Faith & Responsibility: What we can do TODAY

 Expectations. We all have them. From the way we want to live our lives to the way we set up our homes and living spaces to the loyalty we expect from our family and friends. We expect certain behaviors from others and others expect them in return, and when people or things fall short of our expectations, we become frustrated at best, and at our worst, destructive, even to the point of self-destruction. I’d like to talk about how expectations, if we cling to them white-knuckled,  can affect our mental health.  I’d also like to talk about justice and most of all, what God expects of us at this time in our history.

At this point in time, we have certain expectations of those currently vying for the highest office in our land: the roles of President and Vice President of the United States. We expect the candidates to deliver — in the areas of economy, health care, foreign policy, immigration, climate change, human rights, and our police force, to name a few. Finally, we look for a leader who will finally end the war on COVID-19, death , and violence on the streets of our cities and towns. High expectations. A tall order for anyone.

Right behind its ravaging effects on human life, the collateral damage of COVID-19 has become mental health. The pandemic and its resulting economic recession have negatively affected many peoples’ mental health and created new barriers for people already suffering from mental health and substance use disorders. 

In a tracking poll conducted in mid-July, 53% of adults in the US reported that their mental health has been negatively impacted due to worry and stress over the coronavirus. This is significantly higher than the 32% reports in March, the first time this was included in the poll. 

Many adults are also reporting specific negative impacts on their mental health and well being, such as difficulty sleeping (36%) or eating  (32%), increase in alcohol consumption or substance abuse (12%) due to stress and worry over the coronavirus. As the pandemic wears on, aging and necessary public health measures expose many people to experiencing situations linked to poor mental health outcomes, such  as isolation — and job loss.

A broad body of research links social isolation and loneliness to poor mental health, and data from late March shows that significantly higher shares of people who were sheltering in place (47%) reported negative mental health effects resulting from worry or stress related to the coronavirus than among those not sheltering in place (37%). 

Research shows that job loss is associated with higher depression, anxiety, distress, and low self-esteem and may lead to higher rates of substance abuse and suicide.  Isolation is a risk factor for suicide. Over half of people who lost income or employment reported negative mental health impacts from worry or stress over coronavirus; and lower included people reported higher rats of major negative mental health impacts compared to higher income people.

Poor mental health due to burnout among front-line workers and increased anxiety or mental illness among those with poor physical heath are also concerns. Those with pre-existing mental illness and substance use disorders, and those newly affected, will likely require mental health and substance use services.

As we get older, we lose our ability to complete once routine daily tasks, and depression can set in. Physical ailments  might end a senior’s ability to drive, read, engage in conversation or other activities that allow a person to stay independent or find meaning. “Growing older in America can be very hard…People don’t talk to you.”

If you or someone you know seems to be getting more distant or difficult to get a hold of, seems crankier OR more jubilant/ joyful than usual, changes in sleep habits or sharing statements of hopelessness or is withdrawing socially, then it is time for YOU to reach out them.  together we can provide support systems for those we know and love , those we care a about.

What does God say about this?

What if we notice despair and depression within ourselves? What can we do?

• “Be of good courage, for I have overcome the world” John 16:33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble! But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
• We cannot care for others or ourselves without love. 1 Cor. 13: “If I spoke with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love…I am like a sounding gong and a clanging cymbal.”  
• Cols. 3:1- “Fathers and Mothers, do not provoke your children to anger lest they become discouraged.”  

Do not provoke … to anger. Both passages contain the same exhortation: Do not provoke, though Ephesians adds to anger. Provoke is the kind of word you might use when you kindle a fire into flame—you begin with something small and provoke it into a roaring fire. Or from another angle, it is the kind of word you might use when you are getting your children all excited, chasing them around and tickling them until you provoke them to being all wound up. Here, of course, Paul is using it in a negative sense of stirring, exasperating, or irritating them toward anger or bitterness. Parents must not provoke their children to anger.

• This can also apply to us as God’s children.  We have a responsibility not only to our own chidren and the elderly, but ourselves. You know what they say when you get on a plane with your child. Take care of your own oxygen mask before your child’s, so that you are fully equipped to provide help for that child. 
• The Shema (Hear, O Israel) states: “Thou shalt love your neighbor as yourself.” This is a commandment, something we are called to do. 

