Saying No! and Meaning it.

 I don’t know about you, but I’m really tired.  It feels like no matter how hard I try, I cannot get ahead, cannot even keep up with some things.  There are so many things that call out for my attention.  So many special interests are vying for my energy.  There never seems to be enough {{fill in the blank here}}.  Not enough sleep, time, people… you get the idea.

“Not Enough” is a mindset our culture has been ingrained into our thinking.  It is the basis of our economy: there’s not enough to go around so the maximum profit can be made by sellers because we’ll always want for more; we don’t want to fall behind.  This mindset is the basis of our self image:  we can never be enough.  We’re never good enough, pretty enough, smart enough, efficient enough, thin enough, fit enough, strong enough, successful enough.  If we fall short, the culture shames us with its stress on being better than ordinary.  So we say “yes” to doing and having as much as possible so we don’t suffer the “shame of failure.” This mindset of scarcity feeds our greed, our jealousies, our prejudice, and our struggles in living. 

This scarcity mindset undermines the work of the Body of Christ.  Frankly, we become exhausted when we hear the call of the church to be more hospitable, do more in the community, feed the hungry, house the homeless, or free the oppressed.  We long for more community and deeper connection with God and with one another.  But we just don’t have time or energy to do anything more.  We feel depleted, exhausted, run down, tired, stressed, and overextended. We are so controlled by the scarcity mindset of the culture around us that being a disciple of Jesus is just too overwhelming of a prospect.  

If nothing else, Jesus was a counter culture revolutionary.  He stood up against the demeaning and belittling habits of the culture so as to bring people wholeness and fullness of joy.  His ministry and his teaching were about building up, supporting, and strengthening individuals in a culture that ostracized and devalued those who were not perfect in the eyes of the culture.  He did this by valuing them exactly as they were, for who they were. 

Friends, it is past time for us to stand up to the cultural mindset of scarcity.  We do not need to be successful by the culture’s standards; we do not need to measure up to the market’s standards of prosperity.  The way out of scarcity thinking is Sabbath Rest.  I’m not talking about sleeping through church!  I’m suggesting that we need to say, “NO!” to the cultural rat race that feeds of fear of failure and of falling behind.  We need to learn to say “NO!” to doing one more thing that does not build us up as disciples, that does not help to build the Realm of God on Earth.  We need to practice saying, “NO!” to those things that exhaust us and not nourish us, things that manipulate our self esteem, things that do not lead us to wholeness.

To practice Sabbath is to practice resistance.  Walter Brueggemann reminds us that Sabbath resists the spirituality of the principalities and powers--the culture around us--to nurture the physical and spiritual resources to fuel further resistance, making us increasingly available for both community and prophetic ministry[1].  Sabbath requires letting go of the shame-based fear of being ordinary as we allow the world to rush by as we settle into the humble, small and human rhythms of Sabbath. To practice Sabbath means to go quiet, to be less noticed, to rest into the ordinary.

As we move into Lent, I invite you to take Sabbath with me.  Let us take a sacred pause and find new habits. Let us seek together the Joyful Kingdom of God and find the deep joy of following Christ.  I pray you’ll find in this Lenten season fruitful, spirit feeding opportunities to grow in faith. 

[1] Walter Bruggemann:  Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to the Culture of Now.  Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press,  2014.

From the Sermon Barrell: Beach Plums, Plum Lines, and Bounty

A sermon preached on July 17, 2013 at First Congregational Church (UCC) in Pembroke, Mass.

Scriptures:

Amos 7:7-17

Colossians 1:1-14

Along the edge of Cable Road leading to Rock Harbor in Eastham on Cape Cod, there are sand dunes covered with beach plumbs.  On days when my father would be working on the boat or out fishing and digging for clams over low tide, my mother would allow us to play in the dunes, climb on the giant barnacle covered rock, and collect sand dollars and other treasures along the shore of the bay.  The standing rule was, however, that we could go no further inland than the beach plum bushes.  

There was an ongoing, unspoken competition among some of the residents of Eastham centered upon who would pick the beach plums at the height of ripeness.  These tiny, astringent fruit make the best jelly that can be had.  Picked too early, however, and the astringency overpowers the scant sugar in them.  Picked too late, the end result doesn’t set up properly and is a runny mess more like syrup than jelly.  

