The Ordinary, Working Through God's Greatness

By The Rev. Bernard W. Poppe, Rector

In the middle of May, almost two months ago, I was in Berlin for no other reason than I’d never been there before and so many people I know said so many wonderful things about it. It was an amazing city for different reasons. Historically, it will be forever branded by its centrality to the Nazi third Reich. Among the various monuments and reminders of that period is a church substantially destroyed by the bombing of that city toward the end of the war.

Rather than tear the remaining parts down, the city leaders of the time decided to finish the sections off so that it would not further decay, but left it visibly maimed as a reminder of the horrors of war. So there it stands the entry with over half the steeple missing, large sections of the nave gone and its wall jagged. It is a powerful and mute statement of the devastation of war, even more articulate since the structure is intended to be a statement of peace and love. The church is supposed to witness God’s love and is now preserved as a witness to human aggression and turning away from the very love that is offered. Ironically, as I looked at it closer and for a longer time, it became a different statement. That church stands in silent witness to God’s presence in the midst of a broken world, like Jesus, taking upon itself the wounds of humanity to offer peace as the only real option for people. The only alternative to living in harmony with God’s love is the destruction to which people are capable.

The remains of that church also stand in contrast to the new construction surrounding it. I, like many tourists assumed that the new construction was to replace the older buildings which had been destroyed during the war. We were told that is not the case. Only 10 percent of Berlin’s building’s were destroyed. Older buildings were just torn down so they could make new ones and enjoy the creative spirit and energy represented in modern architecture. Perhaps too much of the past is a painful reminder of their shocking history and in order to move on, a new city must be built on the site of the old. But even if that is the case, they have no intention of forgetting the past. Like that church, there are plenty of reminders.

We look at Berlin now as a city connected with World War II. Even with its new exciting look, I don’t think it can ever exist without that part of its identity. And yet, in some of the museums there are pictures of happier days before there was a war, before there was a Third Reich and before there was a man named Hitler. By the time I got to Berlin and was seeing these sites, I was also tired of not hearing English. My ability at German is pathetic and though my comprehension is better than my ability to speak, both are painfully inadequate. I needed a dose of English and decided to go to the movies.

In Potsdam Place there is a center of stores and theaters that is incredibly futuristic in appearance and since the latest Star Trek movie had come out, and the theater was showing the English version of it, I made straight for it. I liked the movie very much and I also like the movies that take characters we’ve become familiar with and show us who they were before we got to know them. Youthful versions of all the characters we’ve come to know as the crew of the Star ship Enterprise grew and matured before our eyes. Like the city in which I saw this film, there was a time before they were famous. A time when they were unknown, before their greatness and faults were lived out.

Our lessons are a little bit like that too. In this case, we see David as he was just coming to the throne. The people of Israel were actually taking a big chance on him and taking a "nobody" and making him king. He had some good demonstrations of leadership in battle but could he rule a kingdom? The people of Israel had a belief that God was not only with David, but more importantly with them and could work though David as their King. David was God’s tool in building a Kingdom.

In somewhat of a reverse situation, the Gospel shows how Jesus went back to the people who knew him before he got well known and they weren’t impressed. They had a "who does he think he is" attitude and Jesus displays what might be described as frustration, but rather than dwell on it, keeps moving to the next town to continue his work and toward his destiny. Further, he sends out his disciples to go into other towns and gave them authority to do the things he did like healing and casting out demons. These are the early stories of the disciples’ humble beginnings before they became the giants of the faith they were to become.

God takes the ordinary and accomplishes extraordinary things. A shepherd becomes a king. A carpenter becomes the Messiah. Fishermen, tax collectors, and women from poor homes became phenomenal missionaries who changed the world. And it wasn’t so much that they were so great, but that it was God working Gods’ greatness through them to accomplish great things.

This July 4th weekend recalls for us 56 ordinary men given authority by the people they represented to declare independence from England. History show that many of them paid dearly with their lives and that of their families as well as their fortunes and livelihoods to sign that document and set in motion a string of events that changed a nation and the world. It’s exciting history filled with tragedy, triumph, failings and courage. We celebrate with fireworks because we know how that particular chapter of the story ended. They worked out of their faith and sense of calling without the knowledge that we have. I wonder how they would respond to the statues, museums exhibits and depictions of their lives and deeds.

In a much smaller, current example, this week marks for Episcopalians the start of the convention held every three years to lead our denomination with legislation, resolutions and visions of ministry and common life in our faith and witness of God’s love working through us in our various ministries. Ordinary people elected from each diocese around the country meet in Anaheim, California - not to go to Disneyland, but to do the work or the church and suffer constant teasing for their choice of location.

The major issues facing this convention center around how to address the departure of different diocese and individual churches from the Episcopal Church over their sharp differences over scriptural interpretation and social teaching. Specifically, churches and Dioceses in conflict with the direction the Episcopal church is moving in continuing to support the ordination of women as priests and bishops, as well as similar ordinations for gay and lesbian members of the church as well as creating liturgies for same gender marriages or civil unions. They have countless other issues, but these will dominate their work. One of our own members, Martha Gardner, is an elected Deputy to General Convention and we prayed for her at 8 am as she prepares to leave today, and we’ll continue to pray for all the Bishops and Deputies as they do this work. Hopefully history will look back, knowing the outcomes, and tell the stories of how these ordinary people given authority to heal God’s church came together and accomplished great things in the name of God and for the good of God’s church.

