Holy Comforter Episcopal Church

The Day of Pentecost: Whitsunday Sunday, May 12, 2013 Acts 2:1-21 I needed a translator. Badly. There I was in an old beat up Volkswagen bus in some dingy back corner of the Dominican Republic. We bumped down the road full of pot holes, blasting merengue music. The driver yelling at pedestrians and beating on the side of the door, trying to drum up business, and not even slowing down for stop signs or red lights, but driving like a man possessed. And there was this young girl sitting next to me. Pawing me. Making suggestive glances. Speaking in blazing fast Spanish. This was public transportation in the Dominican Republic. I needed a translator. Badly. Then there was this guy in the front row, flashing his pistola. Making menacing glances at me. Speaking in blazing fast Spanish. I needed a translator. Badly. To make a long story short, as you can see, I escaped that VW bus unscathed. With my heart in my throat, I nearly jumped out of that VW bus when I saw the Episcopal Church to which I was headed, and ducked inside. All this happened during seminary, when I went to go study in the Dominican Republic. See, seminary was more than just praying in a quiet chapel and learning ancient Greek. Seminary was about getting hit on by Dominican girls. Seminary was about almost getting mugged. In a sense, what I learned at seminary, was that everybody needs a translator. Now, God’s native language is love. But love is a hard language to learn. It’s much harder to understand God’s all-encompassing forgiveness, than it is to conjugate irregular Spanish verbs. It’s much harder to realize that God loves you, yes, really, you, than it is to realize that Dominican girls want American husbands. So, like students, we have to learn how to speak God’s language of love. And learning a new language is really, really hard. Because when you learn a new language, you have to actually re-wire your brain. The way you learned how to speak English has to be un-learned, and then re-learned for Spanish. And when you’re learning a new language, you’re going to sound like an moron. I can’t tell you how many times I made a fool of myself in the Dominican Republic. Once I mixed up the words “slavery” and “goodness.” That was awkward. And I called one of the Dominican men a “very good looking girl.” That was even more awkward. But that’s alright - I was learning a new language. When you are learning the language of love - God’s language - sometimes you’re going to make a fool of yourself. You won’t get it right. Your prayers may be self-serving and shallow. But that’s alright, you have to start somewhere. You may not think that Jesus really meant the whole “forgive your neighbor thing”- but that’s okay, you’ll get there. You’re still learning the language of love. Nobody becomes fluent overnight. But just because you are not fluent in God’s language of love, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t try to speak it. Because the world so desperately needs to hear of God’s love. You don’t need me to tell you that. Our families, friends, neighbors, and those who are alone are thirsting for a language, they want to hear that sweet language of God’s love. If only somebody will translate for them. The world needs a translator. Badly. This is exactly what the disciples did on Pentecost. They took God’s native language of love and translated it to the peoples gathered in Jerusalem. The disciples took what they had received from God - this all-encompassing love - and told anyone that would listen. Parthians, Medes, Elamites, Mesopotamians, Judeans, Cappadocians, Asians, Phyrgians, Pamphylians, Egyptians, Libyans, Romans, Cretans, Arabs. The disciples translated the love of God that they felt in their own hearts, to the people gathered there. The disciples made fools of themselves. They didn’t conjugate all their verbs correctly. They spoke with funny accents. The disciples weren’t fluent in God’s language of love,

Sermon for the Seventh Sunday of Easter Sunday, May 12, 2013 Acts 16:16-34   Note: This sermon was preached by our graduating high school senior. Only audio is available.