Beach plum jelly is a coastal specialty.  It’s unheard of in the regions where I’ve lived inland, probably because beach plums are reluctant to be domesticated.  They don’t do well outside of their salty, sandy environment.  They produce richly one year and may barely produce at all the next.  They thrive after a winter of high tides and being buried in the sand.  They thrive in the constant shift of the sands around them.  The normalcy of a cultivated patch does not lend itself to these fruit.  These bushes want constant change.  

It was an area of beach plum bushes that was the boundary of my bay side playground. 
As I listen to and read this morning’s scriptures, my mind is drawn to beach plums, to the line drawn in the sand beyond which we children were not permitted to go, to the fussiness and inconsistency of beach plums harvest, and to their resistance to cultivation.

In Amos’ time, the Jewish people had been divided into two kingdoms for nearly 200 years:   the ten tribes of the northern kingdom (Israel) and the two tribes of the southern kingdom (Judah). It was the time before the fall of the northern kingdom (c. 721 B.C.) to the Assyrians.  Jeroboam 1 feared that if his people were to continue going to Jerusalem to worship, they would be loyal to the southern kingdom, Judah, and would overthrow Jeroboam in favor of Rehoboam, the king of Judah.  1Kings 12:28-30 says, that Jeroboam made two calves of gold; and he told the people that “it’s too much to expect you to go to Jerusalem.  Use these calves as your gods.  It is these that have brought you out of Egypt.”  He put one in the city of Bethel, just a few miles north of Jerusalem,  and the other in the town of Dan, in the far northern reaches of the northern kingdom. The people did as they were told.  They worshiped in those places as well as in the high places – the altars of pagan gods.  

This morning’s passage tells us of the third of five visions of Amos.  The first vision  was of locusts (7:1-3); the second, fire (7:4 – 6).  After each of the first two visions, Amos begged for mercy (7:2, 5), and in each of those instances Yahweh relented (7:3, 6).  However, in this third vision, Amos makes no attempt to ask for mercy and Yahweh shows no signs of relenting. Maybe Amos has decided that Yahweh's judgment is righteous and he no longer has it in his heart to protest the coming punishment.  

It is not a line of beach plum bushes but a plumb line that Amos sees.  A simple weight at the end of a string, this device shows a true vertical – 90 degrees from the horizon – against which a builder measures a wall.  A wall that is not plumb is not structurally sound and is not strong enough to support the weight of the upper structure and the roof; it has to be dismantled and rebuilt.  

When we had an offer from a potential buyer of my parents’ home, an inspector found that the east wall of the basement was not plumb; the block wall was 2 inches off plumb.  In that condition, the house could not be sold.

It’s not easy to straighten a wall that is not straight.  We had no idea that it had shifted.  It was plumb when my father played those blocks 28 years earlier.  There had been no earthquake.  There had been no flood.  But over time and with no one noticing, that wall moved, drifted from its strength and into a compromised state.  We had to hire a contractor to place jacks under the floor joists, take down the cement block wall and replace it.

Yahweh is comparing the Northern Israeli tribes to an untrue wall; they have strayed from the truth with their worship of false gods. The actions of the people do not match the plumb line of God’s grace.  Their leader has led them astray; they have drifted from strength to something less.  God needed to unassemble the people – to unsettle them and dismantle their security – in order to reassemble them into a true and strong community of faith. 

What is the plumb line against which we measure our life as followers of Yahweh, as Christians in an increasingly unChristian and secular society? Where have we moved away from the grace of God; settled into less than strong standing wall?  What ministry, what attitudes, what mission and purpose measures true to the Plumb, and what needs to be unassembled and rebuilt? What are we doing that future generations in the Church will be able to say that we did our job well in the midst of the change – the shifting sand – around us?  How do we measure, how do we review and assess our lives as Christians to be sure we are true to God’s plan for us? 

The letter to the Colossians gives us some guidance. Paul has never met the members of the Christian community in Colossae.  He has heard about them from his colleague Epaphus.
Paul first acknowledges what the community is doing right and well.  Paul builds up the community by first recognizing that they have gotten something absolutely right. In verses 4-5, Paul mentions three virtues––faith, love, and hope.    He has heard from his good friend Epaphus that this community has demonstrated strong faith, unfaltering love, and a hope for the future.  

Faith:  Paul has heard good things about their "faith (pistis) in Christ Jesus."  In the New Testament, faith has to do with the person's response to the kerygma––the proclamation of the Good News of Jesus Christ.  The Colossians have taken the Good News and acted upon it.  They have internalized it and made it their life story, their purpose and he center of their being.  
Love:  "the love (agape) which you have toward all the saints" (v. 4b).  The word that Paul uses for love, agape, has to do with a concern for the well-being of the other person while philos has to do with brotherly love––friendship love––companion love––the kind of love where a person receives as well as gives.  In other words, friendship love –philos – has to do both with giving and getting, while agape has to do only with giving––with an undiluted concern for the welfare and well being of the other person. 

