only view of the divine, however.

Thankfully, over the years, the church has developed sensitivity toward persons and perspectives that don't share that sentiment. And most folks, I think, would agree, that is a very good thing.

This fall, the keynote speaker at the Banff men's weekend, an event that has been running more than 50 years, is actually a Muslim, Dr. Amir Hussain. We have come a long way and we are a better church and more in tune with the spirit of the divine when we embrace a renunciation of absolute and dogmatic claims of knowledge and Christian privilege and, instead, choose to focus on life's ordinary experiences of what makes life sublime as a way to encounter the holy. Doing that, automatically, leads to greater tolerance — and openness to the spiritual riches of other traditions.

It is this emerging understanding that opens the path to dialogue with folks like Dr. Hussain.

Bishop Spong has it right when he says, "Human beings can discuss our God experience, but that does not equip us to discuss who God is. When Hindus, Buddhists, Moslems, Jews and Christians meet together, they cannot debate the nature of God, since none of them is privy to God's true nature. All they can do is to debate the validity of their varied human experiences and the conclusions to which they have arrived based on that experience.

They can wonder whether their experiences of God are real or are delusional but that is as far as the human mind can go. If we realized just that, then interfaith disagreements would not be about who God is, but about how each believes he or she has experienced God. That would make for a radically different conversation. It would be more humble and less arrogant, more a search for truth than the claim of already possessing it.[Spong adds] I yearn for that level of honesty."

With the middle east a powder keg again this week with Iran testing missiles and Israel ever at the ready to challenge every possible threat, the seeds of calm of which Spong speaks make a lot of sense.

"Every change in thinking involves the death of a previous way of thinking and human beings do not do well in the dying — even when death turns out to be the doorway to resurrection." John Shelby Spong.

The seeds that are continually sown before us, can germinate into new options for life and blessing and sharing diversity and hope that are peace making for everyone. The parable of the sower, has offered to many, the promise of new life and has also spoken to some people of the curse of unworthiness. Your understanding, will be shaped by your perspective. The light of the divine is intended for all people …living outside that light is not something we are cursed with but something we choose to do with all of the little and the big choices we make in life.

How we choose to see those seeds of blessing…releasing from the hand of God does not need to be a stagnant view…we can choose to allow that vision to evolve and, I think, we are more faithful to the endless call of the divine when we do allow our vision to evolve. That change in us honours the gift of life.

Tim Taylor tells the story of walking his dog and discovering on the walk a bird rustling in the under brush of a neighbours shrub.

He says, "When I got closer, I realized the bird was trapped behind some black netting that the neighbour had strung over his cedar hedge, to protect it from the deer. Gardening books assure me that deer don't like cedars. That may be true of cedar trees, but certainly not of cedar hedges. Around our area, unprotected hedges all have an hourglass shape—nibbled back almost to the trunk near the ground, filling out only above head height.

To protect their precious hedges, people attempt various measures. Some string up electric fences. Others hide their hedges behind stucco wire. Some lay chicken wire on the ground, hoping that the deer will dislike the feel of it underfoot. Others spray their hedges with smelly chemicals.

This particular neighbour had chosen to wrap his hedge in black nylon netting—almost invisible to the eye.

And this little sparrow had somehow flown in behind the netting, and couldn't get out.

Since human action had created this problem, I didn't think I was interfering with nature by reaching in under the netting, grabbing the bird, and setting it free. It panicked at first. Then as my hand closed around it, it gave up struggling.

I pulled it out and tossed it into the air. Its little wings opened. It flew away.

As I walked on, I wondered how it would relate this story to its friends on a bird feeder somewhere.

"It was wonderful! I was trapped by invisible forces. I couldn't fly. I thought I would die. And this hand, this gigantic hand, reached in and gently held me, and set me free. It was the most amazing experience of my life."

Or, perhaps...

"It was awful. I was trapped by an invisible demon. I couldn't fly. I thought I would die. And then this hand, this gigantic hand, grabbed me and squeezed me and hurled me into the air. If I hadn't spread my wings, I would have crashed. It was the most terrifying experience of my life."

Same story; different interpretation.

I am not one who believes that God reaches down with a gigantic hand to pluck us out of our troubles when things go wrong. If that happened, God would surely not have let our friend Carolynn die last Sunday morning, writhing in pain from the cancer that had started in her kidneys and liver and spread to her bones.

But I do believe that each of us interprets each bit of evidence of God's presence in our lives differently. Some treat it as punishment, some as salvation. Some dread it, some welcome it.

The experience may be the same—but the meaning we derive depends on the way we describe it.

Just like that sparrow.

Amen.

June 29, 2008
Reward, What Reward?
By Rev. James Farrell

Do you believe in a God of punishment and reward?

If you do, what causes you to think that?

Have you had an experience that has left you feeling either punished or rewarded?

Do you believe genuine punishment and reward exist only in the life to be, or in this life as well?

What if God truly is perfect love…not a love that needs to reward or punish but a love that simply envelops life with a cocoon of unconditional love that is not agenda driven?

If you just engaged that thought, do you find yourself feeling cheated as you think about that God description? Maybe you feel liberated?

