Stewardship of the Mind

October 30^th, 2016                   “Stewardship of the Mind”               Rev. Heather Jepsen

Psalm 1 and Romans 12:1-2

          Today we continue our four part stewardship series.  Last week we talked about good stewardship of the body and rather than offering you a guilt infused healthy checklist, I just told you to love your body which can be much more difficult.  I am curious to know how our standing naked in front of the mirror exercise went last week.  I can say that I did it every morning and I am surprised to report that it made a real difference in my self-esteem.  I hope you had similar results.   

          As I mentioned last week, although this is a stewardship series we are saving the money talk for the end.  Today we are talking about the stewardship of our minds, which can entail lots of things.

          We all remember the two greatest commandments that Jesus gives us.  We are called as followers of God to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, all of our soul, all of our strength, and all of our minds . . . and to love our neighbors as ourselves.  Loving God with all of our minds is an important part of developing a life of faith.  But just how do we love God with our mind?

          The Psalmist has some great suggestions.  “Happy are those whose delight is in the law or the teachings of our Lord.  On the teachings of God they mediate day and night.”  By grounding ourselves in the word of God we become like “trees planted by streams of water, that yield abundant fruit and do not wither.”  The Psalmist is telling us that the key to abundant life is to know and study the word of God.

          Some folks interpret this as a zeal for following the rules.  These people are really passionate about knowing all the rules of faith, following all the laws of the church, and upholding the ways of order or the minutiae of scripture over anything else.  These are those people who can quote scripture for any circumstance and can twist the words of the Bible to defend whatever they think the “correct” position is.  I don’t think that is what the Psalmist is talking about.   

          Rather, I think the Psalmist is talking about a deep love and knowledge of the Lord.  I think this is about folks who read the Bible regularly and wrestle with what they find there.  This isn’t simple proof texting.  Rather, this is taking the lessons from scripture and wrestling with them in conversation with our daily lives.  How do we take writings that are thousands of years old and apply them to the 21^st century?

          I can name lots of people who take delight in studying God’s word.  I am thinking of my friends in our adult Sunday school class, or in the Tuesday Brown Bag Bible study.  These are folks who are committed to studying the word of God, but also eager to engage in what I want to call “theological play”.  Where does God intersect in our own lives?  How do the stories of the Bible influence us today?  How can we make sense of the world around us through the lens of faith?  No statement is too out there and no question is out of bounds.  This theological play demonstrates a love of God’s word as well as good stewardship of the mind.

          In his letter to the church in Rome, Paul suggests that we offer our whole selves as a gift to God.  “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is spiritual worship.”  Sacrifices of course, are things that are killed on the altar so this language can be a bit confusing.  A better word for us today might be consecrated.  Present your bodies, present the whole of who you are, as a consecrated offering to God.  This isn’t far off from our sermon last week.  Your body is a good gift from a loving God and should be appreciated as such.  So too, is your mind.

          Paul challenges us not to be “conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.”  We are called to make a gift of our minds to God, and to let God transform the way that we think.  I have seen this over and over again in my own life as the Holy Spirit inspires new thinking and new ideas not simply about my own place in the world but also about how I lead God’s church.  I think of myself as being constantly transformed by the renewing of my mind.

          What about you, do you sense this in your own life?  Where once we thought one way, suddenly God touches our hearts and minds, and we shift and change opinion.  Where once the church was headed in one direction, together we are touched by the Holy Spirit, and we begin to consider new ways of being the church.  We are transformed by the renewing of our minds.

          Today we gather to remember all the saints who have gone before us into the great cloud of witnesses.  All of these folks were influenced by their faith life.  All of these folks were transformed by the renewing of their minds, and that transformation was evident in their actions of faith.  The consecration of their bodies is now complete in death and they are totally united with God.  These saints of the church are wonderful examples of those who have practiced a stewardship of the mind.

