The Parable of the Empty Jar--A Sermon for University Congregational Church, July 9, 2017

“Re-Imagine the World: The Parable of the Empty Jar”

A Sermon for University Congregational Church

Sunday, July 9, 2017

By Rev. Paul E. Ellis Jackson

Traditional Word

 Jesus said: The kingdom of the [Father] is like a woman; carrying a jar full of meal and walking a long way. The handle on the jar broke; the meal poured out behind her on the road. She was unaware, she knew not her loss. When she came into her house, she put down the jar (and) found it empty. The Gospel of Thomas, 97

We join spokes together in a wheel,
but it is the center hole
that makes the wagon move.

We shape clay into a pot,
but it is the emptiness inside
that holds whatever we want.

We hammer wood for a house,
but it is the inner space
that makes it livable.

We work with being,
but non-being is what we use.

From the Tao De Ching

Contemporary Word

“The artist's job is not to succumb to despair but to find an antidote for the emptiness of existence.” 
― Woody Allen

“We become aware of the void as we fill it.” 
― Antonio Porchia

“In all our searching, the only thing we've found that makes the emptiness bearable is each other.” 
― Carl Sagan

            Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. And Thomas. Wait…what? Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. And Thomas. Did I say that right? Thomas? I know the first four as the Gospels of our canonical Bible. That is, the letters and writings that were finally accepted to be the authentic “Word of God”. We hear this all the time—God said it—I Believe it-that settles it. Except for those of us who believe that God is still speaking. And for those of us who know that what is commonly accepted as the “Holy Bible” was actually one man’s preference for what documents should be used for teaching the orthodox view of Christianity. Bishop Athanasius wrote in the year 367, his 39^th Festal Letter in which he outlined those books that he felt were worthy of inclusion into the cannon. This one man determined which words would become Holy Scripture and make their way into the bible. One man. At least that’s the view of my professor of Early Christianities, Dr. Peter Mena, and he makes a compelling case. The documentary evidence is scanty, but the traditional usage is enormous. It’s tough to be a small voice in a large crowd, but I still tried to listen to what Dr. Mena was saying: What if one man, one very powerful man, was able to convince his followers and the emperor that these books and writings were “in” and these were “out”. These are orthodox, “right-teaching” and these over here are heresy “different teaching”. One powerful man. And yet I still hear people apologizing for him all of the time and telling me that God instructed him and he was doing God’s work. Perhaps. But I think he left out a lot of really good, useful, wise stuff in the name of orthodoxy. I think he was too interested in preserving his own power that he wrote off anything that didn’t support that power. Of course, what we’re left with is a huge confounding mess—contradictory and flimsy and filled with doubt. I think this is why people of conscious have a difficult time honestly saying that everything written in the Bible is  the inerrant word of God. Some of us heretics know that the words in the Bible are far too important than to be taken literally. They are to be read with an informed mind and understood in the context in which they were written. Which brings us back to the Gospels. Why only four? And why these four? Matthew, Mark, Luke and John?

We now know that there was the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, the Gospel of Simon Peter, the Gospel of Philip and the Gospel of Barnabas along with many others. One sect of Christianity—the Gnostics—believed that the disciple Thomas was not only Jesus’s twin brother but also the founder of churches across Asia. Christianity was in chaos in its early days, with some sects declaring the others heretics. And then, in the early 300s, Emperor Constantine of Rome declared he had become follower of Jesus, ended his empire’s persecution of Christians and set out to reconcile the disputes among the sects. Constantine was a brutal sociopath who murdered his eldest son, decapitated his brother-in-law and killed his wife by boiling her alive, and that was after he proclaimed that he had converted from worshipping the sun god to being a Christian. Yet he also changed the course of Christian history, ultimately influencing which books made it into the New Testament. It makes sense that the Bishop Athanasius would put in his list of books of the Bible considered “authoritative” only those already approved by the emperor. Especially an emperor with a fondness for boiling people alive.

I’m using all of this to illustrate the complexity of the formation of this dangerous book—the Bible. And to highlight the paradox of pronouncing something finished. Buried deep within the un-official Gospel of Thomas we find this week’s parable. The Parable of the Empty Jar. Listen to the words of the Gospel of Thomas: “Jesus said: The kingdom of the [Father] is like a woman; carrying a jar full of meal and walking a long way. The handle on the jar broke; the meal poured out behind her on the road. She was unaware, she knew not her loss. When she came into her house, she put down the jar (and) found it empty. That’s it. That’s the parable. Counter this with the other parables we’ve chewed on so far this summer: The Lost Sheep and The Mustard Seed. Each of these seemed to have a pretty clear message: In Robin’s work with the Mustard Seed parable she asked us to remember that the seeds of the Beloved Community are within each of us—that God does indeed work in ways unfathomable to us—that the smallest of seeds planted today may reap a huge harvest next year. And when I was working with the parable of the Lost Sheep I found deep connections with conscientiousness and care for the smallest details of our lives.