The Sixth Sunday of Easter Sunday, May 5, 2013 John 14:23-29  Two days a week, I wake up to the same words. Two days a week, I hear, “Hi there, I’m Tom Moreley from Exercise TV. And I hope you’re ready for twenty minutes of yoga for hips, your buns, and your thighs.” Now before you start thinking this is about Maggie, think again. It’s yours truly doing hip, bun, and thigh yoga with Tom Moreley. Now, I don’t buy into any of the fake Hindu spirituality that goes with yoga, but wow, it’s a great workout. I stretch muscles I didn’t know I had. I sweat like a pig. And while I’m stretching, standing, and doing all sorts of strange poses in the living room, our two dogs look at me very, very strangely. Every time I’m doing this routine, there comes a time when Tom Moreley really tries to kill me. My legs are spread far apart in some crazy lunge, my head is bent over to my knee, my hands are clasped and raised backwards above my head. Let me say this - it’s not very easy. And there’s Tom Moreley, cool as a cucumber. He has this surfer-dude attitude. And while he’s in this insane yoga pose, Tom Moreley says this: “Remember, at challenging times like this, make sure you keep breathing. Just on the yoga mat, so in life. When you come to a challenging moment, just keep breathing.” Usually at this point I’m saying to myself, “Cram it, Tom! I don’t need your philosophy right now.” But the more I think about it, I have to admit, Tom is right. Keep breathing. Because it’s not if we hit a rough patch, it’s when we hit a rough patch. Our worlds are grow dark. We are saddened by news. Our hearts are troubled. Our hearts are afraid. I know you know what I’m talking about. When a problem festers in our minds. When grief overcomes us. When we want something so bad to work out, and it just doesn’t. When our hearts are troubled. When are our hearts are afraid. And it seems that we are alone. This morning, Jesus reminds us that we are not alone. In speaking with the disciples at the last supper, Jesus makes a promise: “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.” The Advocate. The Holy Spirit. Another translation is - The Comforter. That word - “comforter” - has a specific connotation. It’s the same word used in the first century for lawyers. When an individual was being tried, he might have a “comforter.” A helper, a legal aide, an advocate. Someone to stand alongside you. When times are tough, when the world is dark, when our legs are aching and the sweat is pouring onto the yoga mat, when our hearts are troubled - the Father gives a helper. An aide. An advocate. A comforter. And we are given a peace, the peace of our Lord. A peace which the world cannot give. A peace that cannot be manufactured through more stuff. A peace that only comes from Jesus. The Lord makes good on his promise. And on the day of Pentecost, the Comforter, the Advocate, the Holy Spirit comes upon the followers of Jesus to give them the peace which they so desperately want. A peace which surpasses understanding. It’s easy enough to stand here in a pulpit and talk about the peace of God; and how wonderful, beautiful, and lovely it all is. But I’ve been on the yoga mat. I’ve been through life, just as you have. And the peace of God can seem distant or absent. I struggle with anxiety and worry. I let my heart be troubled and afraid. The real trick is finding the peace of God. And then, I feel guilty about not knowing the peace of God. And in a weird, cyclical way, I struggle with even more anxiety and more worry because I feel guilty. It’s easy enough to talk about the peace of God, but what about actually living with the peace of God? The first thing to do is to breathe. Even though I hate admitting that Tom Moreley and his silly yoga philosophy is right, we have to breathe. When your hearts are troubled and afraid,

The Fifth Sunday of Easter Sunday, April 28, 2013 - 10:30 AM Revelation 21:1-6 Imagine with me for a moment: it is three days before Christmas, December 22nd. And by virtue of your laziness or procrastination or a simple aversion to spending money...

The Fourth of Sunday Sunday, April 21, 2013 Revelation 7:9-17 Is there no decency left? Is there no goodness, no charity, no love remaining in this world? Is there no respect for human life? Is there no hope? Is there no forbearance? No tolerance? Is there no loving God? Is there no God who protects the people of Boston? Is there no God who protects the people of West? As we all know, this has been a particularly difficult week for the people of the United States. We are beset by tragedy - both accidental and intentional. Death and injury are at hand, and recklessly splash themselves over our TV screens and Facebook news feeds. The responses to these tragedies have been both inspiring and despicable. To see the charity, and selfless acts of service was inspiring. Men and women rushing toward explosions. People of great valor and courage fighting fires, making tourniquets, housing the newly minted homeless of West. I have been inspired and grateful for numerous acts of selfless love. And I have been sickened. I have been dismayed and distraught over some of the responses to the events of this week. I have heard the bloodthirsty desire for punishing those men in Boston. This week, I have been sickened by the use of the word “justice.” We have heard how these terrorists must be “brought to justice.” My friends, I tell you, that is not justice. That is a perversion of our Christian belief of justice. Do not be fooled by the politicians and the pundits when they clamor for justice. Because they do not know what they are saying. The politicians and the pundits, the leaders of this world, they do not want justice. They want revenge. They want vengeance. They want an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. And they do not know what they are saying. Justice is not about punishment. Justice is not about eliminating threats. Justice is about putting things right. Justice is providing help and comfort for the amputees in Boston. Justice is working with the people of West to rebuild. Justice is defined by hope, love, and trust in God. Justice is not exacting vengeance. For vengeance belongs to our God. And no one else. Seeking revenge, wanting to punish for a wrong-doing, is not our purview. That is God’s. For our intentions are never pure, our judgments are never free from error. Only God, who is the gracious judge, can ever sort things out rightly. As Isaiah says, God’s ways are higher than our ways. When we want to exact revenge for a wrong-doing, we are committing blasphemy. Because we are putting ourselves in the place of God. I am not calling us to be weak or helpless. I am challenging us to call a spade a spade. Do not confuse justice with vengeance. Justice is caring and providing for those who have been the victims of senseless or accidental tragedies. Vengeance is our misbegotten and unholy desire to punish. Did these men commit a horror of horrors? Of course. Should we seek out who is responsible for these atrocities? Absolutely. But it must be done with a faithful view of the future in mind. We are seeking who is responsible in order to protect ourselves in the future. We are not seeking who is responsible to exact a vengeance upon what has happened in the past. Because no amount of punishment, no arrest or investigation, will ever put limbs back on bodies or raise the dead. That’s what God does. An infatuation on the past only makes us callous, and more focused on retribution than on how to start putting the world back together again. These words may grate on your ears. They may make lumps in your throats. But I ask you to think on Jesus. Our Lord was an innocent man put to death by a vicious and cruel system. But notice how our Lord responded. Jesus did not rise from the dead to take vengeance on those who killed him. Jesus did not rise from the dead to kill Romans. Jesus did not rise from the dead to take an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Jesus rose again from the dead,