We too are ordinary people. Yet we are called to extraordinary feats of faith every day. Worshiping God and loving our neighbor is a task that calls forth greatness in us no less than that called out from David or Paul, or the disciples or the men and women throughout the ages who shaped and changed the world. God sends us out today giving us the authority to heal and cast out demons. There are things and people we will meet today who are hurting or broken. We may find that we are the only ones who can make a difference and we are called by God to do so. Our own brokenness and hurt may need attention and God offers healing for us and is available through prayer.

Like our ancestors in the faith, we can open ourselves to allow God to work through us and change us. Like them we can change the situations around us and together effect great changes in the world. We don’t know how the story ends, today is only our beginning. But through God’s grace it’s a story worth writing with God who is the author of life. Amen.

©2009 St. George's Episcopal Church, Maplewood, NJ

Imagine

By The Rev. Bernard W. Poppe, Rector

Imagine. Imagine yourself so desperate to be healed that you would fight a crowd to touch the hem of Jesus’ garment. Imagine the realization that he knew what happened and turned to find out who did it. Imagine the thoughts that would go through your mind, weighing whether or not you should admit it, or run away before anyone found out. Imagine stepping forward fearfully, wondering if Jesus would take the healing back and push you back into the pit of your disease. Now imagine the smile on Jesus’ face when he looked happily at you and shared your joy. Imagine being stunned that after so many years of illness, he told you that your faith has made you well, go in peace and be healed.

The woman in this story has no name given, imagine it was you. Now ask yourself, what might you have inside that would make you so desperate that you would risk the crowd and your fears to touch that hem.

The healing stories are among the most numerous in the Gospels. And in most cases there is a common thread, namely, the person in need such as the woman in today’s lesson, or someone on behalf of the person in need - such as Jairus on behalf of his daughter - approaches Jesus and asks, begs, or even takes the healing. And even though the individual cases differ, there is no one who is turned away. No one is told “no”. One notable difference is the way Jesus handled the death of his friend Lazarus. In that case he was asked to come quickly, much the same as Jairus. He didn’t say “no”, but he didn’t hurry either and Lazarus died. To Martha and Mary that must have seemed like a great big “NO” to them, but it turned out to be a greater good.

I find these healing stories to be fascinating. Ultimately I wrestle with their factual quality versus their spiritual quality. There are plenty of stories in each of our lives where physical healing has occurred to ourselves or someone we know that appear quite miraculous and in response to prayer. And there are also many tragic stories where the answer to desperate prayers seems to be “no”. When the answer appears to be “no” is it an imperfect faith that has failed or an imperfect God that closes the door? These are haunting questions, for which I for one, do not have the answers. It doesn’t stop me from praying however. Part of my personal faith is accepting that I don’t have the whole picture yet. I have learned that what I want is not always what is best. That doesn’t stop me from praying either. That little bit of insight simply shapes my prayer into making my requests known to God while remaining open to the outcome, certain that in the end my healing is God’s desire for me. Where I have to remain open is coming to understand what shape that healing takes.

Today is Gay Pride Sunday in New York City and it gets world wide attention. A vast community of Gay people and their straight friends witness and advocate in a parade not asking, but demanding healing. Demanding that the legal system statewide and nationally give full equality and protection from bias and hate. Claiming the spiritual healing that comes from not asking for equality, but fully acknowledging that despite the legal realities, we are equal.

I remember being tortured as a child by my own fears of being gay and the ostracism and danger I risked. I remembered my desperate prayers to be healed, made straight. I remember all too well the anguish I felt at God’s apparent silence and non-responsiveness. I prayed deeply and the answer seemed to keep coming back, “NO.” Was I not faithful enough, or good enough to heard? Was I already lost and left behind? Was I so awful as not even to be noticed by God? I was not only touching that hem, I was pulling it! Jesus couldn’t have helped but notice!!

The healing I sought came in a different way. It came by slowly over time understanding God’s love for me just as I am. Being gay is a rich quality of my character that informs how I see the world, form relationships with men and women. How I enter platonic or romantic intimacy. Even my humor and how I choose to decorate my home. It’s no better or worse than anyone else, it’s just who I am and part of who God made me to be. It is one facet of this particular diamond in the rough that God keeps polishing over the years of my being. There are many other facets, some smoother and rougher than others. My point here is that healing came not as I had asked for, but as I needed it. God did answer, and I believe is smiling, but I had to lift my head to see it, and open my hears and heart to receive it.

