It is almost funny to witness the fear of the guards. They remind me of those goats that seem to pass out when they get scared. One minute, they’re up, doing regular goat stuff. The next, they hear a loud sound or see a predator and topple right over, legs straight out, muscles stuck so tensed that, at least for a little while, neither fight nor flight is an option. That’s how I imagine the guards looking, stiff legged and silly, unable to intellectually or spiritually handle what is happening in front of them. These men, probably some of the same men who had gleefully participated in Jesus’ state sanctioned torture and execution, have been rendered powerless in their fear. They don’t even get to witness the glory that has overcome their violence.

     There are some people who do get to witness. They have been consistent witnesses all along, even when not being named. As Cheryl Lindsay points out in her commentary, we’ve spent a lot of the last week hearing about Judas, Peter, Barrabas, and Simone of Cyrene. The 12 disciples are mentioned as a group, as are the violent soldiers. But, there are also women whose presence is only intermittently described. Just before the Last Supper, a woman anoints Jesus with expensive ointment, preparing him for what is coming next. The next time women specifically are described in the book Matthew is after Jesus’ death. “Many women were also there, looking on from a distance; they had followed Jesus from Galilee and had provided for him. Among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee (Mt. 27:55-56).” This is an acknowledgement of the care they provided Jesus before death. They, alongside a man named Joseph of Arimathea, would be the ones who would tend to his body after.

     The soldiers are at the tomb only to cause problems. There’s all manner of rumors floating around and the Roman state co-conspires with local people who are threatened by Jesus. They have grown paranoid in the wake of the destruction they have wrought and believe people will move Jesus’ body to make it look like he was raised from the dead when the conspirators were sure he could not be. Imagine having to wade past the violent people who killed your friend in order to just visit his tomb? The women, who have been tending to Jesus all along, are willing to take the risk to go to the tomb, even under threat of violence.

     Mary Magdalene and another Mary went to the tomb, and heaven and earth protect them from the soldiers. There is an earthquake, said to be from the divine power of an angelic visitor who “was like lightning and who’s clothes were white as snow...” you know, the kind of white that makes it hard to see clearly. Seeing and feeling that angel’s power is what causes the soldiers’ fainting goat impression. As Matt Skinner notes in his commentary, “Nothing is ever certain during an earthquake. Nothing is stable. Everything totters.” The soldiers totter. The women do not. The angel says what angels say in the Gospels, “Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said.” The angel invites them to look with their own eyes to see that Jesus, who had been sealed in the tomb, is no longer there.

     If you have heard this story before, it can be easy to forget that it is supposed to be strange and dramatic and basically impossible. A dead person is alive! A glowing angel has shown up wrapped in lightning, riding an earthquake! Rome, the greatest power in their understanding, has lost! That’s right! Rome, who had taken their nation, who had given them a puppet king, who breathed violence across their homeland and regularly strung up people on crosses just to show how powerful they were, that Rome had lost! Conspirators who worked with one of Jesus’ closest friends... they lost, too! Death! Death lost on that day! This is a wild and weird story meant to show us, as Matt Skinner says, “No one and nothing will obstruct what God is doing.” What God is doing will include a new assignment for the women.

     In her commentary, in describing the Marys faithfulness, says “The women take the alternative path set by Jesus, and they follow him. They follow him from town to town. They follow him to the cross. Then, they follow him to the tomb.” The angel will tell them where they should go next. “Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ ” As we would expect, they follow the new path set before them, in fear and in joy. Because how else would you feel at this unexplanable moment? They ran to tell the disciples (in this case, it’s not just the 11 remaining men of the 12... it’s a big mixed-gender group of followers).

     In the midst of their haste to do what has been asked of them, they meet Jesus along the way and they worship him. He affirms them and encourages them, saying “do not be afraid; go and tell my siblings to go to Galilee; there they will see me.” J. Andrew Overman, in his notes on Matthew, reminds us that in going to Galilee, the people are returning to their homeland as well as place where Jesus began his ministry with them. They aren’t running and hiding. They are reconnecting with the place where they first came to know Christ, and where they will begin their next steps as the new Body of Christ, guided by his Spirit.

     I read in Salt Project’s notes on today’s scripture, and they offer up the idea that Easter Sunday isn’t the end of Lent, it is the beginning of Eastertide. That is to say, Easter is best understood as a new beginning of Christ’s mission. This is a commencement that is sending out the first preachers to share the Good News that will then be shared further and further and further. There is still danger at hand. As Matt Skinner notes, those soldiers are gonna wake up, and “Rome never runs out of crosses.” The next stage of the kingdom, that unfurling into the world, doesn’t need to slow down. It needs to keep going. The poet Lucille Clifton captures the vibrancy of this moment well in her poem “spring song”:

the green of Jesus
is breaking the ground
and the sweet
smell of delicious Jesus
is opening the house and
the dance of Jesus music
has hold of the air and
the world is turning
in the body of Jesus and
the future is possible

     There are powers and principalities at work trying to create a future far from the love, justice, and healing that Christ demands. Their hope is that we will be convinced that is the only future possible. They are trying to put the seal on the grave of that which threatens them- affirmations of the dignity of trans people, truth-telling of our nation’s history, reparatory actions to address racism of both the past and present, the leadership of women. May we hear the story of Christ’s resurrection and know that the seal can always be broken and that the purveyors of violence can be rendered powerless. May we be like the women and follow Christ to what we think is the end, and like them, may we come to understand that new life with Christ is just beginning.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
​More information about fainting goats: https://animals.howstuffworks.com/mammals/fainting-goat.htm
Cheryl Lindsay: https://www.ucc.org/sermon-seeds/sermon-seeds-they-left-the-tomb/
Matt Skinner: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord/commentary-on-matthew-281-10-14
Salt Project: https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2020/4/6/dawn-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-easter-sunday
You can find the Lucille Clifton poem here: https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2020/4/12/three-poems-for-easter-joyce-kilmer-marie-howe-and-lucille-clifton
​

​     “Hosanna” means “save us!” While that word has come to be celebratory in the context of worship, it can be a cry for help. In his notes on Matthew, J. Andrew Overman says that this word “Hosanna” has likely come from Psalm 118:25, “Save us, we beseech you, O Lord! O Lord, we beseech you, give us success!” It is interesting to me that the “save us” part is the only part of the line that stayed in the original language. Hosanna is a Hebrew word that carried over into Greek and Aramaic. It was carried into Latin translations of the Bible, and into modern languages like English, too. While the original language was translated for the whole rest of the line, hosanna stayed in Hebrew through the shift from a cry for help from God to an exclamation of celebration.

