Luke 24:13-35

It’s the third Sunday of Easter.  Maybe it feels like we should be farther along in the story by now.  Maybe it feels like everyone should have already adjusted to the news of Jesus’ death and resurrection.  But on this third Sunday of Easter, we receive a story from the Gospel of Luke in which it’s only hours since the empty tomb was discovered.  We’re still in the very first day of Easter.

Two of Jesus’ followers are walking seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus. We don’t know why they go.  While they walk, they discuss the troubling events of holy week.  And then, miraculously, Jesus comes to join them. 

For some reason, these apostles can’t recognize Jesus. And when this stranger asks what they are discussing, they hesitate: standing still, looking sad.  But like most of us, they are grateful to find someone who is honestly curious, someone who will wait for an answer, someone who will really listen. So they tell this stranger how Jesus, a prophet mighty in deed and word, was handed over and crucified. “But we had hoped,” they say, “that he was the one to redeem Israel.”

But we had hoped!  All of us know this feeling; the strange sense of disjointed surprise or disbelief that comes upon us after accident, illness, tragedy, pandemic. We had hoped, perhaps, for a miracle; or we had planned for a special event; or we had simply expected that life would go on as usual. But we had hoped, the apostles say, that he was the one to redeem Israel.

It’s painful to realize that you’re on an entirely different journey than the one you had hoped for, or planned for, or expected.  Still, as one of my colleagues wrote this week, we have to travel the road we’re on, and not the one we wish we were on.  We have to travel the road in front of us, not that other imagined, anticipated journey.

What would you tell Jesus – or anyone else who asked, and waited, and listened,– about the road you’re on today? If you had seven miles of slow travel, field and open sky around you, space and time and a compassionate ear?  What would you say?

Some images of this story make me laugh. They may be beautiful, as this one certainly is.  But it seems unbelievable that Cleopas and his companion do not recognize Jesus. The artists can’t help themselves; they make Jesus obvious to us. So it seems strange that the folks in the picture don’t get it. I want to say, Hey! He’s right there! Look at the halo! Check out the distinctive white robe!

But although many artists make Jesus beautifully obvious to us, I think many of us miss the holy encounters that we are a part of, at least in the moment when they are happening.  Out of grief, or self-involvement, or practicality, we miss that there’s holy presence RIGHT THERE, beside us, in our most difficult moments, or in our everyday.

The two disciples do eventually recognize Jesus. It happens after that long walk, when he listens to them. It happens after he interprets the prophets and the scriptures for them, explaining the larger story that they’re living in. It happens when he blesses and breaks the bread at dinner that night; they know him in the breaking of the bread.  Maybe there’s a reason that flour and yeast are hard to come by right now: something to touch, to taste; something that is real, and nourishing, like the presence of Christ.

Please pray with me: God, thank you for travelling with us, when things are not going as we had hoped, planned or expected; when we find ourselves on strange new roads. Thank you for listening to us, for as long as it takes, when our hearts are full of grief. Thank you for feeding us, with prophecy and presence, with bread and blessings. Amen.

John 20:1-18

Mary Magdalene comes to the tomb alone on that first Easter morning, according to the Gospel of John.  She comes alone, and she finds that even the body of Jesus is not there to keep her company. So she runs to tell Simon Peter and another disciple: “they have taken the Lord.”

Simon Peter and the other disciple come, and they go, and Mary is alone again. She weeps. Then she looks into the tomb, and there are two angels there. But like many people in grief, Mary is not very conscious of her surroundings. She doesn’t seem to realize who these figures are.  All she can say to them is the same thing she said to Simon Peter, the same thing that is filling her heart: “they have taken away my Lord.”

Finally, Mary turns around and she sees another figure. Her eyes full of tears, hear heart full of sorrow, Mary imagines it might be the gardener.  She tells him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”

But the stranger who Mary imagines to be a gardener is, in fact, Jesus. He calls her name, “Mary.”  Finally, Mary knows him. Filled with surprise and awe, Mary can finally see and hear and understand what is happening. When she greets the disciples again, Mary’s message is transformed. She tells them, “I have seen the Lord!”

There’s a lot we don’t know about the resurrection of Jesus. I wonder if this is, in part, because the stories that we have all come from people who are grieving.  Grief makes it hard to be aware of what is going on around us.  Grief makes it hard to piece things together, to remember what has happened, and when.

One of the things left unclear, even within the Gospel of John itself, is what Jesus’ physical presence is like after his resurrection.  Jesus comes to be with Mary, but tells her not to hold onto him.  Jesus offers Thomas the chance to touch his wounds, as if he was solid; but also transports himself in and out of a room through a locked door, as if he was a ghost. Jesus cooks breakfast for some disciples on a beach; but it’s unclear whether he can eat it.

What does it mean to trust that someone is really with us when we can’t hold them, be with them, eat with them, in the ways that we’re used to?  This is an important question right now. How do we know that our friends, lovers, family, are really with us, meaningfully connected with us, without all the ways of being together we are used to? Hugs, shared meals, the clasp of a hand at the bedside: physical presence is denied us. 

Grief is a natural and necessary response to all of these losses. And, our holy story suggests that in physical separation, and even in the separation of death – all is not lost.  Our grief, our loss, is one part of a larger story.  

