Category Archives: joy

Dressed for Joy (Sermon 12/16)

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Isaiah 61:1-11
How many of you know the adage, “Wear clean underwear, because you never know when you’ll be in an accident”? While I do not want to know how many of you follow that rule, I suspect many of you think about what you wear each day. Am I dressed or ready for the car to break down? Am I dressed or ready if I had to sit for a while and wait? Am I dressed and ready for walking around the store, getting gas, watching a toddler, changing a tire, having lunch with a friend?
This is a question I ask myself all the time. Especially as the number of clothes I have that fit begins to dwindle, I ask myself, “Is this what I want to be wearing for a hospital visit? For an emergency call? For pastoral authority in the office?” Sometimes I’m not dressed, or I don’t feel like I am, for what I need to do.
On Friday, after the initial shock of the news out of Connecticut, I was thinking about opening the church into the evening for prayers. When I decided to do that, I was wearing jeans and a sweater. A fine outfit for sitting in the office and writing a sermon, not what I wanted to be wearing when we were opening the church and I was talking with the people who came in and out all day. “I’m not dressed for this”- I kept thinking. What I really meant was- I’m not ready. I’m not prepared for this.
This is not the first time this has happened. Someone here once told me- it doesn’t matter what you’re wearing, just show up. Good advice, but I know I’m not the only one to whom this happens. How many of you felt overwhelmed this week- either by the season, by events, or by memories? How many of you have had a call during the day or in the night- for which you weren’t dressed, for which you weren’t ready?
Thus, in considering that the third Sunday in Advent is Joy Sunday, I don’t feel dressed for it. If we had colored candles, this would be the pink one (the others being blue or purple). Joy Sunday! And that’s what the task that the prophet Isaiah delivers to Israel and that is also communicated to us, as our task, through Jesus. It is our task to seek joy, to be found by joy, to communicate joy.
Isaiah says the role of the prophet, which is now the mantle that goes over all of Israel and extends to all who live by faith is this: The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to provide for those who mourn in Zion — to give them a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.  (61:1-3)
Do you feel dressed to do that? To declare the year of the Lord’s favor? To bring good news to the oppressed and to comfort all who mourn? Do you feel ready to proclaim joy?
Joy is not happiness. It is one of the fruits of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness)- not something we can produce ourselves, but something that God brings forth in us. Joy has the twinge of the fight, of how far it took to get there, it is hard earned and treasured. Joy is the light that shines in the darkness and shines that focused beam, making us aware of how dark things can be. How can we be ready for joy? How can we be ready to proclaim it? How do we dress for this?
The only way to be dressed for joy is to be clothed in Christ.  To be clothed in the experience of weeping at the death of a friend, to know betrayal, to have eaten good-bye meals, to have people turn away from grace, to feel forsaken… and to still taste resurrection, to still hope in return and restoration, to trust in the possibility of peace, to rest in the light of Love. 
The only way to be dressed for joy is to be clothed in Christ, clothing which comes with all of these experiences, the accessories of faith, if you will- the very real experiences of this very real life.  Joy is not the absence of suffering, but the presence of God.
            I cannot tell you why bad things happen. I cannot tell you that we will live to see the good that God will bring from some of the tragedies of our lifetimes. I cannot undo the exile of the Israelites and I cannot redo Friday with a different outcome.
            God is not the “why” of tragedy and devastation. God is the how- the how we get through it. God is the where- consoling to the grieving, receiving the dying, walking with the confused and afraid. God is the who- the One who made all things and loves all creation. God is the when- a mystery to us, but a promise of renewal and bringer of unexpected joy. God is the what- the what we shall wear, the what we shall say, the what we shall turn to.
            When there is no “why”, there is a Holy Who/Where/How/When/What that clothes us in grace, that dresses us in mercy, that accessorizes us with joy. We come as we are to God’s dressing room- the baptismal font, Holy Communion, a conversation with a friend, a time of prayer- and we are draped in Christ.
            What do you wear to do that proclaiming, to be a priest of the Lord, a minister proclaiming God’s favor (as Isaiah says you are)?
            (Make the sign of the cross). You wear the sign of the cross and…
There! You’re dressed for proclamation. You are wearing the promise of the Holy Spirit, the mark of Christ crucified and risen, the symbol of hope for the whole world. You will never be more ready to bear joy. You will not find anything that fits you better. There’s never been a more graceful fit, a closer fit, a more beautiful shape. The cross is the clothing we’ve got… its emptiness, its inability to be the final word, its attempt to stop the Word of Life… it is how God dresses us to go out into the world. The sign of the cross is our clothing for grieving and for rejoicing, for sorrow and for joy. The sign of the cross is our Christmas sweater, our Easter suit, our Epiphany workout clothes, our Pentecost learning outfit, our clothing for waiting, for hoping, for proclaiming.
            It is Advent and we wait. We wait for a great deal, including joy. But we’re dressed for it, when it comes. Saved and clothed in righteousness by Christ’s own faithfulness, we are dressed to heal, to share hope, to be a part of the work of the kingdom. In the midst of tragedy and hope, we are dressed, in the cross, to seek and to be found by joy. Amen.