Agape love is more a "doing" than a "feeling" word.  It doesn't require that we approve of the actions of the person whom we love––or even that we enjoy their company.  It does require us to act in behalf of that person––to demonstrate our love in some practical fashion.  An agape person will do what is possible to feed the hungry––and to give drink to the thirsty––and to welcome the stranger––and to clothe the naked––and to visit the sick and the person in prison (Matthew 25:31-46).  The agape person has little or nothing to gain by helping these hungry, thirsty, strange, naked, imprisoned people.  The thrust of his/her agape love is giving, not getting. Love is the first of the fruits of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22)––and is the greatest of Christian virtues (1 Corinthians 13:13).

Paul calls the Christian community to be future looking.   In verse 4, Paul mentioned the faith of these Colossian Christians––and in  verse 5  he speaks of their hope:  "....because of the hope which is laid up for you in the heavens" (v. 5a).  Both faith and hope look to the future––to future rewards––to the future fulfillment of present promises.  The author of Hebrews says, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, proof of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1). 

Hope is vital in the full sense of that word.  Hope is life-giving.  Life without hope is drab and meaninglessness.  Prisoners serving sentences with no clear end-date tend to cope much less well than prisoners who can calculate the number of days until they will be released.  They cope less well, because their future is unclear––because they have nothing definite for which to hope––no end-date by which to measure their progress.

We tend to place our hope in all sorts of things:  Personal strength or appearance, academic degrees, 401k's or pension plans, political figures, etc..  But Paul tells the Colossian Christians that their hope grows out of their "faith in Christ Jesus" and "the love which (they) have toward all" (v. 4).  It is a hope that gives them a vision of a strong future, and that gives them strength for today.

Faith, hope and love:  These are the things the Colossians are doing well.  Paul builds up the confidence of the community by recognizing what they have done well – where they are plumb with the life of Grace God intends for them. 

Then Paul moves to those things with which the Colossians are struggling.  He tells them he is praying for those areas:

• To be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding," (1:9) 
• To be leading a life pleasing to God --bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God 
• To "be strengthened with all power… for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to God

To be filled with Knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.  When we are faced with conflicts in our lives, how does God want us to respond? How can we seek to be filled with the knowledge of his will in "all spiritual wisdom?"

One way is to look at Jesus Christ. But to know what Jesus would do you have to know Jesus’ ministry, what he did, and what God did in history. To know that, we have to actually read the Bible. That is why studying it is so important. That is also why Bible Studies and Sunday School are important. Yes, you can read the Bible by yourself but studying it with others helps us all gain from the varying perspectives of other Christians. Whether we’re nine or 99, we cannot stop learning about God, listening to the experiences of others with God – both in the Bible and through the voices of our sisters and brothers. 

Paul says he is praying for is that they "lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to God, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God."(1:10) It is one thing to know the will of God, but it is another to do it. You can intend and plan to do the right thing all you want but it is no good until you actually do it. This is where the rubber meets the road. You can ask "What would Jesus do?" but then you have to do it or the asking was pointless.

Paul speaks of the Colossians "bearing fruit in every good work." Elsewhere Paul talks about the fruit of the Spirit being "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control." (Galatians 5:22-23) A fruit is something that grows on a tree because of the kind f tree it is. Beach Plum bushes produce beach plums; Apple trees produce apples. Peach Trees grow peaches. And we Christians are supposed to produce the fruits of the Holy Spirit because we are people of the Holy Spirit of God.  When we show the world lives lived with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, we are displaying that we are plumb with God’s way.  It is showing others God’s grace without even using words.

But Paul doesn't stop there. He goes on, "and increasing in the knowledge of God." Doing God's will leads to a deeper knowledge of God. You can't just sit in your ivory tower contemplating God and know God. You have to act on what you have learned to learn more. You have to practice being like Christ to become more like him.

The last thing he says he is praying for is that they may "be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light."(1:11-12) We don't make ourselves strong.  Yes, we have to study the Bible and to practice what we learn. But ultimately it is not our actions that make us stand Plumb. It is power of God that dwells in us. Our actions simply open or close the door to that power.