     A colleague of mine recently shared that a favorite question he has for people who claim to be biblical literalists is to ask them how many donkeys there are in the Palm Sunday story. You’ve probably heard me point this out before if you’ve been worshiping here for a while. Jesus’ processes into Jerusalem in every Gospel. He does not have the same number of donkeys in each story. Matthew has two donkeys. The other Gospels only have one. Matthew 21:7 says that Jesus “sat on them,” which seems... challenging. It’s not always easy to sit on one donkey, much less two.

     I am usually persuaded by one interpretation of this difference. In a commentary on this text, Dr. Wil Gafney argues that the difference in numbers of donkeys likely comes from a mistake that the author of Matthew made in reading the text that inspired this story, Zachariah 9:9: Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

     Zachariah is being poetic when describing the donkey in two ways. The author of Matthew missed the poetry, reading it as literally two separate donkeys that then Jesus would have to ride at the same time. I saw another pastor I know post a funny illustration of Jesus with a foot on each donkey, as you might see in a circus act or Wild West show. The image is both majestic and deeply silly at the same time. If we can learn only one thing from the story of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, “if you want to understand the Bible, it’s often best not to read it literally” and “even the authors of the Bible make mistakes in interpretation... you will, too” are two pretty good ones.

     Catherine Sider Hamilton offers up an additional explanation for the second donkey that I think is interesting. She isn’t as compelled by the explanation that the author of Matthew made a mistake. She argues that that because of the particular Greek words for donkey Matthew is using, one that means specifically “donkey” and the other which is more like “beast of burden,” that the author is actually referencing an additional scripture other than Zechariah. Jacob gives a blessing to Judah in Genesis 49:10–11, “The scepter [Septuagint: ruler] shall not depart from Judah,” Jacob says (49:10). Tying his foal (pōlos) to the vine and the colt (pōlos) of his donkey (onos) to the choice vine, he washes his garments in wine …” (49:11). Because this scripture would eventually become an important scripture to describe the coming Messiah, and it has two donkeys, Hamilton argues that the author of Matthew having Jesus enter into the city in way that evokes both the Zachariah story and the Genesis story. By evoking both stories, the author is saying even more clearly that Jesus is the Messiah the people have been waiting for.

     Each of the Gospels has the people making a path for Jesus. John is the only one that specifically mentions Palms. Matthew and Luke follow Mark, saying that the people celebrating the entry used cloaks and branches to make a path forward. Regardless of what they used, the people, recognizing Jesus’ power and wanting to make a clear path for him, offered up what they had at hand, even if it was only the clothes on their backs. I appreciated the part of today’s liturgy where Sharon Fennema compared the laying down of cloaks and branches to make a path into the city to laying down the burdens we carry in hearts in order to make a path for the Spirit. “Lay it down,” she said, “here, now, whatever covers your vulnerability, cloaks your openness.” Lay it down, and make a way for the Spirit to enter in. Lay in down, and help make a way forward, so we can go with Christ towards love and justice.

     It has long been said in some Christian circles, “No King but Jesus.” Today’s reading would be an interesting text to support that. Because, he’s clearly being compared to a king. The Zachariah text is about the “king who is coming to Jerusalem.” And, so is the Genesis story if Hamilton is correct that it is also being referenced here. Even the “Hosanna” that three of the four Gospels (not Luke) have the people shouting to Jesus might also be shouted to a Roman politician by desperate people who needed help. Dr. Gafney, in her commentary, invites us to remember that the desire for a monarch reflect more about the people with that desire than it describes God’s preferences for styles of governance. Gafney argues that in a world where monarchs had power, the words that describe that power might be used in other context to try to explain something about God.

     In choosing to enter into Jerusalem in this way, Jesus intentionally connects his ministry to that of biblical images of kingly power, while at the same time, showing that he would wield that power in ways that they do not expect. Dr. Gafney points out that even the people who knew Jesus best would be challenged to fully understand how he would wield the power grant to him. To understand that better, we might have to return to the donkey.

     As I’ve shared before, Roman officials came into the city on powerful war horses, accompanied by phalanxes of soldiers. That is a far cry from the “beast of burden” that carried Jesus.  According to Teresa Stricklen, there is utility and humility in showing up with a donkey rather than a fine horse. Jesus, who spent his ministry among the sick, the poor, and the outcast, would not adorn his power in the trappings of Rome. Instead, he would reach back into his own tradition, to a story of a king who will arrive with humility. Sharon Fennema also points out that he didn’t own the donkey or buy it. He borrowed it. She argues that this action is Jesus alluding to the reign of God being a place where people hold goods in common and give them to those that “have need of them” not only those rich enough to purchase them. Fennema invites us to consider the question: “What resources might Jesus be asking you to share in common today?” And, I would add to this question: who is this king who teaches sharing and humility? How can we follow him?

Recently retired UCC pastor Maren Tirabassi offered up this poem for Palm Sunday.

A detail of the story
First, untie the donkey- the one that’s standing at the gate waiting to be untied-
from some sorrow or some guilt, from somebody else’s judgment -
too young for the ride, or too old, too much tattoo ink on the skin,
parkinsons in the hands, pregnant in the belly.
First, untie the donkey, the one that’s standing at the gate waiting to be untied –
from some abusive relationship or some really intricate
self-made knots, because what binds always pretends to be a blessing.
This is just the donkey God wants for the ride -
this burro with no documents, or others not-yet-ridden
because they are - gender-queer, recovery-thin, on-the-spectrum.
So, first untie the donkey - this one- the one who needs a parade,
the one willing to carry both joy and the premonition of cross,
the one embracing a day of song and danger,
fetlock deep in palms, and a life that will echo … Hosanna.

     “Who is this” asked the crowds. “Who is this,” we ask in this moment. Let us untie the donkey and maybe we’ll find out.
​
Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Sharon Fennema: https://www.ucc.org/worship-way/palm-sunday-march-29/
J. Andrew Overman's notes on Matthew in The New Oxford Annotated Bible: The New Revised Standard Version with Apocryphya, ed. Michael Coogan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001)
Will Gafney's A Women's Lectionary for the Whole Church Year A (New York: Church Publishing, 2021)
Catherine Sider Hamilton: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/sunday-of-the-passion-palm-sunday/commentary-on-matthew-2711-54-7
Teresa Lockhart Stricklen, "Sixth Sunday in Lent (Liturgy of the Palms), Preaching God's Transforming Justice: A Lectionary Commentary, Year A featuring 22 New Holy Days for Justice (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013)
Maren Tirabassi: https://giftsinopenhands.wordpress.com/2026/03/28/a-detail-of-the-story/

After a challenging week of travel, I returned to a sermon I preached in 2023. I called it “Who Sinned” that time.