         As this election season draws to a close I think it is important to lift up two more aspects of what I consider to be good stewardship of the mind.  The first is to take responsibility for being well informed.  As with any political election, there is a lot of lying going on out there on both sides of every candidate and every issue.  In an environment like this, it is vitally important that we seek out non-partisan sources of information.  It is our job to seek out the truth behind what we are told on the TV or what we read on the internet.  Good stewardship of the mind, means using your critical thinking to be well informed about the issues facing our world.  That is a responsibility of someone who is going to love God and neighbor, using their whole heart and mind.

          The second thing I want to remind us this election season is how to stop the madness.  Now I know that I am young, but I have never seen people get as worked up as they are about this election.  Folks are going out of their minds with stress, and fear, and rage.  This is not good, and it is in our power to stop it.

          Good stewardship of the mind this election season, means controlling your mind.  Take a break from the election rhetoric.  Pause and let things go.  When you feel your heart rate increase and your blood pressure rise; turn off the TV and walk away.  Leave it for a while.  Stop the cycle of madness.

          Praying is a great option, but I am also a big fan of meditation for helping to deal with stress.  Learn how to turn your mind off.  Learn how to rest in silence.  There are lots of opportunities for this at church from prayers here in worship, to walking the Labyrinth on Tuesdays (available through election night), to yoga on Monday mornings (which is also good stewardship of the body).  Good stewardship of the mind means knowing how to calm yourself down.  Don’t let this maddening election cycle eat you up.  Step back, breathe, vote, and then walk away.

          Our texts this morning remind us that God loves the whole of who we are; body, mind, and soul.  God wants us to rejoice in the study of God’s word and in “theological play.”  God wants to transform us by the renewing of our minds.  God wants to change who we are by changing how we think.  Part of being good stewards of the gifts God has given us, is being good stewards of our minds.  Thanks be to God for the wonderful blessing of our brains.  Amen.

Stewardship of the Body

October 23^rd, 2016     “Stewardship of the Body”    Rev. Heather Jepsen

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

          This morning we begin a new four part sermon series on stewardship.  Some of you will be happy to know that I am not preaching on money for four weeks straight.  I will save the money talk for the end of the series, our stewardship dedication Sunday on November 13^th.  In the meantime, I want to address how we treat other areas of our lives that are also gifts from God under our care and requiring our careful stewardship.  In that line, today we are talking about the stewardship of the body.

          Historically, the church has not been very comfortable with bodies.  In fact, we often have not known what to do with them.  Are bodies good creations of a loving God, or are bodies sinful things that lead us astray?  You can find both answers in the history of the Christian church.  But, what you find more often than anything is simply a desire to ignore the body.  Bodies make us uncomfortable and so we have a tendency to pretend that they don’t matter.

          That was the argument of the people in the community of Corinth.  Bodies die and are over, they said, what we do with our bodies doesn’t matter.  Paul disagreed because Paul thought that bodies mattered a whole lot.  Paul thought the body was a temple for the Lord.  Even better, I think, is the word sanctuary.  The body is a sanctuary of the divine.  Does that change the way we think about things?  Paul certainly thought so.

          The folks in Corinth felt like they could do whatever they wanted with their bodies.  With new freedom in Christ, then all things would be forgiven, and all acts were acceptable under that forgiveness.  Even engaging in sex with a prostitute was acceptable.  Paul vehemently disagreed.  What happens to your body matters to your soul; who you choose to have sex with matters to your body and to your soul.  “You wouldn’t unite your soul with a prostitute, often working in the service of another religion, so why would you unite your body with them?”  Paul asked.  Paul wanted people to understand that these things had staying power and were not to be taken lightly.  Your body is a gift from God, Paul taught, a holy sanctuary, and you should treat it as such. 

          One of the most compelling arguments for the value of the body is found in the person and nature of Jesus Christ.  Rather than telling a story of a God who overcomes bodily existence to live in an entirely spiritual realm, we tell the story of a God who chooses to be embodied.  We tell the story of a God who was formed in a womb and born naturally from a woman.  We tell the story of a God who cried and spit up and wore dirty diapers.  As he grew into a man, Jesus’ body did all the things our bodies do.  He got hungry, he got tired, he probably threw up and had diarrhea sometimes.  Jesus had sexual urges in his body and boogers in his nose.  Jesus had toe-jam and belly button lint and dirt under his fingernails.  Our God had a body and embraced that experience.  If Jesus had lived long enough, he would have had an old body, and that would have been a beautiful thing.  Our God is an embodied God.

          So too, God created us to be an embodied people.  In the beginning when there was nothing, God took the dirt and like a sculptor God formed the first body.  God filled that body with the breath of life and God called that creation very good.  Bodies are the epitome of creation.  Bodies are very good.  Bodies are an essential part of the whole of who we are.  Bodily existence cannot be subordinate to the spiritual life; rather the two are interconnected in divine perfection.  This whole package; mind, body, and soul are a perfect creation, a perfect gift to us, from a loving God.

          So then, why do we hate our bodies so much?  In our society bodies have become a thing of confusion and shame.  Our culture glorifies the body as something to be constantly improving and investing in.  And yet it also shames the body by convincing us that our bodies are never good enough.  Especially for women, body issues are a real thing.  Author Brené Brown points out that one of the key aspects of being a woman in our society is working to improve your body, or at least complaining about how it looks.  Our bodies are one of our most amazing gifts from God, they take us from here to there, pump blood through our veins and bring oxygen into our lungs, and yet we continually tell ourselves that they are not perfect.  I can hardly think of a more perfect gift.

            So, how do we practice good stewardship of our bodies?  Well, for starters we try to love them.  Barbara Brown Taylor has some interesting ideas about this in her book An Altar in the World.  She writes . . .

          “I can say that I think it is important to pray naked in front of a full-length mirror sometimes, especially when you are full of loathing for your body.  Maybe you think you are too heavy.  Maybe you have never liked the way your hipbones stick out.  Do your breasts sag?  Are you too hairy?  It is always something.  Then again, maybe you have been sick, or come through some surgery that has changed the way you look.  You have gotten glimpses of your body as you have bathed or changed clothes, but so far maintaining your equilibrium has depended upon staying covered up as much as you can.  You have even discovered how to shower in the dark, so that you may have to feel what you presently loath about yourself but you do not have to look at it.

          This can only go on so long, especially for someone who officially believes that God loves flesh and blood, no matter what kind of shape it is in.  Whether you are sick or well, lovely or irregular, there comes a time when it is vitally important for your spiritual health to drop your clothes, look in the mirror, and say, “Here I am.  This is the body-like-no-other that my life has shaped.  I live here.  This is my soul’s address.”  After you have taken a good look around, you may decide that there is a lot to be thankful for, all things considered.  Bodies take real beatings.  That they heal from most things is an underrated miracle.  That they give birth is beyond reckoning.  When I do this, I generally decide that it is time to do a better job of wearing my skin with gratitude instead of loathing.”

          What do you think?  Can you say a prayer of thanksgiving while you stand naked in front of a mirror?  Thanksgiving for stretch marks and for surgical scars, for bruises that won’t go away and for scars from childhood playground incidents, thanksgiving for those wrinkles that demonstrate a life well lived, or those few extra pounds that show a love of good food and wine.  It can be a scary prospect to really look at our bodies and embrace them as the gift that they are, but I promise to try it this week and I hope you will to.

          Another aspect of good stewardship of our bodies is reminding ourselves that other people’s bodies matter as well.  This has been a topic of conversation at a national level with this presidential election.  Is it OK to touch bodies without permission?  Is it OK to say things about other people’s bodies in a disrespectful manner?  Is it OK to treat some bodies like property, like they are ours for the taking?  Paul would certainly so no.  Paul would tell us that all bodies were purchased at the price of Jesus’ own life and death and so all bodies are to be treated with respect and love.  If my body is a sanctuary of the divine, then so is everyone else’s.  That demands a certain level of respect.