As I listen to and read this morning’s scriptures, my mind is drawn to beach plums, to the line drawn in the sand beyond which we children of God are to measure our work and play—our lives in God’s way.  Like the beach plums, we too are fussy and inconsistent of our harvest, and we too are resistant to cultivation even when the sands of change drift around us.  Yet God calls us to look at the plumb line of fruitfulness and evaluate where we need to straighten and strengthen ourselves.

May we grow in the strength and knowledge of God, so that we may bear the fruit of God’s spirit and live faithfully and with agape love in God’s way.  

A Newsletter Article From the Archives

I first published this here in July, 2008.  I felt it was worth bringing back to the top of the list.  

As an alternative to preaching on some Sundays, I’ve had people write anonymous questions for me to answer during worship. One of the questions submitted was this:

“…religion is something people do because that’s what is expected of them. We are told we must believe in God to go to heaven, so we do it blindly or not sincerely because we are afraid of the consequences….Is there true sincere faith?” 

Wow!  Why are we part of a faith community? What do we get out of it? What difference does faith make in our everyday lives?  Here’s a few possibilities:

• Some people attend church because they’ve always attended church. Their ancestors before them attended church, so they do too. It’s a habit and a duty.
• Some people participate in a community of faith because they are looking for answers to life’s questions. They are looking for what will fill emptiness in their lives, trying to satisfy an unidentified hunger. They shop from church to church, faith to faith, looking and looking, and moving on when something offends or challenges them.
• Some people attend church because they fear the wrath of an angry god. They’ve been told that God will judge harshly those who do not jump the hoops and submit to the anger of an all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present God.
• Some are part of a community of faith because it is in relationships with others that they are fed, nourished, challenged to grow, and refreshed in their whole being.
• Some people don’t attend church because they see people who do as hypocrites and judgmental, but they still have questions, are still looking to fill that emptiness. 
•  Some people don’t attend church because they can’t wrap their minds around the whole “motivation by fear” concept.
• Some people are not part of a faith community because they have no idea what goes on there but have seen and heard in the media what “Christians” are about and they don’t like it.
• Some people are not part of a faith community because they’ve never been there, their parents didn’t attend, and none of their friends attend. These are spiritual people and the consumer’s market of offerings in the Spirituality section of the bookstores and the internet communities are great places to check things out.

I would propose that participating in a faith community and having faith are not the same. One can be a “member” of a church and not “have faith.” Humans are born with a spirit, a soul that yearns to be connected to something larger and beyond themselves. That yearning is satisfied through faith, but not by faith. Faith is not a solution, but a journey. True, sincere faith is an honest and open trek through life – both the challenges and the joys – growing and reaching toward that “something” beyond and greater than us. In Christianity, that trek is guided by the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth and the writings of his earliest followers. And that “something” is the One Jesus called God.  With faith, we never remain the same; change is the only constant.

Yes, my friend, there is true, sincere faith. It is not found in a book or on the internet. It is not found in the media or in anything someone else can give you. It’s not even found at church!  It is found by looking within yourself, recognizing the God-shaped hole within you, and seeking honest, open, and challenging ways to fill that void. It is a journey we must share with others who feed, nourish, and challenge us. Easy answers and the status quo of life will not be a part of this journey. It is a journey that will continuously transform, change, and remold you.

Blessings on the Journey!      Carly

Remembering

A novelty to me when I moved to the Midwest was the tradition within some German heritage congregations of Totenfest: the celebration of the the dead. Usually this is held either on the Sunday nearest All Saints Day, or the last Sunday of the liturgical year, often the Sunday after Thanksgiving -- just before the start of Advent. Call it a Memorial Day for the church, perhaps. In the New England congregations of my younger years, this was not part of my experience. Though I would not consider myself to be liturgical in a traditional way, this is a lovely tradition.

In this season between the traditional times of Totenfest, I find myself remembering my mother. Anyone who knew her well and knows me at all can see traits of hers in my being. Practicality, logic, ration, frugality, eccentricity are all words that could describe either of us. Can do and make do are attitudes I learned from her. Like her, I often forget where I've left my purse; and like her, I've taken to wearing it over my shoulder and across my chest so that it doesn't get away from me. (Unlike her, my purse is tiny and contains the bare necessities instead of anything that might possibly be needed.)