     I’m not sure if I saw it when it first aired, but there is an episode of the tv show Designing Women that has stuck with me for about 35 years. The episode originally aired in October of 1987, early enough in the AIDS crisis era where there were few treatments and many untimely deaths. Designing Women was a show about a group of women who ran a design firm in Atlanta. In this episode, a young man, who is also a designer and friendly with the women in the firm, comes to them with a sad request: he is dying of AIDS and would like them to help plan his funeral. After some hesitation, as they aren’t a church or funeral home, they agree. After all, he is their friend.

     Over the course of the episode, the young man, named Kendall, stops in the office to go over some details of the service. A few things happen that he doesn’t expect. The first thing is that the character Charlene shakes his hand. If you remember anything about how people with AIDS were treated in 1987, you might remember that people, including their nurses, were often afraid to touch them. This young man deserved care and the writer of the show wanted to be clear it was safe for Charlene, who was a deeply kind character, to offer him that measure of welcome and respect.

     The second thing that happens is less positive. There is a homophobic woman there, another client of the firm, who overhears the conversation about the funeral and decides to say something terrible to Kendall. She says that gay men like him are getting what they deserve: "As far as I'm concerned, this disease has one thing going for it: it's killing all the right people." When I was reading up on this episode, I learned that Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, the creator of the show and writer of this episode, had written that line because she heard a nurse say almost the very same thing when Bloodworth-Thomason was visiting her own mother, who was dying of AIDS, in the hospital. Imagine being a nurse and having this much disdain for your patients. Imagine thinking they deserved to suffer this way.

     Well, if you know anything about Designing Women, you would know that the women in the firm would not let that hatefulness go unaddressed. Julia scoops her up, dragging her to the door, and tells her off, saying that if God was handing out illness because of sin, “you would be at the free clinic all the time! And so would the rest of us!” And, Suzanne, Julia’s sister, corrects some of Imogene’s misinformation. And, Bernice, a character who is often portrayed as confused, but with a strong moral compass, makes it clear that the homophobe is lacking the compassion it takes to really be a Christian. Julia slams the door on the homophobe, making it clear that she is no longer welcome as a client of Sugarbaker and Associates.

     I was somewhere between 7 and 10 years old when I saw this episode for the first time. Obviously, it made an impression. I remembered it when I began to think about today’s scripture, which is the beginning of a longer story about one man who was disabled and his community’s response to his illness and his healing. Turns out that plenty of people believed he must have deserved to be disabled.... that he must have done something wrong to be suffering. But, Jesus made it clear that his blindness was not a punishment, and showed his disciples, and the broader community, that this man was in need of healing, not condemnation.
Who is to blame? That’s what the disciples are really asking when they see a man who has been born blind and wonder if the blindness is because he sinned or because his parents sinned. The disciples, like a lot of us, assume that people get what they deserve. If someone has had something bad happen to them, that person, or the people they love, must have deserved it. And, they don’t even seem to be talking to the guy.

     They are just talking about him, while he is in earshot, as though his ailment is simply an object lesson in a theological argument... as though he was an object and not a person who could be talked with or helped as he struggled. In the devotional on this text, Bruce Reye-Chow argues that, in treating this man’s ailment as a thought experiment rather than an opportunity to offer mercy and care, it leads to the disciples asking the wrong question, “who is to blame,” rather than the right question: “how can we reflect God’s love in this moment?” Thankfully, and unsurprisingly, Jesus’ knows how to respond not just to their wrong question, but to the right one as well.

      Remember, seeing is believing in John. In her book on John, Karoline Lewis argues that seeing Jesus perform a sign or miracle is a gateway into believing he is the Messiah. Being healed yourself is a gateway, too. The restoration of this man’s sight will become his gateway into a relationship with Jesus. Jesus spits on the ground and takes the mud he created and wipes it on the man's eyes. We all know that healing can be messy sometimes, can’t it? Then, he tells the man to go to a particular pool in the city and wash his face. The man made his way across the city, covered in spit and mud, and washed his face. Suddenly, he was able to see for the first time in his whole life.

     Our reading stops at this point, but the story goes into chapter 10. The short version of the rest of the story is that this man’s neighbors and leaders in his community are suspicious of his healing and of Jesus. They refuse to trust what they see because they’d rather go on believing that people get what they deserve than have to change their minds about illness and healing. The formerly blind man will call Jesus a prophet and say that he believes Jesus to be from God. The ones who don’t agree with him drive him out of the synagogue, his own religious community,

     Imagine: seeing someone you’ve known your whole life be healed from a life-limiting condition, and being so afraid and annoyed that you don’t understand how it happened that you would be willing to kick that person out of community? Imagine thinking that you should make him suffer isolation because of your own limited understanding.

     While Julia Sugarbaker welcomed her friend into community by shutting a door on a bigot, Jesus welcomed the formerly blind man into a new community by opening the door for him to become a disciple. Later in this story, upon hearing that the man was cast out, Jesus goes looking for him and welcomes him with open arms to become part of his disciples. Lewis talks about this as Jesus helping frame belief as a relational category, not an intellectual one. This man believes that Jesus is from God because he can now see because Jesus first saw him and knew he needed care. And, his belief leads him into an on-going relationship with Jesus.

     I pray that we may not mistake an opportunity for healing as a place for condemnation. I pray that we seek out the answer to the question “how can we heal and help,” rather than distract ourselves with the search for “who is to blame.” May we march bigots to the door, and welcome the ones whom Jesus has seen and loved with open arms. May we always try to see our neighbors with the eyes of Christ.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
A summary of the episode of Designing Women: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_All_the_Right_People
The scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VW5-IErNxuM&t=21s
Karoline Lewis, John: Fortress Biblical Preaching Commentaries (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014)
Bruce Reyes-Chow's commentary for the fourth week of Lent in Seeking: Honest Questions for a Deep Faith A Lenten Devotional from A Sanctified Art LLC (2022)

     Several years ago, I tried overwintering a rosemary plant. It did not go well. The house was warm enough, but our cat Albite’s bad habit of chewing on plants meant I couldn’t keep it near the windows with the best light. I got it through January pretty well, and even was able to take a couple small cuttings to use in an altarscape during zoom worship (remember when I’d decorate our bar like our communion table when we were worshiping at home?). I kept the little sprigs in water, thinking I’d use them for a meal later in the week. Imagine my surprise when I saw tiny roots coming off the stems. I had no idea that you could propagate rosemary in water like that.