I want to talk for a minute about the presence of the risen Christ. Now, let me be clear, I know that in our community we have agnostics and Unitarians, a few atheists, folks of all kinds of beliefs and questions. Stay with me.

In Christian tradition, Jesus is the most person-like part of God. I love this image from Hildegaard of Bingen, an image of the Trinity. God, creator is the big circle, shimmering in the background. God, the Holy Spirit is the circle vibrating within it. Then, there in the middle, hands outstretched, is the God we come to know as Jesus.

When Jesus dies, rises, and returns to God, there is still this person-like aspect to the unfathomable holy. Jesus, who knows human birth and life and suffering and death; Jesus, who is fully human as well as fully divine; Jesus, who has been to hell and also to heaven: Jesus is a part of the eternal. Out of this understanding we get so much art and music expressing a longing for Jesus as a companion in our lives. In the morning, when I rise, give me Jesus. I want Jesus to walk with me.  Jesus is available, to be with us, to go alongside us, when we need him.

If all that is too much for you, perhaps this will work instead. Maya Angelou has described how when she has something difficult to do, she brings everyone who has ever been kind to her, along with her. They may be people who have died.  They may be people who are still living, but physically far away.  She says, “come with me, I need you now.”

When things get difficult for you in these days, I hope you will grieve. Grieve those who have died. Grieve all that has been taken away. Name your losses. Write them down, cry them aloud, share them with someone.  They are real, and ignoring or minimizing them will not help. Name your losses, and weep.

I hope you will grieve. And then I hope, like Mary Magdalene, you will open your heart to what remains, what abides, what is newly perceivable around you: the larger story, the bigger picture. Remember that you are never truly alone. Call on those you need to be present with you. Anyone who has been kind to you. Anyone whose strength or wisdom you require.  Living or dead, holy or utterly human, call on those you need.  Breathe, and feel their presence.  Hear them call your name. Let them make you strong. 

God, and God’s people, do not leave us alone in our grief. Thanks be to God.

Mark 16:1-8

The women come to the tomb, early in the morning, with their grief and their spices, to anoint the body of their beloved Rabbi, Jesus.

But nothing is as they expect. Nothing is what they have prepared for. At the tomb, the heavy stone is already moved away. In the tomb, there is no dead body. Instead, they find  an unfamiliar young man. He says:

“Do not be alarmed: you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here… but go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.”

All around the world, this Easter morning is different than we expected it would be. So many traditions cannot be carried out. So many gatherings cannot be held. And the churches are empty. Hundreds of thousands of sanctuaries, full of memories, full of prayers, full of beauty, are still empty in the absence of their congregations. They are silent, without the glad greetings of friends and strangers, the singing and ringing and organ playing, the solemn pronouncement of scripture, the patter of small feet.

These empty sanctuaries are signs of loss: the loss of our rituals of celebration, and more tragically, great loss of human life. And yet, like the tomb, our sanctuaries’ emptiness holds the promise of life.  In this case, life conserved; life protected; life cherished.

Nothing is as the women expect it to be on that first Easter morning. And Mary Magdalene, and Mary the Mother of James, and Salome are given a task perhaps even harder than embalming the body of their teacher. They are asked, instead, to trust the fantastic news that Jesus has been raised.  To trust this news, and to share it.

The weight of this awesome task is most obvious in the version of this story we receive in the Gospel of Mark. The last verse of the whole gospel reads: “They went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”

If you find that you have no Alleluias ready today, or not much holiday cheer: take heart. We are keeping Easter in a more biblical fashion than usual. This Easter Sunday, the tragedy of Good Friday is so close, that the idea of love triumphing over death may be too amazing, or even too terrifying, to believe.

This past Lenten season, I had planned for a caterpillar, chrysalis, and butterfly theme. I was hoping we would get live caterpillars, too, to accompany the ones on clothespins in the hallway. We would watch them grow, and then release them on Easter. 

But, as it happened, I spent most of the past few weeks learning new technologies, and dealing with the flu, and homeschooling. I did not get any caterpillars.

So, we’re going to have Easter season caterpillars instead.  Let me tell you, when they arrived on Monday the caterpillars were not very impressive: tiny, unattractive, and entirely still: appearing almost certainly dead.  But within a day or two, they started moving.  Now they are almost three times as large, eating and shedding their skins at an alarming rate. I’m starting to think that they really might make something of themselves, with time.

Easter is strange and surprising this year, hard to accept. But really, it’s always been that way.  The church season of Eastertide is 50 days long because it took Jesus’ disciples 50 days to come out of hiding.  It took the folks closest to Jesus 50 days to mourn and pray together, locked behind closed doors, before they could then trust in and act on the good news they had received.

So let’s take it slow, this year. We’ll have butterflies a little later in the Easter season. At our house, I’m planning to do Easter crafts for weeks.  Meanwhile Spring is coming to New England; the tulips will be here, soon, and the peach tree outside the church just started to show some pink buds.  Instead of finding Easter in our beloved church buildings, we’ll need to seek it out in the world. News of great generosity and surprising hope and amazing collaboration emerges every day, even in the midst of a pandemic. All of us will need to be paying close attention to the signs of Easter we can find: and sharing them with one another, for encouragement.