My healing is not evenly celebrated throughout the world. I am so fortunate and blessed that it is recognized here in this congregation, this Diocese and to some degree this state, but certainly not to the degree it will be one day. Parades are important, though the media will focus on the more exotic elements, and reinforce the negative rather than the positive understandings of what is hoped to be achieved. The struggles that take place in so many ways are also important in which ever arena they happen. But most importantly, the setting for healing must take place in the spirit of the individual who feels God’s love personally saying, “you are well, you faith has healed you, go in peace.” The disease that is healed at least in my case, was that of fear and self loathing. The healing that happened brought peace and self acceptance and deep knowing that I am loved by God who made me as I am and loves me. I have seen similar healing in other gay and lesbian people and I celebrate it. I have seen healing in straight people whose prejudice and even hatred and violence has been replaced by understanding and warmth if not, in fact, love.

All of us need healing in one form or another. In most cases the heed for healing will be within our bodies minds or spirits. It might be in our relationships or about finding our place in the world. Ironically we’ll discover that we don’t have the full picture on any given issue and that our prayers may appear to go unanswered or unnoticed. But I believe with my whole being that is not the case. Our prayer brings whatever awareness we have to the surface, so that it is not we who have God’s attention, but God who finally has ours.

None of us can afford to stop praying for healing for ourselves or others. There’s a lot that needs to be healed physically, emotionally and spiritually. Like the woman in the story each of us will have a time when we are so desperate about something that we will fight the crowd to claim the healing that Jesus will lovingly give. Whatever healing you need, I encourage you to reach out, risk what you fear to know that God’s love will surprise you with an incredible healing energy that you may not even realize has been at work in you until much later.

This wonderful woman in the Gospel story sought Jesus in quiet desperation to heal something that she had dealt with for many years. She later experienced fear and trembling after claiming her healing. And then experienced the ecstasy of hearing her savior tell her she was healed. That woman was healed in so much more than her body that day. So many of our illnesses are physical or emotional reflections of the illnesses we keep in our spirits. Accepting God’s love, and healing the spirit within radiates outward and takes many different forms - emotionally, physically, even in society. Imagine that. Amen.

©2009 St. George's Episcopal Church, Maplewood, NJ

The Baptism of Eleanor and Owen

By The Rev. Bernard W. Poppe, Rector

First of all, let me welcome the families and friends of Eleanor Paige Matteson and Owen Jace Main. One of the parting words of Jesus to his disciples is to go out into all the nations and baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Among all the work that any church does, there is nothing more important than what we do here today.

Baptism is the welcoming of a person into the family of God in the body of Jesus Christ known as the Church. Vows will made on behalf of these two babies and the rest of us will renew our own baptismal vows. These promises bring us into relationship with God and each other by setting the priorities and values which we want to live into. To worship God. To study scripture and participate in the Eucharist. To resist evil and see forgiveness when necessary. To talk about our faith and proclaim the Gospel. To seek and serve Christ in all persons and love our neighbors. To strive for justice and peace, and respect he dignity of all people.

It’s a tall order. We’re not always able to do it well. Sometimes we don’t do it at all. But sometimes, we’re really quite remarkable in what we’re able to do in the name of God. It’s those moments that we strive for and pray for. In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul begs them to open their hearts wide to the teachings he brings and the love of God he proclaims. Today we beg for this also - to open our hearts wide to the love of God and reflect that love by how we live in the world.

I must admit that when I looked at the lessons for today and saw that on a Baptism Sunday we have one from Job, I thought, “Oh no... maybe the Gospel will be better.” But there we have a storm at sea. Not much of an improvement. But given the weather lately, it might be appropriate than I first thought. But the more I thought about these lessons, the more I liked them and thought them perfect for today.

Job is a well known book of the Old Testament in the Wisdom literature. The Wisdom Books are specifically designed to teach lessons and Job is certainly among them. It has a peculiar beginning, in that Satan and God are talking, perhaps over tea, and God is bragging about Job’s righteousness. Satan says, “Of course he’s righteous, everything is going his way. I bet at the first sign of trouble he curses you.” It’s a bet that God was willing to make, and so began a terrible ordeal for Job that included a lot of mental and physical suffering. (This wager doesn’t place God in the most favorable light, I must say - but it sets the stage for the story about to unfold.) Job is visited by three friends and most of the book centers around their conversations. In a gross over simplification, Job’s friends spend a lot of time accusing him of having done something wrong to deserve his suffering. Job continually maintains he’s done nothing wrong. It’s a circular conversation that digs a hole deeper and deeper without ever getting out of it. In the portion we read, God intervenes “out of the whirlwind” quite angrily it seems telling them all that they can’t possibly know all there is to know, and suggests that they shouldn’t even be asking the questions of “why” when things go wrong.

Job seems to be written as a book to explain the existence of suffering but never quite explains it. Rather, the book seems to discourage the question. In the tradition of Wisdom literature, the reader has to wrestle with the answers. Rather than see the cause of suffering in this book, I see the tendency most people have in the face of it. Blame or self pity. We look for reasons to explain the origins of what is already there and spin wheels that might otherwise be used to get us moving beyond the issues.

I’ve seen people who, when confronted with a spouse’s infidelity continually torture themselves by asking “why”. The same questions occurs when a loved one dies, or some tragedy or setback happens. Some questioning is normal and a specific reason may be helpful, but when the answer is simply not knowable, obsessing over it keeps a person paralyzed. There are simply things we will never know and like Job and his friends we can go round and round trying to find answers that don’t exist, or accept reality and look for ways to move beyond the difficulties.