Don’t give in to the pandemic of Anger.  Anger in any form is a red flag, or a wakeup call. It usually masks a deep-seated fear that may have originated in childhood. if and when you see this within yourself or another person, it is time to get help and get on your knees.”  Remember, too, the PERFECT LOVE CASTS OUT FEAR. 

Do not beat down, but raise up. Do not provoke with impatience and injustice, but instead shepherd with nurture and tenderness, and do this through discipline and instruction.

WHAT DOES GOD REQUIRE OF US?

Micah 6:8 -  

Do justice

LOVE mercy

WALK humby with your God.

In order to do justice for others, we need first be able to do justice to ourselves, simply by being ourselves, starting with behavior that befits God’s beloved  children. 

The Golden Rule — 

What it ? Do until others as you would have others do unto you

AND…Do unto yourself as you would have others do unto you..   

A Toolbox

So I just gave you a toolbox for how to cope with the side effects of what we are going through as a nation and as global citizens. If we think these tools are going to solve all of our problems, we will be disappointed. Why? Because having a toolbox increases our expectations even more. After all, we grew up with Band-Aids, so we think we can just slap one on and our problems will be fixed and gone.

Well, I’d like you to meet someone who didn’t grow up with that kind of luxury. In fact, I think many of you know him.  His name is James McJunkin, and he is our Executive Minister at the PBA. On September 17, he wrote a Pastoral Letter to all 165 churches in the PBA and in it, he shared his personal story. Here it is:

My Story:

I will never forget what it was like when the police car came speeding around the corner as officers with guns drawn pointed spotlights in my face. They jumped out of the car and started yelling for me to lay on the ground, face down, and to spread out my legs and arms. I was forced to the ground, and my friend was forced to step away at gunpoint as one of them searched the bushes behind me for a gun.

The Taco restaurant just up the block had been robbed at gunpoint by a Black man in a white jacket. I was standing on the sidewalk waiting for a bus while wearing a white jacket. I ended up being cuffed, forced into the car, and driven up the street to the restaurant. The officers asked the woman working the cash register to come out and see if I was the man who held her up. She came out to the car and they pointed a flashlight in my face. I thank God she could tell that I was not the person who robbed the store. She said--in what I understood to be outrage--"No, that’s not him. I said he had on a nylon jacket; that’s not a white nylon jacket!”

After my “I told you so,” the officers gruffly handed me a business card with a number on it that people were to call if they felt that the police had done anything wrong. Can you guess what would have happened if I were not completely compliant? I am glad that my father taught us how to respond to the police. I experienced the disregard for my humanity that is reserved for the poor and people of color in this nation. 

Of similar ilk was the I time spent in jury duty in Media PA when at the end of the day the clerk happily announced the number of trails conducted and the success of the nearly 100% conviction rate to the remaining jury pool members. The group broke into spontaneous applause and cheers, much to my surprise, curiosity, and dismay.

In Conclusion:

The full picture is that indeed we are changing as a nation—over the years real progress has taken place in racial justice and we celebrate the same. Life itself has a way of humbling everyone and surely victimization is not limited to certain racial ethnic groups or economic class. Policing in America is not limited to citizens being killed. Law enforcement also saves lives! Even so, we are at a critical juncture, together.

This is an all-consuming and all of America dilemma. Each of us must search our conscious to determine our own responses. It will take all of us in an intentional effort to change course. We pray that the church helps to make a difference in the days ahead. 

The justice movement in our midst will be around for a while and history will record our participation. Scripture speaks to Christ’s church in America today in the story of the unjust Judge.

Luke 18:1-9 (NRSV)

[Jesus] said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent.’ For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’” .... And the Lord said,” Listen to what the unjust judge says.”

I will remind you of the ancient context. Jesus and his disciples were people living in poverty under the domination of the Roman government. Rome utilized crucifixion as a policing practice, a public demonstration of what happens to people who protest and challenge their rule. This unjust judge was one of the paid magistrates appointed either by Herod or by Rome. Unless a plaintiff had influence and money to bribe her way to a verdict, she had no hope of ever getting the case settled. These judges were said to have perverted justice for a dish of meat. The widow in the lesson represents those that we would term, the most vulnerable, the powerless living in deep level poverty. 

Please consider these questions as they relate to the current issues of racism, inequality and police brutality.

• Will we ignore the plight and the plea for justice from the most vulnerable in our society or will we help to bind the wounds?

• In what ways are we able to identify and confront unjust leaders among us who are self-centered and demonstrate a lack compassion and empathy for the people?

• Why do we respond to people who are aggrieved only after feeling threatened by the free-floating anger unleashed by oppression and hate speech?

• In what ways are we complicit by allowing brutal policing practices that crush the powerless whose repeated calls for justice are ignored?

• Will there remain a remnant of the faithful among us who will seek justice for all people, even today?

• Do we trust that God is at the side of the oppressed?

We can rely on God. Though we have our own expectations, we can never be sure that any human being, including ourselves, can fill those expectations. But we can count on God.

Proverbs 3:5-6:  Trust in the Lord with all your heart

    and lean not on your own understanding;

6 

in all your ways acknowledge him,

    and he will make your paths straight.[a]

Isaiah 40:8 The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever.”

And remember what God’s Word tells us today -

DO, LOVE, WALK.  It’s what God requires of us.

Let us pray -

                      AMEN.

Sermon SJBC July 12, 2020 - “Good Soil” - Mt. 13:1-23

Lisa sermon 071220 SJBC - “Good Soil” - Matthew 13:1-23

 

St. Johns Baptist Church Sermon 05.03

“Jesus is the Gate”- St. John’s Baptist Church, May 3, 2020

Advent: God is Waiting, Too

Sermon – Church of St. Luke and the Epiphany

ADVENT 2A – Mt. 3:1-11: “Advent: God is Waiting,Too”

Lisa Helmel Thomas, M.Div.

Blessed be the holy Trinity, one God, the Parent who rouses us from slumber, the Shepherd who gathers us on the holy mountain, the Deliverer who sets us free. Amen.

——————

Advent. Probably my favorite season of the church year. As I get older, Lent rivals a close second, as my appreciation for the parallels between these two seasons increases.  The waiting. The attempts at suspending time just a little, within the finite bounds of our human framework. What sets Advent apart from Lent a bit is this sense of HOPE. “Open our eyes,”we pray. Hope-filled dreams have a way of shaping what we are able to see. They are like lenses that train us to interpret and to act in the present....

“In those days,” the lesson says, and so begins a dream not just about what is, but about what might be if God’s reign might indeed be drawing near. Such dreaming has already been there earlier in the story when Joseph, our first character in Matthew’s narrative, is called to imagine what righteousness will look like in the light of God’s promise (Mt. 1:18-25 — Advent 3):

““Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit......She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the LORD through the prophet: 23 “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,”

To know that promises will be kept is a way that hope is shaped.  In John the Baptist we see the beginnings of that hope.

And isnt it interesting that LAST week, Advent began with the END of Matthew’s Gospel, not Chapter one. Today, Advent 2, we are in Matthew 3, and Joseph’s promised hope you just heard won’t be read until next week. God’s time. Kairos time. It isn’t necessarily linear.

I’ve always been fascinated by KAIROS TIME and LIMINAL SPACE.  “Kairos” in Greek means “the right, critical, and opportune kind of moment,” while the opposite of kairos is “chronos “ - linear, chronological, measured time.  Kairos is the opportune moment, the right time for action.

So we always have this sort of tension between kairos and chronos. Then there is liminal space, where we find ourselves in Advent.  Liminal space is the time between the 'what was' and the 'next. ' It is a place of transition, a season of waiting, and not knowing. Liminal space is where all transformation takes place, if we learn to wait and let it form us. It is into this kind of time-warp, if you will, that John the Baptist steps in.

Here is this guy, dressed like a Bedouin — a coat of camel’s hair with a belt tied around his waist — looking not unlike the prophet Elijah, eating locusts and wild honey, crying from the margins, “Repent! For the Kingdom of Heaven has come near. This is it!” The peripheral prophet, who today might be categorized as some sort of liberal evangelical.

WHAT is it? Who IS this guy?

In the meantime, the world is centered in the big city.,it is the time of Herod Antipas, a client of the oppressive Roman Empire.  The power of the current regime was concentrated in places like temples,buildings, bureaucracies, and tax collectors.

In stark contrast, John the Baptist stood at the margins. The MARGINS can come to the center, but the center could not go out to the margins.  When we read “Then the ppl of Jerusalem and ALL Judea were going out to John, and ALL the region of Jordan, and they were baptized...confessing their sins.”  “ALL” is actually hyperbole, but its effect is to emphasize John’s influence. Here was this man from the wilderness having an impact on the city. He is not only paving the way, but leading Israel through another time of transition.  No less than MOSES or Samuel, John the Baptist is a bridge between eras in Israel’s history.

Then there is this matter of repentance.  The kingdom is near, yet repentance has something to do with preparing the way for Gods entry into our lives. The CALL for repentance signals that there is something wrong and  a need for change.  Gods power is present but not unrelated to what we do. Ultimately, it directs our vision not so much to sorrow for the past,  but to look to the promise of a new beginning.

But wait. Doesn’t this call to “Repent!” reek of judgment? EVEN NOW, John says, “the ax is lying at the root of the trees, every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” Yikes. 

Judgement. It brings to mind texts we wrestle with. What about the divorced spouse? The queer teen who is looking for an appropriate church or youth group? That person in Bible Study who was taught about the inerrancy of scripture and is now trying to reconcile it with their current situation?  How can they not feel judged? Are they unrepentant?  The wheat. the threshing floor, and again, the fire.  And John does say he is baptizing with water now (human), but the One who is more powerful that comes after him will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire.”

Powerful words here. Words that clearly tell us that there is more to Advent than just sitting around waiting. Matthew makes it clear that the Kingdom of God brings about a fundamental break from the past.  Our preparation here is not primarily self-purification, but rather, that purification and redemption takes place by way of a RADICAL TRUST. A trust that Christ Himself is working to purify us and the world around us to become ‘a dwelling place fit for the Lord.’

As the Church, our rediscovery of Advent will come in small steps - as we learn the difference between Advent hymns and Christmas carols, recover ancient practices such as praying the daily lectionary, things like music, holiday lights, presents, that prepare us for Christmas joy and feasting when they finally arrive. All these things  are marked by a steady confidence that God’s Kingdom is indeed at hand.

So Gods judgement is essentially related to Gods promise— the old is passing away, in Christ the new has come. That FIRE represents both judgment AND hope.

If God loves us enough to welcome us into Christ’s family, then God loves us enough to expect something of US this Advent. — repentance in the form of radical trust.

This Advent tension remains — between kairos and chronos, repentance and judgement, the margins and power, and finally, nostalgia and memory.

Nostalgia says that Advent is all about looking back and feeling good and what used to be., but Advent tells us it is all about looking ahead. We pray/preach/teach “waiting expectantly for what is to come.”

Nostalgia is memory filtered through disproportionate emotion.  When memory is filtered through gratitude, faith begins, which leads to hope.  The ghosts who made Scrooge look back before he could look ahead had a point. Yes, we look forward only by looking back, but we do it with renewed gratitude.

Perhaps for Advent we can give up on nostalgia, but we cannot give up on memory after all, for it is in looking back with thankful hearts that our vision clears up enough to see what lies ahead.

One December afternoon … a group of parents stood in the lobby of a nursery school waiting to claim their children after the last pre-Christmas class session. As the youngsters ran from their lockers, each one carried in his hands the “surprise,” the brightly wrapped package on which he had been working diligently for weeks. One small boy, trying to run, put on his coat, and wave to his parents, all at the same time, slipped and fell. The “surprise” flew from his grasp, landed on the floor and broke with an obvious ceramic crash. The child … began to cry inconsolably. His father, trying to minimize the incident and comfort the boy, patted his head and murmured, “Now, that’s all right son. It doesn’t matter. It really doesn’t matter at all.” But the child’s mother, somewhat wiser in this situation, swept the boy into her arms and said, “Oh, but it does matter. It matters a great deal.” And she wept with her son.

It does matter. Our Advent worship, Advent hymns, Advent expectations, and Advent comforts require the reminder that John the Baptist makes so clear. It does matter. We do matter. Perhaps the church can give up on judgment, but we cannot give up on responsibility.  

  David L. Bartlett - “It  is an exercise in false piety to come to the manger without remembering the cross.”

Lion-lamb, past-future, judgement-Redemption, death-rebirth, water-fire, Kairos-chronos....There is a LOT going on here. It looks about as busy and conflicted as the material world all around us these days. But if you burn it all away, the takeaways are trust and gratitude — our tools for repentance.  Repentance that leads to hope. Hope that will bring forth the Kingdom.  As our “stuff” decreases, God and his Kingdom will increase.

As we wait, let us remember that God is also waiting.  How shall we meet him? Amen.

A FEAT OF LOVE

“A Feat of Love” - Sermon from March 24, 2019 - St. Paul’s Glenside

"BY ANOTHER ROAD"

"By Another Road"

First Sunday of Epiphany, January 6, 2019

LISTEN

I love to travel, even though I have a horrible sense of direction. I have always been fascinated by maps, and now, GPS.  One of the things that amazes me is that we can sometimes get to the same destination using a number of different paths. Few places fit this description more aptly than this very town of Glenside.  Without knowing exactly how, I have discovered that there are at least a half dozen different ways to get to St. Paul’s from our home in Northeast Philadelphia.  I learned this one night in October, just before Halloween. Some of you may have your own stories about that night.

It was late afternoon on a Thursday, Kids’ Choir night. My son Noah and I headed down Glenside Avenue toward the church cutting it close and as usual, not leaving ourselves adequate time for our commute. Just as we approached Easton Road, we encountered walls of people and the street turned into a parking lot.  Traffic was at a standstill.  Unbeknownst to me, the Food Truck Festival, originally scheduled for October 11,  was rained out, so it took place a week later.  Long story short, it took us another 40 minutes to go up and around on one of the side streets, all the way over to Limekiln and Mt. Carmel, circling back to St. Paul’s the long way.  We finally arrived about 15 minutes late for Noah’s rehearsal.  I met another mom in the hallway and no words were needed to comprehend the frustration on our faces.  She broke the tension, saying, “What on earth is up with that traffic? I uttered some very UN-Christian words on the road just now!”  Didn’t we all!

Since there was no other way, we took the long way home, too, by turning right instead of left onto Mt. Carmel.  But we still got there - eventually.  And we learned a thing or two.  Things we wouldn’t have learned if it hadn’t been for that Food Truck Festival. Who knew?  It was an “Aha! moment.”  The light turned on.

Revelation. That’s what the word “Epiphany” literally means.  “Revelation,” God with us, revealed to us.   It is the twelfth day of Christmas, traditionally the day three sages followed the star to Bethlehem to visit the Christ Child and present him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh 

This is also the day that many get their homes blessed. You see it a little more in Germany or around Europe — Doorways of homes are marked in chalk:  C+M+B 2019.  Those are the names of the t
Magi — Caspar, Melchior, Balthazar — and the year 2019, with which a priest would enter the home, say a prayer to bless it, and write the initials of the kings along with the numerals of the current new year.

Epiphany happened to me as I was reading the Gospel lesson this week.  I read about those Magi, and as usual, was taken in by their grandeur.  I pictured jewel-toned robes, camels, precious stones, gold, and incense.  Great stuff.  But what more could I say about them?  I have more questions than answers. Were those their real names?  They don’t have names in the Bible.  So where did the names  come from? Who were they, exactly?  Astrologers?  Magi?  Did they really exist?  Were they really kings, or just sages?  

The Bible refers to them as “wise men from the East.” There is no proof that they were actually kings, as it is not stated in the scriptures as such.  It’s another reason why “We Three Kings” no longer appears in our latest hymnal.  It may not be biblical history, but is certainly filled with legend.

In Matthew’s account, we do know that Herod summoned these three sages (I will call them sages or Magi or wise men) and asked them to find this King of the Jews that, according to prophecy and the stars, was to have been born recently.

Herod knew that Bethlehem would be the place where this king would be born because ot was written in the Hebrew scriptures by the prophet Micah, which we read a few weeks back.  It turns out that when you search the Bible for the word “Bethlehem,” up pop almost countless references, most in the Old Testament. Based on this knowledge, and motivated by fear, Herod sends for these three Magi and learns of the exact time when the star had appeared.  You see, these wise men had been observing this star since its rising. Isaiah actually ties together our two other readings by saying, “And the Gentiles will come to your light, and Kings to the brightness of your rising.”   Having traveled through the prophecies of the Advent season, we have learned that things don’t always turn out according to HUMAN plan.  That is also the “Mystery of Christ” that the Apostle Paul talks about in his letter to the Ephesians — that Christ will come to ALL people and nations.  This is something nobody expected would happen.

“And having been warned in a dream no to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.”

“By another road.”  HERE is the verse that I would typically zone out on for most of my life.  That is, until I read it again and again — so much so, that this jumped out at me this time. I had my own Ephiphany-revelation as I pondered “by another road.”

The three wise men did not go home the same way they came. They were transformed by seeing the Christ Child. It says earlier in the reading that when they saw that the star had stopped, they were filled with JOY.  And they would never be the same again.  They knew they couldn’t go back to Herod.   King Herod sent the Magi out, motivated by fear and anger.  Filled with Joy upon seeing the Christ Child, they were transformed.  If they went back the same way, there would be trouble with Herod, and at the very least they would hit the same roadblocks again.  So they took another road. They were called back to their own country and never turned back to Herod.

We, too, face unexpected roadblocks in life.

What are some of the ways we can face them?  By trusting Jesus, who leads us through them.   By praying to be open to the ways of the Spirit, by following a new kind of light.  Yet they only seem like roadblocks until we look and listen to God’s revealing power, the “God WITH US” power demonstrated in the Epiphany.  

Throughout Advent and Christmas, we lit candles in the darkness.  It is always amazing to me how a single candle can completely change a darkened room, offering a special kind of light that reminds us of the sacred and gives us focus.  It is enclosed, protected.  When we have more than one candle, we generate light as a community and suddenly there is literally more warmth in the room, which those of you who were here at Christmas can attest to as we sang together “Silent Night.”  It was a very special moment.

Now that Christmas is winding down and the Light has come into the world, it shines even brighter. Instead of a candle, though, it’s now an “Aha!’ moment, when the light bulb suddenly turns on and we see a whole lot more than we thought there was.

Revelation can be a challenge. At times we see more than we want or expect  - a medical problem, a challenging relationship, a job loss.…  the list goes on. What do we do when forces beyond our control divert us from the path we thought we were meant to be on?

We may be called to take another direction, even at a moment’s notice. It requires faith to go down another road, but God gives it to us in abundance.  Taking that first step, that first turn in faith is often all we need.   In this imperfect world, we don’t need to wait for the stars to be perfectly aligned for this transformation.  Only a simple kernel of faith.

Listen to the words of a Christmas poem by Madeleine L’ Engle, entitled “First Coming -“

He did not wait till the world was ready, till men and nations were at peace.

He came when the Heavens were unsteady, and prisoners cried out for release.

He did not wait for the perfect time. 

He came when the need was deep and great.

He dined with sinners in all their grime, turned water into wine.

He did not wait till hearts were pure. 

In joy he came to a tarnished world of sin and doubt.

To a world like ours, of anguished shame he came, and his Light would not go out.

He came to a world which did not mesh, to heal its tangles, shield its scorn.

In the mystery of the Word made Flesh, the Maker of the stars was born.

We cannot wait till the world is sane to raise our songs with joyful voice,

for to share our grief, to touch our pain, 

He came with Love: Rejoice! Rejoice!

What comfort, what assurance there is in knowing that Jesus is our guiding Star on that road.  He is our hope.  We are never alone, even though we may often feel that way. Look up. God is here.  Follow that Star!  For THIS particular Star is different. Unlike a typical star that generates its own light, this Star reflects the light of the Son — the Son of God.  He is here for us, for you and for me. AMEN.