Here is some good news: we can’t do Easter wrong. That’s because Easter is not something that we do. It’s not dependent on us.  Easter is something that God does, and God is still doing it. God took a tragic death and turned it into an opportunity: going down to dwell with the dead, breaking the gates of hell, bringing hope to the people, birthing the church, and rising all the way up into heaven.  We’re just the witnesses, scared and awe-struck. Even the most faithful among us may feel the urge to run away.

Please pray with me. O God, your love, stronger than death is hard for us to fathom; terrifying in its beauty and power. Stay with us, as we try each day to put our trust in you; as we witness you, each day, bewilderingly alive, all around us. Amen.

During this holy week, Jesus directly challenges the powers that be. He challenges the colonial government, riding into the holy city of Jerusalem as if he were the star of a Roman military procession. Jesus challenges merchants and commerce,  driving moneychangers out of the temple. Jesus challenges religious authorities, calling them hypocrites, and predicting the destruction of the temple.

But that’s not all.  Jesus goes on to challenge his own followers. He defies their expectations of social and political change, telling them that he will soon be crucified. He defies their values around money, accepting an extravagant gift of ointment. He defies their self-image, predicting that they will betray him.

Jesus challenges everyone. And most folks don’t react well. Some are angry. Some are troubled. Some lose their enthusiasm for Jesus’ movement, and drift away. A few are so upset by Jesus’ actions that they begin to plan for his destruction.

Reading the story again this year, I was struck by how much determination it must have taken for Jesus to do what he does. Everyone – literally everyone except for God – wishes he was acting differently.  But Jesus still choses, again and again, to speak and act in a way that is true to who he is, and how he is called.  He points out the dangers and limitations of all the structures around him.  He even questions the expectations and character of those who follow him. Jesus offers his community his truth: a strange gift that is difficult to accept. 

In this time, we are also dealing with some hard truths.  A global pandemic has arrived, and it has challenged everything. It has brought into stark relief the weaknesses and failures of our governments, our economic systems, our religious authorities; our societies.  It also brings out many revealing reactions in individuals: in you, in me, in all those around us.

Like the disciples in Jesus’ time, we cannot control how this all ends. We can’t control how the structures around us respond, how the people around us react.  We can’t control those things; we can’t even predict them. The only thing we can decide is the same decision that faced the disciples: What will I do? Who will I be?

A few among us may be called to truly heroic acts in this time. Bless you. For most of us, the faithful living of these days will mean something else. Each day, we will need to discern: how we can be true to ourselves, true to our callings?  How might we practice patience, kindness, generosity, and honesty, to impact the good of the whole?

Don’t forget that in this difficult work we have the comforts that Jesus left us.  He does not only offer challenge to the world during this week.  He also gives us a meal in which to remember and experience him.  He gives us a new commandment, to love one another. He gives us his presence beside us in prayer.

Please pray with me: Jesus, challenger and comforter: may your story, and the crucible of these days, inspire us to find within ourselves a deeper truth, a greater strength, a more bountiful sense of grace to accept and share. Amen.

Ezekiel 37:1-14

We are living in a strange time. And it would be easy to assume that no scripture passage could meet us here, in this bizarre and challenging modern time.  Well, here is one piece of good news: there are a lot of strange stories in our scriptures, truly bizarre stories; and many of them come from very challenging times in the lives of our ancestors in faith.  So it is with our reading today.

Things are bad for the people Israel. The great King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylonia and his armies have deposed Israel’s king and laid siege to the holy city of Jerusalem. Thousands of Israelites have been cast out of their land. Others are still living in Israel under foreign rule. There is no sign that things will ever get better.

Then God takes the Prophet Ezekiel out into a valley full of bones.  If this doesn’t sound creepy enough to you already, the scripture assures us that there are very many bones in that valley, and they are very dry.  And then God asks Ezekiel, “Can these bones live?”  Ezekiel replies, “O Lord God, you know.”

God proceeds to instruct Ezekiel about how to prophecy to the bones: how to speak so that the bones come together, bone to its bone, with sinew and flesh and skin. And then the breath of God comes into these reformed bodies. They live, and stand on their feet, a vast multitude. Finally God tells Ezekiel that these bones are the whole house of Israel.  Israel says, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.”  But Ezekiel’s job is to let them know that God is going to bring them up out of the grave, and fill them with spirit, with life.

We are perhaps still at the beginning of the trial that this pandemic we are living through may become. But there are already stories of great devastation. And it has already impacted all of us: our social connections, our childcare, our work habits, our income, our mourning rituals.  We may also find ourselves battling with inner devastation: a dryness, a hopelessness, a sense of being cut off from that which keeps us strong.  We may find ourselves saying with the people Israel, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.” How might this story of God meet us in those times of desolation?

One striking thing about this story is that God does not restore this valley of dry bones alone.  Instead, God offers restoration in partnership with a prophet. God’s imagination and guidance, leads to Ezekiel’s proclamation, which in turn leads to physical changes. It may be that we have a role to play, that the human community has a role to play, in helping to communicate and enact what God knows can take place amidst the challenges of this time. Keep watch, pay attention to where this may be happening around you.

I am struck also that this scripture story is not simply a before-and-after story. God does not come and restore political victory to the people.  Their exile is not ended at the end of the story.  Rather, the reanimating words of hope come in the midst of devastation. The desert of dry bones, and the renewed multitude of living bodies, are existing in the same bleak reality. It’s not the exterior circumstances that change, but the sense of vibrancy, life, hope, in the midst of the circumstance.  How might we live like a watered desert, like a re-membered people filled with God’s breath, even in the midst of isolation, in the midst of desolation?

Some questions for reflection:

• When have you felt dried up, without hope, cut off, like the people Israel in this story?
• What are the losses you grieve in this pandemic time, for yourself or for others? I think grief is a real and important thing to acknowledge for all of us, what we are losing, what we have lost.
• How, even in times like this, does God partner with us to open graves, give breath, fill us with Spirit?

John 3:1-17

Nicodemus knows that someone named Jesus is making waves.  How does he know? Maybe he has heard about how Jesus came out of the waters of baptism, the Holy Spirit swooping down like a dove right above him. Maybe he has heard about how Jesus changed jars of water into a very fine vintage of wine at a wedding. Almost certainly, he has heard about how Jesus spent his first day in the holy city of Jerusalem driving money changers out of the temple.  Nicodemus learns that someone named Jesus is making waves, and he wants to learn more.  So this esteemed religious leader shows up, at night, at Jesus’ door. 

Sometimes folks imagine that Nicodemus is ready to become Jesus’ disciple as he visits this night, if only secretly. I imagine Nicodemus is ready to examine this upstart uneducated Galilean Rabbi.  What does this Jesus really believe? What has he been teaching the people?  Will this youngster need to be reigned in before he causes trouble with the Romans?  But Nicodemus doesn’t get a chance to ask his questions or offer his guidance.  Jesus sees this experienced elder, and begins teaching him, instead.  “Very truly, I tell you,” Jesus says, “No one can see the kingdom of God without being born again.”

Now, as it happens, Nicodemus does not live in America in the 1990s.  So, he has no idea that the phrase “born again” might have a spiritual meaning.  Jesus’ teaching, therefore, seems simply ridiculous. “How can anyone be born after having grown old?” Nicodemus asks, bemused. “Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb?”

Jesus replies, “Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’  The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

Nicodemus does not know what to do with Jesus’ answer. “How can these things be?” he asks. We might want to ask the same thing.  It’s hard to be sure exactly what Jesus is saying, but he seems to be saying that to get close to God, we need to be reborn. Reborn, through water. Reborn, through the Spirit.  Reborn, or born again, or depending on how you translate the original, born from above.

But what does it mean to be reborn, born again, or born from above?  Isn’t everyone born just once? We only get one shot in life, right? There’s no starting over, physically or otherwise.  Our past can’t be changed. We can only go forward.

Plus, even if we could start again – would all of us really want to?  Especially folks like Nicodemus, who seems to have it all together?  He’s educated, he’s respected. He’s probably financially secure. Nicodemus is even spiritually revered.  Why would someone like that risk it all to be reborn? Why would he need to?

Jesus tells us that the way to get close to God is to be reborn.  “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

With God’s help, we can start over, Jesus tells us. But he’s not talking about starting over to build more successful lives, lives with more money or fame.  Instead, this starting over has to do with loosening our attachment to the external parts of our lives, so that we can respond more freely to the wild, unexpected movements of God in our hearts.

This teaching of Jesus makes me think of the spiritual leader Richard Rohr, who’s spent time unpacking psychoanalyst Carl Jung’s ideas about the two halves of life.  The first half of life, he claims, is dedicated to building an identity for ourselves through outwardly noticeable achievements.  The second half of life begins when these outward achievements are no longer sufficiently meaningful.  Instead, we begin seeking spiritual or religious experiences that can fill the outward structure of our identity with a new kind of inward satisfaction.  This is the work of finding God deep within.(Read more here or in Rohr’s book Falling Upwards)

Consider the caterpillars we are learning from this season.  Starting as a small egg, caterpillars eat and eat and grow and grow – just like in the book, the very hungry caterpillar.  In fact, caterpillars are so good at eating and growing that they outgrow their own skins more than once!  The goal of all this, we might imagine, is to become the biggest and best caterpillar out there.  But just when they’re getting really successful at being caterpillars, caterpillars stop being caterpillars at all.  Instead, they hang upside down, create a chrysalis, and give up their caterpillar lives to become something else entirely.

So I wonder: what have you been trying to achieve in your life so far? What have been your goals?  Maybe you’ve achieved those goals spectacularly well. Maybe it hasn’t gone exactly the way you hoped or planned. Either way – are these the same goals that you want to claim for the rest of your life?  Or is it time to start doing something else altogether – even if it means undoing parts of the life you’ve built, letting go of some privilege or prestige you’ve enjoyed? 

Each of us is only born once.  Nicodemus is right!  We can’t enter a second time into our mother’s wombs.  We can’t even undo our mistakes, or erase our scars.  But Jesus wants us to know that everyone can still be reborn.

We can be reborn, if we’re broken and troubled and desperate.  We can be reborn, even if we seem to have it all together.  Humble or proud, rich or poor, successful or struggling, all of us can be renewed. All it takes is acknowledging the emptiness we feel inside the outside shell of our outer lives, and inviting God to fill us.  

Simple, but not easy.  Letting God fill our lives means moving into mystery, and letting go of everything we thought we knew.  It means putting our trust in absolute eternal love, and not much else.  This kind of life isn’t something we choose only once.  Instead, being reborn is a choice every day: as we slowly deconstruct the self we thought we needed to be, to become the one we are called to be, instead.

Please pray with me. Holy God: You are the womb from which we all come, and through you, we can begin lives that are entirely new: empty of everything except the wind of your Spirit, blowing free.  Help us each to claim this bewildering opportunity, this mysterious offer, today and every day, for the sake of our own lives, and for the sake of your world. Amen.

Matthew 4:1-11

At the beginning of the season of Lent each year, we return to this story about what happens to Jesus after his baptism, when the Spirit leads him out into the wilderness. Who does Jesus meet in the wilderness? (the devil!)

Now our cultures have all kinds of ideas about what the devil might be like, but there isn’t much about the devil in our scriptures. We don’t know if Jesus really saw the devil with his eyes, or if the devil was more like a dream, or what the devil might have looked like, or if the devil could have looked at all like Susan, who read the part of the devil in our scripture lesson.  We don’t know if Jesus really heard the devil with his ears, or if the devil was more like a voice inside his head, or what the devil might have sounded like, or if the devil could have sounded anything like Susan.

What we know is that the devil tempts Jesus three times.  He asks Jesus to prove himself by turning stones into bread, to fill his own belly; to jump off a high place, to test God; and to worship the devil, to gain power over the whole world. What does Jesus say to these temptations?  Does he agree to do them, or not? Jesus says no, and he says no by quoting the Hebrew scriptures. When Jesus has hard choices, he remembers what he knows about God and God’s ways.

I don’t know whether anyone here has ever felt like the devil was whispering in their ear, tempting them to do something. But I do know that we all have to make choices, and that those choices can be hard to make.  How can we learn more about God, how can we get closer to God, so that we’ll make better choices?

In this season of Lent, we’re invited to choose a practice that will help strengthen our ability to make good choices.  We’re invited to set an intention, to make a change that will help us know God and God’s ways more deeply.  Perhaps we could try something that might help us become less anxious, less selfish, less judgmental, less isolated. Perhaps we could try something that might help us become more peaceful, more generous, more gracious, more connected.  We’re invited to try something new: just for 40 days.  Maybe it’ll become a habit we love and keep doing. Maybe we’ll never do it again. But almost certainly, we will have learned something about ourselves and about God by trying it.

Each of us is invited to choose a practice, to make a change in our individual lives. And all together, as a community, we’re trying a change as well, in our space.  Did it feel a little strange coming in today? Was anything surprising?  I wonder if you notice anything that is different in our space today. What is different?

• There is purple fabric hanging in the air!
• Our platform and our table are in the middle of the space.
• Face new directions in our seats; see each other more, and the organ and windows more
• We may not always see the face of the person who’s speaking or leading.

There are also a lot of things that are the same. What is the same?

• Walls are the same
• Same Furniture
• Liturgy, the way we worship is more or less the same
• The people!
• God, the reason we gather is the same

This way of setting up echoes the design of the ceiling. It’s an extension of the most ancient pattern of Christian gathering, which was around a table.  It may help us feel closer to each other, or even closer to God, as if we’re wrapped around with  care.  Like anything we try for Lent, this may be something we love — and it may be something that we never do again. Regardless, I hope we learn something from it, about ourselves, and about God.

The imagery that we’re using this year for Lent is from the life cycle of butterflies.  Butterflies can inspire us as we consider what it might mean to change. And the most dramatic change in a butterfly’s life happens when it’s inside the safe walls of its chrysalis.

So, this season, I am imagining that God’s forgiveness and grace and love is our chrysalis.  God is our safe container, within which we can risk change.  We have some chrysalises, made on Ash Wednesday, on our table. The curve of our chairs, the sweep of the fabric above our heads, may also help us think of the wrapping around love of God.

Change is hard.  It’s hard to choose to change, and it’s hard to face changes we don’t have a choice in.  But we’re not alone.  Not even Jesus was alone.  When he begins his public ministry, in each moment of his transition, God is there: in a spirit like a dove, in words of blessing; in the wisdom of the scriptures; in visiting angels.  God is there, wrapping around Jesus to give him support as he dares to do something new.

Please pray with me: God, help us to feel your strength surrounding us, holding us, hugging us, grounding us, as the world changes, and as we choose to change, to become closer to you. Amen.

Matthew 17:1-9, 2 Peter 1:16-21

On the feast of Epiphany, we celebrate Jesus, who was born beneath a star and becomes a light for the world. During the weeks following Epiphany we witness Jesus’ holiness shining forth at the time of his baptism, and in his work of preaching and healing.  On this last Sunday before the season of Lent begins, Jesus’ brightness is revealed again in a spectacular way. 

Just a few days after Jesus has broken the news to his disciples that he will be killed in Jerusalem, and raised on the third day, Jesus goes up a high mountain with Peter, James, and John.  There, at the top of the mountain, Jesus is transfigured.  His face begins to shine like the sun.  His clothes become dazzling white.  Moses and Elijah, the two greatest heroes of his faith, begin talking to him like an equal.  Then, as if all this wasn’t enough, a bright cloud overshadows everyone, and a voice proclaims, “This is my child, the beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”

It must have been amazing to see Jesus’ face; to hear the conversation between him and Moses and Elijah; to feel the presence of God.  But none of us were there on that day. How can we feel the awe? How can we grasp the mystery?  How can the glory of God become real to us?

Only a few folks witnessed the events in the life of Jesus.  Thankfully, they shared their experiences generously.  As so we can still receive the blessings of these events today, not only in scripture, but also in song. There are Christians in just about every part of the world, speaking many languages, representing many cultures, and singing about the glory of God.

The sharing of Christian songs across culture, geography, and language has dramatically increased in recent decades.  As a result, our New Century Hymnal includes songs that did not originate in the European-American cultures that are the largest roots of our denomination, the United Church of Christ.

Our opening hymn today is one example: Siyaham’ ekukhanyen’ kwenkos.  This song expresses the longing of the black South African majority for rights and freedoms denied by an oppressive colonial white minority.  It is written in the language of the Zulu people, the most widely spoken indigenous language in South Africa.  Like so many protest songs, this one empowered those who sang it on their journey towards social change.  Some of us know it because it was recorded and published in 1980 by the Church of Sweden Mission, and became popular in North America during the 1990s.  In churches and concert venues, this song highlighted the fight against apartheid while introducing rhythms and energy that were unfamiliar in many predominantly European-American cultural institutions.

Our closing hymn, Sois la Semilla, was written by a Spanish theologian, Cesareo Gabarain, in the 1970s.  Father Gabarain wrote many hymns while serving as a parish priest and the Spanish chaplain to Pope Paul the 6^th.  This one was translated into English by the United Methodist Church and arranged by Mexican organist and choral director Skinner Chavez-Melo.  Tragically, the nineteenth century missionary movement encouraged Latin American and U.S. Latinx people to forget their language and culture. Including the Spanish language and Latinx song styles in our worship today is a way of honoring the identity of many, both here and far away, who were threatened with cultural erasure by the church.

One more international selection for today is the Taiwanese hymn “God Created Heaven and Earth.”  English missionaries Boris and Clare Anderson translated the text into English in 1981. The melody is from the Pi-po tribe, originally from the island of Taiwan.  I-to Loh, a professor of church music and hymnologist, harmonized this tune in 1963. Before the groundbreaking work of Professor Loh, the sharing of indigenous Asian hymnody was so focused on western accessibility, that it compromised indigenous musical styles or character.  Professor Loh has played a key role in researching, educating, and promoting the sharing of authentically indigenous hymnody.  Let’s sing…

Many issues arise as we use hymns that originate beyond North America and Europe.  Some of us are uncomfortable singing in an unfamiliar language or musical style. It may be challenging to sing, or feel less “holy” to us than the songs and styles we know by heart. Others among us are excited to have new cultural experiences.  Regardless of our personal preferences, questions of justice remain.  How can we be confident that we are honoring language, music, and stories that do not belong to us?  When might the use of songs from other cultures become appropriative?  How can we acknowledge the colonial and missionary history that has shaped this music, especially within congregations and denominations that are predominantly white?

These considerations also apply as we turn our attention to music that arises out of minority cultures in the United States. Wakantanka Taku Nitawa is a song from the Dakota people.  It was written in 1842, using an existing Dakota tune. The author is Joseph Renville, son of a French-Canadian trader and a Dakota mother.  Renville served as an interpreter between white missionaries and Native Americans, helping to establish the Lac qui Parle mission in Minnesota. This hymn was paraphrased in English by R. Philip Frazier, a Native American and Congregational minister, in 1929.  I don’t feel comfortable singing in Dakota without someone to teach us, so let’s sing in English…

Among many hymns of African American origin in our New Century Hymnal is Lift Every Voice and Sing.  James Weldon Johnson, the text writer, was a teacher, poet, lawyer, newspaper founder, diplomat, and a leader in the NAACP.  He worked together with his brother, John Rosamond Johnson, a musical composer, performer, and director. This hymn was first performed in 1921 for a celebration of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, and is often referred to as the black national anthem.  As with all spirituals and songs from African American traditions, I wonder what it means to sing this as someone who benefits from white supremacy.  As we sing together, notice the words “our” and “we” and consider their meanings. Let’s sing…

Writing to the faithful many years after the Transfiguration, the author of the second letter of Peter assures their audience that “no prophecy ever came by human will, but people moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.”  With humility and gratitude, let us receive the gift of God’s Holy Spirit revealing herself through the holy songs of many peoples.  For God’s glory cannot be limited to any one language or culture, rhythm or hymnody; it bursts forth in a magnificent diversity of expression.  As witnesses and students of this music, as participants in this music, may we receive a clearer understanding, a brighter glimpse, of the God at the heart of it all. May it be so.  

Deuteronomy 30:15-20

Moses is tired. He has been leading the people Israel through the wilderness for decades. With God’s help, he has faced their complaints, met their needs, and given them guidance.  Now the people are on the plains of Moab, almost within reach of the promised land. But Moses is 120 now, and according to his own account, he no longer gets around very well.  Who can blame him?  Moses is nearing the end of his life, and he’s not going to make it to the promised land. So before he dies, he shares some more wisdom with the people on God’s behalf.

After all that he’s done and said, what is it that Moses wants to make sure that the people know? You have a choice, says Moses. You have a choice. You can choose between prosperity and adversity.  You can choose between blessings and curses. You can choose between life and death. You can choose between honoring the God who brought us up out of Egypt, and worshiping someone or something else. You have a choice, and your choice matters.

This season we listen to both Moses and Jesus share ideas with us about how to live faithfully.  Many of us have heard it all before.  Don’t lie or steal or kill.  Don’t spend your energy on worry or hate.  Don’t worship wealth or seek power for its own sake.  Instead, honor creation and be generous with what you have.  Strive to forgive other people and help those who need help the most. Love God with all that you are, and your neighbors, and even your enemies, as yourself.

These instructions may be familiar to us. They may even seem simple.  But one thing’s for sure: they aren’t easy.  So what does Moses mean when he tells us to choose? Can we really just choose a way of God, a way of life, once and for all, and everything will fall into place?  If so, why hasn’t it happened already?

The ways Moses asks us to choose aren’t simple to live out.  His insistence that we have a choice may even make us angry as we remember just how many things we can’t choose.  None of us get to choose the circumstances of our birth or upbringing.  We don’t get to choose what we’re naturally good at, or what is really hard for us, or what jobs we get or lose. We don’t get to choose who falls in love with us. We don’t get to choose if we or our loved ones get sick. We cannot choose how the people who are closest to us will act, siblings or spouses or children or parents or friends, even if we really, really wish that we could.

There are so many things we don’t have a choice about — not only in our personal lives, but in our common life, as well. It’s President’s Day weekend, and this is an election year. We don’t get to choose who runs for office, or who other people vote for, or how politicians act once they are elected.  We cannot force our leaders to tell the truth, or care about the truth, or uphold any kind of moral code. We cannot single-handedly stop hateful speech and action, or redistribute wealth, or eliminate oppressive laws and practices, or halt climate change, or transform our immigration policies. 

Choose a way of life, Moses?  What choice do we really have? If we pay attention to the world around us, and particularly if we stay up late reading or watching or listening to the news, it’s easy to end up feeling entirely powerless. I wonder how those folks Moses was talking to felt, coming up out of slavery in Egypt only to endure 40 years of wandering and want. How many choices did they feel that they really had?

But Moses never claims that we can choose the circumstances of our lives, or that we can choose anyone else’s actions. He only reminds us that we have a choice about how we will live in the midst of everyone and everything else.  God creates us for choice in the very beginning. God designs us to be free and even creative. God does then offer us guidelines for meaningful and just living, suggestions for how to use our freedom, lots of them; but God has no interest in forcing us into obedience.  Instead, throughout our holy text, God cajoles, pursues, provokes, questions, and entices.  God invites us to recognize and claim our freedom to say no to whatever is life-taking, life-denying. God invites us to recognize and claim our freedom to say yes to whatever will nurture, heal, inspire, connect, strengthen, honor.

God gives us freedom. God makes us free. It is our work, then, to claim that freedom. To choose despite the pain of our past, and our fear of the future. To choose despite the pressures of our families and cultures and political systems. To choose with as much creativity and faithfulness as we can, and then, when we make a mistake – as we will inevitably do – to accept God’s forgiveness, and choose again.

What might you choose, if you truly felt free?  How might you live, if you claimed all your choices?

Keep in mind that Moses wasn’t speaking to one person here, but to the whole people of Israel.  A free human community. As we struggle to make choices in the directions of goodness, and kindness, and justice, we will discover others who are striving to choose these things too. And while each of us has very limited power, together we have astonishing power.  Power to influence, and power to change.

Just before he asks us to choose life, Moses says this:

“Surely, this commandment that I am commanding you today is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away.  It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to heaven for us, and get it for us so that we may hear it and observe it?’  Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross to the other side of the sea for us, and get it for us so that we may hear it and observe it?’  No, the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe.” (Deuteronomy 30:11-14)

Please pray with me.

God, you are close enough for us to cling to, and the wisdom you give us is not far away, but planted here, in our hearts. Whatever challenges we face, personal and political, grant us the strength and courage to still claim some part of that magnificent freedom you have given to us. Guide us as we struggle to choose faithfulness, wisdom, and life: by ourselves, and together; for your sake and for our own  sake and for the sake of one another. Amen.

Isaiah 58:1-9a, Matthew 5:13-20

In this season, we remember how Jesus is baptized and begins his ministry, and how he invites others into discipleship.  We remember how we were baptized, many of us, and how Jesus invites us into discipleship. But what does this mean, discipleship? How could we really do it? What does it mean to follow Jesus, or to live a life faithful to God?