I ask these questions because we have all been steeped in the metaphors of punishment and reward. Work hard and you will get a good job…a good job will give you a lot of money which will most certainly make you happy as you acquire everything that money can give you…and isn't that the message that the world wants you to live with?

But, just a minute, aren't we 'church-folk' much less plastic than that…much more real? More grounded?

Haven't we been molded to think less in terms of the material and more in terms of a life that affirms positive social and spiritual values? So, perhaps we have been molded to think, "do the right thing and great things will come of it"…isn't that a message that you coddle in your thinking? It certainly is for many people.

I am not poking my finger in the eye of that kind of thinking…I don't want you to think that I'm saying, don't do the right thing because it really doesn't matter anyway…but I am asking about motivation…what motivates you…if you find yourself wanting to do the right thing, are you able to entertain those thoughts for their own purpose…not for any sense of reward, present or future?

Religion that has as its focus a system of rewards and punishment is genuinely flawed. That focus has been used for control for thousands of years…that control has often held people hostage and prevented the natural and lighthearted connection with the holy that embraces and edifies life, from taking root and flourishing.

At our best, we reject that archaic and prolific message and at our worst fall victim to it. Can we really move beyond that message of coercion and control?

Is it at all possible to move beyond that message?

Society might need such systems to keep people in line and to keep chaos from reigning, but, life-giving religion—the principles that propel us through life—should be founded on something more than a legal system. Those in tune with the holy—the heart of God as we experience God—have come away being able to say, "God's ways are not the ways of people." If that is true, and I believe it is, certainly it is true in the area of reward and punishment as well.

Most of our religious history is a history of the human mind clinging to a notion of reward and punishment as a way to get through the day. Sure that message is one of control but there is no denying a certain comfort in such a system. Comfort is important to us. Peace of mind and peace of heart and whatever it takes to get us there are seen as worthy pursuits.

The fact is that most of what we collect as metaphor and turn into practice has at its base, a focus on human comfort, comfort of the mind, body and spirit.

We spend a lot of time doing what we can to help us move through life with as much comfort as possible. And, to be sure, it is terrifying to think that there may not be predictable consequences of good and evil actions in this life or the life to come.

If Matthew heard Jesus properly, what are the rewards of a prophet or a righteous person?

What is it to gift someone in the name of a disciple? How we answer that has a lot to do with what Christian messages we have heard, read or otherwise encountered through film, music, or other programming.

But if any reward, per se, exists, I believe it exists in the moment. Someone shares something prophetic with you and you give them ear…and, it is finished…the action is complete…how that will shape you in the future as that experience messages your being is still to be determined, but the moments you shared with that person stand on their own.

If you give a cup of water to anyone, the action of that gift and your presence to that moment is its own gift back to you. Full stop!

We do what we can, because, simply put, it is what we do as those who have sensed a higher calling and a more important message than Madison Avenue Advertising agents can frame for us.

People who understand that are sincerely the most content people.

I see it here, in this church, all the time…people who give of their time and energy just because they can, and that is who they are and they are content!

As I write this, five human feet have washed ashore in B.C. along with one hoax that was not human tissue but animal matter used as a prank….sick stuff all around and the stuff of novelists I'm sure you would agree …and it is the stuff that has captured the attention of the world. If it is the work of some gang retribution or turf war, our minds demand some kind of justice…end the carnage! Incarcerate the villains! Please!

The laws that we live with have evolved from the Judeo-Christian concept of reward and punishment and they have helped us shape our thinking on all kinds of stuff. These laws let us sleep at night. Nothing wrong with that…law helps us organize the ways that we will deal with one another in a society. We need that and we need the people that help us do that.

Laws of spirit, are not a rehash of laws of the land…our ancestors grabbed onto the 10 commandments as principles that make life in community livable…and living in community is something we all need to do!

But what is "of the spirit" should not get cemented in our minds in such a way that the real freedom of spirit becomes confined by law. Clearly Jesus spoke against this very thing.

Our eastern neighbours in the global village—those who have grown up in parts of the world that have allowed them to swing with spiritual nuance—understand that freedom better than we who have taken our social laws and morphed them into spiritual realities. Logical, sure, life-giving, not necessarily so.

The Abraham story…is one of the great biblical stories—the metaphor of giving to God what really matters—is a foundational story for Christians with its obvious connection to the Jesus story of the later testament and its central place in the lives of our Jewish and Muslim sisters and brothers! It is one of the foundational stories of all three faiths.

Being Christian doesn't mean following blindly a set of rules; Christianity depends on the character of people's lives. It depends on commitment in the face of challenge…seeking to do the right thing when discerning the right thing is itself problematic. The Gospel has no meaning unless it can be lived out and embodied in people's lives. And what that looks like is constantly a place of re-evaluation.

It is not easy, but it is character building and community sustaining.

Contentment & fulfillment follows in that faithfulness. Too often we confuse the quest for Madison Avenue's "happiness" for our real longing for contentment and fulfillment.

What we do when we educate kids to just be happy is to absolutely ruin them. Parents should say to their kids, "What you want out of life is not happiness but to be a part of a worthy adventure. You want to have something worth dying for." It's awful when all we have to live for is ourselves; that's not what the Gospel reveals to us.