A Moveable Feast (Second Easter Service)

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Mark 16:1-8
            Do you know why the date of Easter changes? It has to do with the cycle of the moon and the church calendar. Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. For the most part that means Easter falls somewhere between March 22 and April 25. Of course, and this is one of the best parts, the churches that use this date for Easter have what’s known as an “ecclesiastical calendar”, meaning the church occasionally has slightly different lunar dates than the astronomical calendar, kept by, well, astronomers. But for the most part, the formula has held true since 325 A.D. (for churches using the Gregorian calendar).
            Easter has earned a special name, since it does not have a fixed date. It is referred to as a moveable feast. Moveable feast. And all the dates that are coordinated with Easter’s date are also moveable feasts: Transfiguration, Ash Wednesday, Holy Week, Ascension, Pentecost, and Holy Trinity Sunday. All moveable feasts because their celebration is always a given number of days from Easter. (For example, Ash Wednesday is always the Wednesday before the sixth Sunday ahead of Easter.)
            Why am I talking so much about calendars? It’s actually not the calendar part I care about. It’s the name: moveable feast. It sounds like a picnic on the go, something that comes with us, that we can carry, that carries us. A moveable feast sounds like a banquet, a glorious table spread with all kinds of amazing foods. But when you’ve been really hungry or exhausted, a moveable feast is a shared crust of bread and the slug of liquid that makes you feel like you can keep going. Easter is both of these kinds of feasts.
            Mary Magdalene, Mary- the mother of James, and Salome were not in a feasting mood as they headed toward the tomb for that first sunrise service, a service of laying on of hands and prayer. They probably ate very little the day before, since it was the Sabbath and because they were probably still stunned from the crucifixion. At some point during that day, each of them quietly set aside ointments, cloths, spices in a little basket. Not a feast, just little odds and ends to tend Jesus’ body, to mend it, to commend it to God through washing and prayer. Tears pouring down their faces, they crept out of their houses at first light, before their families were awakened. Instructions were given to oldest daughters and daughters-in-law about the morning meal. And then the quiet slap of sandals on hardened dirt streets.
            The mother of James probably thought she was the only one, until Salome hurried to catch up to her. They both saw the figure of Mary Magdalene ahead of them and scurried to be by the side of that beloved apostle on the way. Still stunned by how abruptly it had all ended, the ringing of the hammer on the nails in their minds… the feel of Jesus’ body gone cold as they laid it in the tomb… the confusion as to where the disciples had gone… was it true about Judas… how will they move the stone. It was all too much. These women were not ready for a feast of any kind.
            But, ready or not, they arrived to hear of resurrection. They come with one task in mind, if they can accomplish it. That task proves worthless, all their planning, their grieved collection of materials. The task they came to do is moot and they are given another task, but it’s too much to absorb. We want to imagine them leaping in excitement and leaving the symbols of sorrow in their wake, a trail of spices, cloths, and broken perfume bottles leading to the empty tomb.
            They are stunned and afraid. What if this is a trick? What if Jesus’ body has been stolen? Do they go tell the apostles, who will doubtless come to the same conclusion and, possibly, accuse the women of knowing what happened? What do they do? Only minutes before they had a momentous task, honoring the body of Jesus. Now they have a different, monumental task… becoming the body of Christ. Carrying words as a balm, hope as the fragrance, faith as a spice. They nibble at the edges of this feast, easing the hunger of their grief.
            Why does the angel tell them to go his disciples and Peter? Is it because Peter is special, is elevated, or because Peter denied Jesus and it’s important to express plainly that he is still in the fold. He is still a sheep of Jesus’ own flock, a lamb of God’s own fold, a sinner who has now been redeemed. The messenger is clarifying for the women that there are no side tables at God’s feast, no people who wait for scraps in the kitchen, no one who will be turned away from the banquet of resurrection. Even Peter has a place at the Easter feast, when it reaches him through the witness of the women.
            That’s the thing about a moveable feast. It comes whether you’re ready or not. Whether you are in your own extended Lenten season, wrestling with crucifixion, lying in the tomb- unable to rise, the moveable feast comes. A moveable feast offers us hope until we can taste joy. A moveable feast offers expectation until we can drink from faith. A moveable feast fills us with courage until we are stuffed from encounter.
             