During my recent trip to South Africa, the evidence of suffering is everywhere. The reasons are vast and complex and stretch back generations into a mist of unknowing. There are times when we need to stop looking backward and start to look forward to solutions. In South Africa there are places of hope where that is happening. But there are also too many places where blame and self pity keep people locked in a place of paralysis.

The imagery of God calling out of the whirlwind is wonderful. When we are in times of suffering there is a crashing and confusion in our heads that might as well be a whirlwind. And this is where the story becomes important for a Baptism. We all know that life has joys and struggles. Baptism does not protect any of us from life’s hardships, and it’s no insurance against suffering. It is, however, part of the solution to maneuvering out of the storm. If you sense a segue to the Gospel lesson, yes it’s coming. Whether it’s God calling out of the whirlwind or Jesus calming the storm, the presence of God in the midst of life’s suffering and hardships is essential for us to hold onto to move beyond it.

Faith and prayer work. In these things we find strength and solutions to what confronts us. They do not turn back the clock and undo everything that may have been done, but they give us the strength to move forward and create an environment for healing to occur. In order to tap into these wonderful tools, a person needs guidance and support in developing their own relationship with God and the shape their faith and prayer will take. That’s why it’s so important that people have a community of faith that can help them. It’s into the Christian faith that Owen and Eleanor are being baptized because we believe the promises we’ve received through the Gospels and scriptures of God’s love for us and God’s driving intention that we live life fully and joyfully.

©2009 St. George's Episcopal Church, Maplewood, NJ

Home Again

By The Rev. Bernard W. Poppe, Rector

It feels good to be back home and very good to be back in this pulpit. I preached in several interesting places including a monastic chapel and a Cathedral in South Africa, a village church and Cathedral in England. The monastic chapel is a relatively new building and the Rochester Cathedral is among the oldest in Britain. The memories of all those places are like a kaleidoscope of images accompanied by memories of the sounds of drums and ethereal choirs. But of all the pulpits I entered, this is still the one that fits best. There are many stories to tell and lessons learned. I have some to share and I already know that you do as well. Our sabbaticals were each times of exploration, learning and prayerful journey. One of my favorite quotes is from T.S. Eliot and it says: “We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started... and know the place for the first time.” I feel a bit of that now, grateful to have gone, and even more grateful to be back.

As the weeks unfold, so will the stories, but today we have some other kinds of celebration and transitions to observe. We’ll start by looking at the readings.

The lessons today give nice images of new life, growth and hope. Ezekiel wrote of a sprig being taken from the top of a mighty cedar tree and becoming the start of a new tree that would be a haven for birds and beasts. He even goes so far as to say that it will bear fruit. We need to remember that Ezekiel is a prophet, he’s not a botanist. Cedars don’t bear fruit, but the image still works in terms of the growth of the new sprig and the abundance of protection it offers. Ezekiel is writing to a people in exile and giving them hope of new beginnings and a return to their homeland. The image is itself a seed to plant the imagining of a new Israel in the future. In an earlier chapter he uses the metaphor of the cedar to refer to their former line of kings. In the segment we read, clipping the top of the old tree is the suggestion that the royal family will be restored someday. It is in fact the seed of the expectation that a messiah will come to restore that line.

The Gospel echoes this story with the parable of the mustard seed. Again, we have to let go of botanic accuracy in favor of literary license. It’s not really the smallest of all the seeds on the earth, but it’s small. And who hasn’t picked up any tiny seed and been amazed at the tree or shrub that grows out of it? Any growth is a wonder and Jesus uses it here to make the point of both growth and protection. The birds make their nests in the shade of this shrub where they will be safe.

I decided to do some research on this image and although I don’t have a mustard shrub in the yard, I do have some nice trees and I went outside when it wasn’t raining, sat down and watched one. Watching a tree can be very instructive. As for the tree I watched, I noticed that some birds do in fact have a nest in it, while others simply came for various periods of time and flew off. Not all the birds got along and some got along very well. Occasionally one would chirp, sing or coo. But that’s not all. Not only birds are to be found it the trees. There were squirrels and the neighbors cat sat curiously poised, alternately looking at me and then the tree, no doubt like my neighbors wondering what I was doing and why I was there. (It had occurred to me to disguise my intent by holding an open book in my lap, but I decided to keep my focus uncluttered by deception or embarrassment.) I glared at the cat, daring it to go up the tree, it left shortly after. I think it was shaking its head, but I could be wrong.

I counted several varieties of birds and just meditated a bit on the miracle of the seed that took root so many years ago. The kingdom of heaven is like this tree too, I imagined.

The art of the parable is to look at it in different layers. There are some generally accepted interpretations, but there’s no one way to understand them and each person who studies one will have a different take on it.

We have a lot happening today in the life of this parish and while I watched the tree I imagined that it was St. George’s like the kingdom of God where some make nests and stay for a long time raising families, while others are here for a shorter time and will make their nests in another tree. But all in all, it’s a miracle.