The message invites us along the adventure that humans have been made part of through our awareness of God's love that we experience in the life of Jesus, and through the mission and outreach of the church.

Along that journey, we find joyful contentment. I use the language of joy because 'happiness' is just too pale to describe the adventure.

Christianity is the proclamation that our experience of God is a gift that transforms our lives in such a way that we are constantly being trained to want the right things rightly.

Walking down that road is its own reward!

July 20, 2008
Reflection for the Day
By Rev. James Farrell

Jesus used to like to teach in parables. Sometimes those parables were hard to understand. So one of the disciples wondered, “Why do some people get it and some don't.”

Rhianna Lee McClaren from Arvada, California, writes her question on an online forum:

She says, “How do you believe there is an actual God rather than just principles by which the universe operates? I feel like everyone has the equivalent of a radio receiver in their brain and almost everyone can at least get static on the "God channel" for lack of a better analogy. They at least know there is really something there because they can hear the static or maybe even hear a bar or two of music once in a while.

Other people have really good reception and can actually tune into the God channel and have a dynamic experience. I, however, don't even get static. All my life people have been telling me that I can use the radio receiver in my brain to listen to someone far away and hear the music of life. But because I don't even get static, I have no way of knowing whether they are lying to me and just want to control my actions, or whether they are delusional and truly believe there is something there even though there isn't, or whether there really is something there but my tuner/receiver isn't sensitive enough to pick it up.

I can tune in mathematics, physics, chemistry; all these things I can believe in even when I don't understand all the math behind the physics. But I can't tune in "God." My question is, "How do I do that? How do I get any kind of reception?"

I don’t think that Rhianna is unusual…I think her experience in pretty common place. Certainly it was for the disciples. That she is asking the question tells me that she is seeking to tune-in in a way that leaves her feeling connected.

We can do lots of stuff that is important and not really connect to it. Part of our routines of living actually isolate us from the sacred encounter that we would all like to share in.

Harry, an emergency physician, tells this story. One evening on his shift in a busy emergency room, a woman was brought in about to give birth. The nurses rapidly wheeled her into a room and paged him immediately,. He had been in the room next door. As he entered, they rushed out past him to call her obstetrician. One look and Harry realized that their call was probably too late. If her obstetrician wasn’t already somewhere in the building, Harry was going to get to deliver this baby himself. He likes delivering babies, and he was pleased. The nurses had returned and were hastily opening the deliver packs. The woman’s husband had also arrived and the nurses seated him by his wife’s head. They stood on either side of Harry, supporting her legs. The baby was born almost immediately.

While the little girl was still attached to her mother, Harry laid her along his left forearm. Holding the back of her head in his left hand, he took a suction bulb in his right and began to clear her mouth and nose of mucus. Suddenly, the baby opened her eyes and looked directly at him. In that moment, Harry stepped past his technical role and realized a very simple thing; that he was the first human being this baby gift had ever seen. He felt his heart go out to her in welcome from all people everywhere and tears came to his eyes.

Harry has delivered hundreds of babies. He has always enjoyed the challenges of delivery, the excitement of making rapid decisions and feeling his own competency, but he says that he had never let himself experience the meaning of what he was doing before. He feels that in a certain sense this was the first baby that he had ever delivered. He says that in the past he would have been so preoccupied with the technical aspects of the deliver, assessing and responding to needs and dangers, that he doubts he would have noticed the baby open her eyes or have registered what her look meant. He would have been there as a physician, but not as a human being. It was possible, now to be both. He wonder how many other such moments of connection he has missed. He suspects there may have been many. (Kitchen Table Wisdom, pp. 159-160).

How one talks of God is always culturally conditioned. No one has seen God, and the deity about whom most of us speak is our own creation. Religious systems try to pretend that God has revealed God to them, but when they describe that God, it is clearly a God in their own image.

In the culture of Jesus’ day the understanding of the holy was shaped by the prophets and teachers of the law and the history and myth of the people of Israel. Connecting was about distilling these messages into something that made sense for their time. It was the hope behind the disciple’s question. “Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.”

So Jesus explained the parable. The Messiah sows the good seed of the kingdom and some people believe and become followers of God. But the Devil sows lies that like weeds infest some people’s hearts.

What are the weeds that infest our heart’s? What do we choose to believe that prevents us from being all that we can be? What are the lies that keep us from seeing the eternal holy in the life of another?

The early Christians faced many hardships. The world around them threatened to choke them out. From where they sat, the big question was, “How long could God allow this to go on? Why didn't God take out those evil people that persecuted them?”

Ever felt that way. “Oh God, take from me this weight, this anchor from my heart.”

This parable answers their question in first century language. God has a purpose allowing the wickedness to continue to exist. But the parable also contains words of hope they long to hear.

Human understanding has marched on…first century responses are not literal answers to 21st century problems. Today’s people do not live in a time warp. They listen to television, read newspapers and use the Internet. So the world crowds in upon them daily. If the church is a ghetto espousing yesterday's certainty, then it will die, [Jss] but if the church is a place that allows people to engage the meaningful questions without throwing in their faces platitudes and trite answers that actually serve to keep people from the holy…if the church engages the real stuff, without asking people to believe the unbelievable and the unhelpful than its relevancy can do nothing but stand as a beacon pointing to a wholesome future.