     After a failed attempt at transferring one of them to soil, I left the remaining one in a small jar, replacing the water when it needed it. It grew more and more roots and the stem grew longer and longer. It even bloomed a little purple flower for two or three seasons. The sprig is looking a little crummy right now... it may have finally run out of space or maybe I lost track of watering it or maybe it has just come to the end of what is possible for an eight-inch twig to do in a jar in the kitchen window. But, I am glad I added that little bit of water, and kept giving it water. Something delicate and beautiful grew out of it.

     “Water changes everything.” I read that in some Church World Service materials a few years ago. Water has been a theme in our readings for weeks now... waters of baptism. Water in a miracle at a wedding. The Living Water Jesus told Nicodemus about. In the book of John, water changes everything. This interaction over the well changes things, too.

     Last week, we spent some time with the story of Nicodemus, a well-respected leader in the community who felt like he had to go see Jesus in the dark, in order to ask him questions in secret. Today’s interaction between the unnamed woman and Jesus happens in broad daylight. That’s not the only way this woman will be different than the Pharisee who needs to be braver. In fact, in her book about the Gospel of John, Karoline Lewis says that “There can be no character more opposite Nicodemus than the Samaritan woman at the well.” It is too bad we don’t know her name. She and Jesus had a remarkable encounter over the water. I can’t help but think it changed both of them.

     In today’s story, Jesus is traveling through Samaria. He left where he was because his disciples had been baptizing people, garnering the attention of leaders who were suspicious of Jesus. See, water was already changing things. We should remember that Judeans of this era and Samaritans, though they both traced their lineage back through to Abraham and upheld Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy as their holy texts, were in deep conflict, especially over where they understood the proper center of religious worship to be: Mount Gerizim or the Temple in Jerusalem.

     Judeans, descendants of the Southern Kingdom, like Jesus, and Samaritans, descendants of the Northern Kingdom, did not hang out, and, they didn’t spend a lot of time in each other’s cities, even if there were religiously significant sites, like Jacob’s Well, in those cities. And, yet, Karoline Lewis notes, here in John, where Jesus is said to be the expression of God’s love in the world, it seems appropriate that he would go right through a place and spend time with a people whom his community mistrusted. Lewis puts it this way, “There is nothing in God’s creation that God does not love, not even the least anticipated persons.”

     Wells are places where a lot of important men and women of the Bible meet. Jacob and Rachel, Moses and Zipporah, and Isaac and Rebecca all meet at wells and later marry. What was going on at wells to make them such happening places? Most people didn’t have their own well dug at home. They relied on a communal well. Carrying water for a whole family is a difficult chore, often left to the women and girls to complete. This is a job often done in a group, with multiple women and girls, sometimes from more than one household, going out together. It is interesting that this woman has gone to the well alone. I read somewhere (and I don’t remember where) that some scholars wonder if she’s there alone because she is an outsider in her own community, ostracized by other women who refuse to help her. Why else would she be out at the hottest part of the day to get water unless she didn’t want to run into some folks who didn’t like her.

     Those details aren’t in the story though. If she is intended to function as kind of counter-example to Nicodemus, a respected Jewish leader who came to see Jesus at night, of course she, a Samaritan stranger, would talk to Jesus during the day, in a casual encounter that grows into an intimate conversation about faith. Also, Jesus’ strikes up a conversation with her, not the other way around. Because he asks for her help first. He asks her for a drink.

     It can be challenging to read tone, but I’m inclined to hear her response with some humor or incredulity. “Me? You’re asking me for water?” Yes, this Judean man is asking this Samaritan woman for water. Yes, this rabbi is speaking to this woman about faith. Yes, this single man is speaking to a woman who is not in his family while they both are alone, even though they are in a public place. None of those things are supposed to happen among respectable people. She is wise to ask for some clarification, because people like them do not usually hang out, much less share drinking utensils and talk about God.

     In her commentary on this text, Jennifer Garcia Bashaw notes that this conversation at the well is the longest conversation that Jesus has with any one person in any of the Gospels. She gently ribs Jesus about not having a bucket and also reminds him of both of their ancestral connections to Jacob, who long built the well to take care of his family. Water is a necessity that connects these two to their ancestor in the faith and to each other as humans who need water in this very moment. Something else beyond water is also necessary. Jesus indicates that he has the other necessary thing the “Living Water of eternal life.”

     Because seeing is believing in John, we see Jesus do something that is a little miraculous in this interaction... out of nowhere, he knows something about this woman’s marital history that one wouldn’t necessarily know about a stranger. Given that wells in the Bible are places where people get betrothed, according to Bashaw, it makes sense that something about marriage would pop up in this story. But, Jesus turns that expectation on its head. Rather than make a hasty proposal, he asks about her husband, to which she replies that she doesn’t have one. He goes on to say, “you’re right. You’ve had five and you aren’t even married to man you’re seeing now.” There’s no way a stranger would have known that. While their conversation about water and living water laid the groundwork for her belief, it is this miraculous bit of knowledge about her history that convinces the woman that Jesus is special and holy... that he is the Messiah.

     Water changes things. Had Jesus not been thirsty, he and this woman may not have met. Had he not been brave enough to reach out to someone he had been raised to avoid, and ask for help, he would have struggled on his journey. Had the woman chosen not to share a drink with this stranger, she would have missed out on a life-changing interaction. John goes on to tell us that she becomes one of the earliest preachers, going about Samaria, telling the people about Jesus who “told her everything she had ever done.” Many Samaritans grew hopeful because of what she had said and sought him out. Then, once they saw him, they heard for themselves and began to believe he was the Messiah. Water changed the Samaritan’s life, and helped something new grow.

     In the second half of the reading, we see the disciples not quite know what to do about Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan. Stumbling a bit, they end up asking him if he needed food. He said, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” Dr. Sharon Fennema invites us to think about this food, and the harvest Jesus says is being prepared for the disciples. She says, “Seeds of relationships and dreams had been sown there at Jacob’s well. Seeds of hostility and division had been sown there too. But Jesus invited them to look around and see what possibilities were ripening in their midst, possibilities like the truth-telling, life-changing conversation he and the woman at the well had just had.”