We come here to find God, to discover and develop a relationship with God and be enriched by a community engaged in their own pursuit of God. And that is the Kingdom of Heaven. It’s not without squirrely challenges and catlike struggles, (sorry, but I had to put those in somewhere) but over time it’s a place dedicated to the pursuit of the “holy”.

During June we celebrate graduations of our children from various grades or schools and some of our seasonal programs end. At the family service we celebrated and thanked the church school teachers and their fearless leader, Jane Cates. At this service we will be thanking our choir for their work and dedication over the past year. We will also be thanking Mary Davis for her work and ministry among us as she concludes her time with us. I can also say now that she was interviewed yesterday by the Commission on Ministry and approved for the next level of her process and she is now officially a candidate in this labyrinthine journey to ordination.

Today we also observe Juneteenth, commemorating June 19, 1865 when General Gordon Granger informed the people of Galveston, Texas that slavery was over. General Order # 3 was read aloud stating:

"The people of Texas are informed that in accordance with a Proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and free laborer."

Hats are worn today as a gracious tribute to the traditions of African American women and the crowns they represent from the heritage of proud African dress.

June is also the month of Gay Pride with parades and marches scheduled in many different towns and cities giving witness to the need for further equality and justice. These marches like almost every other march for justice is sometimes met with cheering and welcome and at other times met with jeers, insults, arrest and violence.

In this church this morning we all rest in the shade of this great tree of God’s love. We represent and participate in one or more of the many facets of life celebrated this day or this month. We do so in community and in sharing God’s love. We do so claiming our own voices and in support of our brothers and sisters who are claiming theirs.

Sometimes I like to come in here when it’s quiet and walk around. I like to look at the plaques and memorials and wonder at the people who were here before us. What kind of shade were they looking for and what kind did they find? Using Ezekiel’s image, were they seeds for shrubs or trees? How high did they grow and how high will we grow while protecting the little sprouts in our care?

With all its graduations and celebrations, June is a month that marks transitions and life changes. It watches movements occur in our lives. But like the birds of the parable, we may go from branch to branch or tree to tree in the kingdom of God we are assured that God is a safe secure roost for our wanderings. We may go from place to place, but God is there wherever we go ready to give us shelter, protection and hope. That is the Kingdom of God. Amen.

© 2009 St. George's Episcopal Church, Maplewood, NJ

Trinity Sunday

By The Rt. Rev. Mark M. Beckwith, Bishop of Newark

This video is in two parts.





©2009 The Rt. Rev. Mark M. Beckwith

Pentecost

By The Rev. Anne Bolles-Beaven, Sabbatical Priest

Take my lips and speak through them; take our ears and hear through them; take our hearts and set them on fire with love for thee. May I speak in the name of the Living God.” Amen.

When the day of Pentecost had come the disciples were all together in one place: attentively, watching and waiting for whatever it was that Jesus had said would happen to happen. Without warning seemingly out of nowhere came the sound of a roaring wind. It filled the entire house where they were sitting. Then the Holy Spirit swept through their ranks like wildfire. Suddenly they were all speaking at once about God’s deeds of power—and they were speaking in all the languages of the world.

Devout Jewish pilgrims from all over the world were staying in Jerusalem at the time. They came running at the sound, thunderstruck. Aren’t all of these who are talking Galileans? How can we hear them proclaiming God’s deeds of power each in our own mother tongue? What is going on here? How can this be?

It was a singular moment yet to a lesser degree we know this miracle of speaking and hearing in our own experience, times when someone seemingly ordinary says something to us that blows us away as, again, seemingly out of nowhere a connection is made, a freeing insight gained, healing happens. We hear a sermon or a song and think: It’s as if they’re speaking directly to me! And, indeed, the Holy Spirit does speak to us every day many times a day if only we will listen. Fifty years ago a friend is given a passage of scripture; he credits it with saving him from a nervous breakdown. A friend tells another friend: “you are loved, so loved” and she hears the voice of God. Someone in a grocery store smiles handing a woman back a dropped can of peas and hands her back her self-respect.

We’re here because, miraculously, over the course of our lives we’ve experienced “God’s deeds of power” spoken to us in a language we can understand, a language that calls to us like our mother tongue in a foreign land, irresistibly drawing us in love, by love, for love. Like the Jewish pilgrims before us we’ve gathered at the sound. People being people—both then and now—continue to draw varying conclusions about the evidence: “It’s God,” cries one. “You’re kidding yourself,” mocks another. “They’re drunk on cheap wine,” some sneered at the disciples.

Something happened in that movement of tongues and wind and fire because from that moment everything changed. In the words of Barbara Brown Taylor, “The followers became leaders, the listeners became preachers, the converts became missionaries, the healed became healers. The disciples became apostles, witnesses of the risen Lord by the power of the Holy Spirit. Surprising things began to happen. They began to say things that sounded like him, and they began to do things they had never seen anyone but him do before.” (Gospel Medicine, Cambridge: MA; Cowley Publications, 1995, p. 77-78).