Sermon for the Third Sunday of Easter & Holy Baptism April 14, 2013 Acts 9:1-20 The fun of eating at a Chinese restaurant is, of course, the fortune cookie. I think they always put it with your check so you’re in a happier mood when you see the bill. Last week I ate at one of my favorite places and this is what my fortune cookie said: “You will receive unexpected help this week.” “Oh boy! I can’t wait!” I thought, “What is going to happen to me?” And would you believe it, the funniest thing happened to me this week. I didn’t get anything! Not even a nice phone call or a check in the mail. Darn those fortune cookies and their lies! And as I see it in my mind’s eye, Saul eats at his favorite Chinese place in Jerusalem before his big journey to Damascus. He wants a big meal of Won Ton soup and orange chicken before his trip. So Saul goes to his favorite Chinese place in Jerusalem with the high priest, and he talks about how many Christians he’s going to capture while he’s in Damascus. At the end of the meal, the check comes. Saul lifts his tunic to get at his wallet and then opens the little plastic wrapper on his fortune cookie. Saul breaks open his fortune cookie and reads: “You will receive unexpected help this week.” Saul says, “Oh boy! This trip is going to be even better than I thought! I’m going to catch a bunch of Christians! Maybe the synagogue in Damascus will help me out. I bet this will get me a promotion.” On the very same night, while Saul is eating at his favorite Chinese place in Jerusalem, Ananias, who is a disciple of the Lord Jesus, stops by his favorite Chinese restaurant in Damascus. Ananias, because he’s a Christian and can’t be out in public, has to take-out his Chinese food. Christians were in danger of being persecuted and beaten for their beliefs. And as Ananias cleans up his Chinese food from in front of the TV that night, he opens up his fortune cookie: “You will receive unexpected help this week.” “Oh boy,” Ananias thinks. “Maybe this bad guy Saul will fall off his horse and break his neck. Maybe they’ll let us Christians live in peace.” And the funniest thing happens - their fortune cookies are true. Both Saul and Ananias receive unexpected help. As Saul is walking to Damascus, breathing threats and murder against the disciples of Jesus, something happens to him. He’s knocked flat on his face. He’s struck blind. And Saul hears a voice, “why do you persecute me?” The voice of the Lord sends him on to Damascus where he receives unexpected help. Ananias is praying, and the Lord gives him a vision. The Lord sends Ananias to Saul, the same Saul who is there to persecute Ananias. The voice of the Lord sends Ananias to the street called Straight, to meet Saul, and to receive unexpected help. Ananias prays over Saul. Ananias baptizes Saul. And immediately, Saul regains his sight. And Saul begins to proclaim that Jesus is the Son of God. Saul has received his help. Thanks be to God for Saul. He comes to be known as Paul. This is the man who established churches throughout the ancient world. This is the man that we have to thank for phrases like, “in the twinkling of an eye,” and “In Christ there is no male and female.” This Paul, the same man who wants to kill disciples of Jesus, becomes one of the most celebrated disciples of Jesus. For Ananias, Paul was unexpected help. Because Paul spread Christianity far and wide. Paul quit persecuting Christians and become one himself. Ananias has received his help. And thanks be to God for Ananias. A man who overcame his fear and went to Saul, even when it was known Saul was out to capture Christians. Ananias, a man who was faithful to the Lord Jesus. Ananias - the man who showed Paul has to follow Jesus. The fortune cookies were telling the truth. They received unexpected help. I know the unexpected has happened to you. How many of you would have ever expected that you’d be sitting in Holy Comforter Episcopal Church?