     This time of year, many people are turning to planning our gardens. I’m passing around a bowl of seeds. Take a seed or a few seeds. In order for these seeds to grow, they need water. They need other things, too, but first they need water. I hope you’ll take these seeds with you and remember that water changes things, be it a cutting or a dry little seed, into something larger... something that will feed people. May you find the sustenance you need to grow in this season. And, may you find your way to labor alongside those who have gone before. There is much harvest to be done. We’ll need our strength to complete it.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
More information about Church World Services work to help people access clean water:  https://cwsglobal.org/learn/hunger-and-poverty/water-sanitation-and-hygiene/
Karoline Lewis' John: Fortress Biblical Preaching Commentaries (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014)
Jennifer Garcia Bashaw: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/third-sunday-in-lent/commentary-on-john-45-42-6
Sharon Fennema: https://www.ucc.org/worship-way/lent-3a-march-8/
​

​     We have mostly been reading through Matthew since Christmas, but now we’re going to switch over to the Gospel of John for a little while. If you remember from our Christmas pageant, in John, we don’t have any baby stories about Jesus. We meet Jesus for the first time in John at his baptism when he is adult. This is the first story where his mission is connected to water. The next time, it's in a miracle just one chapter later.

     The miracle is the first big one in John, where Jesus and his mom are at a wedding that has run out of wine. It was really embarrassing to run out of the most safe thing to drink at such a big gathering in a community and Jesus’ mom ordered him to help the poor bride and groom. Unlike the wedding I officiated that ran out drinks (lemonade in that case because they didn’t allow wine in the venue) where one of the friends and I ran to the store to get some more, Jesus just turned a bunch of water into wine. I mean dozens of gallons of water into dozens of gallons of wine. Jesus saved their reputation and the celebration with a tremendous, over-the-top act of generosity. And, then there’s another mention of water in today’s reading in chapter 3.

     You know how there are some stories that are in more than one Gospel? Well, this story about Nicodemus visiting Jesus is only in the Gospel of John. Does anyone remember who Nicodemus was? He was a Pharisee. And, you probably remember that Jesus and some Pharisees argue a lot because they all thought that the religious law was important but disagreed on how to follow it. What time of day did Nicodemus come talk to Jesus? He came to see him at night. According to Karoline Smith, in her book on the Gospel of John, Nicodemus comes to Jesus at night because he’s afraid that his fellow pharisees will not approve of him having friendly conversations with Jesus. So, he went out when it was dark, and hoped other people would not be awake to see him.

     While Jesus performs miracles in all of the Gospels, John is the only one where the writer of the Gospel says that Jesus performs miracles specifically to prove himself to be the Messiah. In the chapter about John in his introduction to the New Testament, scholar Bart Ehrman points out that in John chapter 20: 30-31, it says: “Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you many come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the son of God, and through believing you may have life in his name.” In John, seeing Jesus is believing him. Or, believing in him.

     One of the first things Nicodemus says to Jesus is that he saw him performing miracles, and seeing those miracles makes him believe that the power Jesus has has come from God. Because of what he has seen, Nicodemus also wants to talk to Jesus and wants to ask him some important questions about faith. Jesus reiterates that seeing is important: “No one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” Nicodemus misses the whole part about seeing because he gets distracted about the “being born” part.

     He asks, “How can anyone be born after having grown old?” In a commentary on this text, Cheryl Lindsay points out that interpreting Jesus literally here is not helpful. She says, “Literalism makes the complex even more complex; symbolism enables simplicity.” When Jesus tells him not to take these words literally, then Nicodemus can get closer to understanding what Jesus is talking about. Remember, we have already seen water change and be changed. Jesus was born anew at his baptism, passing through the waters of the Jordan. His mission was made clear in the miracle of the water into wine. He said to Nicodemus, “no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.” Water is powerful. It can change things. Nicodemus needs to remember the real power of water, and understand it as a metaphor for a force, the Spirit, that can bring change within.

     In a commentary she has on this text, Carolyn Brown offers her opinion that Nicodemus is trying to figure out how to be brave. And, Jesus is offering up a little instruction. It is possible to live differently, to live more bravely, but, you have to be willing to be changed. And not just changed a little. Changed a lot. Who here has seen how water can change things? Deserts bloom. Walls crumble. Solid stone gives way to cracks, then fissures, then canyons. The Spirit will mold us that way, Jesus says.

     Jesus, himself, will be a conduit for that Spirit. He will not bring condemnation but instead, will be source of life. He will be a passageway for divine healing. It’s like he’s saying to Nicodemus, “Come on in. The water’s fine.” He seems to be hoping Nicodemus will join him, awash in God’s love, born again and reconnected to God’s promise of love and justice. It’s too bad that we never see Nicodemus again in John, or in any other Gospel. Perhaps he was never willing to take the plunge into living faithfully in full view of God and everybody. Perhaps he became one of the throngs of people who followed Jesus. Perhaps he stayed among the Pharisees, recognizing Jesus’ wisdom and goodness, but staying home to living out his faith in familiar waters.

     All of us have our own Nicodemus moments, where we can be brave but only just a little at first, with the cover of darkness for protection. I pray that from those first steps, our next steps into the Spirit will be splashy enough for everyone to see. May we find the healing and new life we need. And, may it change us in ways that help us live out our faith more boldly, so that no one may be left wondering what happened to us in the rest of the story. Jesus says that the water is fine. Let us get ready to swim.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Carolyn C. Brown: https://worshipingwithchildren.blogspot.com/2014/02/year-second-sunday-in-lent-march-16-2014.html
Cheryl Lindsay: https://www.ucc.org/sermon-seeds/sermon-seeds-of-water-and-spirit/
Karoline Lewis: http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5075
Karoline Lewis, John: Fortress Biblical Preaching Commentaries (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014).
Bart Ehrman, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction of The Early Christian Writings, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).

     Today is the first Sunday in Lent. In a time when certain stories about Christianity are being used to cause harm and when people are very much in need of some foundational support to guide them towards right action in this world, Lent, with its emphasis on discernment, listening to the Spirit, and walking alongside Christ into the greatest of challenges could not have come sooner. Acts of discernment are rarely efficient and often done best in community. Despite the common practice of adopting a particular discipline during this season, Lent is not actually something we do alone. We do it together with Christ. And, this Lent, we will consider the Christian stories being told right now, and the good stories we actually need to hear.

     According to scholar Sharon Fennema, this story of Jesus being tempted in the wilderness is probably the basis for the whole season of Lent. We spend 40 days listening because Jesus spent forty days listening. Though, to be fair, this time in the wilderness is likely not the beginning of Jesus’ attentive listening to the Holy Spirit. In Matthew, he has already been baptized, which can be recognized as a sign of his following the Spirit, especially when the Spirit affirms his belovedness by God. That same Spirit, is what led him to the wilderness. He is out listening in the wilderness because he listened at his baptism. As he is in the wilderness, he realizes that he must decide who he’s going to be listening to, because an additional voice began speaking in his ear.