For one thing instead of denying he even knew Jesus Peter stepped up on Pentecost with boldness: Friends, we’re not drunk. It’s only 9 o’clock in the morning. But it is intoxicating—this mind blowing, heartwarming, life changing power of God that connects us to each other and the world in love and service. Listen up and get this story straight. This is just as the prophet Joel announced: God has poured out God’s Spirit “upon all flesh” upon all kinds of people, not just on prophets, priests and royalty, but on our sons and our daughters, on male and female slaves, on the lost the lonely and the left behind, our young see visions and our old dream dreams.

The Spirit of Truth is here to lead us into all truth: the truth about ourselves, the truth about Jesus Christ crucified and Risen, the truth about whose world this is and how we can help one another. God is calling us all in the language of passion and love—a language each of us can understand. It brings courage out of fear, life out of death, community out of chaos, saying: Step out in faith, I will meet you with power. If you want to walk on water you got to get out of the boat! “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

“When the day of Pentecost had come” the community consisted of 120 people. By the end of Peter’s sermon 3000 people were baptized. (O to preach like that!) “When the day of Pentecost had come” all Christ’s followers were all together in one place, by the time the sun had set they’d been blown out over the known world. Without the power of the Holy Spirit the disciples would have become life-less and scattered like Ezekiel’s dry bones BY it they came together bone upon bone into a living Body, the living, breathing, transforming Body of Christ. The Church was born. We’re still here.

With the events of this day the Easter season comes to an end. The Paschal candle which has burned in our midst since the Easter Vigil will be extinguished—the presence of Christ no longer signified by its presence in our midst but by his presence in US. With the Feast of Pentecost the flame of love that burned in Christ alone, now burns in us by the power of the Holy Spirit. It has the power to transform and transfigure us as it did the disciples if only we’ll allow it. It comes to warm and comfort us. It comes to guide us in places of risk and uncertainty—where life has broken us open and we are not in control. It comes to strengthen and empower us, to equip us with patience and courage we did not know we had, for struggles we could not have imagined, for glory yet to be revealed. When we find ourselves with speech beyond our reasoning, faith beyond measure, love beyond thought, we know the Spirit has caught hold of us.

It is, my friends, the greatest unharnessed power in the world. What might we do if we understood, believed in, experienced the power working in us through the Holy Spirit! If we opened ourselves to it, decided to work with it? It may come more like a whisper than the rush of a violent wind in our lives but by our baptism we have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit. We may speak with an eloquence that converts 3000 in a day or find ourselves unable to utter a word—even so, as the alternate reading for this morning asserts, the Holy Spirit is there interceding “with sighs too deep for words.” Receiving the Holy Spirit doesn’t make life easy for us. It aligns us with God’s plan for our lives. It isn’t that life gets easy, but that important things begin to happen. We become part of something great.

Wherever we find ourselves today God is at work in us. Maybe we are lying on the ground like dry bones. God asked Ezekiel, “Mortal can these bones live?” I answered, “O Lord God you know.” Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the bones.” And Ezekiel prophesied. “Prophesy to the breath.” And Ezekiel prophesied and the Spirit of God came into those very dry bones and they lived. I’m struck—on this birthday of the church—by the power of community. The bones—and God—needed Ezekiel. The crowd needed Peter. We’re all in this together. The bones in the valley weren’t just disconnected they were “very dry.” But through Ezekiel the Spirit entered into that place of desolation and death and brought life. The disciples had been waiting and praying and praying and waiting but they didn’t give up. They encouraged one another and the breakthrough came as it always will because God is bigger than the wait or the confusion, or the risk or the fear or the uncertainty or the loss. The Holy Spirit is the greatest unharnessed power in the world.

Pentecost marks an end and a beginning—which seems fitting as our sabbatical time draws to a close. For one thing it marks the end of the disciple’s life with Christ as they had come to know it—just as it does for us. Like the disciples we’ve shared the last supper, endured the cross, rejoiced in the resurrection and encountered the Risen Christ in people we mistook for strangers and friends until the day he was taken up from us in the Ascension. We puzzled over his parables, washed each other’s feet, and pondered the meaning of his sacrifice. We shared insights and conversation, compassion and support. Like the disciples we laughed and cried and planned and prayed. We celebrated our beloved-ness, received the gifts each other had to give, kept an eye skinned for the Spirit. In short, we’ve been the Body of Christ.

It’s been a privilege to have served among you—beside you. Never have I had the pleasure of working with a team so caring and competent, spirited and supportive: from the wardens—Tom and Cheryl; to the clergy—Chris Carroll for her teaching and pastoral visits and Chris McCloud for support above and beyond the call of duty—liturgical, pastoral, personal (I could NOT have done this without you!); to Karen, parish administrator extraordinaire, to Mary our wonderful seminarian and her gift of Taize; John, our joyful and talented organist and the choir who not only processes in a reverential dance but sings when they get here; to Ulysses and the altar guild—gracious, collegial and kind, all; to Dan in charge of acolytes (and great help to me and Deacon Chris especially at Holy Week); to Roland and his healers; Nina and Kirk, masters of the gospel on the web; Clarence and newcomers, George in charge of readers (no small feat today) ; to Jane worker-of-wonders Cates in charge of our children; to Jane who covered our Confirmation Class; to the family service musicians; to ushers and greeters to all of you who “gather at the sound.” You have spoken to me for 14 weeks in a language I can understand. God is good, all the time. I thank God for you all. What a gift! What a blessing! What a parish!