What is Jesus trying to teach in this parable? Is it some profound doctrine about the church? Is it how to be a good neighbor? Is spilling grain all of the way home being a good neighbor? Is it about forgetfulness? We don’t get any real moral from this story. Jesus doesn’t add a pithy saying at the end and admonish us to always check our jar and make sure it securely fastened so that the grain doesn’t spill out on the way home. Jesus is comparing God’s ideal community to this empty jar. Talk about room for interpretation! There’s literally nothing in the empty jar that keeps us from interpreting the Beloved Community in any way we wish whatsoever. It’s about as ambiguous as you can get. I believe that how one approaches life in general might inform how you interpret this story. If you view life through a lens of woe-is-me and I’m such a terrible person, a negative approach to life, then you will probably interpret this parable as a cautionary tale. This woman gets exactly what is coming to her for being so careless. Serves her right! But if you approach life with a more life-giving view, one of abundance and one comfortable with ambiguity, you might look upon this parable with wonder and awe. A pragmatist might say—well, she lost her grain, but now she has an empty vessel in case her neighbor has extra flour she can spare. A person who approaches the world with an attitude of abundance could look at this parable and see it for the mystery that it is. Jesus said that God’s beloved community is like this woman, carrying a leaky jar. We can look at this story and wonder—what’s next for this woman?

So what do we do with a woman who gets home and finds that she’s lost all of her grain on the trip from the market? How often do we do this? Get so caught up in one thing, that we completely forget the thing we started with. Have you ever walked into a room to get something only to get in the room and realize that you’ve forgotten what you were looking for? Of how about this one: Once I was talking to my mother on my cell phone, and I was gathering up stuff to leave to teach a class, and I was getting more and more frantic because I couldn’t find this one thing. I went back into the house—all the while chatting with mom—and back out to the car—I must have done this at least three times. Mom could tell I was getting frustrated and she asked me what was going on and I said—I can’t find my cell phone. I’ve looked everywhere! And she said: Isn’t it in your hand?

Isn’t that what is going on in this parable? The woman is so sure that she’s securely attached her jar filled with grain that she needn’t worry about it, so she begins her journey only to get home and realize that she’s lost everything she traveled so far to get. And where’s the big moral? This parable is confounding, isn’t it? It seems to be about nothing at all. And maybe that’s the purpose. Maybe that’s why Jesus used this teaching—The Jesus Seminar firmly believes this is an authentic teaching of Jesus—and that in itself is fascinating. Because the Gospel of Thomas wasn’t even discovered in full until 1945. I was always asking my professors at seminar: How many more caves are out there, like the one in Nag Hammadi where the complete Gospel of Thomas was found, filled with documents from the early Christian experience—waiting for us to uncover them and find new, life-giving meaning in them and learn more about the true teachings of Jesus.

So what do we learn about the Beloved Community (my preferred term for God’s Kingdom) in this parable? Well we learn that the Beloved Community is informed by loss. There’s no great miracle of divine intervention for this woman when she gets home to discover her jar is empty, is there? The clouds don’t open and the grain doesn’t magically appear, just because she has faith. There’s no happy ending here—it’s pretty bleak. We also learn that the Beloved Community is a journey. Jesus said the woman “walked a long way”. We see the journey metaphor often in Jesus’ parables. Bernard Brandon Scott says the journey metaphor isn’t the main point of this particular parable, but he also acknowledges that in the Gnostic tradition, a journey in a story represented the journey our souls take throughout our lives.^[1] Another important aspect of this parable is that it is showing us that the Beloved Community cannot be possessed, but is found by losing something. We learn more of this aspect to our lives from the teachings of Lao Tsu in his Dao de Ching, or The Way (an ancient Chinese religious text): We join spokes together in a wheel, but it is the center hole that makes the wagon move. We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness inside that holds whatever we want. We hammer wood for a house, but it is the inner space that makes it livable. We work with being, but non-being is what we use. Isn’t that impenetrable for a Sunday morning? I love a good puzzle! We work with being—but it is non-being that we use to be. Or more to our point—God’s community of good neighbors is present in the spaces between us. A final aspect to consider when reading this parable is this: The Beloved Community is created when we least expect it, and we might be surprised by its appearance. How often are you surprised by the presence of God?  Or maybe this, how often do you simply think: Wow, this is good. Life is good. I wasn’t expecting things to be like this, but they’re pretty darn good. I’m grateful for this surprise.

If we close off our faith and our spirits in a glass jar and declare them finished—done—I don’t need to think about these things anymore—God Said It—I Believe IT—That Settles It! When we do this, we begin to die. That glass jar is impermeable to the winds of the spirit. The rigid cement of a pre-modern mindset, one that refuses to allow science to inform our faith—one that refuses to acknowledge the suffering of the world right in front of us (or writes it off a “God’s will”), that’s shallow, puny thinking. But if we can imagine caves filled with more teachings and empty space and jars that leak grain all the way from the market to our homes—then we begin to see a God that works in the empty spaces. A God that breathes new life into us each day. May we fill our glass jars with grain and may they leak out, seed by seed, and nourish the earth with life-giving hope. And may we come to understand what Carl Sagan meant when he responded to the vastness of space, the enormity of the cosmos and the vast empty nothingness he encountered there, he said: “In all our searching, the only thing we've found that makes the emptiness bearable is each other.”  The only thing that makes this bearable—is each other. Cherish each other and don’t worry so much about spilling some grain on your way home. And keep that amazing hope alive—what else don’t we know about all of this? What else is waiting to be discovered. I thank God each day for this community of bright minds that isn’t afraid of looking into an empty jar and asking “What’s next?”

Amen

References:

Scott, Bernard Brandon. Re-Imagine the World: An Introduction to the Parables of Jesus. Santa Rosa: PoleBridge Press, 2001.

http://rorycooney.blogspot.com/2013/10/thomass-empty-jar-and-empire-of-god.html

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/thomas-anon.html

https://www.danielharper.org/archive/?p=478

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/emptiness?page=2

http://reti.sebts.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Lost-Gospels_2.pdf

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[1] Bernard Brandon Scott, Re-Imagine the World: An Introduction to the Parables of Jesus, (Santa Rosa: PoleBridge Press, 2001), 44

"Not a Day Goes By" A sermon for Plymouth Congregational Church, Wichita, KS May 29, 2016

NOT A DAY GOES BY: THE CURSE OF MEMORY

A Sermon for Plymouth Congregation Church, Wichita, Kansas

Sunday, May 29, 2016

By Pastor Paul Ellis Jackson

Traditional Word

Mark 14:66-72

While Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant-girls of the high priest came by. When she saw Peter warming himself, she stared at him and said, “You also were with Jesus, the man from Nazareth.” But he denied it, saying, “I do not know or understand what you are talking about.” And he went out into the forecourt. Then the cock crowed. And the servant-girl, on seeing him, began again to say to the bystanders, “This man is one of them.”  But again he denied it. Then after a little while the bystanders again said to Peter, “Certainly you are one of them; for you are a Galilean.” But he began to curse, and he swore an oath, “I do not know this man you are talking about.”  At that moment the cock crowed for the second time. Then Peter remembered that Jesus had said to him, “Before the cock crows twice, you will deny me three times.” And he broke down and wept.

Contemporary Word

“Not a day goes by, not a single day; but you're somewhere a part of my life…where’s the day I’ll have started forgetting?” Stephen Sondheim

            Humans are cursed with memory aren’t we? I’ve heard it said that it’s a blessing to have a bad memory: You don’t remember all of those slights against you and then you don’t have any grudges against those who slighted you. But, of course, the downside to this is you don’t get to remember the good stuff either. I suppose a perfect memory would be one that filters out the bad stuff and only leaves the good. I’ve been accused of having this kind of memory. But I can also be frozen in place sometimes when some odd memory surfaces in my brain and I stand there thinking: “Did I really do that?” or “How on earth did that happen?” or “What I wouldn’t give to be able to go back and handle that in a different way”.

            What it must have been like for Peter, then. Imagine how much his heart must’ve ached after he realized what he had done. Here he was, denying the man he’d spent the last few years following, working with, trusting, and sharing meals with. Peter and his brother Andrew had been recruited by Jesus just a few years earlier with Jesus saying to them: “come and be fishers of men”. And then in Matthew 16 we get the story of Jesus asking his followers ‘who do you say that I am” and Peter answers: “You are the messiah. Son of the living God”. So, the man who reassures Jesus and tells him that He is the Messiah—the Son of the Living God—doesn’t sound like someone who is undecided about Jesus’ credentials, right? And for this man to then go on and betray Jesus at a critical point in Jesus’ last week…well, that leaves me scratching my head and wondering what one earth Peter must have felt after this betrayal. The regret that he surely felt at his part in the arrest of Jesus. The scripture tells us he “broke down and wept.” He realized what he had done. He had regret.

            But when we remember Peter, is the first thing that comes to mind his betrayal of Jesus? No! We recall that he was a fisherman--that he was one of the twelve apostle--and that Jesus built his church upon him. Peter means rock so Jesus made him the rock, the foundation of his church—the very man who betrayed him. Jesus forgave Peter and put him in charge of continuing his memory-- his legacy. A legacy that lasts, obviously, to today. I mean, here we are—remembering Jesus.

I’m so grateful that I went through all of my youthful follies before the advent of Social Media. It’s bad enough when Facebook pops up some memory from three years ago that I’d rather forget. Imagine having your entire life stored on hard drives and servers and thrown back in your face just when you sooner forget. I’m worried for some of our young people who might end up with some serious regrets. Behaviors, antics and peccadilloes that are better off with only a handful of people knowing about them are now broadcast to thousands AND stored in vast server farms that will never forget. This makes a nice corollary to the story of Peter’s betrayal. Think about it—his betrayal of Jesus was so important that it’s in the three synoptic gospels pretty much the same way. Peter realizes what he has done, has regret and cries.

The Gospel of John tweaks the story a bit and does not have Peter crying and showing regret. Perhaps that early community of followers of that Christ Movement, the Johannine Community, needed a Peter who didn’t cry—a Peter who had no regrets? It’s almost impossible for us to know why the writer of the Gospel of John chose to leave our the regret part, but it interesting to think about. They wanted to remember a Peter who had no regrets. Why?

Tomorrow we celebrate Memorial Day. I used to be pretty ambivalent about this holiday. It usually just meant a three-day weekend and often this was spent in Dallas with a group of friends from college in one of our annual reunions. But in the past few years, this holiday has become more and more important to me. For the past couple of years, Duane and I have visited the local cemeteries where are family members who have died are buried. This means a trip to Derby, where we both grew up and where a number of our family members now rest. It’s not necessarily a sad time. It’s bittersweet. We spend time searching for graves and making sure we spend a moment lingering over each marker. There’s a lovely, quiet solemnity in a graveyard on Memorial day. Most who are there are busy with their tasks of flower arranging and grave maintenance. Brushing dirt off of a neglected marker, or pulling weeds from around a patch of earth. It’s a humbling time—standing in a cemetery—looking at the great mass of humanity that has left the earth and gone on to their glory. It’s humbling because I think in the back of all of our minds is the thought…I, too, am going to die someday. Just like everybody else on this planet. Someday, I will no longer be physically present. Now we all have ideas of what awaits us after our deaths and the scriptures provide some insights as well. For me, I think that since I came from God that upon my death I will return to God. In what form that takes, I don’t know. Nor does it really matter. What really matters is what I do with the time remaining. In whatever time we have—working to build the Beloved Community of Right Relationships should be our primary task. And standing in a cemetery contemplating my demise is a surefire way to even more finely focus my attitude on building that Beloved Community.

Stephen Sondheim wrote a beautiful song about remembering: “Not a Day Goes By” and thank you so much Ted for that beautiful rendition. If you listened carefully to the lyrics you heard someone who has experienced some great loss and is unable to forget this person. We don’t know who the person was: a lover, a friend—it could be anyone. And I think we’ve all been in that position—I hope we’ve all been in that position. Someone who entered our lives and became a part of the fabric of those lives—so much so that when they are gone there is a tremendous hole where they used to be. And sometimes we are stuck. We can’t move one from that memory. There’s such great pain in the unfinished story of that person and you that you are lost. You are unable to move on.  But maybe that’s part of your story. It’s up to you to fill in the gaps—to address the empty spaces—and to find a way to propel the story forward without that beloved person. Your story must go on without them. Perhaps the story is just paused and awaits your input as to what happens next.

Part of my work as Associate Minister at University Congregational Church is to assist our Senior Minister, Robin McGonigle, with pastoral care issues. When I took this position in the summer of 2013, I started working with a number of our older congregants on a variety of issues. Duane and I would put up grab bars or hand rails or make other simple adjustments or suggestions to help with mobility issues in a member’s home. Or I’d take them shopping or make sure that someone in the congregation did so. One particular member of our congregation was Becky Tucker. Now I had known Becky since I joined University Congregational’s choir in 1995. She had sung in the choir since almost the beginning—over 30 years. Last year Becky had a serious fall and broke her leg. She ended up in a rehab facility and here was an opportunity for me to be an even better pastoral care giver as Becky had no local family. So whenever Becky needed help, she’d call on me and I’d be right there. Or if I was out of town or unavailable, I’d make sure someone from the church did so. A couple of Wednesdays ago, I picked up Becky for our one of our usual shopping trips and we had our usual silly fun time at Dillons. I mostly followed her around while she rode her scooter through the store gathering her supplies for the week. She was a maniac on that scooter and I often warned the people in the vicinity that their lives were in jeopardy. Becky liked being thought of as a dangerous shopper. That Wednesday evening we had choir rehearsal and Becky was there, as always, ready to sing and have fun with a choir she’d been with over 30 years. Because that Wednesday night was our last Wednesday night choir rehearsal for the season, the choir went out to the Bricktown Restaurant on rock Road for a celebration. Becky went along, sat next to me and I bought her dinner because I knew this was an extravagance for her. As Duane and I were preparing to leave, she leaned over and said she’d like a slice of cheesecake and without a moment’s hesitation I handed her a ten dollar bill and told her to enjoy that cheesecake. And I am so glad I did. The next day, Becky’s sister called me to tell me that Becky had had a massive heart attack and had just died. I knew she had no family in town so I instantly rushed to Wesley and was able to say goodbye to her for all of the people in her life who just could not be at her side.

I will be officiating Becky’s funeral here in a few weeks—her family is scattered about the country, so it took some time to find a day when everyone could come to Wichita. Becky’s death reminded me once again of the fragility of our lives and of the sacredness of the everyday. The beauty of the mundane. Her last hours on earth she spent doing those things that gave her great pleasure—singing and celebrating and eating some delicious cheesecake. And I learned an important lesson: Never forgo the opportunity to buy someone a slice of cheesecake. You never know if it might be their last. And if you do so, you won’t regret that you didn’t. University Congregational Church’s second Senior Minister, the Rev. Dr. Gary Cox, whom we lost way too early in 2006, said something in one of his sermons  that has stuck with me to this very day. He said, whenever I am faced with an important decision. Or when I am sitting on the horns of a dilemma. Anytime I am faced with a situation that I know requires thoughtful reflection on my part. I sit back and I imagine how I want to remember this moment at my time of death. Do I want to look back on it with regret and anxiety because I made a selfish and shortsighted, quick decision? Do I want to look back on it with ambivalence because I put off making the decision and left it for someone else to work out?  Or do I want to look back on the memory with fondness and love, because the decision I made considered others—it took into account the fact that we are not alone in this world and that our decisions, however small, might impact many other people for many years to come. Did my choice help further the building of God’s Beloved Community of Right Relationship? Did I offer love and selflessness? Will I be proud of my choices on my deathbed? Obviously this has stuck with me and I hope you hear Gary’s words this morning and that they might resonate with you in some manner as well. How do you want to recall your life on your deathbed? Do you want to remember a life of regret, fear and worry? A selfish life where you put your needs first? Or do you want to look back on a life of selflessness, of service to others, of love freely given and wrongs quickly forgiven and pride in your accomplishments? The choice is yours and you can start living a selfless life right now. I think part of our commitment to the Jesus Movement includes selflessness. Walking the way of Jesus, faithfully, can help us live a life without regret. I mean, if Jesus can make his betrayer the rock of his legacy, what do you think he can do with you?

            Tomorrow, regardless of if you visit a cemetery or not, take a few moments to remember those you have lost. Smile in warm remembrance of their lives and what they meant to you. Think about the gift that their life was—find the gift in their life—the blessing—the reason that you were so glad to have known them and why you are grateful that, for whatever time you had, they were part of your life and not a day goes by that you are so glad that you knew them. No regrets. Just love. The price of love is loss—and still we pay—we love anyway. Amen.

            Thank you for inviting me here this morning. 

Those Pesky Prophetic Voices!

THE CHRISTIAN LIFE FOR SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2016

We have quite a group of theologians in this congregation. I would go so far to say that most people in this church are theologians. By this I mean, we think about God. Not in some simplistic Santa Claus figure in the sky whom we ask for candy and if we are good boys and girls we get something. Not that there is anything wrong with this theology….ok, there’s lots wrong with that theology and it leads to profound problems and eventually violence, war and questionable presidential candidates. But many people hold this type of theology about God. They just wouldn’t know to call it theology. They’d just assume that everyone believes this same way.

But we know here at University Congregational that few of us believe that way. We actually prefer the questions to the answers. Robin is walking us through the pitfalls and anxiety that living in ambiguity can cause, but I’m here to share with you that the questions matter far more than any concrete answer.

Moses, when he encountered God in the form of a burning bush asked God who he was: The bush said I AM THAT I AM.  Moses didn’t start theologizing and run to the Tanakh and the priests and say, help me define this, guys. What does it means that God just told me I AM THAT I AM. Let’s think about this…

No, Moses instead listened careful to his mission from God (to free to Hebrew slaves) and Moses, in true Prophet fashion said, uh, who I am to go to pharaoh and free our people? I’m not such a good speaker…surely you can send someone else. And God in the form of a burning bush reassured Moses and sent him on his ministry.

After a while, knowing who this God was became less and less important to Moses. Knowing what this God wanted to be done became more and more important to Moses.

I think sometimes our questions are out of order. I think we get too caught up in God’s name or nature or whether or not God loves me, than we do in asking this question: Am I doing to the best of my abilities, those things that I’m pretty sure are pleasing to God? Do I love my neighbor? Do I walk humbly with my God? Do I practice mercy and justice? Do I pray for God’s will and God’s community to be made available for all? Or just for today’s sports team? Or the lottery ticket in my pocket?

Do I work to build God’s beloved community for all, here and now, with the gifts I’ve been given?

Or am I too preoccupied with being offended because someone asked me a tough question that made me think theologically. Or someone said something unfair about me. Or someone ate the last piece of pie. Or some other perceived slight. Oh we love to get bent out of shape over the slightest thing and then drive right by a homeless girl without anything to eat—driving by in our nice shiny Buick.

Are we asking the right questions about God? Are we thinking about God in theologically sound ways? How are you going to think about God during today’s share meal of communion? Let’s stand and sing our communion hymn found in your bulletin: As Grains on Scattered Hillsides

The Four Agreements--Be Impeccable with Your Word

Yesterday, Robin began the first in our sermon series on Don Miguel Ruiz' book The Four Agreements. This little book of Toltec wisdom is fascinating and one that I have long loved. Yesterday's agreement, the first, is Be Impeccable with Your Word. This sermon led me to thinking about how often I use the phrase: To be completely honest. How many times do I say to someone, well, if I am to be completely honest I must say....such and such. Does this mean that in all of my other speech I am being less than honest? Or is this just an idiom that we use when we are trying to emphasis that what I am about to say next is extra-true?  Just some thoughts for this second Monday in January.

The Name of the Book is Opportunity

The Name of the Book is “Opportunity “

Paul Edwin Ellis Jackson

University Congregational Church

January 3, 2016

Traditional Word

Hebrew Bible:

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!

 Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

Isaiah 43:18-19New International Version (NIV)

New Testament:

 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

2 Corinthians 5:17New International Version (NIV)

Contemporary Word

“We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day.” 
― Edith Lovejoy Pierce

A few Sundays ago Robin preached on the Gospels and how we are all writing the Gospel anew ourselves. Each time we act out of Christian love we are adding sentences and exclamation points to the Good News. Each time we embody one of the teachings of Jesus we are putting a new paragraph in our version of the Gospel. When we recall one of the parables and use it to teach someone in our lives the moral nugget therein, we are indenting the paragraphs and formatting the text of our Gospel. We, each of us, are writing our own Gospel each day that we are alive. Here, in the present moment, is when we write the Gospel best.

But how do we do this when we can’t get to the present? How do we write the Good News when we’re not so sure we’re worthy of Good News? What about those of us who are stuck in the past? The prophet Isaiah tells us that we are to “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”

Our ancient prophet to the people of Judea is still speaking wisdom today, isn’t he?  And while he was writing to an ancient people who had been through the worst parts of the Exodus and he was wanting them to forget the misery and humiliation they had been subjected to, don’t his words ring true today? So while our Jewish family from old had been startled by the parting of the Red Sea and their fear of traveling through the desert, they were being reminded of this so they could remember that the New Exodus was even more divine—was even more life-affirming. They were looking at a life of slavery and endless drudgery and had been given new life and a new way to see the past. New lenses through which to look at their story.  They would not have their new lives if they had not left Egypt. They had to go through their Exodus to gain their new lives.

I remember once when I received a new prescription on my eyeglasses after I had gone a number of years without an eye check-up. My eyesight had declined somewhat, but because it happened gradually I was unaware of the change. Until I put on that new prescription. I remember standing outside in awe as I was able to make out the detail in the trees, they were so green and I could now see individual leaves where before I had just seen a green blob. It was stunning. But I would have never experienced that if I had not gotten new lenses with which to see. Viewing our past is similar. If we are looking at old events with unhealthy eyes, then we might not be seeing what really happened.

Here are some signs that perhaps you are viewing things from your past in an unhealthy and possibly destructive manner—perhaps you need a new prescription!

1)      Do you embellish the past? When the truth about a past event just doesn’t live up to your expectations, or if it doesn’t make for a good story, we might find ourselves embellishing things that have happened. A childhood injury becomes much more dire than it really was, or our role in a heroic sporting event was much less. I actually have a trophy from when our team won first place in basketball. That’s the truth. I was on a first place basketball team when I was in Junior High. What I’m omitting is that it was awarded during the year I had a severe bout of walking pneumonia and did not play in a single game. But because my name was on the roster, I got a trophy. You get the picture. I can claim that I was a basketball superstar. I don’t, because that’s not important to me, but you can see how this might be tempting in certain situations.

2)      Do you ignore the past? This may seem like an easy way out, but it’s not very healthy for us. We must acknowledge the bad events in our pasts if we are to face them and move on from them. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself reminded of whatever past event affected you at the worst possible times. This one often takes some professional assistance so if you think you are hiding from something in your past; find a counselor or therapist who can help you face it.

3)      Do you romanticize the past? Humans have an amazing propensity for self-delusion. The statistics on people who return to abusive relationships to only have the abuse continue are staggering. These people are romanticizing the past. They might think: “It wasn’t all that bad, she didn’t manipulate me that much” or “He didn’t mean to hurt me and he promised he’ll never do it again and we have so much fun together when he’s not angry—I should go back—it’s better than being all alone”. Call this what it is—if your relationships bring out the worst in you (and others) don’t let fickle human emotions make what is toxic look like treasure and tempt you into returning.

There are more of these: Denying our pasts, imitating our pasts, inheriting our past, but they all share a common theme: Not dealing with a past event that keeps us from moving forward—from making positive changes in our lives. And while I’m talking mostly about individuals, I think institutions are often subjected to the same thing. Even churches. When a church cannot forgive itself of past mistakes, when it cannot take an honest look at its errors or tragic circumstances, when a church cannot look at its past with clear eyes and simply acknowledge what occurred, then that church has a difficult time moving forward. It remains mired in the past, unable to propel itself into a future of hope and love. And a big part of moving forward is thinking about how we write our story of our past for others. If we are constantly dredging up old hurts and perceived wrongs in front of people who are reading our story for the first time, well how does that reflect the Gospel? How is that Good News?

In roughly year 57 of the Common Era, St. Paul writes to a church in Corinth suffering from just this very malady. The burgeoning church in Corinth was suffering from financial and political woes. It had become mired in its own worries and had forgotten its very reason for being: A proclaimer of the Good News of Jesus Christ. Paul writes to Corinth and says: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” To me, Paul is telling us “the old that has gone” is the old, selfish desires of a self-centered life. The “new that is here” is the inner changes that occur when our thoughts and ambitions are no longer centered on ourselves, but on the bigger world—on the Beloved Community of Right Relationships that Jesus taught about.

That is the Good News. That is the Gospel that each of us is writing, each day that we claim to be Christians. It has nothing to do with doctrine and dogma and everything to do with building the Beloved Community of Right Relationships right here and right now. Each day of our lives are blank pages on which to write our interpretation of the Gospel. Your interpretation of the Gospel is probably different from mine and that’s okay. The more I work with these texts, the more I find that interpretation matters much more than we have ever been led to believe. And the responsibility to be good interpreters lies with each of us.

Edith Lovejoy Pierce, the 20^th Century poet and pacifist wrote these words: “We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day.”  As you complete the sacred of task of turning the pages of your calendar or day planner and begin to fill your hours and your days with the responsibilities and tasks and duties of your life, make sure to make a little time for play. Make sure to make a little time for worship and prayer and meditation. Make sure to plan a little time for your family and your friends. Each page you fill in your calendar reflects the life that you live. These three hundred and sixty some pages extending before us in 2016 are pages of opportunity. Myriad opportunities for us to better build the Beloved Community. Is there a mission or outreach that fills you with passion? An idea that inspires you to action? Let’s get together and flesh it out. We should be a community of 300 plus ministries. Each one of you active in our shared ministries and passionate about the ministry that lights your fire—the thing that ignites within you the spark of light and love. Is it working with our homeless community? Robin and I can hook you up with the right resources! Is it helping our communities’ poor families? I can think of a dozen places for you to serve off the top of my head. Do you have a desire to help more with our Hygiene Pantry? We can get you in touch with the people who will put you to work. Do you want help young gay and transgendered people navigate this complex world that often doesn’t seem to give them a break? I got you covered! Reach out to me and Robin in the coming days and we will find you a place to serve.

The days that stretch ahead of us this year offer plenty of opportunities for us to write the Gospel and to maybe get it right. The coming days and weeks and months offer us so many opportunities to better live in Right relationship with one and another. I’m grateful for this church and this congregation and thank God for the opportunities that lie before us in the coming New Year.

Amen

Please stand if you are able and sing the traditional tune, Auld Lang Syne.

My first year in seminary

So..I haven't posted in over a year and I have an EXCELLENT excuse. I started seminary at Phillips Theological Seminary last year and my life has been extremely busy. I'll post more soon, I promise!

Pax,
Paul

My latest sermon--given Sunday, March 16, 2014 at University Congregational Church, Wichita, Kansas

Paul Jackson

University Congregational Church

March 16, 2014

The Last Week: Tuesday

Tuesdays are odd days, aren’t they?  They don’t have the historical dread that Mondays seem to hold for us and there really is none of the joy about them that Fridays have.  Tuesdays don’t even have a fun nickname like the ones we give to Wednesdays and Thursdays: Hump Day and Little Friday.  I don’t have to elaborate on Saturday, because everyone loves Saturday-- and we all know that Sunday is the day we dress up a bit and come to the little white church with the steeple in North East Wichita.

Well, the Tuesday that Jesus experienced in his last week-- His last Tuesday-- was the busiest day of His last week—at least according to Mark’s Gospel.  Mark fills almost three chapters with 115 verses making Tuesday the longest day in Mark’s story of Jesus’ last week.  About two-thirds of the day’s accounting are stories of conflict with the temple and temple authorities and their associates.   The remaining third deals with the coming destruction of the temple and Jerusalem and with the coming of the Son of Man, all of which are in their very near future.

So, I’d like to start at the beginning of that day.  Robin’s in Israel.  I’ll try to have you out of here by 1:45 or so.  Jesus’ last week—Paul’s last sermon.  When Robin and I were discussing this sermon series and the fact that I’d be delivering two of them during her absence, we both agreed that the first temptation of a new seminarian would be to tackle the entire day.  That one should hit on every parable and utterance from this important Tuesday.  And we both agreed that would be a mistake.  This entire sermon is my take on this part of Jon Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg’s book, The Last Week—What the Gospels Really Teach about Jesus’ Final Days in Jerusalem.  Ready?  Here we go!

At 5:05 am on that Tuesday, Jesus’ alarm went off.  He hit the snooze button three times (twice according to Matthew)…

Actually—we have a series of parables and stories that provide insight into Jesus’ conflicts with the temple authorities and the brilliant way in which he handled each situation.  First there’s a situation involving the temple authorities’ questioning Jesus’ authority to even be present in the temple. Jesus handles the Sadducees and Chief Priests and Scribes deftly by challenging their devotion to John the Baptist (who was immensely popular at the time).  Then Jesus tells the parable of the greedy tenants.  It’s a complex parable involving a vineyard and tenants who rob the landlord’s messengers and rent collectors and kill his son. 

After this bit of exhausting teaching, Jesus had his morning tea (well, Luke and John disagree on this—Luke says it was a rich coffee blend, perhaps  from Starbucks, but John is certain it was tea-- me, I like the new scholarship that supports the Coke Zero Theory, but I digress…). 

Anyway, after his morning break he gets right back to work and is accosted by the Pharisees again with another trick question involving the payment of taxes. This is the part where Jesus’ utters his famous “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s” speech. Good stuff, there.  Right after that, Mark tells us that the Sadducees question Jesus if God is of the living or if God is of the Dead. I’ll let you read that one for yourselves.  It is way above my limited theological understanding.

Then Jesus had lunch.  We don’t know all of the details, but a document was recently uncovered at Nag Hammadi that scholars tell us was an American Express receipt signed by Jesus.  He even put a pithy little quote by the total amount due.  Something to do with the waiter’s pledge.  They’re still working on the translation.

After lunch Jesus answers one of the scribes questions about which commandment is the greatest commandment—Jesus deflects that one brilliantly, doesn’t he?—it’s the traditional word in your bulletin if you want the full account—and then Jesus attacks the scribes about their teaching and practices.

Finally, he spends the rest of the day preaching about the coming destruction of the temple and the “little apocalypse” that is imminent.  The “big apocalypse”, is of course, found in Revelation, but this “little apocalypse” is Jesus’ admonition to us to be wary that no one leads us astray—think false prophets and teachers—he tells us to flee to the mountains—and he says to “keep alert—watch—keep awake”. 

That’s a pretty busy Tuesday.  I’d be lucky to get even that first temple authority question resolved by 5 PM on a good Tuesday.

OK—So I digressed a little bit.  The tea and lunch comments are not biblical.  But I think it’s important to remember that Jesus would have needed a rest during this busy, busy day.  He was, after all, a human being.

Let’s go back to Monday for a minute:  Remember Monday of The Last Week?  Robin told us last Sunday of the two parables that were framed in Mark’s Gospel: The cursing of the fig tree and the over-turning of the money changer’s tables.  And she carefully reminded us that when the church (or religious authority of the day) puts anything above justice, God rejects it.  God rejects it again and again.  Then on Tuesday, we have Jesus’ followers comment, first thing, on the fig tree from Monday.  They basically say, look, a dead fig tree.  You cursed it and it died.  Nice work.

So now on Tuesday we have the religious authorities of the day challenging Jesus on any number of topics—his authority, his pedigree, his theology, and his stand on Roman taxation—lots of challenges.  And at each obstacle, Jesus turns the tables back on the inquisitors.  He reminds them that their beloved John the Baptist baptized him—so he has the right to be present in the temple.  We have him bluntly saying that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul AND to love your neighbor as you love yourself.

Then we have Jesus starkly and simply addressing perennial church/state issues with his “give unto Caesar” statement.  And all of this verbal repartee is transpiring in and around the temple I Jerusalem.

I think we could call this Tuesday of The Last Week—Temple Tuesday, (there’s our new nickname)—because it all revolves around the importance of the temple in Jewish society and everything event that happened on this day, took place in, or near, the temple in Jerusalem.  The temple would have been filled with pilgrims from all over the region--visiting the big city for the Passover celebration that is already in full swing.  The temple would be teeming with people.

And let’s look at the temple.  The temple played an important role in daily Jewish life.  Religious faith was the central part of Jewish life in first century Palestine. Many of their daily activities were based around fulfilling the commandments that are found in the Torah.

In the time of Jesus, Jewish life and culture centered on the Temple—actually, in this case, the second Temple, which had been rebuilt by Herod the Great after the first Temple, Solomon’s Temple, was destroyed in 587 BCE. Crowds of people thronged in and out of the Temple every day, making ritual animal sacrifices to atone for particular sins, this was another common practice for Jewish people of the time.

So what if you didn’t belong to the club?  What if you were not born Jewish? Where is your justice? How do you atone for your sins? How to gain access to “God”?  There were other religions at the time, but the Jews held hegemony in Jerusalem at this time and would do so up until AD 70 when this second temple was destroyed.

When one approached The Temple in Jerusalem, everyone encountered a giant stop sign, called the temple warning.  It was a big slab of limestone with large, red letters that said this:

“Let No Gentile Enter within the partition and barrier surrounding the temple; whosoever is caught shall be responsible for his subsequent death.”

Gentiles were excluded from the temple and all temple rites and rituals and privileges. The temple warning is pretty clear.  But is this just?   Is the temple a place of justice?  For that matter, is the church a place of justice? Remember, we’re clearly told about Monday of the Last Week that anything the church does that does not include justice is rejected by God.

So who’s excluded from our temple? Who’s excluded from the full participation of life in our church?  In other churches in Town?  In THE church in America? In the world-wide church?  Is it the poor? Is it the illiterate? Is it the boorish?  Is it the disfigured?  Is it folks with tattoos?  Is it folks who love differently than you?  Folks who think differently than you?

Would our hygiene pantry families feel welcome at UCC?  Or would they encounter a big red-lettered slab at our driveway? 

I like to think we’d welcome them with open arms.  I like to think we’d really hear Jesus telling us that the greatest commandment is to love our neighbors as ourselves.

What about you?  Are you excluded?  Where can you not go?  Where can you not eat?  Not shop? Not pray? Where would you not feel justice?

Mark, in his Gospel, tells of the imminent return of the Son of Man—that Jesus would return to the early Christians in their lifetime—this was their fervent belief and hope.  And it didn’t happen.  It still hasn’t happened.  At least in a literal sense.  Crossan and Borg argue, and I agree, that the second coming of Jesus will triumph—through us, despite the “tumult and resistance of this world.”  The struggle goes on—and each of us, each day, when we choose to live in right relationship with each other, when we choose to do the right thing… when we act out of confidence and enduring hope--each of us embodies the spirit of Jesus Christ. 

Is the church the Second Coming of Jesus?  Are we living His return on a daily basis?

Who knew that a mere Tuesday could catalyze such change in the world?  Who would’ve ever thought a plain, old, boring Tuesday would hold such revolutionary ideas in it?  The seeds of justice.

Keep alert—watch—keep awake—lest we slip into the delusion that we, and we alone, belong in the temple, in the church, and that there are others out there who do not.  I know of a radical Jewish man who might have a few choice words for you.

Amen