     Many of us have come to think “being in the spiritual wilderness,” as being in a time of confusion or a time when one feels adrift or far away from God. That is not what is happening in this text and it is not the spirit with which we should go into Lent. In her commentary on this text, Aubrey West reminds us that Jesus is not being punished and is not lost out in the wilderness. He is exactly where the Spirit wants him to be to discern his next steps in ministry.  The wilderness, a marginal, in-between space that many thought to be dangerous, was a place of connection to the Spirit for Jesus. How many of us have gained important insights on God in uncomfortable spaces? The same is for Christ.

     This first time we see Jesus in the wilderness, we are told that it is a test. The Tempter will show up. According to Scholar Melinda Quivik, we can learn something about Jesus, and about the God we know through Jesus, in paying attention to Jesus’ response to temptation. One thing we learn is Jesus’ relationship to power. One thing we learn is Jesus’ relationship to power. These tests, like many tests from antagonistic conversation partners, are from the start, obviously not in good faith. “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” Imagine saying something so callous to someone who is hungry. Jesus had been intentionally fasting for days and days. This question was intended to be real provocation. Thankfully, Jesus had the resources within himself to see the provocation for what it was: an invitation to use his power to make himself more comfortable. And, that’s not what his power was for. He responded with a scripture that defines his understanding of power: “One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”

     The next two temptations are increasingly goading, with the Tempter, having heard Jesus use scripture, chose to tempt him with scripture. The tempter took him to the high point of the temple and said, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you’, and ‘On their hands they will bear you up so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” Isn’t it interesting to have a literal interpretation of Scripture as a temptation for Jesus? Melinda Quivick calls this the temptation to “abandon deep-reading of God’s word by taking it literally.” I think there is also the temptation to use literal reading to shore up an excuse to use power for personal gain. In a devotional we used a couple years ago, one of the authors, Danielle Shroyer calls this the temptation to use his gifts as a “parlor trick.” Jesus does not fall for this temptation. He does not choose to use the scripture to justify a misdeed.

     The final temptation is to have a kind of power that comes as the cost of allegiance to one who does not share the same values as God. Jesus is offered all the kingdoms of the world and all they have to offer if he will shift his allegiance away from God to the Tempter. Imagine what good he could do with the power? It is in his response to this temptation that we might see Jesus most clearly. When given the opportunity to have tremendous power over people at the low, low price of all of his devotion and loyalty, Jesus declines. His mission is not about his ego or his ability to dominate creation. That’s what Quivik and Shroyer, in their commentaries, argue this question is about. Will he choose ego and domination or connection and justice? The Jesus we come to know in this passage chooses connection and healing, as Rev. Shroyer says, every time. “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.”

     In a commentary on a different text in that devotional we used a couple years ago, Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow, who had suffered greatly from a covid infection and had long covid, spoke of that time, three years into the pandemic, as a time that was revelatory in the fullest sense of the word. Our personal response and larger communal responses to the pandemic revealed and continue to reveal some things about us and about our communities: some positive, some negative. With these revelations came the opportunity for us to consider, as Reyes-Chow puts it, “who we can be and become.” In this particular moment, when many Christian voices are using scripture to justify all manner of cruelty, particularly to immigrants and transgender people, Sharon Fennema, in introduction to her worship series on Lent, invites us to do what Jesus did and define our faith according to God’s sense of love and justice.

     Fennema asks, “How might we, like Jesus, re-story our faith with new interpretations and understandings of scripture rooted in liberation and flourishing for all?” One way is to take time to consider what stories about Christianity and within Christianity are being use for harm. She invites us to take them up in our hearts and imagine releasing them, like sand trickling through our fingers. In the same way, consider the scripture that guides you toward a braver, more generous, and move loving faith. Imagine taking it into your hands and holding it to your heart. Our devotional for this year Tell Me Something Good might be able to give you some inspiration for faithful stories if you find yourself coming up a little dry.

     May this season of Lent, in the midst of our own wilderness, be a place where we can hear the Spirit in the midst of our discomfort. May we follow the model of Christ and use our faith to build loving systems, not simply systems to make our lives easier. May we hear something good... that we are called together... that Christ is with us... that we can love each other in the midst of trial.

     May the words of Sharon Fennema’s prayer be our prayer:
     In the wilderness and the wandering and the weariness, lead us, Holy Spirit.
     In the hungering and the holding and the humbling, accompany us, Holy Spirit.
     In the tempting and the testing and the turning, move us, Holy Spirit.
     In the resisting and the refusing and the recognizing, guide us, Holy Spirit.
     Ground in us, as we ground in you.
     Breathe with us, as we breathe with you.
     Turn with us, as we turn toward you.
     As the new way emerges, we pray. Amen.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Melinda Quivik: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/first-sunday-in-lent/commentary-on-matthew-41-11-5
Audrey West: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/first-sunday-in-lent/commentary-on-matthew-41-11-2
Seeking: Honest Questions for a Deeper Faith, a devotional developed by Sanctified Art (2023)
Tell Me Something Good, a devotional developed by Sanctified Art (2026)
Sharon Fennema: https://www.ucc.org/worship-way/lent-1a-february-22/
​

     I looked over the last couple sermons on this scripture, and I realized that when I preach on this Matthew’s version of the transfiguration, I end up starting with questions. This year: who am I supposed to tell? In 2023: So, when do we tell? In 2020, I didn’t use a question as the sermon’s title, I did wonder, at the beginning of the sermon, just what was going on. Today is a day in the church year called the Transfiguration. According to Carolyn Brown, that word is only really used in church circles and only really used for this day. It is to indicate a day that something about Jesus’ form changed, or at the very least, show us a moment that changed how three of his disciples understood him. It is interesting to me that with that change, we don’t see a ton of clarity. In fact, the end of our reading includes an instruction to secrecy.

     I read a commentary from the Salt Project that points out that the period of the church year after Christmas but before Lent is full of things rightly called revelations, events that make something clear that was once less so. It begins with Epiphany, the celebration of the Wise Ones journey to Jesus. The wise astrologers had seen a bright star that showed them the way to a child who would be a new kind of leader for his people. Then, there was Jesus’ baptism, where he, and probably the people gathered, experienced the Holy Spirit descending upon him as a dove alights on a branch. They also heard the voice from the heavens affirmed that Jesus was a Beloved Son.