Pentecost marks the beginning of a new Spirit in Christ. “I tell you the truth:” said Jesus, “it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.” Fourteen weeks ago the Holy Spirit blew Bernie to South Africa and me into your midst. Now the Holy Spirit is blowing Bernie home and us apart. In true Pentecost fashion you and Bernie are coming together in a new spirit because the community has not been just sitting here marking time. The Holy Spirit has been at work. Bernie’s been changed. You’ve been changed. I’ve been changed. How will God knit together these living bones into a new reality I wonder? It must be a new reality because there is no going backwards in Christ. God always moves forward, melting us, molding us, leading us on.

That first Sunday I quoted Marcel Proust: the real voyage of discovery lies not in seeing new landscapes but in having new eyes. I wonder with what new eyes you will see yourselves and Bernie as the future unfolds. One thing is for certain God will be speaking We only know that God will be with us all speaking the language of love and grace and transformation in a way each of us will be able to understand and that the power of the Holy Spirit—the power of the invisible God is constantly at work beneath the surface of things.

The Body hasn’t stopped growing or the wind blowing since. In fact, it blew mightily during the silence of our 10:30 Taize service two weeks ago. After the whir of the siren, after the barking of the dog into the silence there came the rush of a mighty wind and it shook the roof of the house, this house, where we were sitting. Did you hear it? What a marvelous sign. Pentecost wasn’t only “back then” it is here and now. Come to make all things new—even me and you. Thanks be to God.

Come, Holy Spirit, come!

© 2009 The Rev. Anne Bolles-Beaven

Memorial Day

By The Rev. Anne Bolles-Beaven, Sabbatical Priest

“As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.” May I speak in the name of the Living God. Amen.

The soldier had what looked like a quiver of them on his back: American flags on small dowels and he solemnly stood them upright one after another with military precision in front each headstone in what turned out to be rows and rows and rows of headstones at Arlington National Cemetery. On this Memorial Day weekend we remember those who have given their lives in the service of their country; who like the disciples in the gospel this morning were sent into a world hostile to them and laid down their lives in the service of a mission larger than themselves.

Are there any in our midst who have served in our nations’ armed forces? Could you please stand. The most cursory student of history knows we owe you a debt of gratitude. On behalf of the rest of us, I’d like to give a special word of thanks to those of you who were willing to be sent—they aren’t called “orders” for nothing, are they? Are there any who supported a family member who served? I’m glad Michele Obama has made the support of military families one of her main concerns because Lord knows the families of our service men and women bear a great part of the unseen cost of our nation’s defense: long deployments, fear for loved ones, the sometimes dangerous transition to peacetime life after war, the reality of post traumatic stress. These things are better understood now though still difficult to deal with in the suck-it-up stoicism of military life. My dad dealt with a lot of it: “I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.”

I grew up in the military. My dad was a naval captain and chaplain. Church wasn’t in parishes but on naval bases with military personnel. My dad served for 36 years: 20 active, 16 reserved. We knew about being “sent.” Some of the places my dad was sent were to the S. Pacific in WWII, to circumnavigate Africa when I was 4, to be the chaplain of a Marine infantry battalion in Vietnam when I was six in 1966-67—and where he earned the Bronze Star with Combat “V” for valor. As a family we were sent from Indiana to RI to MA to Virginia to Newfoundland—which necessitated breaking out a map—then back to RI where my folks retired and still live. My older brother was ROTC in college, serving 20 years in the marines: 12 active, 8 reserved retiring as a Lt Colonel. He was married for 20 years to a naval pilot. She flew C130s those big huge cargo planes.

We knew from military. I was never cut out for it myself, disagreed with my brother about it in college but at its best there is little like it. The military we knew was a community of dedication, commitment and self-offering that ran in illustrated parallel to the gospel in our house. We heard the gospel themes of costing love, danger, sacrifice and courage in the sea stories that riveted us. Countless evenings were spent regaled at the dining table or sitting at the feet of guests in the living room listening to stories in which our parents saw and taught us to see the great realities and truths of the gospel enacted in real time and with power.

Stories like the precious water from a canteen poured over a wounded comrade’s head in the Vietnamese jungle, “It is like the precious oil on the head, running down upon the beard,” wrote my dad in Vietnam, quoting Psalm 133, “on the beard of Aaron, running down over the collar of his robes.” Stories like the nun cutting the bloody boot off a wounded soldier told, “I wouldn’t do that for a million dollars” who replied: “neither would I.” The family friend in the Coast Guard, commander of an 83 footer search and rescue boat that was one of the boats that responded to the destroyer the USS Turner that blew up off the coast of NY. Another boat returned first and was given quite a bit of press. Peter’s ship didn’t come in for 18 hours. He was credited with saving 49 members of the crew, the majority of those who were left, heroically pulling up alongside the burning ship and not giving the order to abandon ship until all the officers were accounted for as wounded or dead. To our parents these were signs of the power and presence of God alive and at work,” the God who seeks until he finds, the God who bears what cannot be borne for love of us.