          It’s not very often that the exact subject of our sermon comes to church that same day but lucky for me, every person here brought their body with them.  The very thing I am talking about loving and respecting is sitting in the pew with you right now.  And so I ask you to take a moment and look at your body.  (You can keep your clothes on.)  Look at your hands . . . are they the young nimble hands of a child or are they wrinkled and spotted with age?  These hands, these fingers that do so much, are a wonderful gift from a loving God.  Look at your mid-section, that spot that most of us hate.  That belly there, that shakes when you laugh, that powers you through the world, that houses heart and lungs; it is a wonderful gift from a loving God.  Look at your legs and feet, stretch them out, feel them and notice them.  These legs and feet have carried you for miles, through a lifetime of adventure.  They may be failing now, full of aches and pains, but they have been faithful companions for so long.  They are a wonderful gift from a loving God.

          Your body is a beautiful miracle and how you treat it matters.  Take care of it, exercise it, respect it, and most importantly love it.  Those extra 10 pounds or signs of age don’t matter nearly as much as the negative self-talk we often give ourselves regarding our bodies.  This week, I challenge you to be a good steward of the wonderful amazing gift of your body.  Notice it, pay attention to it, be in it, and embrace it.  This body of yours is a wonderful gift from a loving, embodied God.  What a marvelous miracle!  Thanks be to God!!  Amen.

The Internal Life of Faith

October 16^th, 2016       “The Internal Life of Faith”      Rev. Heather Jepsen

Luke 18:1-8 with Jeremiah 31:31-34

          A lot of our Sunday sermons are about external actions.  Are we being good people?  Are we doing the right things?  Are we working to bring about the Lord’s justice in our world?  In contrast, this morning’s sermon is all about the internal life of faith.  Are we praying?  Are we studying?  Are we carrying the law of God in our hearts as we enter the world each day?  These too are important questions to consider.

          This morning’s parable from Luke’s gospel is one of Jesus’ more disturbing stories.  The story of the widow and the unjust judge seems as harsh to us as it surely did to Jesus’ first listeners.  The author of Luke prefaces the story by telling us that Jesus wanted the disciples to understand that they needed to pray always and not to lose heart.  In the story the widow begs daily for justice from a judge who is not interested in justice.  Only because she bothers him so much does the judge relent and offer justice to her.

          This is very hard to understand.  Are we the widow?  Is God the judge?  That doesn’t seem right.  Jesus is employing a rhetorical technique from his time called “from the lesser to the greater”.  One gives an example of something and the listener infers a greater example.  When we apply this principle we find that the judge is unjust, but God certainly is not.  It follows then, that even if an unjust judge answers a persistent widow’s request, how much more will God respond to us when we approach God consistently in prayer.

          That is all well and good, except we can all think of prayers long unanswered; prayers that we have offered over and over again in our faith. And yet God seems to be silent, or God seems to delay in action.  What are we to make of these situations?  Jesus too, seems to sense the reality as he asks “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”  Two thousand years later these words ring especially true.  Just how long are we called to pray?

          The answer, it seems to be, is forever.  We are called to pray forever.  We are called to pray daily without ceasing.  According to the writer of the gospel of Luke, these are the true elements of faith, to pray always without losing heart.  This is the internal life of faith, a constant yearning and leaning toward God in prayer. 

          In her article in The Christian Century, author Debie Thomas has some wonderful ideas about this persistence in prayer.  She writes . . .

“What happens when we pray?  What is prayer for?  I can only speak from experience, but I know that when I persist in prayer – really persist, with a full heart, over a long period of time – something happens to me.  My sense of who I am, to whom I belong, what really matters in this life, and why – these things mature and solidify.  My heart grows stronger.  It becomes less fragile and flighty.  Once in a while, it even soars.  And sometimes – here’s the surprise – these good things happen even when I don’t receive the answer I’m praying for."

          I hope that you have had an experience like hers; an experience of a lifetime of prayer shaping and changing who you are.  These practices of habitual prayer are what constitute our internal life of faith, and will eventually change and influence our external life of action.

          Some of us though, might feel like we struggle to pray without ceasing.  When we hear this text this morning it may sound foreign and challenging.  We have enough trouble as it is offering structured prayers to God in church, let alone praying with such persistence and dedication on our own at home.

          In her book An Altar in the World, Barbara Brown Taylor has a wonderful chapter where she discusses her difficulty developing a prayer life.  She writes . . .

“I learned that prayer was not a contest.  The categories in the prayer book were for sharpening my intention, not for winning God’s attention.  How then should I pray?  When I fretted over people I knew who were in trouble, so that my worry for them followed me around all day like a hungry dog, was that prayer?  When I cooked dinner for people who had plenty to eat at home, thinking about them while I chopped turnip greens and mashed the sweet potatoes, was that prayer?  When I went outside after everyone had gone to bed and moaned at the moon because I could not come up with the right words to say what was in my heart, was that prayer? . . . Prayer is happening, and it is not necessarily something that I am doing, God is happening, and I am lucky enough to know that I am in The Midst.”

          When we think of things this way, praying without ceasing seems less of a daunting task.  Do our actions of prayer, our acts of caring for others on a daily basis, not underscore an internal life of faith that compels us to pray always and not to lose heart?  I certainly see this being lived out throughout the work of this congregation.

          Our reading for Jeremiah brings us back once again to the story of the Israelites at exile in Babylon.  God is offering a word of hope, a word of a new covenant.  This law of forgiveness and love will be written in the very hearts of the people.  No longer will the law of God be a yoke or a burden upon our lives.  Rather it will be the word of love, planted in our hearts, and embodied in our behavior.  This too is the internal life of faith.  God is offering us a relationship we can live into, rather than a standard we must live up to.

          This past Tuesday night was our first Labyrinth walk for the month and I always find these to be insightful and moving times.  I consider my role on these sacred evenings as one who sits and holds the place in prayer.  I think of it as a privilege to be the host of the event, to hold the space, and to pray for those who are walking the pattern of the labyrinth.

          As folks were meandering along the track this past Tuesday I was struck by what an outward expression the labyrinth is, of the internal life of faith.  Jeremiah writes “no longer shall they say to each other ‘know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me.”  In the silence of the labyrinth walk I saw this played out.  Folks pass by one another in peaceful prayer and there is no need to talk, no need to teach.  Rather, we can simply be together in companionable silence.  We don’t need to tell one another about our faith using words, rather we can feel the truth of faith that is present in each person’s heart.

          So too, the labyrinth is a powerful metaphor of the internal life of faith.  As one walks the pattern, one often finds themselves turned around, or walking in a confused way.  One’s desire is to move towards the center of the labyrinth, but to achieve that goal one must often be turning out, toward the outer rings.  Similarly, when one is ready to leave the labyrinth, one finds themselves needing to turn continually in instead of out.  So much of our prayer life is like this.  Following God in faith as we seem to turn out, turn in, and turn every which way in life.  Sometimes the right direction feels like the wrong direction and we are called to simply trust in faith.  We are called to pray always and to not lose heart.

          Jesus asks “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”  I certainly hope so.  I hope by that time that we will have been able to keep praying to the best of our ability for God’s justice, hope, and healing for our world.  I hope that we will have survived the odd turnings of the internal life of faith, and that like the widow in Jesus’ parable we may finally receive the answer that we are so longing for.  I hope that through continually turning to God in our hearts, we become better people in our outer lives.  And I hope that our external actions of prayer, showing care and concern for those around us, draw us ever deeper into an internal relationship with the divine.

          The life of prayer is one of mystery and wonder.  It is full of difficult questions and uneasy answers, found right alongside moments of love and glimmers of healing and hope.  God has written love deep into our hearts.  Our internal life of prayer is what will connect us to that love, connect us to God, and connect us to each other.  May God continue to strengthen our hearts in prayer, and may the Son of Man find us faithful when he comes in his glory.  Amen.

         

Finding our Home in Exile

October 9^th, 2016         “Find our Home in Exile”    Rev. Heather Jepsen

Jeremiah 29:1-14 and Psalm 66:1-12

          Last week we talked about the Israelite exiles in Babylon.  Our Psalm reminded us that the people had been carted away from their homeland and by the rivers of Babylon they sat down and wept.  They hung their harps in the willows, unable to sing the Lord’s song in a strange land.  Through all their lamenting their hearts were bowed low within them and their spirits were crushed.  The writer of Lamentations reminded the people that the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases and in this morning’s reading they will hear more of the same, although the message is not the one they are hoping for.

          By the time the prophet Jeremiah writes, the people are settled into exile in Babylon.  They are hopeful for word of their return to Jerusalem and seeking after prophets who will give them good news.  Unfortunately, through the letter of Jeremiah to the leaders of the community of Israelites, the people get a different message from God.  They will not be returning to Jerusalem in the near future, in fact they will not return for 70 years.  Those who are exiles, the captives, the refugees must settle in for two generations before God consents to return them to their homeland.

          God tells the people to make their home in exile.  They are to settle into the land.  To take jobs and to build houses.  They are to find husbands and wives, to raise families, and to encourage their children to marry.  They are to plan for generations in Babylon.  They are called to accept bondage, and to make life in exile a life at peace.

          Moreover, they are called to pray for the fortunes of Babylon.  They are called to pray for their enemies, pray for their captors, pray for the wellbeing of those who have ruined their lives.  God makes it clear that the welfare of the Babylonians, of the faithless captors, is the welfare of the Israelites.  Settle in, worship in Babylon, pray for your enemies, and accept bondage as your new way of life Jeremiah encourages.  Jeremiah tells them that the time has come to take down their harps and to sing a new song in a strange land.

          The message that Jeremiah offers the people of Israel is a very difficult one to accept, but I love it for just that reason.  I think this message, of accepting bondage, of making a home in exile, can be a truth for many of us as well.  Most of us will not experience an actual physical exile, of being taken from our home land, but we see it in our world.  Refugees fleeing the violence of war in Syria are certainly in exile.  So too, are illegal immigrants who are crossing the border to flee the drug violence of Mexico. 

          Sometimes we face a physical exile but more often than not, our exile is emotional.  Life doesn’t work out the way we planned and we can find ourselves marooned in a strange place.  The doctor’s office calls and the test results are bad.  We are in an exile of waiting, of testing, of treatment, of fear, and of pain.  A loved one suddenly dies and we are in an exile of loneliness, of grief, of broken spirit.  A relationship deteriorates and we have lost our way, we are in an exile of confusion, of sadness, of strained conversations.  We lose our job and we are in economic exile, stressing about how we are going to make ends meet and provide for our families.  Suddenly we are strangers in a foreign land and we are tempted to hang our harps in the willows and give up.  Surely God will save us from this exile soon.

          The Israelites certainly hoped salvation would be sooner than 70 years.  Jeremiah warned them against falling for false prophets who would fill their heads with dreams and tell them the things they wanted to hear.  “Do not let the prophets among you deceive you, do not listen to the dreams that they dream, for it is a lie they are telling you.”  We do the same thing when we fall prey to “miracle” healers or those who would preach a prosperity gospel.  We all want to believe that since we have faith in God everything will be the way we want it to be.

          Jeremiah reminds the people that everything will be ok; it just won’t be the way that people want it to be.  God’s idea of ok, the Israelites settling into the land of Babylon for two generations, probably doesn’t sound too good to the people longing to be home.  And yet, God’s blessings will be there, God is able to make life flourish in inhospitable places.  The blessing of grandchildren will happen in this exile, God will make life when the people assume that life is over.

          I love the picture of the flower in the sidewalk that I used for the children’s sermon to remind us of this.  Even when there is little soil, water, or nutrients, there is life.  God makes a home where we assume there can be no home.  Another cool example of this is Andy Weir’s book, “The Martian” that was made into a movie starring Matt Damon last year.  The movie is good but the book is wonderful.  It is hard to imagine a place more inhospitable to life than the surface of Mars.  And yet the main character, Mark Watney, is able not only to survive there but to grow food for his own sustenance.  Even more telling is the way that Mark grows in spirit and strength throughout the story.  Although it doesn’t talk about God specifically, I found the story to be an amazing idea about God creating a home in exile, God supporting life in inhospitable places.

           The Israelites’ exile into Babylon is not their first wilderness experience and it won’t be their last.  In our reading from the Psalms, the people remember their exodus out of Egypt.  They praise God when they remember the story of crossing through the sea on dry land.  But they also remember that things have not always been easy.  “You brought us into the net; you laid burdens on our backs; you let people ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water; yet you have brought us out to a spacious place.”  God has blessed them, but their lives have been full of trial and tribulation.

          Jeremiah too, reminds the people that after they have served their sentence in captivity, the blessing of God will return.  “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”  Jeremiah promises that God will return the people to their promised land, just not on the time table that the people are hoping for.

          And so today, we sit and wonder about where we find ourselves in the story.  Some of us are probably doing just fine.  Our period of exile is over and we have returned to blessed places.  Like the writer of the Psalm, we can sit and remember the hard times and thank God for bringing us through to the other side.

          Others of us though, may be in the midst of exile.  We are longing for good news of hope and healing, which we may get, or like the Israelites we may hear another message.  We may be told to sit and wait, to settle in, to make a home in exile.  We may be told that God is with us even in this foreign land, and like the flower in the sidewalk crack, we need to bloom where we are planted.  It may not be ideal, but it is where we are, and thankfully God is with us in our places of pain.  

          As you go out into the world this week, I encourage you to take stock of your surroundings.  If you feel like you are in exile, then have courage and strength for the journey ahead.  Make a home where you find yourself and look for the blessings of God in unexpected places.  If you feel like your time of exile is over, than take a moment to praise God and offer thanksgiving for the Lord who has brought you through difficult times and into the promised land. 

          In addition, all of us are called today to pray.  Pray for this town, pray for this country, pray for our world, and for the people around you.  We all see stories of exile on the news, but we may not know the stories of exile that our friends and neighbors are living through.  The prophet Jeremiah encourages us to pray for each other, for in the welfare of our neighbor we will find our own welfare planted.  May God bless us and everyone, this day and every day, even as we make our homes in exile.  Amen.

         

Come to the Table of Peace

October 2^nd, 2016        “Come to the Table of Peace”       Rev. Heather Jepsen

Luke 17:5-10 with Lamentations 3:19-26

          Today is one of my favorite days in the Presbyterian Church calendar.  I love celebrating World Communion Sunday and I love that it is a day that our church has chosen to focus on Peacemaking efforts and the work of bringing God’s justice to our hurt and broken world. The message of peace that we celebrate at this table is something we need to hear and remember now more than ever.

          When we look at the state of the world around us it is easy to get down and depressed.  From racial violence and rioting in the United States, to the war torn brokenness in Syria, to the forgotten famines in Africa, the world seems a sorry and broken place.  Like the writer of Lamentations, the thoughts of our current state of affairs can fill our bellies with poison and sickness.  Our souls are heavy with grief and bowed down within us.

          Our alternative Psalm for today, Psalm 137, easily sums up our collective feelings of grief.  “By the rivers of Babylon – there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion.  On the willows there we hung up our harps.”  The people have been taken from their homeland and are living as captives, refugees, and strangers.  “Our captors asked us for songs . . . (but) how could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?” 

          This is certainly the way I feel as I watch the nightly news.  One more unarmed black man appears to be shot by the police for no reason.  One more angry and broken person with a gun begins shooting at random strangers in a mall or parking lot or worse an elementary school.  One more picture like this one from our bulletin insert last week, of war torn Syria a broken and desolated place.  One more angry person insisting that folks fleeing this mess cannot come here because they don’t have the same religion we do.  I am tempted to hang my harp in the willows and to never sing again.  How can we sing when we are living in a lost land on a broken and grieving planet?