[Where is God?]

There was a little fish who swam up to his mother one day and said, “Mom, what is this water that I hear so much about?” laughing, she responded, “You silly little fish. Why, it’s around you and within you and gives you life. Just swim to the top of the pond and lie there for a while; then you will find out what water is.”

Another time there was a fawn who walked up to her mother and asked, “Mommy, what is this air that I hear so much about?” smiling, she answered, “you silly little deer. Why, air is within you and around you. Air gives you life. If you want to know what air is, stick your head in the stream and you’ll find out.”

Finally, there was a certain young man who was beginning awareness of his spiritual journey. After having difficulty knowing where to turn, he asked a holy woman, “what is this God I hear so much about?”… (Paul Wheaton in Stories and Parables for Preachers and Teachers (Paulist Press, 1986)

Amen.

September 17, 2008
Why Church?
By Jane Clarke

The story of the Red Sea makes me think of the story from the Talmud, in which the angels ask God, “Why are you crying?” and God responds, “Because the Egyptians were my children too.”

I love that story that the Jewish people tell because I don’t believe in a warrior God. Any stories in the bible where there are winners and losers find God on the side of the winners. I like the image of God crying for the losers. A caring compassionate God.

God in the Hebrew scriptures was seen as a warrior. As I thought about this image of God as warrior I wondered what kind of warrior God could be? Stories are always written by the winners of a battle so of course they would see God as a good warrior on their side. Maybe instead of seeing God as warrior we could see God as protector.

When I hear the story from the Talmud of God crying it takes on a whole different light for me. Remembering that in the Hebrew scriptures God was seen as having human qualities and walking with the people. Unlike the in the Christian Scriptures where the Divine is seen as being part of us our soul or our spirit. Working within us not outside us. The working of the Divine within helps us to learn to be open to a loving way to live and react to the warriors around us.

I connect with the Matthew reading which talks about forgiveness. When we are attacked, physically or verbally we want to hit back and protect ourselves, but maybe the gospel isn’t about keeping ourselves protected.

Maybe forgiveness is like going into a similar kind of sea as the Israelites walked in – a sea of all those overwhelming fears of what will happen if we forgive, if we reach out to those who are different, if we really open our hearts in our churches. Maybe the dry land is what we discover when we forgive and allow ourselves to listen to the Holy within through all those fears.

Think of the trust needed for that.

Every Sunday we say the Lord’s Prayer. We say “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us…?” While we may forgive someone we may also have to go to someone and ask for their forgiveness. It works both ways. It isn’t always easy to go to someone and say that you are sorry and talk about the transgression. The onus is on us to ask for forgiveness as well as to give forgiveness. In the parable today one person is forgiven but then turns around and is unforgiving himself.

In my experience, there is an essential and mysterious ingredient to forgiveness that comes only from a Divine source. We can have the desire to forgive someone, but it remains unplanted in our souls until we awaken the Holy within. There is no mistaking the moment when it all comes together and a remarkable peace washes over as forgiveness flows from a divinely touched source within.

Today we have covenanted again for this coming year to uphold one another on our journeys. We are called to be the Body of Christ. What does that mean? What does it mean to be a community of faith?

Part of the covenant words we prayed today were that we rededicate ourselves to be the church. What does it mean to be the church?

Why do we come to church? Some people come every week others come when they are able. What is it that makes us want to join together for an hour on Sunday mornings?

For me it is the sense of community that we share. To be with like minded people and be able to discuss the journey that we are on is what draws me here. Of course it’s also my job to be here isn’t it? The question for me then would be … if this was not my job why would I want to be here?

I love to have conversations about what others believe. I love to ask questions that don’t necessarily have answers or at least not easy answers. I love to be challenged about what I believe and why I believe what I do. I love to challenge others to ask questions about their faith. That is part of what would draw me to church.

For some of us it is because we are far from our families so this community becomes our family. The community is what we rely on if we are going through a difficult time or if we are sick. We depend on this community for prayers and support. We depend on this community to bring us a meal if we are unable to look after ourselves or our family. This community may be the only place where we have friends.

So then what do the scriptures that we heard today have to do with our church family? Maybe we are trying to find liberation from something that is enslaving us as the Israelites were. Maybe we as a community need to provide the parting of the sea as an escape route. We may need this to be the safe place to come to be listened to. This may be the safe place to be loved. This may be the place where we feel safe enough to love.

The Matthew parable is about forgiveness. Are we a forgiving people? or do we hold a grudge. Do we judge others? Do we ask for forgiveness if we have be mean or rude or hurtful? Are we quick to forgive when someone apologizes for hurting us? How many times is seventy times seven? I believe that seventy times seven is as many times as we need to forgive.

In the nucleus of a family there are times when things are not always calm. I’m sure that there must be times when a mother, father, sister, brother, uncle, aunt, cousin, daughter or son has caused some upset. So then, do we just write that person off or never visit them or speak to them again? Not usually. We try and work things out. We communicate and try and find some kind of reconciliation don’t we?