            Easter is the moveable feast that brings us the food for our souls when we need it and when we can receive it. Sometimes in April. Sometimes in September. Sometimes in December and January. The news of resurrection comes to us in our deep hunger and edges us into fullness, into renewal, into strength.
            Who would believe the story of three women who say they saw a heavenly messenger at the empty tomb of an itinerant preacher from the backwater of Nazareth? Who will listen to that story? Who will take their word?
            People who are hungry for forgiveness. People who thirst to believe God is still acting in the world. People who believe in the possibility of redemption. People who crave justice and peace. People smell the scent of equality and long to have their fill. People who have tasted of true freedom and want to revel in it again. That’s who will listen to their story. That’s who will believe them. People who are hungry for the feast of Easter. Hungry for it on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. Hungry for it on the day after. And after that. And after that.
            Do you dare to believe that this is a moveable feast for you? That is for the person beside you and beside them? That this feast has moved from an empty tomb to Galilee to Judea to all of Palestine to the entire world? Do we dare to speak up and say this is a feast to which everyone is invited?
            Our hymns and our words mainly speak of Easter joy, but that first Easter (and maybe every one since) wasn’t about joy. It was about hope. The hope in the truth of the resurrection. The hope in the triumph of the God of life over the power of death. The hope of grace and forgiveness and the family of God. You may not always feel like feasting on first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox, but we can believe the feast is there.
The moveable feast of resurrection, of Easter is bound human limitations, then or now.
When is resurrection?
When is Easter?
Thanks be to God that the moveable feast of Easter is always right when the world needs it to be.
Amen. 

Ready or Not, Resurrection (Early Easter Service)