Sermon for the Second Sunday of Easter Sunday, April 7, 2013  John 20:19-31 Lock the doors! They are out there. You know who I mean...them. The ones not like us. Lock the doors! They might come in! We are afraid of what they might do to us, what they might say to us. Lock the doors! It’s a scary world out there. So let’s keep them out. Who’s them? Well, anybody that we fear. For the first disciples of Jesus, it was the people of Jerusalem. The disciples couldn’t trust them. They were afraid. So they were hiding behind locked doors. Keeping them out. Keeping themselves safe. So the disciples think they’re safe. They think they’ll be alright there behind the locked doors. The others are outside, they’re inside. It’s all just hunky-dory. They think to themselves that when the storm blows over, they’ll sneak out of town and go back to their old lives. But the tragedy, the real sinister thing going on, is that the disciples have locked themselves in. Their fear and their anxiety have taken over. The disciples thought they were for keeping the others out. But in reality, the locks on the doors are keeping those scared, anxious ridden disciples in. They’re stuck. And then comes Jesus. Just as the risen Lord bursts the gates of death, the risen Lord bursts through the locks the disciples have put on the doors. He comes in and tells them to do the very thing they fear so much. Jesus commands them, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Sending. In Greek, the word for send is “apostle.” Jesus is turning his followers, his disciples, into his apostles. Jesus is sending them out. He’s taking away the locks on the doors and kicking them out in that scary world. Jesus is sending them to the very people they fear. Jesus is giving his disciples a difficult, difficult task. If those frightened followers of Jesus want to continue being disciples of Jesus, they have to become apostles. That is, if they want to know Jesus, they have to be missionaries. There is no getting around it. They can’t stay in a locked room if they want to be followers of Jesus. They have to unlock the doors and go out there. To where they are. And here we sit, cozy and safe on this Sunday morning. The doors are closed behind us. The people that we fear - the naysayers, the punks, the others - they are out there. The danger is thinking that if we are here with each other, holding on to each other, then we’ll be safe. We’ll be fine. But then the risen Lord busts down the door. Jesus comes to us in the bread and the wine here, and the words that he gave to his disciples he gives us, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Jesus is not asking us to be his apostles. He is commanding us to be his apostles. To go. To be missionaries. To be sent. To unlock the doors and go to where they are. This is a critical lesson for the church of our time. Everywhere we look, we see churches shutting themselves in. Pastors tell their congregation to be afraid. Churches lock themselves in, guarding themselves from anybody who looks or thinks differently. Christians lock up their hearts, scared of what the culture “out there” may bring to them. We sit and we pray behind our locked doors because it’s a scary world out there. Where they are. Former Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple saw this in his own day in the 1940s. He saw churches that had convinced themselves that their only purpose of existence was to gather on Sunday mornings. He saw churches closing in on themselves, locking the doors, and trying to be “spiritual.” He saw a generation of Christians who were not apostles. So William Temple wrote these stunning words: “A church which ceases to be missionary will not be, and cannot rightly expect to be, ‘spiritual.’” A church that is content to stay behind its locked doors is no church at all. A community of Christians that only does pious prayers and beautiful liturgy is not a community of Christians. A Church, to be a church,

Sermon for the Sunday of the Resurrection: Easter Day Sunday, March 31, 2013 John 20:1-18 Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men, couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again. When I hear this nursery rhyme, two questions come to mind immediately. First, why is there an egg sitting on a wall? Don’t eggs know that they are prone to roll off the tops of walls? Second, why are horses trying to put together a broken egg? Horses don’t have thumbs. Now, Easter Day is not about chocolate or candy or even eggs. But Humpty Dumpty has a few things to teach us on this holy day. And the first lesson is probably the hardest. All of us, regardless of who we are, or who we pretend to be, will take a great fall. A divorce. A disease. A death. Loads of student debt. Bankruptcy. Failure at work, failure at school. The tough part of being human means that we are going to sit on some walls. Walls of marriage, walls of health, walls of achievement. But sometimes, just because we’re human, we will roll off those walls and splat! Humpty Dumpty has a great fall. And it’s not just individuals that go breaking themselves. It’s the whole world. It’s us. Cataloging the whole history of human heartache is a sickening experience: Auschwitz, Rwanda, Katrina, September 11th, Newtown. Splat! Humpty Dumpty has a great fall. And so what happens? We want someone to put us back together again. I know it from my own life - when something bad happens, when I go splat! I just want to go back to what I was. We want to go back in time and fix something before we go rolling off a wall and breaking ourselves. We wish we had never married that jerk in the first place. We wish we had never opened up that first credit card. We wish there were no such things as hurricanes. We wish it was still September 10th, 2001. We wish. We wish. We wish for an unrealistic past. But it’s time to face the truth. Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. I stand here this happy Easter morning with good news. You will not be put back together again. Let me repeat. The good news is that you will not be put back together again. Even if the horses had thumbs, neither they nor the king’s men could do anything for you.  And you don’t want them to do anything for you. Because you don’t want to go back to your old self, and keep falling off that same wall. We need something new altogether. And it is something new altogether that Mary Magdalene sees on that first Easter morning. While it was still dark, Mary goes to the tomb of her Lord Jesus. And for Mary, Humpty Dumpty has gone splat! She had been healed by Jesus, and now he was dead.  We can imagine Mary weeping on her sad, lonely journey to the tomb on that morning. Crying, because her whole life had just rolled off a wall and broken into a million pieces. She’s trying to put together the shattered pieces of her Humpty Dumpty life. And then comes a voice, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Mary is so distraught, so focused on the past, wishing that it had never been, that she doesn’t even recognize Jesus. Mary thinks that he is the gardener. Then Jesus speaks her name, and instantly, Mary doesn’t want to be put together again, because God has done something new. It’s not what Mary expected. On that bright Easter morning, after bursting the gates of death, Jesus doesn’t look the same. Jesus is put together again alright, but different. Humpty Dumpty is not the old Humpty Dumpty, but a new Humpty Dumpty. One that cannot be broken. That is why we are here this morning. Easter is not about us going to heaven. Easter is about God putting us together again, in a new way. This happy morning means that broken things don’t stay broken. Dead things don’t stay dead. God puts us together again, but different. And better. The promise of Easter is that God takes our bitter divorce and helps us learn how to love again.

Sermon for Good Friday Friday, March 29, 2013 John 18:1-19:42 When I was studying at the University of Texas, I read one verse of scripture just about everyday. Words from Jesus in the Gospel of John stood at the heart of the UT campus. On the magnificent tower building are etched these words: “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” Those words became stitched in my mind, and I learned that yes, indeed, the truth will set me free. And just as the words were etched in stone, I came to learn that the truth is unchanging. Yet in today’s society, and in today’s culture, truth seems to be fluid. Indeed, I imagine many students at the University of Texas have no clue that those words come from a poor, uneducated carpenter. And I know that the truth is often questioned, that a new definition of truth has arisen. Many will say that the only truth is that there are many truths. We live in a society and a culture that has become unstitched; we are a people who have lost sight of the truth. And we have begun to live by our own truths. As a society, we have decided to follow our own hearts. To let our emotions rule. We live by our own passions and desires. But this is not a new phenomenon. We cannot blame university professors or political activists for destroying our notion of “the truth.” The truth has been under question for centuries. In today’s heart-wrenching gospel narrative, we catch a glimpse of truth under fire. Jesus is hastily summoned to stand before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor. It appears that Pilate is hesitant to punish Jesus, for it seems Jesus has done nothing wrong. It all boils down to this: if Jesus says that he is a king, then he stands in open rebellion to the Roman Emperor, Caesar. Pilate asks Jesus, “So you are a king?” Jesus responds, “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate then asks a haunting question, a question still asked by today’s skeptics, charlatans, and hedonists: “What is truth?” It’s a question that Jesus does not immediately answer. The story shifts back to Pilate’s interaction with the crowd at Jerusalem. Then comes the death sentence. Since Jesus claims to be a king, he must be executed because the Roman Empire will have no other kings but Caesar. Then Jesus is led away and crucified. Jesus instructs the disciples he loves to care for Mary, his mother. Jesus dies. His side is pierced and out springs blood and water. Joseph of Arimathea takes the body of Jesus away, and buries him in a new tomb. And still, still Pilate’s question hangs in the air, “what is truth?” If we read too quickly, or if we are not paying attention, we’ll miss the answer to Pilate’s question. Jesus does not give his answer in words. Jesus offers no pithy reply to Pilate. In a divinely ordained twist of irony, Pilate answers his own question. Pilate puts a sign above Jesus on the cross, a sign that tells the truth. The sign reads, “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.” That is the truth. The truth is that this poor, uneducated carpenter from a town about as exciting as Cleveland, Texas is the King of the Jews; the one who was in the beginning with God, and through him all things came into being. This is the truth. That Jesus of Nazareth, dying on the cross is the very one who has come to set us free. The truth is that Jesus loves his disciples so much he is willing to wash their feet like a slave. The truth is that Jesus and the Father are one, and that as his disciples we are invited into that relationship. Jesus did not have to answer Pilate with words. The life and death of Jesus is the final answer to every skeptics’ question in every age. What is truth? That Jesus of Nazareth is the King of the Jews. As a society, we are seeking for the truth. And the truth seems to be elusive. But I tell you this: we know where the truth is.