To me, that is being the church. This is where we learn to do that. Some people think that because we are a church that everything should be wonderful all the time and there are never any conflicts. I like to think of the church as a type of hospital where we come to find healing. We aren’t a group of perfect people who join together every Sunday to get a shot of good news to keep us perfect through the rest of the week. At least that’s not my experience of any church.

There will be times when we will experience some conflict with one person or another. It is impossible to get along with everyone all the time but hopefully we can be gracious enough to mean what we say when we pray the Lord’s prayer and forgive others as we are forgiven.

In the resource from Ralph Milton this week he had this story. It was about a man from the John Howard society. The John Howard Society is a group that helps men who have come out of prison return to a normal kind of life. This man told Ralph about a man who had been an accountant with a large firm, and had embezzled a substantial sum of money. He was caught, convicted, and jailed.

On his release, a friend took him to church and introduced him to some of the people there. He made no secret of the fact that he had just come out of prison, but he really wanted to put his life together again. He volunteered to help out with anything that needed doing, thinking they would ask him to mow the lawn or some such thing.

They asked him to be treasurer of the church!

“That was the turning point in my life,” he said. “Their act of trust showed me the heart of God.”

For me that is a wonderful example of community of what church should be about. It’s about helping one another. It’s about trust and not judgment.

For some it’s in the “other” times that they experience what church really is. Maybe it is in the experience of meetings, or women’s or men’s groups that meet other than on Sunday. We have other opportunities within our church to build community. For instance we have the knitting group where we have wonderful theological discussions or we talk about life, about our joys and sorrows.. The times that we have fund raisers and people get to know one another on a deeper level is another aspect of why we come to church. This summer when all the renovations were happening was a time of family working together.

I ask you again. What is church for you? Why do you come? Do you have other reasons that weren’t mentioned? Everyone is here for a reason. We are all part of the community all part of the family. Are we ready to forgive and be forgiven? I hope so. That is how we are going to learn to live in peace and harmony.

The Qur’an states “It is the servants of the all-merciful Holy who go about the earth in modesty and who answer “Peace” when accosted by those who talk to them rudely.

So as we recovenant together this year; to learn from one another, to pray, sing, break bread, care for one another, volunteer our time, teach our children, support one another, welcome the stranger, and renew our faith let us be the church!

Amen.

October 19, 2008
Reflection
By Jane Clarke

An eight-year-old arrived home from Sunday school. “What did you learn today?” mother asked.

“Well, our teacher told us about when God sent Moses behind the enemy lines to rescue the Israelites from the Egyptians. He called for the engineers to build a pontoon bridge. After the Israelites had crossed, he saw the Egyptians coming after them, so he radioed for air support and had the bombers blow it up.”

Mother was aghast. “Is that really what the teacher said?”

“No,” said the child. “But you wouldn’t believe the story she told in a zillion years!”

Today’s reading from the Hebrew Scriptures in not about the parting of the Red Sea but for a person reading this story about Moses seeing God for the first time it may seem unbelievable as well.

When reading the Hebrew Scriptures it is important to remember that they were writing about a God who walked with them. God was seen as “a being” someone who was “out there”. Not an indwelling Holy Presence.

I can’t imagine, as Moses was, being killed for seeing the face of God.

In Exodus, there’s the distinction of finding favor, which seemed to be translated as being known by God. That makes me think about our actions. If somebody saw us on the street, would the way that we interact with others or whatever we do, say anything about our faith? Does it make any difference to our behavior whether or not we are Christians?

If we, who claim to be Christians, were branded with some kind tattoo that identified us as Christians, would we behave in a different way? Are we any different than the culture in which we live?

Ought the way we behave be the same always no matter what religion or faith we belong? If we listen to the Divine within each of us then we really know how to treat others and ourselves and to live in peace and harmony with all creation. Our actions will live out in the way we believe.

Matthew ties in with this because it’s really asking, “Do you play along with the culture or do you not? What it means to be “chosen” or “favored” by God is an issue here too. The Israelites believed that to be “favored” by God meant that they were better than others. But God’s favor doesn’t mean we are “better”, but that we have greater responsibility because we have awakened this sense of Holy presence within us.

Not one of us is without this presence because we were born with it. Whether we chose to recognize or listen to that presence is our choice.

The parables are interesting. Jesus is so good at answering questions. Unlike the parables of the previous weeks, you don’t have to have anything explained to get this story.

Jesus is being set up. The Pharisees pose a question to which they think there is no “safe” answer for Jesus: Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor or not? If Jesus says no to paying taxes, the Herodians (whom the Pharisees have brought along) will go to the authorities accusing Jesus of anti-government activity. If he says “yes” to the tax, Jesus will lose standing with the people, who hated the economic burden Roman taxes represented, and who also believed that true tribute belonged only to God.

With his response “Give to the Emperor the things that are the Emporer’s, and to God the things that are God’s”, Jesus extricates himself nicely.

There now that settles things nicely doesn’t it? Or does it? What does that mean for us today? What do we give to the government? We give to them what they tell us don’t we? Well, we are supposed to.

What then are we supposed to give God? I don’t believe Jesus is talking about how much money we give. I believe Jesus is talking about how we live our lives. We have the best example in Jesus as to how he lived his life and therefore we follow that example. Jesus loved himself so then he could truly love others. That’s what it’s all about. If we don’t love who we are then how can we possibly truly love others.