     From there, as Jesus passed through the temptations in the wilderness and into his public ministry, we learn of more everyday revelations, particularly healings and wise teaching from Jesus that show people more and more clearly who he is and what he is about. Even his conflicts reveal something about how God has come into the world anew in him. His disciples are confused a lot of the time, but he continues to drop epiphany after epiphany, and they keep following him, even if they don’t totally understand what is going on. Their confusion in much of the Gospel is mirrored by their confusion in the Transfiguration story. They want to understand more clearly, but they just don’t yet.

     In his commentary on this text, Eric Barreto points out that important things happen on mountains. Moses’ interactions with God on Mt. Sinai come to mind, but so do other important hills and high places where the people remembered vital parts of their history and worshiped their God before the temple was built in Jerusalem. Barreto points out that in the chapter just before this one, in an encounter in Caesarea Philippi that happens 6 days before the transfiguration, Peter demonstrates a clear misunderstanding of who Jesus and what he’s supposed to be doing in the world. He gets that Jesus is the Messiah, but when Jesus explains that he expects to have to go through significant suffering in this role, Peter admonishes him. He basically says, “God forbid you be killed.” Jesus calls him Satan for his trouble.

     Jesus goes on to say that if he were to do what Peter wanted, and protect himself, he would limit his ability to follow his mission. The Messiah is not here just to amass power. The Messiah is here to bless those who God bless and hold the powerful to account. You cannot prioritize your own safety and do those things. Jesus says that Peter’s fear is a stumbling block for him. Barreto argues that we need to remember this encounter to better understand the important encounter on the mountain. Peter is missing something when he observes Jesus. He needs something more to help him understand Jesus and his mission clearly. As Barreto states, suffering and glory are not opposed in Christ.

     So, up the mountain Peter, James, John, and Jesus go. As they climb, something wild and unbelievable and incomprehensible happens. Peter, who thought he had Jesus all figured out, realizes he very much does not. I am sure you’ve seen someone’s face shine in love and in pride and in ferocity and in joy. I imagine that shine turned up beyond measure. While Moses encountered God’s mystery in misty, smokey darkness, Peter, James, and John encountered in blazing light. Within this numinous light, Moses and Elijah enter.

     I’ll clue you in on a little interpretive shorthand: When Moses and Elijah show up, holy things are happening. Peter, doing the best he can in the moment, offers to build some tents for the three holy ones. I mean, when faced with two of your most important prophets hanging out with your beloved friend and teacher, hospitality is a pretty reasonable impulse. But, it’s the wrong one, in a similar way that Peter’s impulse to protect Jesus was wrong six days prior.

     More brightness shows up, a cloud so bright it obscures. The cloud may be hiding God or may actually be God, and is here to affirm Jesus in ways similar to his baptism. A voice comes from a bright cloud that says, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with him I am well pleased.” The voice adds, “Listen to him!” The disciples are right to be terrified. This is all terrifying and incomprehensible. What even had they just seen?

     In a very normal, very human act of kindness, Jesus touches his cowering friends, saying “Get up and do not be afraid.” When they look up, everything is back to normal... except nothing will be the same for them ever again. Scholars think that the author of Matthew carried some stories from Mark over mostly whole cloth. Mark is known for Jesus telling his followers and people he heals not to tell anyone else about what they saw. Matthew does that here, too: “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.” What a strange piece of instruction with an unclear time frame.

     Epiphany brought clarity to the Wise Ones. And, the Baptism seemed to have brought clarity to Jesus and maybe John and possibly a bunch of strangers in the woods. The regular healings brough clarity to the healed. And, the teaching helped many people understand God’s covenant better. There is a presumption that everyone who received those revelations will then share what they have learned. So, why are the disciples asked not to share anything yet? Why is this revelation different?

     Ronald Allen, in his commentary on this text, suggests that it is because what they have seen is supposed to help explain something that will happen much later. The Transfiguration is the preparation for the Resurrection. They are getting a preview of what is to come. The preview is intended to help them talk about the Resurrection when it finally happens. There’s going to be a lot of hard stuff between the transfiguration and the resurrection. Jesus needs his followers to be prepared for the hard parts. It seems like the transfiguration is the “foretaste of glory divine” that might help them get through the coming weeks. Jesus hopes that in the same way that he transformed before their eyes, this experience will transform within their hearts over the course of the coming weeks and months, eventually guiding them to a clear understanding of the Resurrection. The Transfiguration is a key for a door they haven’t yet walked through.

     Allen puts it this way, “God will make good on the promises that God has made, to make blessing possible for the whole human family, including gentiles.” When they see their friend struggles, when they see him argue and be exhausted and be tormented and beaten and ultimately killed, maybe this vision of the light and the accompaniment of prophets who have come before will be enough to carry them through the mourning. Maybe it will set the foundation for them to believe Mary Magdalen and the other Mary when they rush to them saying “He is risen! He is going ahead to the mountain, a different mountain, in Galilee to meet you there!” Peter, James, and John need the light now, but may not understand why yet. Jesus wants them to keep this information close, stored up in their hearts, slowly transforming them into the disciples who will carry on the church without him physically by their side.

     What is the vision of Christ you are carrying with you in these current times of struggle? What experiences have shown so intensely in your life that, at the moment you couldn’t fully understand, but have come to see as pivotal in your understanding of Jesus on this side of the resurrection. Something began anew in the disciples on that mountain that would carry them through their hardest times. What has changed you so that you can better understand new life when it blooms before you? I don’t know yet who we’re supposed to be telling about the experiences on mountains that helped us know Christ more fully. I imagine that can change day by day. But, I do know that what we have experienced can carry us through harder things than we have imagined and help us build beautiful community on the other side. Get up, and don’t be afraid. Resurrection is waiting ahead of us.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:
Carolyn C. Brown: https://worshipingwithchildren.blogspot.com/2016/01/year-c-transfiguration-of-lord-february.html?m=1
The Commentary from the Salt Project: https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2020/2/18/transfiguration-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-transfiguration-sunday
Eric Barreto: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/transfiguration-of-our-lord/commentary-on-matthew-171-9-5
​Ronald Allen: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/transfiguration-of-our-lord/commentary-on-matthew-171-9-6

     “Learn to navigate Salt, Fat, Acid, and Heat, and you can make anything taste good.” This is Samin Nosrat’s bold claim in the introduction to her cookbook Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking. Nosrat, a renowned chef who has cooked and taught cooking professionally for more than 20 years, came to this understanding early in her career while learning from great chefs. As she learned more techniques from more teachers and more cultures and types of cuisine, she began to recognize a pattern. Food that tasted good, from food made at home by regular people trying to feed their families to the highest of cuisine at the most exclusive restaurants, included some combination of those four elements: the right amount of acidity to balance whatever fat was involved, the right about of cook time, at the right heat, and the right amount of salt used the right way. If we learn the basics about each element, we can use them to make our food better, too.