          In the midst of his heartbreak, the writer of Lamentations says that he has hope.  “But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, God’s mercies never come to an end.  They are new every morning.”  What words of faith and hope.  The writer of Lamentations encourages us to wait for the Lord, to have faith and to be patient.  God’s promise of healing and justice will come.  God’s new kingdom where we beat our swords into the plowshares and turn our guns into tractors is on its way.  We must be patient, we must wait with hope.  “It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.”

          Like the apostles in Luke’s gospel, I am tempted to cry out, “God, increase my faith!”  In the gospel of Luke, Jesus has been teaching the disciples about the path that is required of them.  They must share all that they have, the must not lead others astray, and they must always be ready to forgive even at the umpteenth offense.  They cry out for the Lord to bless them with more faith and Jesus responds with the parable of the mustard seed.

          Boy, nothing makes us feel guilty like this one, huh?  “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea.’ and it would obey you.” That’s a tall order!  I have met many a faithful person in my life, but I have yet to meet someone who can undertake a major landscaping project simply by the power of their faith.  Many times we hear this and we simply end up feeling bad.  None of us measure up if this judging Jesus is setting the standard.

          Thankfully, with this as with all other Biblical texts, we can turn it around and read it another way.  What if Jesus isn’t shaking his head in disgust and judgment at the disciples’ inability to muster enough faith?  What if instead Jesus is laughing and smiling?  “Why you don’t need more faith!  Even a tiny amount is plenty for life!  You can do anything with just the smallest amount of faith.”  As listeners we begin to straighten up and reconsider.  Instead of being filled with shame we begin to be filled with hope.  “Even a teeny amount is enough?  Well, I can manage that.”

          Jesus goes on to tell that odd story about the slave and the master.  This parable only appears in Luke and it is full of pitfalls and tripping hazards for the modern reader.  We are likely to stumble on the slave imagery, the master imagery, and the language about being worthless.  But really, Jesus is just trying to encourage the disciples.  “You are doing a great job” he seems to say “you are doing just what you ought.  And remember, I am the servant Lord, serving alongside you every day.”  Instead of feeling guilty we can say to ourselves that we have done what we ought to have done.  We have done enough with the right amount of faith, and that can be a hopeful thought for many of us this morning. 

          In the midst of our broken and fearful world today, we can comfort ourselves with the thought that even if we have just a tiny amount of faith, we will have enough.  Even if we do one small thing, it will make a difference.  We can use our little bit of faith to work for justice in the world and in our neighborhoods one day and one relationship at a time.  We can do what we know we ought to do, and call ourselves faithful servants of our servant Lord.  Imagining that we’ve got this, that we can make a difference, feels a lot better than telling ourselves over and over again that we will never measure up.

          Today we gather at this table of peace and remember the people who come here from all over the world.  This table unites us in faith with Christians in every country, on every continent, in every corner of the globe.  As we work for justice and peace in the world, we can look ahead with a tiny seed of hope, to the day when God will wipe away every tear and people from every place will gather and feast together at the kingdom of our God.  This is a table of peace for us today, and it is a table that looks forward to the day when peace will be a reality for all people in all places.  This table can be our teeny tiny seed of faith this morning.

          Like the writer of Lamentations we can look around our world and feel dismayed.  Like him, we can also remind ourselves that our hope is in the Lord, the one who is able to fix this terrible mess.  The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, God’s mercies are new every morning.  If we even have a tiny drop of faith, we have enough to be good servants who do what they ought.  We have enough to change the world one moment at a time. 

          May we come to this table of peace this morning filled with hope and courage.  May we come to this table of peace this morning in faith.  May we come to this table of peace this morning and celebrate with people of every time and place, of every land and nation, as we declare the love and grace and justice of our marvelous and faithful God.  Thanks be to God for this table of peace.  Amen.