Over the 8+ years since my mother's death, the hole in my being where she lived has become a familiar part of who I am. Early on, I stumbled into it frequently and found myself shedding tears over my loss. That hole is still there: I still long to pick up the telephone and call her for a recipe or to share some good news (shouting it so she'd actually hear it, then explaining it so she'd understand its importance to me). I still miss her e-mail notes with daily itinerary and menus from her days since her last e-mail. When I open my cookbooks or photo albums and find a note with her handwriting -- a piece cut from old file folder turned into a post card with a recipe or an address she sent to me by request-- the vacuum is obvious to me. As my children have become young men with lives of their own, as my nieces and nephews have babies, as my life reaches numeric and chronological markers, I look into that hole and wonder -- even speculate -- what her response would be to these.

The hole has not filled in over time, but it has become familiar and less forbearing. As time has passed, it has even become the source of celebration, of joy, of moments of warmth and loveliness. That does not discount nor make nostalgic the less than happy memories: embarrassment, hurtful words exchanged, inexplicable actions. Those will always be part of the memory and, fortunately, part of the vacuum. Those memories have become markers and reminders of where I need to draw the line between her being and my being.

When I find myself doing or saying something particularly frugal, practical, rational, or otherwise "Evelynesque," I've been know to break out into song -- a particular song with an Easter melody:

She lives! She lives! Dear Evelyn lives today!
She walks with me and talks with me
Along life's rational (or practical or frugal) way!
She lives! She lives! Frugality none too terse
You ask me how I know she lives,
She lives within my purse!

Perhaps that could be seen as sacrilegious. That's not the intent. As with her, there's no malice in my actions here. To me it's a humorous way to honor one whose influence on my life is noticeable in everyday ways, to acknowledge that seed of who I have become and am becoming, and to celebrate the life of one important to me.

What do you do with regularity to lift up and honor the life of someone important to you? Where is his or her life reflected in your actions, attitudes, perspectives, or words? How does a sense of loss become a source of celebration in your everyday living?

Is there REAL faith?

“You know, if you want a church where you can pretend for an hour or two that everything is just fine with you , with your family, and with the world, then we’re probably not for you. But if you want a church where you can tell the truth about how it is an know that it’s okay, maybe you’ll find a home here.”
UCC website

“…religion is something people do because that’s what is expected of them. We are told we must believe in God to go to heaven, so we do it blindly or not sincerely because we are afraid of the consequences….Is there true sincere faith?”
Question left in my church’s offering plate.

Why are we part of a faith community? What do we get out of it? What difference does faith make in our everyday lives?
My question to both of the above.

Here’s the response my faith leads me to give.

• · Some people attend church because they’ve always attended church. Their ancestors before them attended church, so they do too. It’s a habit and a duty.
• · Some people participate in a community of faith because they are looking for answers to life’s questions. They are looking for what will fill emptiness in their lives, trying to satisfy an unidentified hunger. They shop from church to church, faith to faith, looking and looking, and moving on when something offends or challenges them.
• · Some people attend church because they fear the wrath of an angry god. They’ve been told that God will judge harshly those who do not jump the hoops and submit to the anger of an all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present God.
• · Some are part of a community of faith because it is in relationships with others that they are fed, nourished, challenged to grow, and refreshed in their whole being.
• · Some people don’t attend church because they see people who do as hypocrites and judgmental, but they still have questions, are still looking to fill that emptiness.
• · Some people don’t attend church because they can’t wrap their minds around the whole “motivation by fear” concept.
• · Some people are not part of a faith community because they have no idea what goes on there but have seen and heard in the media what “Christians” are about and they don’t like it.
• · Some people are not part of a faith community because they’ve never been there, their parents didn’t attend, and none of their friends attend. These are spiritual people and the consumer’s market of offerings in the Spirituality section of the bookstores and the internet communities are great places to check things out.

I would propose that participating in a faith community and having faith are not the same. Humans are born with a spirit, a soul that yearns to be connected to something larger and beyond themselves. That yearning is satisfied through faith, but not by faith. Faith is not a solution, but a journey. True, sincere faith is an honest and open trek through life – both the challenges and the joys – growing and reaching toward that “something” beyond and greater than us. In Christianity, that trek is guided by the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth and the writings of his earliest followers. And that “something” is the One Jesus called God.

Yes, my friend, there is true, sincere faith. It is not found in a book or on the internet. It is not found in the media or in anything someone else can give you. It is found by looking within yourself, recognizing the God-shaped hole within you, and seeking honest, open, and challenging ways to fill that void. It is a journey we must share with others who feed, nourish, and challenge us. Easy answers and the status quo of life will not be a part of this journey. It is a journey that will continuously transform, change, and remold you.