We have all been born with our souls that know exactly how we are to live our lives. Our souls remember where we have come from. Maybe we have forgotten that everything we need to know is inside us. Unfortunately, along with our souls comes our egos and there in lies the rub.

When we listen to our egos it usually doesn’t bring us peace and joy but when we listen to that which is deep within us, our higher self, the Divine within, it does bring us peace and joy. It also brings us love.

Our knowledge of what we are doing everyday puts on our shoulders the responsibility to make good choices, and to do our best to see that the world becomes a better place. What we do changes the world, and this is no small thing. In fact, it cuts to the heart of everything. Those who carry this knowledge are required to live and work out of it.

Regardless of the specific vision of God we hold, we have been given life and we are now responsible for giving life. Each of us has been gifted with life itself, and through life the opportunity to shape and reshape the world. In our hands lies the power to create or destroy, to build up or tear down, to enhance or detract. To accept the gift of life is to accept the responsibility of creating, so that future generations may know life, and know it as gift.

This means that our living and what we do must give life to the world. Responsible living takes the stuff of our existence and shapes it to produce a new world where all creatures can live, grow, reproduce, experiment, and create with greater freedom and better direction than they could before our work. Life after our actions should have new potential, new vibrancy, new hope, and new opportunity. We should be able, at the end of the day say, “It is good.”

This is a call to action that demands the application of the best of our ability, a lifelong commitment to learning and acting on what we have learned. It is up to us to create the world we and future generations will want to live in.

This responsibility encompasses not only the goal toward which we work, but also the way we journey.

How do we make this journey? I know for sure we don’t make it alone! There are many who journey along with us and many to help us.

This responsibility encompasses not only the goal toward which we work, the destination toward which we journey, but also the way we journey. There are many ways of traveling, and not all of them are consistent with the destination. Our way of moving toward life must itself be lively.

Since our journey is toward life, it must be marked by life. We must proceed joyfully, celebrating whenever a celebration is appropriate. We must proceed cooperatively, so that others may join us. We must proceed hopefully, so that no one gives up. And we must proceed proactively so that the path is marked with new live. The way of our journey lends much to its eventual outcome.

When I set out to climb a mountain, I must take pleasure in the climbing and celebrate the view along the way. Failure to do so leads to a grimness of spirit which will haunt the path, no matter how accomplished a “climber” I may be. It also leads to isolation. I am unlikely to find too many companions to join me if I proceed only by grim determination. If we wish to climb with others, we must climb in such a way as to use every step and every handhold as a new opportunity to enjoy, celebrate, and learn. To see each other as gifts along the way. When we look at each other what do we see?

Do we see the face of God? Or are we afraid of what will happen to us if we allow that. And if we do see the face of God when would that be? There is a song from Les Mis and one of the lines in it says. “To love another person is to see the face of God.” So then when we look in the mirror or look into the eyes of another person, that is when we will see the face of God.

Let us all climb that mountain with joy and enthusiasm and allow others to join us on this journey we call life.

 Amen.

October 26, 2008
Reflection: “Silencing History?”
Rev. James Farrell

John Elbridge Hines, opened his sermons regularly with the prayer: “And when we would make much of that which cannot matter much to thee, forgive us.” That prayer might be appropriate in this situation. Reviewing church history is always a bit of a gamble as is the review of any history because we review with our biases and we all have different biases. History gives us voice. It should not silence us!

Moses died and was buried…interesting he was buried by God…but that’s another story.

So, dead and buried, but his influence continues…it continues for Jews, Muslims and Christians…an influential guy to be sure. Persons of historical faith often have influence that lasts well past their years on earth.

It’s “reformation Sunday” so we speak about those who have gone before and those who challenged the faith assumptions of their day to move faith matters beyond where they had been before…

As those whose faith tradition descends most predominantly from the “Reformed tradition” we often, at this time of the year, look back to the influences of the personalities who shaped that movement: Luther, John Knox, Philipp Melanchthon and many others took a look at what was happening in their day and sought change.

Clearly, in the sixteenth century, people were being mistreated by the church and so out of that mistreatment grew a need to revisit issues of the faith and to invite the faith community to move into a new area of care and faith formation or ‘reformation’.

That same ‘willingness to challenge’ early reformers engaged to usher in change, was later employed by other people of faith who wanted to take scripture to new heights of literalism. Over the centuries, many things entered the faith that were to assure “the faithful” of specialness in the sight and heart of God…protection and favouritism and God’s special anointing for some.

As these assumptions became the norm for groups, further along the path of “reform”, that same specialness and “holy welcome” morphed into greater division between groups and disrespect set in between denominations whose views of scripture differed from one another…after all, people will be people.

If reform tells us anything, it is that we need to be very careful about our assumptions.

What we believe, informs our responses to one another and we use our religious assumptions to inform and transform our view of the world.

Let me share an example with you that arises from the looming election of our neighbours to the south.

The American press is much better at uncovering the foundational underpinnings of its candidates. I have no real idea about what faith matters inform our Prime Minister’s assumptions but, thanks to the American press, Sarah Palin’s faith stance becomes a matter of record.