Sermon for Maundy Thursday Thursday, March 28, 2013 I Corinthians 11:23-26 My paternal grandmother died of breast cancer when I was just eight years old. It was  an unexpected tragedy for our whole family. And sadly, just being eight years old, I don’t remember my grandmother all that much. I have faint memories of family dinners and birthday parties, but not much beyond that. She is the grandmother I never knew. I don’t remember the sound of her voice. I don’t recall hardly anything she ever said to me. The cancer came too quickly and too assiduously for me to ever get a chance to really know my grandmother. But the strangest thing happened last Christmas. Maggie received a gift basket of Chanel Number 5 products. I didn’t give her that gift, because I didn’t know what Chanel Number 5 was. And I didn’t think much of it; until Maggie opened that basket full of Chanel Number 5 products. *Snap!* I am five years old again, sitting in my grandparents’ house on Christmas Eve. The whole family is getting ready to go out to dinner, and my grandmother, the grandmother I thought I didn’t know, is giving me a hug, and speaking tenderly to me. I can feel her arms around me. I can hear her loving words. I smell her Chanel Number 5. My grandmother’s favorite perfume.   The grandmother I thought I didn’t know was just buried deep in my memory. Somewhere, in the recesses of my mind, her hugs, her tenderness, her love, was remembered. I had forgotten all of that. But that smell, that smell of Chanel Number 5 made her come alive again. And I remembered. Tonight, Maundy Thursday, is all about memories. We, as fragile human beings, tend to forget. We forget pedestrian things like names and phone numbers. We forget important things like what our grandparents were like, or the details of weddings or graduation ceremonies. And we forget the most important thing - the Lord Jesus. We forget his words. We forget his purpose. We forget those times in our lives when we were close to God. We forget. Our forgetfulness is not a symptom of our sinfulness, but a reflection of our humanity. Memories important to us - even the ones filled with love and joy - find their way to the dark recesses of our minds. The Lord Jesus, in all his great compassion, knows this about us. He knows that we cannot remember the things we need to remember. Jesus knows that we need something to hold onto, something to smell, something to eat or drink, in order to remember. And so on the night before he died for us, our Lord Jesus Christ took bread; and when he had given thanks to God the Father, he broke, and gave it to you and to me. And the Lord Jesus said, “Take, eat: This is my Body which is given for you. Do this to remember me.” And after supper our Lord Jesus took a cup of wine. And when he had given thanks, he gave it to you and to me and said, “Drink this, all of you: This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness. Whenever you drink it, do this to remember me.” It is far too easy for us to get caught up in what happens to the bread and wine on the altar. Does it become the actual body and blood of Jesus? Or is it just a spiritual presence? I tell you that does not matter. What matters is that when we eat this bread and drink this wine, we remember Jesus. We remember his glorious birth witnessed by shepherds and wise men. We remember his baptism in the River Jordan. We remember his temptation in the wilderness. We remember his words of challenge and compassion. We remember how he healed the sick and raised the dead. We remember how he was betrayed, arrested, and crucified. For me, and for you. All of that, in just a stale cracker and a sip of wine. Spiritual amnesia is a prevalent and particularly nasty condition. We forget the things God has done for us. We forget the mountaintop experiences we’ve had with Christ. We forget love that we have shared. But this altar, and this meal,

Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday Sunday, March 24, 2013 Luke 24:14-23:56 Last Thursday marked a day of great celebration for Anglicans and Episcopalians around the world. Last Thursday, the Most Reverend Justin Welby was officially inaugurated a...

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent Sunday, March 17, 2013 Psalm 126 There is a strange, new fad sweeping the country. It is one of the strangest things that I have ever heard. It’s not some new drug. It’s not some new dance move. No, this bizarre fad is weirder than all of that. So here it is: many public zoos are now selling elephant dung. From Waco to Seattle to South Carolina, you can show up at your local public zoo and buy elephant dung by the bucket, wheelbarrow, and truck load. I told you it was weird. Among vegetable gardeners, elephant dung is all the rage. Some people are going to great lengths, buying as much of the stuff as they can find just to grow a better cucumber. Plus, it’s got two advantages over cattle dung. First, you can get a lot of elephant dung. And it doesn’t smell as bad as cattle dung. So here is this stuff - stuff that you couldn’t pay most of us to be around - being sold hand over fist. This stuff that you and I would probably run away from, giving growth to healthy, succulent vegetables. In other words, the stuff we don’t want, is necessary to give us the stuff we need. This isn’t a lesson just for vegetable gardeners. The author of Psalm 126 gets this too. “Those who sowed with tears, will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying the seed, will come again with joy, shouldering their sheaves.” Sowing with tears is a powerful image; an image that was of great comfort to the ancient Jews. This psalm was probably composed after the Jews were returned from exile. For those of you who don’t know or don’t remember, the Jews were taken away from Jerusalem in the sixth century B.C. They were dragged away to the foreign city of Babylon in exile, and they longed to return to Jerusalem. Seventy years later, when the Jews were allowed to return, their mouths were filled with laughter, and their tongues with shouts of joy. As Psalm 126 says, “when the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream.” But of course, before all the shouting and the laughing and the dreaming, there was a lot of crying and weeping and lamenting. For seventy years they lived; in a foreign land, apart from their Temple, their way of life, their home. The Jews sat by the waters of Babylon and wept. And we can imagine that their tears, if collected, would have flowed like an unhappy river. These tears, the weeping and the lamenting, are not unique to the Jews of the exile to Babylon. You have wept. I have wept. Even the strongest, most macho man, has shed a tear. A friendship lost. A beloved one’s death. Unfulfilled aspirations. A sudden and terrifying realization. A phone call in the middle of the night. A bottomless pit of sorrow. We have all wept. Each of us have sat down by the waters of Babylon and cried. All of us have been in exile. This psalm promises that our tears are not unknown to God. In a strange sort of way, God allows us to sow with our tears. It’s as if our tears are fertilizer. Nobody likes to cry, but then again, who likes elephant dung? Our weeping goes deep into the garden of our soul. And then, at some point, and it’s different for all of us, the growth happens. The seed that was your tear, germinates and sprouts and grows. It was probably not the plant that you would have expected, but it was the plant that God gave you. I wept when I was diagnosed with diabetes - but those tears gave the growth of self-discipline. I wept when I left Maggie behind in Texas, going off to seminary in Virginia - but those tears fertilized three years of joyful study. I cried when you called me here, and I left Waco, but those seeds have sprouted into this incredible ministry. “Those who go out weeping, carrying the seed, will come again with joy, shouldering their sheaves.” And I know that we have cried as a community. This church has caused some to cry, and some to leave. It is no secret, but it is not to our shame. If we had never cried,