     Our reading for the day includes two of these very same elements as metaphors for how Christians are supposed to be in the world: Salt and light (the presence of light almost always means the presence of heat). In an effort to help those who had listened to what we call The Sermon on the Mount understand the effects of following the priorities of God in our actions in the world, those who are allowing themselves to be shaped by Spirit into the Body of Christ will be transformed and, will, in turn transform this world.

     In a commentary on this text, Warren Carter notes that salt does more than one thing. It is a transformative substance, offering flavoring but also preservation and purification. In the introduction to the chapter on salt, Nosrat when describing the process of refining a dish for customers in the first restaurant she ever worked in, “[m]ost often, when a dish fell flat, the answer lay in adjusting the salt.” The salt could be adjusted in myriad ways: sometimes by adding literal crystals of salt, sometimes by adding elements to the dish that already had salt incorporated: grating some parmesan over the dish, adding a few olives or capers, mixing in some bacon or bits of anchovy. The right amount of salt can make or break a dish.

     As the wife of a geologist, I’ll make sure to mention that the salt we eat, sodium chloride, is a mineral that naturally occurs on earth. Nosrat also notes that salt is essential to human health. We can’t store much salt in our bodies, so we need to eat it regularly just for the basic functions of our bodies to work. Our bodies are “hardwired”, as she calls it, to crave the salt we need to regulate our blood pressure, distribute water around our bodies, get nutrients to cells, and make sure our nerves and muscles work. Would that many other things in our lives be as pleasurable as salt is to taste while also being so useful and necessary for our bodies to function.

     While salt has many uses, Nosrat argues that the primary role of salt is amplification of flavor. She says, “[n]early every decision you’ll make about salt will involve enhancing and deepening flavor.” Salt has a flavor of its own and can also affect other flavors. We add it to greens to cut bitterness. We add it to caramel to balance the sweetness. Salt will even affect how we smell the food we eat. She said that if we’re going to learn only one lesson from her book, it is: “Salt has a greater impact on flavor than any other ingredient.” No wonder Jesus hopes our presence will be like salt in the world. Salt is powerful. Salt is necessary. Salt, when used correctly, makes things better.

     Carter notes that in describing how God is blessing the world in the Beatitudes, which is the passage just before today’s reading, Jesus also describes the reality of the world. The world of his time and ours is shaped by wealth and poverty, grief and mourning, the relationship between those who wield power oppressively and those they harm, the reality of injustice and the pursuit of justice. Jesus’ followers are directed out towards this world shaped by both war and peacemakers, the merciful and the cruel, and tasked with amplifying God’s grace in it. The presence of these grace amplifiers, like sea salt on an espresso brownie (a dessert Nosrat describes in the book), helps decrease bitterness, enhance sweetness, and offer contrast to the life offered by empire.

     Like the human body needs salt, the Body of Christ needs grace to function. It is the role of the Christian to maintain enough salty grace to share it in this world. A Christian unprepared to bless those who God blessed in the Beatitudes should be as unthinkable as salt that is no longer salty. We must be more than tiny, tasteless cubes!

     And, what of the light? Nosrat talks about flavor as the intersection of taste, smell, sound, appearance, and temperature. Appearance and temperature are where we most clearly connected with light. First, it is light as described in our scripture: literally a force of illumination, making clear and plain what is before us. When we speak of the power of presentation of food, we are reminded of the usefulness and helpfulness of seeing clearly what is before us. For this, we need the light.

     With light, also comes heat. Any of us who have tried to change a recently blown lightbulb were likely quickly reminded of this relationship. Candles, wood stoves, flickers of pilot lights, the backs of televisions, and bolts of lightning... light and heat are right together every time. Getting the heat right with our food is imperative. Nosrat described the best cooks as paying attention to how the heat affected the food, rather than simply the temperature of the food or the amount of time spent on the fire. The sounds of sizzling, the rise of bubbles in a pot set to boil, the tenderness of the meat or the noodles... these are sure signs of the transformative power of heat... the product of the movement of light in the world.

     While plenty of foods do not require being cooked on a stove... ceviche, tartar, and muktuk are meat dishes known for being prepared without heating over flame... much of the food we enjoy is cooked with heat. It makes many foods safer and easier for our bodies to absorb. And, it makes many things more delicious. In order to use heat well, Nosrat encourages us to be clear on what we are actually wanting from the food. Then, we can use heat in the right ways to achieve it.

     Christ ultimately imagines a world where those who struggle are blessed by God. The light within Christ’s followers will shape that which it encounters in the world just as surely as heat applied at a low temperature for a long time can change brisket from a cheap cut of meat into a delicacy I shared with my mom last week. Part of the reason we can smell something delicious being cooked is that heat has broken down the cell walls that contain flavor molecules, releasing them into the air and into our grateful noses. Karoline Lewis, in her commentary on our scripture, described being a disciple as being like the light through which God shapes the world. The next time you smell something amazing, imagine yourself being the heat that releases some of God’s grace into this world, drawing neighbors together for sustenance, fellowship, and joy.

     This is a time that demands salt and light, that demands an amplification of grace, and the melting of forces that cage us in, isolated us from one another, and preventing us having what we need to function as the body God made us to be. May we be forces for light in this world, making it easier to see the truth of the world we live in, but also shaping it for the better. Last week, the Beatitudes gave us the ingredient list for the kindom of God... blessing for those who need it and a promise of change to come. Now, it is our time to go to work in the kitchen, adding a little salt here, turning up the heat there, until we have a meal to share for the good of the world around us. We may not make the recipe perfectly the first time. This kind of cooking is a skill. We’ll keep learning together, novices at the side of the Holy Spirit, who patiently shows us again and again that we can probably add a little more salt to most things, and it will make them taste better.

Resources consulted while writing this sermon:  
Samin Nosrat, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking, illus. Wendy MacNaughton (Simon and Schuster, 2017) 
Warren Carter: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fifth-sunday-after-epiphany/commentary-on-matthew-513-20-6 
Karoline Lewis: https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fifth-sunday-after-epiphany/commentary-on-matthew-513-20-2