For example:

As mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, Palin attended the Assemblies of God church; in Juneau, as governor, she attends the Juneau Christian Centre. Both churches stress the Second Coming. They believe that when things get bad enough here on earth, Christ will return for the final battle against evil.

Palin supports teaching Creationism in schools.

Palin believes in The Rapture, a claim that God’s faithful will be lifted up from earth to join God in glory. Tim LaHaye’s “Left Behind” series of books describes in lip-smacking detail the torments of those left behind. The Rapture was pretty much unknown until a century ago, when it was popularized by John Nelson Darby of the Plymouth Brethren.

Ultimately, Palin believes that God is in command of everything.

Now, some people promote these factoids as evidence of Palin’s fitness for the White House.

I take the opposite view.

These apparently superficial facts tell me that Sarah Palin will not do anything about climate change. If God’s in charge, global warming must be part of God’s intentions. Any attempt to reduce warming would be to oppose God.

The same with medicare and mortgages—God must have pre-ordained that some should suffer.

She is unlikely to take expert advice. She would rather trust the wisdom of a technologically primitive civilization 3,000 years ago than today’s best scientific wisdom.

She will not make every effort to avert nuclear war. If Christ’s return depends on apocalyptic chaos, then a nuclear conflagration simply hastens the Second Coming. What could be wrong with that?

Besides, if the worst comes to the worst, she won’t be here anyway. She and all God’s favoured few will be whisked away. Anyone left behind must be a sinner condemned by God to eternal misery.

And these dangerous convictions could, by a crescendo of calamities, belong to the world’s most powerful person?

God help us!

Those insights were shared by James Taylor in his online column of two weeks ago. (Sun. Oct. 12, 2008 Sharp Edges column)

The same freedom of the press, the printing press, that fuelled the sharing of ideas that resulted in the spread of the reformation of the 16th century continues to fuel ongoing reform in the hearts and minds of the faithful today. That’s a good thing…and that’s a scary thing…religion has always been such.

Writers like Eckhart Tolle, whose books, teachings, and life have had the push of Oprah to spread their fame, champion a new perspective on faith and life. A perspective that clearly upholds that we are all in this together…we all share in the heart of God equally. None are ‘more special’ and ‘blessing’ is a universal human expression of the holy. To that, I say, Amen.

“I get my back up when individuals or institutions, with the best of intentions, establish rules and regulations that attempt to control the creative experiment of daily living. You can’t write music that way. You can’t write stories that way. I don’t believe you can live that way, either.” JT Oct 15th

“I don’t care what label-group someone belongs to; I want to know how they perceive their relationship to God, and how they perceive God’s relationship to the world around us. Is it a loving relationship? A punitive and judgemental relationship? Does God care about whales and algae? Or is it only humans—and indeed a very few humans—whom God cares about?” JT Oct 19, 2008

“Wendell Watters, a retired Professor of Psychiatry from McMaster University, (Hamilton, Ontario), now living in Penticton, wrote “Just not talking about religion is hardly a guarantee that religion is not shaping views about a lot of issues.”” Oct 19th 08 column of JT

I believe that is true of us all.

A person who has no faith in anything beyond what they can see is likely to be a greater care-giver of the earth than someone who sees everything cradled in the hands of God.

Being “reformation Sunday” and we are all those shaped by the reformed tradition, it is probably a good time to rethink our religious process, at least how the sermon, message, reflection or meditation experienced on Sundays nurtures our understandings.

I hope it is not as it was more than 400 years ago prior to the movement we call “the reformation”. In those days, the church was the voice that told you what to believe regarding science, faith, afterlife, finance etc…it was simply ‘the’ voice to be listened to.

Some of you who are used to giving the church a gender, like a ship, and therefore, might think of her as ‘she who must be obeyed’ a powerful mistress indeed.

But if anything has come down through those many years of interacting with the best part of reform, it is that we have the ability ‘right now’ to reason for ourselves—to use the God-given brains and hearts that seem to separate we humans from many other animals—to actually think about what we hear and share in music, spoken word, prayer and liturgy to determine if it informs our beings in special ways… ways that help us align our own ways with our understanding of The Way of Jesus.

When you listen to a sermon, use your facilities to go where the sermon may take you. It is often in that little deviating journey that the spirit is known…that God is revealed.

A friend shared this story with me and I share it with you, my friends.

“Years ago I was the district manager for Southern Saskatchewan, our vice president from Vancouver was well known for long winded discussions. At one meeting (unfortunately I wasn't there) after one of his lengthy addresses he asked my colleague for British Columbia what his thoughts were on the topic he just finished.

My counterpart for Northern Saskatchewan realized a question was coming so listened intently to the BC answer which he found as ambiguous as the original question, and sure enough, Dave, the VP, said: “Well, Doug what about you!” To which he replied “I was fishing!!”. What!!!! Dave responded... and Doug reiterated ... “I was fishing, I wasn't paying attention ...” Frustrated, our VP turned to the manager for Manitoba.... “Well Larry, what about you?”

“I was in the boat with Doug” was all he said.

If your mind is taken to some place of contemplation as a result of something you hear in a sermon, don’t worry about it, enjoy the float…no doubt your spirit is being nurtured on that journey. The reformation not only makes that possible, it invites it.