Sermon for Fourth Sunday in Lent Sunday, March 10, 2013 Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32 From the age of five, to the age of twenty-five, I was in school. Twenty straight years of school. Grade school, middle school, high school, college, seminary. Along with that I read scores of books, I tremble at the thought of how many standardized tests I took. And you know, I thought I had a pretty good vocabulary; until this year, when I heard that word that we all heard - sequester. Or its more proper form - sequestration. And, well, at least sequester sounds less scary than its older brother, “the fiscal cliff.” Of course, budget battles and economic woes are not new issues. Human civilizations have been worrying about economics since we were trading wampum and beads. But all of this anxiety points to a deeper issue; an issue of which we need to be keenly aware. This is the mindset of scarcity. It’s that we, as humans, are always concerned with what we don’t have, rather than what we do have. We fret, agonize, and brood over the money that isn’t in our bank accounts, rather than giving thanks for the money that is in our bank accounts. And it’s not just money: love, hospitality, friendships. The deeper issue is that we tell ourselves there isn’t enough to go around for everybody. Like I said, this is nothing new. I’m not exposing some hidden, not revealed before, human secret. Because Jesus talks about it. This parable that he gives us this morning, the famous parable of the prodigal son, is about this mindset of scarcity. The parable of the prodigal son is about a budget battle. The younger son approaches his father and says, “Dad. I wish you were dead. So give me now what I’ll get when you die.” Amazingly, his father divides his property, and gives his younger, impetuous son, what was coming to him. Then, of course, the younger son gets what’s coming to him. He lives like a wastrel and squanders all that he has on booze and prostitutes. Hungry, penitent, and defeated, the younger son returns to his father. I can see him now - unshaven, sunken cheeks, ravaged by his wild living. We know how the story goes, his father, in a great turn of events, throws a party for him, welcomes him home, and celebrates. And then comes the older brother. The dutiful, somber older brother. And the budget battle kicks into high gear. “Dad! What are you doing? First you gave him half of all your money to live like a lecher! Now you’re spending even more money on his return! Do you want to go over the fiscal cliff?!” In a sense, the older brother is also wishing that his father was dead. Because the older brother isn’t concerned about his father’s well-being. All the older brother is concerned about is receiving his inheritance too. He’s concerned that his dad is blowing through the family fortune before he gets any of it. Really, when it boils down to it, both these brothers wish their father was dead so that they could have their cut of the family treasure. At least the younger son eventually learns about generosity; a lesson the older brother never learns. The older brother remains in the mindset of scarcity. Now, I want to focus on the father. Notice the words that the father never utters. The father never says “no.” His younger son comes to him and says, “Dad, give me half of everything.” And dad says, “yes.” The father isn’t afraid of scarcity. He lives with abundance. When his younger son comes back, the father gives him the best of everything. The best robe, the best ring, the best sandals. He even kills the fattened calf. The father doesn’t care about what his son has done. The father just accepts him home with radical generosity. And when the older brother approaches and reproaches his father about this prodigious expenditure, the father again acts with generosity. The father says to the older son, “All that is mine is yours.” The father is not worried about going over a fiscal cliff. The father is too joyful to be afraid.