We were raised on mission: “The mission of my letter.” “The mission of my phone call;” my dad literally talks like this. The gospel wasn’t long ago and far away it was unfolding right now in our lives with passion and purpose. It was our mission. Military people understand mission. We understand being a part of something larger than ourselves being under authority greater than our own. It was a military man who said to Jesus, “I am a man under authority with men under me. I say to one, “Go” and he goes, to another, “Come” and he comes, to another “do this” and he does it. Only say the word and my servant will be healed.” Jesus marveled at the man’s faith in Jesus’ power over demons and disease: “Never have I seen such faith,” said Jesus, “even in all Israel.”

We never understood comments like you can’t expect too much from church members—after all they’re volunteers. Volunteers? What are you talking about “volunteers”? We’ve been baptized, confirmed and commissioned. “You did not choose me but I chose you,” Jesus said in the gospel last week. “I appointed you to bear fruit, fruit that will last.” “Love one another as I have loved you.” “Go into all the world baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” says Jesus at the end of Matthew’s gospel. It’s not called the Great Suggestion. It’s called the Great Commission. “As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.” Friends, we’re not volunteers. We are on a mission.

How might our lives be different, I wonder if we saw them this way? Not as the center of our universe but claimed by something larger—our God, our nation, this person in need whom I am in a position to help. Love claims us—God’s love, love that that makes the soul expand, love that causes us to forget ourselves, take risks we wouldn’t ordinarily take. Share our time, our money, our canteen and our lives. By all logic there ought to be less of us but instead there is more. We lose our lives and so find them. We die to ourselves and learn how to live at last. We find that all Jesus told us is true—not that it’s easy.

We don’t like to talk about war, about conflict, in polite company, certainly not in church. It’s another way we try to be more spiritual than God. But Jesus meets it head on in the gospel. “I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.” Guard them. Protect them. “Sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth.” Jesus is telling the truth in this passage. There is no way we can look at the world with its genocide, murder, poverty and violence and say there is no evil here. There is no struggle going on here. There is nothing to fight against here. Read the gospels. Jesus came among us healing, preaching good news to the poor, forgiving sins, searching out the lost, the lonely and the left behind and he was opposed almost every step of the way. He came in love, by love, for love and he was challenged and resisted: Get behind me Satan. We said “No” to him and the life he offered on Good Friday. On Easter Sunday he fought back: “Yes.” Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Jesus never raised a hand in anger but he was in every way a warrior. So were Buddha and Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. They were spiritual warriors who faced off with Satan in the wilderness, temptation under the Bo tree, waged war with hunger strikes and peace marches. They fought to the death with a weapon called love. Love is not in the gospel sense, primarily an emotion. It is not a soft focused Hallmark card—ever. It is an act of will, an inclination of heart and mind and strength toward a purpose larger than us, a good greater than our own. When Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery, “Neither do I condemn you,” when he stood his ground before Herod and Pilate, when he took a child and put him in the midst of them, when he “stretched out his arms on the hard wood of the cross” he was showing us what love looks like, the love to which he calls us, the love with which he sends us.

Christianity is not bland, boring, passive and inept—though we often make it seem so. God has enlisted us in a cause. We all signed on at our baptism: to renounce Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God; to renounce the evil powers of this world that corrupt and destroy the creatures of God; to renounce sinful desires that draw us from the love of God” and to “turn to Jesus Christ and accept him as our Savior; to put our whole trust in his grace and love; and to promise to follow and obey him as our Lord.” These are our marching orders. They are dynamic and powerful and life giving for ourselves, for one another and for our world. What life might be possible if we lived into them with soldier dedication? What seeds could such love plant?

This vestment used to have—if you can imagine it—gold orphreys, these bands were glittering gold: “I felt like target practice,” my dad said of wearing it in the Vietnamese jungle glinting in the sun. The local nuns replaced the gold with green velvet. God bless them. He loaned it to me when I was doing an interim at Holy Spirit, Verona, about 10 years ago. They had no green chasuble which I happened to tell my dad: “Oh, I’ve got one you can use, Annie.” “Great,” I say. He sends me this one. “How’s the chasuble, Honey?” “Uh, it’s great dad. But it’s camouflage. It’s practically brown.” “Well, that’s from the heat—hotter than hell in the jungle.”

Christ was with my dad when he sent him to celebrate the Eucharist on the front lines, on the hood of a jeep in the mud with the marines in Vietnam. Christ was with me when he sent me to Verona. Christ is with us now in all the places to which he sends us: to work, to school, to family, to growth personal and relational, to kindness, compassion and love. When he ascended into heaven it wasn’t the end of him being somewhere. It was the beginning of him being everywhere. “As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.” Lead on O king eternal till sin’s fierce war shall cease and holiness shall whisper the sweet “amen” of peace, for not with swords loud clashing, nor roll of stirring drums but deeds of love and mercy the heavenly kingdom comes.” (Hymn 555 v. 2)

© 2009 The Rev. Anne Bolles-Beaven