Amen.

November 16, 2008
Reflection
By Jane Clarke

This morning we celebrate baptism two baptisms in fact. We welcomed Autumn and Mariah into the family of faith. Not just into this church family but the whole global family of faith.

At infant baptism the parents and the congregation covenant to journey in faith together with the children and their families.

We use water as the symbol for baptism. Scripture uses the symbol of water a great deal. Jesus’ baptism took place in the Jordan River. We say words that talk of celebration and unity. We talk about water being the sustenance of life. We talk about journeying together in love and support and care. We use positive words when we celebrate. We talk of water being cleansing. If there is mystery found in baptism I believe it to be the positive words we use as we put water over these babies heads.

We start out life being 99% water, as fetuses. When we are born, we are 90% water, and by the time we reach adulthood we are down to 70%. If we die of old age, we will probably be about 50% water, In other words, throughout our lives we exist mostly as water.

I read a book called “The Hidden Messages in Water” written by a Japanese scientist named Masaru Emoto. Maybe some of you have read this book as well. It is an amazing book about how word, music and environment effect water. Dr. Emoto has taken pictures of frozen water crystals.

Many of the words I am using today come from this book. I thank Masaru Emoto for all his years of research and hard work so that I can share with you today.

I said that we are made up of 70% water. This earth is also made up of 70% water. Hmm, an interesting fact.

Dr. Emoto in the prologue of his book asks this question; “I’d like you to ask yourself if you are happy. Of course, your definition of happiness will depend upon who you are—but do you have a sense of peace in your heart, a feeling of security about your future, and a feeling of anticipation when you wake up in the morning? If we call this happiness, then would you say that at this moment you are happy?”

Can there ever be a single solution that can apply to all people on the globe, that everyone can be convinced of, and that is so simple that everyone can understand it?

In fact Dr. Emoto has found the answer, and it is just this: and I repeat. The average human body is 70% water. We start out life being 99% water, as fetuses. When we reach adulthood we are down to 70%. If we die of old age, we will probably be about 50% water. In other words, throughout our lives we exist mostly as water.

So how can people live happy and healthy lives? The answer is to purify the water that makes up 70% of our bodies. Much of the purifying comes from the words that are spoken to us and the words we speak.

There is much more to say about the studies done and about how the water runs through our bodies and how we purify it but for today I will concentrate on the findings of how water responds to the words we use and the music we listen to and how the environment affects this water.

Dr. Emoto discovered that if he took pictures of frozen water crystals after having the water exposed to different words and music the crystals were very different.

He first looked at the crystals of tap water from different locations. The water of Tokyo was a disaster—not a single complete crystal was formed. Tap water includes a dose of chlorine used to sanitize it, utterly destroying the structure found in natural water.

However, within natural water, no matter where it came from—natural springs, underground rivers, glaciers, and the upper reaches of rivers—complete crystals formed.

Here are some pictures of the crystals from different sources.

This is a crystal from Sanbu-ichi Yusui Spring water.

This is from the Shimanti River, referred to as the last clean stream in Japan.

This is from the Fujiwara Dam, before offering a prayer

This is the same water after offering a prayer.

Because everything on this planet is made up of energy it means that we are all vibrating at different levels. Dr. Emoto decided that if our vibrations change then the vibrations of water will change as well.

He experimented with different music and with different words. You will see by the crystals themselves how music affects the water.

This crystal has heard Beethoven's Pastorale.

This one has listened to the music for the Kawachi folk dance

This one has listened to heavy metal music.

The thought then was that if music had this affect on water then what about words. He wrote words on pieces of paper and taped them to a jar of water and this is what happened.

With the words were love and appreciation this is what happened. A beautiful crystal formed.

The words Thank you

See what happened when the words said you make me sick.

This last crystal is one of a Tibetan Sutra, Buddhist scriptures, which would be soothing positive words.

Today we speak positive words to the children being baptized and to their parents. We are welcoming them into our family. These words have a positive affect upon us and what we do here.

When we speak or are spoken to in a negative way the water in our bodies responds. Sometimes that can make us sick and it certainly makes us feel unwell.

Even when we aren’t listening I believe that words and music affect us. When we really pay attention we are more aware of what the words allow is to feel.

An example of how words are heard happened during a baptismal service. A mom who had had her child baptized was hearing the words as a member of the congregation. She said when she had her child baptized that she was so caught up in the moment that she didn’t really hear what was being said. The words she heard on the Sunday when it was someone else being baptized took her back to what it meant for her own baptism and then that of her own child.

The words she was hearing as a member of the congregation brought tears to her eyes and probably changed the vibrations in the water within her body.

I feel very strongly about words and what affect they have. This now makes perfectly good sense to me to be aware of the words we choose and how we say them. They can be life altering for sure. Even if we don’t think they are. If water changes when words are written on the container that holds the water then we too who are containers for water will change as well.

So here’s to you, every person, every family and the larger family of the gathered community. Here’s to you, saints who remember to love! Here’s to those who heal, teach, listen, comfort; who feed the hungry, clothe the naked, give a cup of cold water. Keep on dancing and don’t let your songs ever end.

Amen.

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