Sermon for Third Sunday in Lent Sunday, March 3, 2013 Luke 13:1-9  By Miss Alex Easley Good morning! My name is Alex Easley. I am a first-year student at Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, and I’m so grateful to be with yall this morning. Thank you, Jimmy for having me! I have to admit, I was sorely tempted to skip over the Gospel lesson completely today and just stick with the safer, slightly more cheerful Burning Bush story.  And that wouldn’t be a bad thing. But I chose to focus on our Gospel lesson for today, tricky though it is, because we can’t just run away from the portions of the Bible that challenge or disturb us. I believe we’re called to dive right into the midst of that difficulty and wrestle with the text, to let it surprise, disturb, and challenge us.  In Isaiah chapter 8, God tells us “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” God is so much bigger than us that we often can’t even begin to understand his ways. But I think God wants us to try anyway.  So. Let’s give it a go. First, let’s get some context and start to unpack what is happening in this story.  So Jesus has been teaching a big crowd of people.  Some of the people in the crowd have a question for Jesus.  They ask him to shed some light on this horrific thing that happened recently.  Apparently Pilate, the Roman governor, murdered several Jews as they were making their sacrifices. So these people in the crowds are asking Jesus to help them understand how something this horrible could happen. They are trying to make sense of something terrible and unfair. It’s obvious to us, reading it today, that this tragedy was a shocking act of injustice, of uncalled for violence.  But in biblical times, it was often thought that suffering, illness, or an early death was punishment for sins.  We see this in the Gospel of John when a group of Pharisees bring a blind man to Jesus, and ask him whether he was blind because he had sinned, or because his parents had sinned.  So when the people in the crowd ask Jesus about the Galileans murdered by Pilate, Jesus understands that this is what is going through their heads – they’re wondering if these people suffered such a cruel fate because they “were worse sinners.”  Jesus then brings up a similar example of this kind of thinking – apparently a tower had fallen recently and killed 18 people – another senseless tragedy.  So Jesus asks, do you think these people were killed because they were worse sinners than the other people in that town? We wait expectantly for Jesus to answer this question – surely we’ve all had thoughts like this before…when tragedy strikes, we want some sort of justification for it. We want to be able to understand it, to explain it away.  But Jesus, in typical Jesus fashion, doesn’t give us quite the answer we were looking for.  He says “No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.” Hmmmm.  So the answer is no, these people weren’t killed because they were worse sinners than anybody else.  And yet, if we do not repent, we will die in the same way.  What are we to make of this? My first instinct is to stay away from any towers that look a little shady. But surely we cannot all be slaughtered by Pilate and killed by crumbling towers…Jesus isn’t just saying, “Watch your back, you’re next.” Nor is he saying, “Repent and nothing bad will ever happen to you; leave behind your sinful ways and no tragedy will ever befall you.” Unfortunately, we know all too well that that just isn’t true. Bad things happen to good, faithful people all too often. (Why? I don’t know. I’ll leave that sermon for Jimmy.) To understand what Jesus is saying, we need to read the text more literally: “Unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did” – that is, having not repented. If you don’t repent, you will perish un-repented, just as these people did.

Sermon for the Second Sunday in Lent Sunday, February 24, 2013 Philippians 3:17-4:1 Like many young boys...I was dumb. In elementary school, I thought I had devised a scheme to get girls to notice me, and to like me. So here was my scheme: I would be obnoxious. Not a bully, but obnoxious. I did that to my older sister’s friends all the time. I remember once hiding for what seemed like hours when my sister and her friends were watching a scary movie. Then, at just the right moment, when the movie was at its scariest, I jumped out of my hiding spot and scared the bejesus out of that them. And you know what happened? It didn’t work. In my mind, this was the perfect ploy to get a girlfriend, and when it didn’t work...well, there must be something wrong with the girl. Not my methods. Upon reflection of my boyhood shenanigans, I realized something. I did a really great job of getting girls to notice me. But for all the wrong reasons. I trust that there are still young boys doing the essentially the same thing today. Doing something you think is good for you, but actually has quite the opposite reaction. We see politicians doing this all the time. Celebrities are probably the best at it. And of course, it happens in Christianity all the time. Saint Paul writes that “many live as enemies of the cross of Christ.” “Their is end is destruction, their god is the belly, their glory is in their shame, their minds are set on earthly things.” Wow Paul. Those are fighting words. In America today, we think we know who the “enemies of the cross” are. The atheists, right? The politicians and the activists persecuting Christians. As the Church, we are quick to point to others, and blame them for Christianity’s decline in America. They’ve taken away the Ten Commandments! They’ve taken away prayer at schools! They’ve done this, they’ve done that! It sure is easy to point the finger at persecution. But I tell you, the Church of Jesus Christ will not disappear from this earth because of persecution, whether intellectual or violent. The Church flourished, even when the Roman Empire was throwing Christians to the lions. The Church flourished, even when our Anglican forebears were burned at the stake. The Church is flourishing, even in places where religion has been banned outright. I tell you, the Church of Jesus Christ thrives under persecution. So what is happening in America? Why is the Church in decline? I tell you it is not because of persecution. The enemies of the cross of Christ are not atheists or other religions, threatening us from the outside. No, the enemies of the cross of Christ are people like us. We are like little boys and their obnoxious hijinks. Many Christians are doing things that they think proclaims the faith, but which are actually tearing the Church apart...from the inside. The enemies of the cross of Christ are among us today and fill the ranks of the Church. Allow me to offer an example: A pastor took a group of parishioners out for a meal. When the time for the checks came, the pastor requested that the automatic gratuity would be removed. So this pastor signed his check, and purposefully put a big, fat “zero” for a tip. Then, to make it worse, this pastor wrote on the check, “I give God 10%, why do you deserve 18%?” Then, to really top it off, this individual signed his check as “Pastor.” What do you think that waitress now thinks of Christians and the Church? She’s making just over two dollars an hour to feed her family and educate her children, and here are Christians making a show of not paying her. Chances of her wanting to be one of us is pretty slim. Sadly, this incident isn’t isolated. In speaking with waiters and waitresses, their least favorite shift is the Sunday lunch crowd because church-goers are the worst tippers. We make a show of thanking God for our meal, and then stiff our servers. I’ve even heard of Christians leaving tracts instead of tips, saying,