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Mark 16:1-8
            What happens when you’re not in the mood for Easter? What if the smells are too strong, the colors too bright, the alleluias too loud? We are all a little used to people talking about not feeling the Christmas spirit, but who doesn’t want new life… who doesn’t thrill at the sound of the trumpet… who isn’t ready for resurrection?
            Sometimes our own Lent goes on beyond forty days. Sometimes, in our own lives, our own passion story, our own feeling of crucifixion… exposure and abandonment… is not over in a week or three days. Sometimes resurrection comes, but we are not ready to get up. We are not ready to tell the story.
            The women heading toward the tomb for that first sunrise service, a service of laying on of hands and prayer… those women were not prepared for resurrection. They may have spent the whole day before, the Sabbath day, longing to be at the tomb. Maybe it was too far too walk for the Sabbath or perhaps the work was not permitted. So each of them quietly set aside ointments, cloths, spices in a little basket. Tears pouring down their faces, they crept out of their houses at first light, before their families were awakened. Instructions were given to oldest daughters and daughters-in-law about the morning meal. And then the quiet slap of sandals on hardened dirt streets.
            The mother of James probably thought she was the only one, until Salome hurried to catch up to her. They both saw the figure of Mary Magdalene ahead of them and scurried to be by the side of that beloved apostle on the way. Still stunned by how abruptly it had all ended, the ringing of the hammer on the nails in their minds… the feel of Jesus’ body gone cold as they laid it in the tomb… the confusion as to where the disciples had gone… was it true about Judas… how will they move the stone. It was all too much. These women were not ready for resurrection.
            But, ready or not, they arrived to hear of resurrection. They come with one task in mind, if they can accomplish it. That task proves worthless, all their planning, their grieved collection of materials. The task they came to do is moot and they are given another task, but it’s too much to absorb. We want to imagine them leaping in excitement and leaving the symbols of sorrow in their wake, a trail of spices, cloths, and broken perfume bottles leading to the empty tomb.
            They are stunned and afraid. What if this is a trick? What if Jesus’ body has been stolen? Do they go tell the apostles, who will doubtless come to the same conclusion and, possibly, accuse the women of knowing what happened? What do they do? Only minutes before they had a momentous task, honoring the body of Jesus. Now they have a different, monumental task… becoming the body of Christ. Carrying words as a balm, hope as the fragrance, faith as a spice.
            Did they go to the disciples right away? Did they make a plan to meet later in the week and talk about what happened? Did they return to their respective houses, already moving with morning activity, and slip back into their routines, knowing things were different, but unsure how to put that difference into words?
            Knowing things are different, but unsure how to put that difference into words is the Easter story for most of us. Sometimes we receive the news of resurrection, but we’re trying to understand how it applies to us. How it makes us free. How it brings us restoration, hope, and faith.
            Stories of grief have to be repeated until understanding comes, until relief arrives, until a light shines in the darkness. The women probably met again… maybe that afternoon, maybe a few days later. They had to get ready for resurrection. Because it happened when they were unprepared. It happens in the same way to us.
            Whatever our state of belief, of grief, of celebration, Christ’s resurrection comes to us, comes to all creation, whether we are ready or not. And here’s the good news about resurrection… we cannot stop it, we cannot slow its work, we will not stem its grace or welcome. Ready or not, we have been swept into the stream of Easter hope. The Spirit keeps us floating until we are ready to swim.
           
Easter is here, but resurrection is still coming, still washing over us, still be absorbed in us so that, like the women at the tomb, we too may take on the task of telling the story and becoming the body of Christ.
Amen.

Friday Five: LOVE

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Over on RevGalBlogPals, revkjarla writes:

Hey RevGals….
It’s Valentine’s Day on Tuesday….
So,
Share 5 Valentines you would like to give this year, and why–
but here is the hitch, 
Can’t give them G-d, Jesus, Holy Spirit…
or your mom, your beloved, your sweet child(ren)…tell us about the other amazing  beings in your life. 
Valentine the First: This one goes out to women whose labor did not goes as planned. I spent a lot of time with C-section regret, even though it was an emergency. Even at the time I knew it had to be done so that we both could (and did) live. Still, it can be hard not to feel like I failed. I didn’t. Other women have this same experience or other birth scenarios that don’t goes as hoped. Some women go home empty-handed for a variety of reasons. Mother’s Day can be hard for all kinds of reasons, so one this day I give a free hug to all moms of all sorts, however you became a mom, whatever happened when you gave birth, however things are working out with your kid(s). 


Valentine the Second: This one goes out to people who are happy being single. This doesn’t mean that they don’t want to meet someone, but that they feel complete in themselves and enjoy their lives as they are already! There’s something to be said for knowing who you are, where you are, and being at peace and at home in that. These people only need Singles Awareness Day inasmuch as they would like you to be aware that they are just fine. 


Valentine the Third: This one goes out to people who are into the sixth week of the diet/exercise regimen  they promised to start on New Year’s! Keep it up! You’re doing a great job. (Would this be you if you hadn’t slipped up a little… it’s okay… just keep going… you can do it… and this Valentine can be a little bit for you too.) 


Valentine the Fourth: This one is for C.C. who watches my son, along with two other children, when I’m at work four days a week. She provides entertainment, instruction, structure, and love. Her work, which she enjoys and at which she excels, makes it possible for me to do the work to which I feel called and at which I strive to excel. There are many children in the neighborhood who have been raised by her capable hands and I’m very grateful that my son gets to be one of the privileged few. 


Valentine the Fifth: This one goes out to the families of people who are in prison or other institutions. I know you think of your son/daughter/father/mother/brother/sister each day. Even if you know he or she is where he or she needs to be or has to be or rightfully should be, the separation is still difficult. You’re doing the best you can.  And you are not alone. 


For all these and more, on St. Valentine’s Day, this bud’s for you: