Matthew 10:40-42 Rewards (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)
 
 “Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous, and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.”

     I’ve been following this author named Priya Parker for a while. Her training is in conflict resolution and mediation. Through that work, she came to understand that part of dealing with conflict and hard discussions is being attentive to developing good relationships. Part of building relationships will also include hosting gatherings. She talks about this part of her work as helping “demystify how anyone can create meaningful, necessary gatherings for their people.” She wants to help people learn to what she calls “an artful gatherer.” This is “someone who is able to create meaning and connection in groups without everyone needing to be the same.” She encourages people to develop skills that allow them to craft a good gathering through thinking about why they are choosing to gather, setting expectations for the gathering, and creating moments to connect in ways that reflect the purpose of the gathering. 

     On her social media, she shares examples of all kinds of different gatherings that she thinks are effective. She’s shared a great story about a guy who meets a bunch of his buddies at a bar on Friday nights and makes a list of potential discussion topics. On the list she shared, he’d come up with the following prompts:

• HAPPY NEW YEAR.
• Favorite Christmas Gift.
• New Year’s Resolutions.
• Yellowstone finale.
• Laundromats.
• Packers/Edgerrin Cooper.
• Football short pants.
• Deep fried peanuts.
• What would your dating profile say.
• Old fashioned preference: Sweet or sour.
• Trivia. General discussion.
• And, he made a note that his daughter would be joining them that night.

Now, I know that not everyone would want a casual hang out with an agenda like this, but as soon as I saw this list, I deeply wanted to know this group of guys’ opinions on football short pants. Also, I thought about how much this guy likes his friends and wants to help them get to know each other better, have the opportunity to argue in good-natured ways, and talk about what they like about themselves and the things that bring them joy. He’s building intimacy, making space for everyone to share, and also welcoming new people to the table. 

     Parker also talks about magical questions: questions everyone is interested in answering, and everyone is interested in hearing each other’s answers. The foundational assumption in these questions is that our differences don’t prevent us from being in relationship. Sharing our differences actually builds intimacy. She recently shared some questions to create connection across cultural difference that included: 

• What does celebration look like where you come from? 
• What is a tiny everyday habit that reveals where you grew up?
• What’s a time someone from a different background made you feel at home? 

These questions may not be appropriate to every context. Parker clearly acknowledges that. I think they’d be better suited to situations where everyone has opted in to explicit conversation about differences than they would be suited to spring on a random strange with an accent you don’t recognize. These kinds of questions, when asked out of the blue, can make someone feel othered rather than welcome if done in the wrong context. 

     Even with the limitations, there is a worthwhile foundation of kind curiosity here. It is good to hear how each other celebrates. It is good to get a sense of how a place may shape daily behaviors you don’t even think about. And, it is good to give people an opportunity to speak of a time when they’ve been cared for in a way they might not have expected. 

     Today’s reading comes from a portion of Matthew that J. Andrew Overman describes in his notes on this Gospel as Jesus’ “sending out and instruction about mission.” I like to think of it as him teaching his disciples to be both guest and host. He is empowering them to heal and teach but also asking them to put themselves in the place of building relationships of utter trust in those to whom they are preaching. They aren’t taking anything with them but the clothes on their back and the Holy Spirit. In his commentary on this text, Cleophus LaRue points out that when “welcome” is mentioned here, Jesus is talking in very practical terms. He means that they will rely on the people listening to them for food and shelter. 

    Jesus recognized that not everyone would listen, so he gave the disciples what he calls a “little ritual” to help them leave a place where they were unable to build a relationship. “If anyone does not welcome you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet as you leave that house or town.” He also assumes that they will be successful in building relationship, healing, and teaching. LaRue describes today’s reading as the “pep talk” to encourage them in doing the vital gathering work he’s sending them out to do. LaRue describes Jesus as giving the disciples a function akin to that of an ambassador. If you welcome an ambassador, you welcome the one who sent them. Even the simple offer of a cool glass of water is a powerful gift if given faithfully. So, the disciples should be as ready to be hosted as they are to heal. The reciprocal nature of this work is the point because the relationship build is the point. 

     I read something in another commentary that I found interesting. Do you remember how I said that there are some limitations in the questions Parker offered to build connections across cultures? A scholar named Pablo Jiménez points out some similar limitations in Jesus’ instructions in chapter 10.  Earlier in the chapter, before our reading, Jesus told his disciples not to go among Gentiles or Samaritans to share the good news. This seems like a narrow view of his own mission of healing and grace. It is interesting that Jesus will find this narrow mission challenged just a few chapters later.  In chapter 15, Jesus encounters a Gentile, a Canaanite woman, who challenges the limits he’s placed on his own willingness to build relationships beyond his cultural and religious community.

     This woman, who is unnamed, is not someone who Jesus approaches. She approaches him. She desperately needs his help because her daughter is unwell. It is interesting that while we, the reader, know little about her beyond her ethnicity, we can see clearly that she is faithful. She has heard what Jesus can do and believes. You’d think this would be the kind of person he’d want to talk to! But, she’s not, because she’s not Jewish. He rudely refuses her: “it’s not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” She is undeterred by being called a dog. 

     I should note that another thing Priya Parker helps people do is have hard conversations about important things. I think she’d be cheering this woman on. This kind of conflict is a vital part of relationship building, and it’s important to say hard truths with moral clarity. The unnamed woman quickly and wisely retorts, “Yes, Lord, even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’ tables.” While one must be willing to say hard truths, one must also be willing to hear hard truths. Thank goodness Jesus is! He says to her, “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish!” Scripture tells us that her daughter was healed instantly.

     Jiménez points out in his commentary that Jesus doesn’t stop expanding his mission with this one Canaanite one. By Matthew 28, Jesus is telling his disciples to “go and make disciples of all nations.” Maybe this was the goal all along. Or, maybe Jesus learned something by being welcomed and affirmed by this woman who was from a different background than him? We are told their encounter changed her and her daughter’s life. I think it changed Jesus’, too. 

     Think back to the first time you came to this church. What are some things that you remember about that day? Now, think about the second time you came to this church? What is something that happened in that first visit that made you or your family want to come back? On my first visit, initially, I couldn’t find the driveway behind the big tree, but I kept looking because I needed a job. Then, I met Mike Burns and Dana Hall, who asked thoughtful questions and let me ring the bell. I went on to meet with the whole search team that first day. I came back because the search committee members were thoughtful, kind, and playful. And, I liked ringing the bell. Why did you come back and why have you stayed?

     As I head into a month of sabbatical, a cup of water you all have offered to sustain me, I hope we can keep thinking about what welcome really means. Sometimes it is very practical (food, shelter). Sometimes it is emotional, like being willing to listen, ask questions, and change our minds when rightfully challenged. As a church, we are both guest and host, invited in by the Spirit, and sent for with the Spirit. Let us keep an ear out for the ones, like the Canaanite woman, who invite us to have a bigger understanding of the healing of Christ. And let us keep practicing gathering with great care. 

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Priya Parker:

• one man's discussion topics for drinks with his buddies: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DYC_W3uh4Ji/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
• Grocery store live music: https://www.instagram.com/p/DXPY7e1DqY_/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
• creating connection across cultural difference: https://www.instagram.com/p/DZgVLRhju5u/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

J. Andrew Overman's note on Matthew in the The New Oxford Annotated Bible: The New Revised Standard Version with Apocryphya, ed. Michael Coogan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001)
Cleophus LaRue: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-13/commentary-on-matthew-1040-42-6
​Pablo Jiménez's notes on Proper 8 in Preaching God's Transforming Justice: A Lectionary Commentary, Year A featuring 22 New Holy Days for Justice (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013)

* all of the photos above are from the Pilgrim Lodge Website: www.pilgrimlodge.org/how-to-rent-pilgrim-lodge/

Matthew 5:14-16 (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)
“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."

     Back in May, I was helping lead the confirmation retreat at Pilgrim Lodge when the other deans and I realized we had a problem. Not a terrible one, but definitely a damp one. We knew that there was a chance of rain on Saturday, but we thought we’d planned around it for our outside activity of the day: walking the labyrinth. We put our heads together while the campers were doing another activity to rearrange the next 90 minutes of activities. We had some workaround and indoor activities that we could switch to, but I also knew that a lot of people really liked walking the labyrinth. I suggested asking them if they want to walk it a little more quickly than we’d planned and then bringing them back for closing worship. I, of course, had to walk in the rain because it was my idea.

     Who here has walked a labyrinth before? Has anyone walked the one at Pilgrim Lodge? Labyrinths have been a part of Christian practice for centuries and have been around in similar form to what we see now for 4,000 years. They are a tool for meditative practice, not a puzzle like a maze, so they only have one way into the center, and you follow that same way back out. The movement into the center of the labyrinth is a kind of full-bodied prayer. For campers at Pilgrim Lodge, this is a site where many feel closer to God and closer to nature.

     Many of the kids and adults at camp wanted to walk the labyrinth in the rain, so we set off down the trail, rain gear at the ready. I can’t easily walk the labyrinth myself. With my issues with proprioception and balance, winding around in a circle on uneven ground isn’t much fun for me. The PL Labyrinth is not flat the way that most labyrinths are. They say, “As is often with the path to God, one must navigate around obstacles.” While I do appreciate this design choice, it does mean that if I’m leading, I have to walk right through to the middle to wait on everyone else. I offered a few words to guide their walking. They made their way towards me, guided by lines of stone that once were chimneys in the cabins. In the center, we prayed together. Some walked straight out with me, and I sent them with an adult to the old dining hall to get ready for worship. I waited for everyone else to wind their way back out, around trees, over rocks, some even crawling under one large root that stretches over one part of the trail.

     This summer, the theme of Pilgrim Lodge’s programming is “It Only Takes a Spark.” I share the story of the labyrinth, because, even in the rain, it is a place where many experience the spark of the divine. Surrounded by trees and rocks, balsam and pine perfuming the air, lake sparkling in distance, people find themselves engaging with the Spirit in ways that can’t always imagine. Walking alongside stones that contained generations of campfires, a way is made clear for them. This is why they walked the labyrinth in the chilly rain that day. They knew that this dark forest is a place where God’s light shines.

Assistant Camp Director Lydia Hoffman wrote a beautiful invitation to campers and explanation of the summer's theme. I shared portions of it with the congregation during the sermon. You can access it here:  https://www.pilgrimlodge.org/2026/05/26/it-only-takes-a-spark/

     In her letter to campers, Lydia speaks about the power of the moment she calls “the flame catching.” It’s when new campers become brave enough to show their face and shine their light as Christ calls us to in our scripture for today and the guiding scripture for this summer at Pilgrim Lodge. Lydia reminds all of us as she invites us to camp: “Oh, how the world needs your light. Oh, how the world needs your spark.” Pilgrim Lodge continues to be a site of tremendous spiritual growth in the Maine Conference. In fact, our conference offices will soon be in the farmhouse there, putting so much of what connects us as a conference in one place. I am grateful for the ways that Pilgrim Lodge has supported countless campers. In a time when places of refuge can feel few and far between, it continues to be a sanctuary. In honor of Father’s Day, let us share generously with Pilgrim Lodge, adding our spark to their Holy Fire.

Donate to Pilgrim Lodge: ​www.pilgrimlodge.org/giving/

     “If you owned a building, would you let your friends live in it rent free?” This is the question a woman named Ellyn Marsh asked her cousin Allan Giacomelli as they sat in the audience of the musical “Rent.” Allan had never seen it before. He and Ellyn share videos on social media of his first impression of musicals he’s never seen before. He’s a person who may like the music in musicals well enough, but doesn’t always follow the sometimes admittedly strange and convoluted stories in them. I watched a video this week of Allan’s first-time watching Rent, and it’s a delight.
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    “Some of them. Not all of them.” is Allan’s answer to Ellyn’s question. Which is funny, even without knowing the musical. Maybe you’d say the same thing about letting your friends stay somewhere rent-free, too. Ellyn and Allan go on:

E: How many of them?
A: One.
E: How long would you let them live for free?
A: A week.
E: What about a year?
A: Rent free? For a year!?
E: Yeah.
A: Do they have a job?
E: They’re artists. It’s hard being an artist.
A: Is it?

     For those of you unfamiliar with Rent, it’s a musical about a year in the life of group of artist and activist friends who live in a building that is owned by another friend. It is set in 1989 in a part of the East Village in New York City. The musical is also inspired by Puccini’s opera La Bohème, a story about young, impoverished artists in Paris in 1837. Unfortunately, there are many eras in which choosing to pursue creative work, particularly as someone who isn’t from a wealthy background, puts you in precarious financial straits.

     As Ellyn and Allan’s video goes on, at intermission, Allan says, “I don’t get what this is about? How many people live in this building? It’s like Charlie Brown in there. Everyone’s just dancing!” He’s not wrong! The friends dance in their apartments and dance at the bar they frequent and then back at their apartments again. Like the party scene in the Charlie Brown Christmas movie, there’s a guy with a blanket and a piano, and a room full of dancing people! “Why don’t they wanna pay rent,” Allan exclaims at one point. As a person who’s lived in the city, like a normal adult, and rented apartments before, he can’t imagine a world where someone just tries not to pay rent. It is a social obligation that he understands, and watching a show about people who are trying to get out of doing something that he thinks is an inarguable obligation blows his mind.

     In the show, the landlord character Benny, who used to be a struggling renter like his friends, is trying to get two characters, Mark and Roger, to pay their rent, so he cuts of the heat to their place. He also offers to give them a pass on the rent if they can convince another activist/artist friend/former roommate Maureen to cancel a protest against him for clearing a homeless encampment in another lot he owns. She organized it with her public interest lawyer girlfriend, Joanne. So much of this film is about the tensions between making art and making money, nurturing relationships while balancing responsibilities and loyalties, and honoring your calling in challenging times.

     Like many musicals, Rent uses music and dramatic stages to discuss a very real, very challenging era in US history. The characters in the show reflect the lives of the struggling arts and activists that composer Jonathan Larson, knew in late 80’s and early 1990’s New York City. These were people struggling with HIV diagnoses in an era with few treatments. This was also an era when people in romantic relationships with people of the same gender had very few legal protections. Many people lost their homes when their partners died of AIDS, not only because they couldn’t afford them without a second income, but also because, without the legal protections afforded married couples, homophobic family members had the legal right to remove them. This reality, compounded with an affordability crisis in their gentrifying neighborhoods, the lack of safety nets for creatives, and addiction crisis of this era, meant that many folks living around Larson were managing a lot of day-to-day uncertainty. If you don’t know this history, some part of the musical will seem so silly or foolish. And, the people in the story might be hard to empathize with.

     It may seem strange to bring the musical Rent into conversation with the book of Acts. I think a lot of people have been taught to read the Bible, including the book of Acts, and assume that the characters are respectable. Even if we know that they may have been living in tension with powerful people, we will assume the tension is because of their moral uprightness and because of the unrighteousness of the powerful. Not everyone will feel comfortable hearing these artists struggling with addiction, living with HIV, and resisting paying rent being compared to the first disciples of Christ. But, I think the comparison is fruitful.

     In a commentary that includes preaching notes on this text, Dr. Wil Gafney notes that much of scripture discusses people who trying to survive in hostile situations. She points to other stories showing groups of people moving from one place to another to escape famine and of characters, making big, bold, and risky choices because if they don’t, they will surely die. The church in Acts is living in the wake of the political violence of Jesus’ crucifixion. Though they have the hope of the resurrection and the power of the Spirit to continue his ministry, there is a threat of violence from Rome that they must contend with. Also, it’s not clear at all that many of these disciples, who were a broader group than just The Twelve at this point had much money. There were certainly wealthy widow women patrons who supported early Christian communities, but most of the people in this text were not. They had to find a way to survive.

     As Dr. Gafney says, “In Acts, it is the community of the church that meets the needs of the people.” They held all things in common. They sold possessions and distributed the proceeds to any who had needs. They shared food, shared worship and conversation in the temple, and shared goodwill. Not only did they survive, but their Spirit-led sharing helped other new people understand that they would be welcomed. Scripture tells us, “Day by day, the Lord added to their number those were being saved.” In his commentary on this text, Jeremy Williams talks about this community that shared everything and prioritized shared faith and building relationships over political and financial success as “putting their critique of the empire into practice.” There are likely people, maybe even people in this very room, who greet this description of a communitarian church with the same level of flabbergast as Allan when he asked why Mark and Roger don’t want to pay Benny rent. What do you mean they sold everything they had and shared the proceeds? Who does that? They shared it with strangers and friends alike? What is going on?

     In verse 42, there is a word that is translated in English as “fellowship.” In Greek, it is “koinonia.” The root of this word is koina, which means common, not common like ordinary but common like shared. Williams argues that the earliest Christian community is marked by a deep, faithful commitment to sharing. Those who had more possessions would be expected to give up more. Those in need could expect the community to offer them care. Williams points out that this ethic probably wouldn’t surprise us if we remember that, in Luke, the prequel to Acts, wealth is often understood to be a barrier to building relationship with Jesus and the disciples. You might remember the rich young man who was very sad to be asked to give away everything to follow Jesus. You might also remember Zacchaeus, who returned all that he had swindled away from people, in order to follow Christ.
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     After watching the complete musical, Allan says, “I don’t get this.” Ellyn responds, “All of the information is in the text.” As we consider how we interpret our scripture in ways that affect how we live out our faith, it might seem facile to say the same: all of the information is in the text. Williams described the lives of the disciples as “doing life together” in a “crisis moment.” That feels like a good description of the characters in Rent, too. The only way forward for all of them is through love and through sharing. As we live in what many feel to be a crisis moment, love and sharing are vital tools for us, as will the protests like Maureen and Joanne were organizing. This is a season of challenge. It is also a season of love. May the Spirit and our generosity continue to hold us together, and on open our hearts to everyone else.
 
Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
The video about the person watching Rent for the first time: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DZY0qC8JjWV/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
Rent's website: https://rentthemusical.com/about/
Background on Rent: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Rent-American-musical
About La Bohème https://www.britannica.com/topic/La-Boheme-opera-by-Puccini
Jeremy Williams: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-easter/commentary-on-acts-242-47-7
Wil Gafney, A Women's Lectionary for the Whole Church Year A (New York: Church Publishing, 2021)

Genesis 12:1-9 The Call of Abram (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)
 
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot and all the possessions that they had gathered and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran, and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of Canaan, Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak[b] of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. From there he moved on to the hill country on the east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east, and there he built an altar to the Lord and invoked the name of the Lord. And Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.

     ​As you all know, I rock climb. I’ve never been much of an athlete, unlike the other women in my family. After a lifetime of being surrounded by joggers, cyclists, and softball and soccer players, it is interesting to be the one explaining the intricacies of a sport that is unlike anything they play and one I am still learning. I tell them about my weird tight shoes that I have to wear and learning how to tie some very important knots. There’s all of these names for different shape holds: Crimps, slopers, jugs, pinches, and pockets. And, there is a process for figuring out a climb. Sometimes you can climb the whole route the first time you try. More often though, you have to figure things out in stages.

     Sometimes it’s hard to even start a climb. There was a climb at Colby this spring that I worked on in multiple days, and I couldn’t even do the first move! Sometimes, you can get part way and get stuck. Your belayer can hold you in the air, hanging on the wall, while you rest and try to figure out how to finish. I had that happen this spring, too. There was a hold I just couldn’t figure out how to reach. Different belayers helped me troubleshoot it and helped hold me up while I rested to keep working on it. I finally got the move on my last climb of the semester before they closed the wall for the summer. I never figured out how to do the one I couldn’t start. But, I got as far as I wanted on the one that I had to work on in stages.

     Today’s scripture reading is about a family that travels in stages not up a wall, but from their home country to the place that God will show them. Abram and Sarai, who will become the patriarch and matriarch of an entire nation, start off as regular people who are called. In a commentary on this text, Cheryl Lindsay notes that one way we can read scripture is by attending to the journey contained within, particularly these early books that are describing to us how a people understand their history. Last week, I preached about the beginning, the first move, where God delighted in creation, built relationships, and enjoyed rest. A fair amount happens in the intervening chapters between one and twelve. Lindsay describes the shift as going from the cosmic narrative of creation to the formation of a nation through the story of one family.  In our reading, we are at the beginning stage of the nation, which is the beginning of Abram and Sarai’s journey.

     Song Bok Jon points out in his commentary on this text that this journey is the beginning of a spiritual renewal through reorientation towards God. It is also a story about immigration. God calls Abram and Sarai to leave Abram’s home nation, giving up “prosperity, social status, and friends” for something new that God promises. God doesn’t even initially name the place, just promises to show them and promises that their family will become a new nation for them. The promise of a new home filled with prosperity is likely familiar to many a contemporary immigrant and descendant of immigrants. Most of our ancestors didn’t have quite the same calling as Abram and Sarai. But, they certainly created a nation, a nation still being shaped by immigration today.

     Abram and Sarai also invited Abram’s nephew Lot. The scripture says that they left when Abram was seventy-five years old. It turns out that this nation-building was not a whippersnapper's job! They also took the people they had enslaved. The fact that he owned humans is but our first clue that Abram will be an imperfect progenitor. He will frequently try to do what God says while also being a deeply fallible figure. And, the land he will go to, like the land our ancestor came to, was an inhabited land. The place is called Canaan and the people Canaanites. They will become known as enemies. They began simply as people living in their homeland. This, too, is a reminder that, as Dr. Lindsay notes, not every stage in a process leads to a desired end. This move might have been a good one for Abram. Was it a good one for the Canaanites?

     In notes on Genesis, David Carr points out that the next stage in the story, Abram and Sarai’s travels through Shechem with its oak tree and Bethel will be repeated later and with more details by Jacob. It is here in these places, with sacred oaks and sacred hills that God appears to him. Abram builds an altar to mark that something holy had happened there. For generations, this stage of the journey will be remembered, and their eventual descendants will return to these two holy places. Their descendants will remember the promises and carry it forward within them. They will make use of these altars as a place for rest and worship. What a gift it is to leave a sanctuary for those who will come later. How might we take care to make sure that the place we’re journeying through continues to welcome the ones who follow?

     Today’s reading has had a challenging place in the history of colonization. European Christians, understanding themselves to be children of Abraham through faith, latched onto it as justification for displacing native people throughout the world. It is also a text that grounds the conflicts between the modern nation of Israel and Palestinians. In his commentary, Song Bok Jon alludes to the work of Walter Brueggeman, who said that he does not read in this text an order for Abram to be in conflict with the Canaanites. He argues that the directive, at least initially, was to live in harmony. Certainly this kind of peaceful co-existence as neighbors could be seen as a sign of the fulfilment of God’s promise.

      I’d encourage us to think of this text like that tricky hold I had part-way up the wall. If we grab hold of it wrong, we fall, unable to finish the route ahead of us. But, if we make use of the people who are helping us, we can figure out a way forward that allows us to complete this stage of the journey safely and with great joy. We might have to hang out at one of the altars for a bit to figure out our next steps. That’s OK though, because we can hold each other up. As Dr. Lindsay says in her commentary on this text, “The blessings of covenantal community elevates us all who journeyed on by stages and by faith.” May we continue to support each other on the routes God has set before us. Remember that God promises to bless the world through Abram and Sarai, not just one people. Let us pass that blessing on to those who need it.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Song Bok Jon, Proper 5, Preaching God's Transforming Justice: A Lectionary Commentary, Year A Featuring 22 New Holy Days for Justice
Cheryl Lindsay: https://www.ucc.org/sermon-seeds/sermon-seeds-journeyed-on-by-stages/
David Carr's notes on Genesis in The New Oxford Annotated Bible: The New Revised Standard Version with Apocryphya, ed. Michael Coogan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001)

Genesis 1:1-2:4 Six Days of Creation and the Sabbath (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)
 
When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. 
Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

And God said, “Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” So God made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome. And it was so. God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
​
And God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so.  God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.

And God said, “Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.” So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.

 And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” And it was so. God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind and the cattle of every kind and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good.
Then God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over the cattle and over all the wild animals of the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”

So God created humans in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the air and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all their multitude. On the sixth day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created.

    You might know James Weldon Johnson from singing “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” Aside from his work as a composer, he was also a journalist, a lawyer, a diplomat, and a poet. While serving as executive secretary for the NAACP, he wrote and edited several volumes of poetry. One of them, God’s Trombones, contains within it a remarkable poem called “The Creation.” In it, Johnson imagines creation from the perspective of the God who is creating. I learned of this poem from my seminary roommate, Alphaeus Green, Jr. He performed it during a worship service at school, and I always think of him and this poem when I read Genesis 1.

     It begins with, “And God stepped out on space, /And he looked around and said: /I'm lonely—/ I'll make me a world.” When so many of us have been invited to imagine God angry or jealous, isn’t lovely to imagine God having a whole range of emotions, especially one that drives so many of us to build relationships and create beauty? If humanity bears the Image of God, might the drivers of our own creativity be connected to God’s? Johnson, who was from Florida, imagined the fertile darkness of the beginning like the fertile darkness of his homeplace,

And far as the eye of God could see
Darkness covered everything,
Blacker than a hundred midnights
Down in a cypress swamp.
Then God smiled,
And the light broke,
And the darkness rolled up on one side,
And the light stood shining on the other,
And God said: That's good!

     As we slowly make our way into spring, in this time when warm and sunny days still feel like a revelation, who among us can’t imagine warmth and light being a direct gift of God, through a simple expression of expression and delight. It’s like how I respond to one of the kittens rolling up on their side to show me their belly. “That’s good!” is a response I can’t help but muster!

     In the poem, as in its inspiration, our Scripture for the day, God keeps making things and being delighted by them. Then, the imagery shifts a little to the second version of creation starting just after our reading for the day. In that one, God makes a human from the dust of the ground. Johnson’s version goes like this. After making so many things, God realizes that God is still lonely. God decides to make something called “a man.” Here’s the final portion of the poem:
Up from the bed of the river

God scooped the clay;
And by the bank of the river
He kneeled him down;
And there the great God Almighty
Who lit the sun and fixed it in the sky,
Who flung the stars to the most far corner of the night,
Who rounded the earth in the middle of his hand;
This great God,
Like a mammy bending over her baby,
Kneeled down in the dust
Toiling over a lump of clay
Till he shaped it in is his own image;
Then into it he blew the breath of life,
And man became a living soul.
Amen.  Amen.

     In a commentary on today’s text, my Hebrew Bible professor, Neal Walls invites us to “be humble” by the questions we might have about Genesis 1, questions that Johnson beautifully riffed on in his poem. Walls brings up some examples: What was God doing before God decided to create the heavens and earth? Some Christians understand God to be infinite and unmovable. Why would that kind of God need to create, especially create something like all of this with our capacity for independence? Did God, as Johnson imagine, desire a relationship with someone else? Walls even thinks it’s fair to wonder “who exactly is this ‘God’ character, so abruptly introduced in [chapter 1, verse 1].” Genesis doesn’t answer these questions. We often make attempts, and our interpretations hinge on our attempts. But, the answers aren’t straight forward in the text.

     Historically, some important theological points have rested on what you think existed for God to make creation out of. Verse two in the New Revised Standard version reads, “the earth was a formless void, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” The King James Version is “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” Dr. Wil Gafney, in her Women’s Lectionary for the Whole Church, translates this verse, “the earth was shapeless and formless, and bleakness covered the face of the deep, while the Spirit of God, she, fluttered over the face of the waters.” At various times, people have translated these verses in different ways and have developed varying theologies based on those translations.

     Some strongly believe that God created something out of nothing. Some people believe creation is more like God bringing order to chaos. I kind of like the idea that God sees potential and gives it shape, like the potter at the wheel, another biblical metaphor for creation. God’s word and Spirit do most of the work in chapter 1. Walls describes the action in Genesis one as “transcendent deity, ‘above the fray,’ who creates by simply commanding distinction, order, and structure.” I prefer to think of transcendent as more being like “distinct and capable” rather than unaffected. Because God does make things and distinguishes among that which has been made and calls it good. I don’t think you call something good if you’re not affected by it.
If someone calls something good, they are satisfied with it, at the very least. More likely, though, they are happy with how it has turned out. They feel a measure of pleasure in what they are seeing. This is a sign of delight, and recognition of relationship between the creator and created. And, it is very good.

     In his commentary, Walls brings up another question: “When God proposes, “Let us create humans in our image, according to our likeness” (verse 26), to whom is he speaking?” Ancient Israelite readers and our Jewish neighbors read this verse as God talking to an angelic court. Later Christian interpretations suggest that this conversion is among the figures of the Trinity talking amongst themselves. Whomever the divine “us” is, the text makes it clear that all genders and all people are created in God’s image. There are some interpreters who’ve found affirmation of not just male and female gender identities, but also nonbinary ones. “So, God created humankind in God’s own image, in God’s own image, God created them; female and male, God created them.” What an extraordinary reading this is that invites us to remember that God’s nature will always be beyond the scope of human language.

     As Justin Michael Reed notes in his commentary on this text, this text about all people of all genders carrying the image of God can become a foundation for safeguarding the rights and value of people who are marginalized. It can inspire us to take action to make sure that everyone with the image of God is treated as a good and beloved part of creation. Even if God is mysterious and today’s reading might not answer every question we have, it does clearly affirm humanity’s status as beloved. Any religious or political system that does less falls short of the relationship described in this story of creation.

     In her commentary on this text, Cheryl Lindsay says, “Creation brings order, diversity, and relationship.” Remember, the act of creating was often the act of noticing difference and creating distinction within the chaos. Difference is not inherently threatening in this story and does not have to be threatening in our daily lives. Dr. Lindsay also points out that with creation also comes rest. The God who desires to create must also rest from the act of creation. She describes rest as a pause in activity, not a completion of the activity. Because there were the first seven days, but there is also now, and God keeps on creating. Rest is a vital part of creation.

     Lindsay even goes so far as to say that rest is “the one aspect of creation that God immediately enjoys for themselves.” Rest is instituted and made holy by God. All of creation rests, and any system that does not allow for rest runs counter to God’s actions in creation. Recently, the United Church of Christ released something called the Marks for Faithful and Vital Churches. This is a tool to help congregations understand what healthy, active, and faithful congregations can look like. One of the marks of a vital church is that they “encourage opportunities for all to practice sabbath and spiritual renewal.” I hope that our time together in worship feels set apart from the demands of work and productivity that are in the world surrounding us. I hope, even as we labor together, that the labor and worship are renewing.

     I also hope though that our work is shared and rotated and evaluated to make sure that we are getting the rest God invited us into. God did not declare our goodness be contingent on how much stuff we make or on how worn out we are. May we find a sanctified rest that reminds us of our goodness and belovedness. When is time to create again with the Spirit, may we be blessed with the clarity that what we have co-created with God is good.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Neal Walls: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/the-holy-trinity/commentary-on-genesis-11-24a-9
Justin Michael Reed: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/narrative-lectionary/creation-by-the-word/commentary-on-genesis-11-24a-8
"The Creation" by James Weldon Johnson: https://poets.org/poem/creation
About James Weldon Johnson: https://poets.org/poet/james-weldon-johnson
Cheryl Lindsay: https://www.ucc.org/sermon-seeds/sermon-seeds-rest-made-holy/

Acts 2:1-21 The Coming of the Holy Spirit (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

Now there were devout Jews from every people under heaven living in Jerusalem. And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. Amazed and astonished, they asked, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.” All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” But others sneered and said, “They are filled with new wine.”

Peter Addresses the Crowd
But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, “Fellow Jews and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:

‘In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.
Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.
And I will show portents in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist.
The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day.
Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

     I have wondered for a while now if the movie LA Story has a sneaky, discrete reference to the Holy Spirit in it. Steve Martin is the main character. He’s unhappy in his work and dating life and searching for meaning, creativity, magic, and beauty. One night, he’s driving with his girlfriend, and the car breaks down on the interstate, right in front of one of those big flashing signs that the DOT uses to warn people about road conditions. While he’s forlornly poking around the engine, the wind kicks up and the words “FREEWAY CLEAR” on the sign click off. He looks around at the sign, and it suddenly reads “HIYA,” which he thinks is strange. He goes back to poking at his engine.

     The moment his back is to the sign, a big flash, like from a broken bulb, shoots off and crackles, getting his attention. When he turns back towards it, the sign read “I SAID... HIYA.” It dawns on him that the sign is addressing him, much to his consternation. He looks around, trying to figure out what is going on. He, with no small measure of disbelief, says “Hi.” The sign then flashes these letters: R U O K? He reads them aloud as one word roo-ock. This is the part that got my attention the first time I saw it, because ruach is the Hebrew word for spirit.

     The reasons I think this might be intentional is 1) there’s wind blowing through this whole scene and the word for spirit is related to the word for wind and the word breath and 2) this sign becomes a guide for Steve Martin’s character throughout the movie. You know how some people ask for signs to help guide them? Well, Martin gets one, a literal signpost, that helps him find the meaning, beauty, and connection that he was missing in his life. He has no idea how it works. He describes it as one of the magical, unexplainable things that have happened in his life. It showed up in his life when he needed it but didn’t expect it. And, it changed him. That sure sounds like the Holy Spirit to me.

     Wind is powerful. A snowstorm becomes a blizzard because of the wind. When I think of the storms in the last few years that have done the most damage to the land and home where I live and the places I drive, it was the heavy wind that gave the rain the power to squeeze through gaps in the chimney. It was the wind that picked up the woodshed and broke it off its posts. The wind knocked down some big trees, too. On my drive to work, on my road, I still see downed trees from the January storms from a couple years ago and the windstorm from October of 2018. Wind is powerful.

     Across the Arab-speaking world, particularly in windy places that are hot and dry or hot and humid places, there is a traditional kind of architecture called a wind catcher. An article that I read described them as being kind of like large chimneys visible on a city’s skyline. There are vents in the tallest parts of the chimney shaft. They capture that powerful wind, directing it down into the lower areas where people and animals live. They may be on private homes or public buildings, like mosques, or utilities, like water cisterns. There are different ways to build these towers depending on your needs. You can create ones for more cross ventilation or ones with a bit of a vacuum effect that draws overly-warm air out of a building.  In places where you need to increase indoor humidity, the wind may even be directed over a fountain before going into the rest of a building. Wind is powerful. But, we can harness it for good, too. This also sounds like the Holy Spirit.

     A bunch of my preacher colleagues were talking about what they were reading in anticipation of Pentecost, and they mentioned a scholar named Kate Bowler’s most recent blog where she talks about having a porous sense of self. She has adapted this idea from a philosopher named Charles Taylor, who says that a porous self has a permeable boundary between their inner life and the outside world. She says, “Meaning, grace, beauty, the divine, even sorrow can cross into you from elsewhere.” This is a sense of self that is capable of being moved by forces beyond the individual person. Joy and suffering alike will enter into this vulnerable self. Bowler argues that “The porous self is the soul, open to God, to others, to feeling fed by the world and everything in it.” It is not a soul that is self-made by your own will to create it. This is self as a posture of connection and receptivity that allows you to receive a gift when it comes your way unexpectedly.

     It is also a posture that allows you to be affected by the good and the bad you witness. It is building a tower to harness the wind. It is gathering with your friends in the wake of Jesus’ resurrection and ascension. In her commentary on this text, Dr. Wil Gafney reminds us that Pentecost is an ancient Jewish holiday marking the end of the 50-day Festival of Weeks (Shavuoth). By the time of Jesus and his friends’ ministry, this festival had shifted from mostly being a harvest festival to also being a celebration of God revealing the Torah to Moses on Mt. Sinai. When you are gathered in the wake of resurrection and ascension, among your most trusted compatriots, during the festival celebration the gift of the covenant of God, open to the holiness happening all around you, you just might receive more than you bargained for. The Spirit cannot help but move when the conditions are right.

     Thank goodness Peter is there to try to make sense of things. Did you know that rocks can be porous? Peter, whose name meant the rock, certainly seems porous but also seems ready to pour into others. He says, “my friends are not drunk. Something amazing is happening here.” And, then he quotes the promises of communal, national salvation found in the book of Joel:

In the last days it will be, God declares,
That I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
And your young men shall see visions,
And your elders shall dream dreams,
Even up on my slaves, both men and women,
In those days I will pour out my Spirit
And they shall prophesy.
​
     That’s the part about who will share the information from the Spirit that we need to be open for. This is a vision of the Spirit moving through a diverse group of people to work in the world. And, what they share will be a sign for those who are willing to pick it up when it passes by. It will be even more obvious than a DOT sign on the interstate: portents in heaven, signs on the earth below, blood, fire, and smoky mist. The signs will include witnessing forces that you considered immutable and unchangeable actually changing in front of you.

     The signpost in LA Story goes on to explain that it is the embodiment of the spirit of Los Angeles that sees people in trouble and stops them, a potent metaphor for a city known for traffic. Don’t many of us want a sign to show us that we’re going the wrong way... and probably the right way, too! Like the Holy Spirit giving the disciples the power to speak languages they don’t know, the DOT sign uses familiarity to inspire. May we, too, hear words that we know that have the power to move us.

     In her essay, Kate Bowler invites readers to work on cultivating some porosity as a kind of summer homework. The challenge of this particular moment in history is that there is much floating around in the world that hurts when we take it in. I will add the image of the wind tower to accompany the idea of the porous self. There are powerful forces coming at us whether we are prepared to receive them or not. It is, therefore, a spiritual practice to find ways to harness and redirect what we receive for the good. Jesus’ followers heard Joel’s promise for communal salvation from war, occupation, and natural disasters, and turned into inspiration for continuing Jesus’ mission. May the Spirit move through you, changing you in ways that serve your neighbor, and creating an environment where life can flourish, even in the most challenging environments.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Here's the clip from LA Story: https://vimeo.com/20401910
Thomas R.W. Longstaff's entry on the Holy Spirit in the Harper Collins Bible Dictionary, Paul Achetemeier, ed. (New York: HarperCollins, 1996)
Wind tower/windcatcher: https://www.melkart.net/p/the-wind-catcher-lessons-from-traditional
Kate Bowler's essay: https://katebowler.substack.com/p/joyful-porous
Wilda C. Gafney, A Women's Lectionary for the Whole Church Year A (New York: Church Publishing, 2021)

John 17:1-11 Jesus Prays for His Disciples (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)

After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people,[a] to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.

“I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you, for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you, and they have believed that you sent me. I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.​

     In his notes on today’s text, Obery Hendrick’s calls it “Jesus’ Final Prayer.” It is the last part of his farewell address in the book of John. He is spending time preparing them to preach the Gospel without him. It takes him about four chapters after washing his friends’ feet (and warning them he would be betrayed) to say what he needs to say. He made sure that they understood that he would be preparing a place for them and instructed them to keep his commandments. They are to keep loving their neighbor and keep loving God. He reaffirmed them as branches to his vine, extensions of his love into the world. He also warns them that bad things will happen, but that doesn’t mean that they should stop loving. And, then, he prays.

     The scholar Cláudio Carvalhaes, in his commentary on this text, says that this final prayer is “as if Jesus is wrapping up his ministry by telling God what happened and what will be needed as the disciples move forward.” Gennifer Brooks describes the prayer as “read[ing] like a narrative of Jesus’ role as Savior and guide, as leader and example for the present disciples and those yet to come.” He prays to God, stating his readiness for what is coming next, and he also prays for his friends. He asks God to empower them. “They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.” He goes on to pray, “I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those who you gave me, because they are yours.” This is a kind and generous intercession on Jesus’ part, an intercession said in such a way that his disciples likely hear him praying for them.

     Dr. Carvalhaes also points out that in his prayer, Jesus beautifully reasserts the relationships that connect the disciples to him and all of them to God. “All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them.” Jesus prays for their protection, asking God “protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.” Jesus knew that they must work together... that their many must also be one if they are to help the kindom come. Jesus wanted his joy to be complete in them, for them to be made holy in God’s word, and for them to be protected from evil, even as they find themselves in conflict with the powers of the world. Who has been praying for you lately? Have they prayed so fervently? Who have you been praying for God to empower?

     He prayed in earshot so that they knew he was praying for them. Brooks says that Jesus wants to make sure that they know what they are receiving from him. The last thing he will be able to give them before he is arrested is this assurance of his on-going love and their capability built by this love. The last time I preached on this scripture I described this passage as Jesus “doing that Good Shepherd thing again: making sure they know they are not alone in the valley of the shadow of death.” Dr. Meda Stamper, in her commentary on this text, notes that Jesus is basically asking for two things for his friends: that they will be protected and that they will be made holy by the presence of Divine Love in their lives. In being made holy, they will be able to continue Christ’s mission.

     I’ve prayed for a lot of people in my life. We pray for each other every week. I’ve witnessed people countless times be moved by having someone pray for them. To be fair, not everyone wishes for prayer. But, for those who do, it can be a balm. Sometimes the prayers are simple and sometimes more complex. Sometimes they are ones that I make up on the spot. Sometimes, they are prayers we know and have memorized as part of Christian tradition. I’ve shared before about how, when I was a hospice chaplain with many patients with memory loss, one thing that most of the Christians could remember was the Lord’s Prayer.

     I learned over the 5 years that I worked in that job that if I started the Lord’s Prayer, I could almost always count on someone who had been actively religious to pray with me, even if they no longer could speak many clear words. Some people would pray clearly, occasionally even saying the most clear sentences that they had said during the whole visit as they recited the familiar phrases of the prayer. Sometimes people would only remember the rhythm of the prayer, mumbling alongside me, and maybe saying a few words clearly. Sometimes they would only remember the Amen. Sometimes they would just hold my hand tightly while I would pray. These experiences really helped me appreciate the power of a communally known and memorized prayer.

     I officiated Ray Baillergon’s funeral this week. His wife Georgia made sure we prayed the Lord’s Prayer. She said it was his favorite. When I looked around at the attendees of his service, his relatives and coworkers, his friends in suits and ties and his friends in Harley jackets and high viz vests, and began the Lord’s Prayer, most of us prayed it together. Our words were able to be unified because the love of Ray brought us together and because tradition had given us a common prayer to reach for in times of grief. It was lovely.

     Another place that I’ve witnessed the power of shared prayer is AA meetings that I’ve been invited to attend. The founders of Alcoholics Anonymous had deep roots in the Episcopal tradition, which might not surprise you if you are aware of their view of a higher power. I think this may also be why they incorporate the Serenity Prayer into meetings. This prayer, likely originally written by UCC theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, may have been rolled into AA practice when some folks from AA came upon the prayer after it had been shared with service members by military chaplains.

     The first version I remember hearing goes like this: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference. I learned a while ago that there is a different version that Rev. Dr. Niebuhr evidently preferred: God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other. As much as I like this prayer, I also appreciate Dr. Angela Davis’ reminder that we don’t have to be serene in the face of that which is unacceptable. She said, “I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I am changing the things I cannot accept.” That’s a prayer I’ve needed sometimes, too.

     I’ve been co-teaching a class through the Maine School of Ministry called Organizing for Relationship and Repair. It’s a class ultimately about helping churches of people who are the descendants of settlers on this continent work on relationships that support the sovereignty of native people who were here first. It has been useful to talk in community about concrete actions of repair. One thing that consistently comes up in discussions of best practices for a settler Christian community that wants to repair relationships is that we must root ourselves in spiritual practices that sustain us for the solidarity work we are undertaking. Communal prayer, either through shared prayers that bolster us, or prayers that are more off the cuff, like that of Jesus for his friends, are a part of those spiritual practices.

     It matters deeply to us that we are listened to and remembered. We often feel better to know that someone hopes good things will happen for us. It is powerful when someone sees and hears what’s on your heart, and acknowledges it before God, and then prays for your relief or your protection or clarity or a change of heart. Jesus hoped his friends would hear him praying and that those prayers would give them strength for the hard work ahead. As Brooks notes in her commentary on this text, the final words of this portion of his prayer for his disciples is for their unity, “so that they may be one, as we are one.” Brooks calls this an “realized petition on behalf of our Savior.” We are still working on our oneness.

     In fact, much of this farewell prayer could be for us, as well as the first disciples. In just a few verses after this one, in verse 20 and 21, Jesus says that he is also praying for those “who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one.” That’s us. We’re the ones who have come to believe. Jesus has been praying for us, for our protection and empowerment, for a long time. May we go into this week feeling those prayers alive in our hearts and praying for each other. These prayers will bolster us for what’s ahead and connect us to God and each other. Jesus prayed on his friends’ behalf. Let us pray on behalf of each other.

Resources Pastor Chrissy consulted:
Obery Hendricks, Jr.'s notes on John in The New Oxford Annotated Bible: The New Revised Standard Version with Apocryphya, ed. Michael Coogan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001)
Gennifer Benjamin Brooks: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/seventh-sunday-of-easter/commentary-on-john-171-11-6
Cláudio Carvalhaes: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/seventh-sunday-of-easter-2/commentary-on-john-176-19-5
Meda Stamper: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/seventh-sunday-of-easter-2/commentary-on-john-176-19-3
About the Serenity Prayer:

• http://archives.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/2008_07/serenity.html
• https://www.hazeldenbettyford.org/articles/the-serenity-prayer#:~:text=The%20Full%20Serenity%20Prayer,-God%20grant%20me&text=To%20accept%20the%20things%20I%20cannot%20change%3B,wisdom%20to%20know%20the%20difference.&text=Forever%20and%20ever%20in%20the%20next.

1 Peter 2:2-10 (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)
Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation - if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture: “See, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” This honor, then, is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner,” and “A stone that makes them stumble and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the excellence of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

     The scholar Angela Parker writes about today’s scripture, “This week’s pericope begins and ends with love.” This is part of the Gospel of John that is often called The Farewell Discourse. It is the part of John that is just before the crucifixion. In his notes on the text, Obery Hendricks calls it “an interpretation of Jesus’ completed work on Earth.” When you look over the story of the Gospel, this is the part of the story when Jesus knows that something bad is about to happen, and he’s trying to give a final summation of this teaching plus a reminder of the promise inherent in that teaching: love for me is expressed though love of God and love of neighbor, and this love cannot be stopped, even by death. The world will no longer see me, but you will see me.

     Friday night into Saturday this week was the Maine Confirmation retreat at Pilgrim Lodge. Our church does not currently have a confirmation class (though I think our next one starts up next year), but I still help host the retreat for other churches in the Conference. One of the activities on Saturday morning was a worship service that involved stations. Two stations seemed resonant for today’s scripture. One was a big paper with the words “God is still speaking...” across the top. We invited everyone, confirmands and mentors alike, to come and write where they hear God still speaking. They wrote of hearing God in the loons who serenaded us to sleep, the woods we walked through, and through the people working at camp to host us.

     They also wrote of the protests they attended with church members and watching other Christians work to extend Christ’s grace into the world in such a merciless time. In just a few words shared by a group of about 20 teenagers and adults, we witnessed how loving God and neighbor is going on in this very moment, and we witnessed a group of people certain of the on-going presence of God in their lives. God is still speaking and they hear echoes of God in so many peoples. In a little while, the world will no longer see me, but you will see me.

     Another station was a mirror. Daniel, who works as the Community Ministries coordinator at High Street Congregational Church in Auburn, invited all attendees to walk up to the mirror and see themselves as God sees them: a beloved part of creation. In a world where a small group of people benefit from us not liking what we see in the mirror, it is powerful to take a moment to take our reflections back from the people who make money off of us not liking ourselves. Daniel then invited people to write in erasable marker one word that people thought God would use to describe them.

     I didn’t have a mirror to bring in for us to do this exercise, I will have you take a moment and consider: what word would God use to describe you? Keep that word in your heart and mind as you go into this week. I imagine one of those words could be beloved. “They who love my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by God, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.” In loving neighbor as yourself, you recall your own belovedness. This belovedness is the gift Jesus told his friends would carry them through until he returns. It is the gift passed down to us to carry us through our own challenging seasons.

1 Peter 2:2-10 (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)

Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation - if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture: “See, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

This honor, then, is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner,” and “A stone that makes them stumble and a rock that makes them fall.”
They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the excellence of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

      Some parts of the Bible are credited to people who wrote them. Like, the book of Romans was written by the Apostle Paul. Some books, like the Gospels and like the book where we found today’s reading, have been traditionally understood by one person, but now we’re pretty sure they weren’t written by that person. But, they are still important and holy books for us and we learn things about how to be a Christian from them. Also, some things we call “books” in the Bible were really letters written to either one person or a group of people. The letters were usually shared between people and churches if the readers found them particularly helpful. That’s how they ended up being gathered up into the Bible. People thought these letters were filled with Wisdom and guided by the Spirit.

     Today’s reading was credited to Peter, the apostle, though his co-worker and traveling companion Silvanus was said to do the actual writing down of things. A scholar named Eugene Boring says the letter was probably written after Peter had died. The way it’s written and many of the points in the letter make more sense to have been written later, like around the year 90, than just a few years after Jesus and Peter’s lifetimes. The letter is written, Boring said, to help churches that were struggling in a challenging social situation. When they decided to follow Jesus, their neighbors began to mistrust them, with some people even thinking they were dangerous. The government wasn’t targeting them in an organized way, but they also were increasingly being treated poorly in the communities where they had always lived.

     It is usually easier to survive something hard if you aren’t trying to do it all by yourself. This letter reminds people that Jesus’ Spirit is with them and that they can build a community of support for one another. The scholar Jimmy Hoke says that today’s reading in particular is about rooting your identity in your community of faith so that you can live out your faith bolstered by God and by one another. “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people,” verse 10 says. How do you become God’s people? You build your house on the Rock.

     One of the ways the person who wrote this letter describes Jesus is as a living stone or a cornerstone. Now, I know when I last preached on this passage, I asked this question. But I’m going to ask it again. Who here has heard of a “cornerstone" before? It’s a block or stone that is set in the corner of a building, often the first corner to be built. While people have been building things in all manner of ways for a very long time, we figured out a long time ago that having a strong and stable stone in to help guide construction. Our reading for the day quotes an even older scripture from Isaiah 28:16: “See I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” The idea of a cornerstone is old! And, it became an important way to describe Jesus, especially for people who weren’t experiencing a lot of stability in their lives.

     In older parts of the Bible, when books use the metaphor of a cornerstone to be about a particular person, they are talking about a leader who will be strong and stable and guide the direction of a nation. God builds the community starting with the cornerstone that will set the direction for the nation. While I don’t think Jesus’ earliest followers were especially interested in starting a nation. They were mostly trying to survive in Rome, which wasn’t always easy. They needed something to draw them together. That would be their faith in Christ.

     They also needed assurance that their suffering wasn’t a sign that they were on the wrong track. Jesus became an inspiration for surviving unjust suffering, too. Verse 7 quotes Psalm 118:22: “To you who then believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe, ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner.” Christ suffered, too. But, he was still the Messiah. Shively Smith, in her commentary on the text, talks about how the people are encouraged to identify with Jesus, not simply as Messiah, but also as one who was rejected but also as one who was “honored in resurrection by God.” As any of us who have come out know, making changes in how we function in community, how we engage with accepted social practice, and with common behavior in a community comes with a risk. The author of this text wants to encourage this church in Rome to understand that the risk is worth it. “Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” Remembering this will help them maintain their faith.

     We are in a challenging moment for talking about persecuted Christians. There is a long history of Christians, even when a powerful majority in a nation, using stories of our abused and marginalized ancestors to prop up stories about Christians being treated poorly in the present moment. There’s a report that’s been commissioned by the federal government that claims giving civil rights to LGBTQ people is an example of anti-Christian bias. It does not acknowledge at all that many Christian churches affirm the lives and leadership of LGBTQ people. With the way they’ve written this report, it sure seems like the Government is deciding what a “real Christian” is and has decided to leave a lot of people out.

     It’s good to remember that the Christians described in this letter were actually, really a religious minority and actually, really dealing with persecution. They weren’t simply being asked to treat a small group people fairly. We should remember these ancestors as people who figured out how to remain faithful at great personal risk. Perhaps they can show us a way to worry less about meeting societal expectations and worry more about aligning our actions with Christ, even if we risk angering powerful people. I pray that Christ is building a strong church with us, strong enough to withstand the forces that would punish us for daring to love as broadly and foolishly and justly as he did. May we take our place as stones laid upon the cornerstone, building the spiritual house we’re called to be. Let Christ’s love be our cornerstone and justice be our guide.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Carolyn Brown: http://worshipingwithchildren.blogspot.com/2014/03/year-the-fifth-sunday-of-easter-may-18.html
The entry on "cornerstone," written by Robert A. Wild in the Harper Collins Bible Dictionary, Paul Achetemeier, ed. (New York: HarperCollins, 1996)
Shively Smith: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fifth-sunday-of-easter/commentary-on-1-peter-22-10-3
M. Eugene Boring’s, intro to 1 Peter in The New Oxford Annotated Bible: The New Revised Standard Version with Apocrypha, ed. Michael Coogan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001)
Jimmy Hoke: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fifth-sunday-of-easter/commentary-on-1-peter-22-10-7

     On Thursday, while doing some much needed tidying in my office, I found this wild little sheep with my name on it. There ended up being a whole herd of sheep from some children’s moment that neither Cyndi nor I remember stashed away in a pile that includes notes from a continuing ed program about capital campaigns, an order of worship from a friend’s installation service where I preached, and a certificate from a boundary training program that I attended in 2015. If there’s anything I’ve learned from conversations with real shepherds, they wouldn’t be surprised that the sheep got somewhere unexpected. They are prone to wander. That’s why both humans and dogs get deployed to keep track of them.

     One of the staff chaplains at the hospital where I did my chaplaincy training often complained about any sentimental reading of sheep metaphors in the Bible. He’d say, “Have you ever had sheep? They’re terrible!” Then he’d go on to outline the ways they get into things they aren’t supposed to and have far too little regard for their own safety. It bugged him when people used the word “sheep” to mean “someone who is easily convinced to follow a leader.” He said that sheep are never that easy.

     In her commentary on today’s reading, Laura Holmes says that when we see or hear “very truly” at the beginning of a reading, we should understand that phrase as a connector to the story that comes before our reading. In this case, it was a story I preached on a few weeks ago, about a man who had been born blind. Jesus healed him. The man’s community had assumed that his blindness was due to something either he or his parents had done wrong and were very suspicious of Jesus’ action. They even pushed the healed man out of community. Jesus promptly invited him to become a disciple and follow him. There were Pharisees, who had been suspicious of Jesus, listening to him talk to the man about belief. They wondered aloud if they had misunderstood Jesus. “Surely we are not blind, are we?” Jesus responds to them, reminding them that disability is not a consequence of sin. But their disbelief continues to keep them from building the relationship with him that they could have.

     In her commentary on John, Karoline Lewis points out that they aren’t literally blind, they are unable to understand his origin and identity. And this is the disruptor of relationship between them. According to Lewis, in the Gospel of John, “to remain in sin” means to not be in relationship with Jesus. While belief is rooted in relationship, sin is rooted in disconnection. This whole shepherd/sheep/gate discourse is preached to, according to Lewis, the newly connected healed man, the already-connected disciples, and the disconnected Pharisees. Jesus will use a whole new set of metaphors to help people understand who he is.
He’ll shift them from talking about blindness and sight, and into talking about sheep and all manner of ways of keeping them safe, with the gate/door and the shepherd being two identities in particular that he assumes to describe his own mission. The door isn’t intended to signal exclusion. It is to signal protection. Lewis points out that in John 18, Jesus will be the gate or door that stands between the disciples in the garden and the soldiers who are coming to arrest Jesus. The gate is put there for protection for the vulnerable. Relationship with Jesus comes with care and protection from the powerful.

     As I talked about with Thomas, another story from John, intimacy is a key feature in Jesus’ ministry. Even in the metaphor about the sheep: They feel safe and gather together when hearing the familiar and trusted voice of the shepherd. In another part of the reading, there’s a gatekeeper who recognizes the shepherd and, in that recognition, opens the gate. In her commentary, Lewis points out that even the part about knowing the sheep’s names is a sign of intimacy that will be reproduced at both the raising of Lazarus and Jesus’ own resurrection. When Jesus calls out Lazarus’ name, he comes out of the tomb, alive (11:43). In chapter 20, Mary recognizes the resurrected Christ when he addresses her by name.

     Jesus, in John, wants a life abundant for humanity. As Holmes notes in her commentary, gates and doors aren’t just for keeping people out. They are also for giving access. John is clear that Jesus intends to give people access to an abundant life. Part of the role of the shepherd to make sure the sheep have all that they need. Clean water, enough forage to remain healthy, care when they are sick, protection from predators, a community of other sheep for joy and companionship. There are seven big miracles in John, and I think it would be fair to read six of them as reinforcing an abundant life: water is turned to wine at a wedding, an official’s child is healed, a man is healed at Bathesda, he fed the 5000, he healed the man born blind, and the raising of Lazarus. Jesus perpetually invites people to be in relationship with him as he opens the door to a pasture full of life.

     Holmes also notes that their a long history within the Bible of leaders being referred to as shepherds. Moses and David were called shepherds of their people. Different prophets might call a leader a good or bad shepherd based on how well they were living into the covenant. Any leader who does not protect his people “death-dealing” forces is a bad shepherd. And, as Holmes says, their actions “go directly against the life that the gate leads to.”

     Very often in the Gospel, people hearing Jesus don’t understand him, and that is true in this story, too. The layered meanings of metaphors drawn from their daily lives as people dependent on sheep and shepherds for survival are still a challenge, as is often true of Jesus’ teaching. In the back half of today’s reading, Jesus attempts a slightly different angle to help the man, the Pharisees, and the disciples understand. He says, “I am the gate.” I am the portal into abundant life. I am the invitation into relationship. I will offer salvation.

     The man born blind offers an example of what salvation looks like: disabled person who has been blamed for his disability and marginalized in his birth community finds new community, its own kind of healing, while following Christ. This man who had begged for survival won’t have to beg anymore. He will have food and people who care for him and safety that he did not have before. Lewis calls this “pasture and protection.” According to John, Jesus tends to the needs of life in concrete ways. So, too, will we, the on-going body of Christ.

     When we speak of salvation, it shouldn’t be in amorphous, spiritualized terms. It should be in terms of pasture and protection. When the Gospel of John claims that God love the world, that means that God will tend to well-being of this world and the people within it. The church, as the sheep and the livestock guardian dogs in training, will be about that business of loving as well. In times when we are called to abandoned those who struggle, remember that Jesus feeds his sheep and so should we. In times when some shepherds are not trustworthy, may we look to the Good Shepherd to see what loving leadership looks like, and emulate it. When we hear of salvation, may we remember that this comes in community, not isolation. As I was reminded while I cleaned this week, you never know where you’re going to find the sheep. Let us make sure they can find the way to safe pasture.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
​Laura Holmes: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-easter/commentary-on-john-101-10-7
Karoline Lewis, John: Fortress Biblical Preaching Commentaries (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014).