Our scriptures offer us two lovely answers today.  Both of them are worth a longer examination, if you want to take home your bulletin and look them up.  In the book of Isaiah, we find a God frustrated by their people. People pretend to care about me, God says, and they pretend to care about my ways. But at the same time, they are oppressing each other, and fighting with one another. (This may sound a bit familiar; you may have witnessed some of this in the news recently.  Times haven’t changed so very much.)

God says, if these people who talk so much about me were really interested in my ways, they would be undoing injustice, and sharing their bounty with those who really need it, and recognizing everyone as kin. Only when they do these things will their light shine forth, and their healing spring up. Only then will they feel my presence, right there, alongside them.

In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus, preaching what is known as the Sermon on the Mount, offers a similar message.  He knows that his audience has heard the law of Moses, and the wisdom of the prophets. You have probably heard at least the basics of it, too: love God, and your neighbor as yourself. But too often even those who know these guidelines do not follow them; or at least, we do not follow them with our whole hearts. Jesus tells us: you already have everything you need to follow me.  You know what you need to know, you are who God created you to be. So, be who you really are. Salt seasons all it touches.  Light brightens all it touches. You were blessed to bless others, so be salty, be bright, be yourself, and bless everyone who comes near you.

This church has taken seriously our calling to love God and neighbor, to bless others – even those we don’t know.  As part of our response, we give a portion of our budget  — recently, 11% —  to organizations we call Mission Partners.  And along with our wealth, we share other things with them, too: time, labor, prayer. 

I give thanks to all the folks who are leaders in this work of connection, several here among us today.  Two of them will now offer us a glimpse into why they do what they do…

Barbara: This church has a long history with Open Table.  Gordon Fraser was its faithful champion along with others when we first came to WCUC 16 years ago.  When Jesus says, “feed the hungry” there is not a lot of confusion or spin around what he means.  Community suppers in Maynard and Concord offer weekly healthy meals and the chance to socialize.  The food pantry, operating in what was formerly the Aubuchon Hardware building on Main Street in Maynard, serves upwards of 80-100 families on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.  Our monthly food donations are part of providing that need.  Local farms, businesses, and the Boston Food Bank fill in the rest, and the team of volunteers to pull off this feat is awesome.  There are so many pieces to a community resource like this.

We all know about housing costs in this area.   Many people who work even full time have trouble managing rent/mortgage, utilities, not to mention the possible need for child care or medical bills and paying back student loans.  Helping families with food frees up money to meet some of these other bills.  If you are like me, the emails, letters and phone calls keep coming—so many worthy causes, so many needs.  I get overwhelmed.

I have needed to find my place of radical solidarity.  I think this is what Jesus calls us to, to partner with the hungry, the homeless, the displaced, the refugees, with those who are struggling.  When I worked in community mental health that was my place of radical solidarity.  In retirement Open Table connects me again with people who are struggling, with job loss, illness, family problems, low wages—all of which impact their ability to provide basic needs for their family.  It is also a place to welcome people new to this country, working to get settled.  For my own spiritual health I have needed to get out of my bubble.

I am grateful to God for the presence of Open Table in our communities and for my opportunity to partner with Open Table.

Constance: Why I support Habitat for Humanity

• Habitat for Humanity is international, at one point present in more than 100 countries.
• Habitat for Humanity is a binding national network—across social, political, monetary,     and religious lines.
• Habitat for Humanity is regional and local, sometimes at work in your own town.
• Habitat for Humanity is cooperative—“each one, teach one” is an unspoken motto.
• Habitat for Humanity is young people baking and selling their wares to raise money for a nearby project.
• Habitat for Humanity is a team of women bonding over a wide variety of tasks during “Women Build” Week.
• Habitat for Humanity is celebrating a 75^th birthday in grand style, challenging friends and family to raise money at the time of the local affiliate’s annual gala.
• Habitat for Humanity is an agnostic Jew and a proud atheist (nephew of two Lutheran pastors) bonding as they dig foundation trenches.
• Habitat for Humanity is learning humility—being just one more team member when the team leader may be 1/3 of your age.
• Habitat for Humanity is being amazed by Jimmy Carter’s steadfast dedication to a cause he did not found but has supported more visibly than anyone for decades.
• Habitat for Humanity is climbing tall ladders to wash windows, getting up on a roof that turns out to be steeper (and higher) than it had seemed, wielding new tools.
• Habitat for Humanity is humbling—patiently washing paint brushes, picking up trash, sorting screws.
• Habitat for Humanity is moving 1000 concrete blocks across a London worksite because they had been delivered to the wrong spot and were in the way.
• Habitat for Humanity is replacing 1000 bolts in fencing because the wrong size had been delivered but everything had to be finished by the end of the Jimmy Carter Week in Vác, Hungary—and someone had to make the switch when the correct bolts arrived.
• Habitat for Humanity is, in the words of founder Millard Fuller: “Love in the Mortar Joints,” “A Simple, Decent Place to Live,” “The Theology of the Hammer, “More than Houses.”
• Habitat for Humanity speaks to me because it pulls me out of the isolating intellectual writer’s world where I spend too much time into physical partnership with people in need—and because Habitat for Humanity can use time and talent as well as dimes and dollars.

All of us can be part of this. Thanks be to God.