Slowtu B. Leave and Bishop W.G. Mildew

First Presbyterian Church, Clarks Summit, PA is one of many congregations that observe Holy Humor Sunday the week after Easter.  What follows below is A Chancel Drama co-written and presented by Jim Thyren and Bill Carter.  It followed a scripture reading from the Gospel of John, Chapter 20, verses 19-24.

HOLY HALITOSIS!

Nate:    There are some conversations that didn’t get written in the Bible. And this might be one of them…between the disciples Nathanael and Thomas. 

Nate:    Thomas, where have you been? We’ve all been hanging out together.

Tom:    Nathanael, I didn’t think that was such a great idea. I mean, if Judas told the authorities where to find us, don’t you think he gave them this location too?  Rounding you all up would be like netting fish in a barrel. So I decided to make myself scarce until things calmed down as the Passover celebrations drew to their close. 

Nate:    “Well, turns out they didn’t come after us, but you did miss a very important visitor.”

Tom:    “And who might that be?

Nate:    “Jesus.”

Tom:    Who?

Nate:    Jesus

Tom:    Say that again!

Nate:    Jesus!

Tom:    No way!

Nate:    Yes, the Way himself! I am telling the Truth. Our Life depends on it.

Tom:    Okay, start from the beginning. Tell me everything that happened.

Nate:     Well, you know how he is. He just showed up. Didn’t knock on the door…or use it that                         matter.He was just suddenly standing there, and the first thing he said was: “Peace be with                     you…”

Tom:     Peace? You mean the whole Shalom Alechem thing? That was his favorite greeting. Most                     people say good morning, or hi, or yo. Always Jesus loved to say “peace be with you.”
     
Nate:     Still does, apparently. Just like that night when he washed our feet. Remember that?

Tom:      Of course I do.

Nate:      “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you…:

Tom:     Well, he didn’t leave us with a lot of peace that night. I still have nightmares of the whole                     evening: Judas selling him out, Peter swinging the sword, the soldiers arresting him, the trials,
             the crowds wanting Barabbas instead of the Lord – and then the way the whole thing ended.
            Too much for me to take. I can’t sleep.

Nate:      Tom, he’s back. 

Tom:      What do you mean he’s back?

Nate:      He’s alive. Breathing. Looking better than ever.

Tom:      Nate, he may have pegged you as a man without deceit,
               but that doesn’t mean you can’t be deceived.

Nate:      No, Tom, he’s here.

Tom:      Where?

Nate:     Well, here… I guess he’s wherever he wants to be.

Tom:      I find this impossible to believe. And I’ve about seen it all.

Nate:      He showed us the holes in his hands and his side.

Tom:      (pause). You’re kidding.

Nate:      His wounds…from the crucifixion.

Tom:      Ghosts don’t have wounds.

Nate:      He’s not a ghost. Just like that night he sauntered across the water and jumped into the boat.
               Scared the life out of us, remember?
               I’m talking about Jesus, the real Jesus. Same Jesus. Same wounds in his wrists, same wounds                   in his ankles, and that big gash in his side. Remember?  John and the women told us all about                that one.

Tom:     Well, so much of this week’s stories come to us second hand. I still don’t believe it.

Nate:    I understand. The rest of us are stunned, too. But it’s the same Jesus – alive! The wounds are                 the same that he endured last Friday. Inescapable! It took us a while to comprehend what we                 were seeing. Peter looked into his pomegranate juice, wondering if it was fermented. Andrew                 stammered, couldn’t find his words. James and John stood on each side of him to get a better                 look. Jesus laughed and said, “Stop staring.” The whole time, Mary Magdalene is over at the                 table, saying: “I told you so. I told you so.”

Tom:      She can be so annoying. And this all sounds so impossible.

Nate:      You know what they say: Nothing is impossible with God.

Tom:     Yeah, but God is so invisible. I just can’t grasp any of this. Weren’t you all afraid?

Nate:      Of course, we were. That’s why we were in that room. That’s why we locked the door.

Tom:      Wait – the door was locked? Are you sure you weren’t seeing a ghost?

Nate:      Listen, I saw him sneaking a piece of pita bread and dipping it in the hummus.

Tom:      This is inconceivable.

Nate:    Oh, I know. We were scared to death – of him, of his enemies, and then he has the audacity to                say Shalom Alechem – peace be with all you. And it was him. I’d recognize that Voice                            anywhere. Never thought I’d hear it again. And there he was. And suddenly the laughter started             bubbling up in our bellies. We were beside ourselves with joy. James and John were first. They                 started hootin’ and hollerin’ and stomping just like a thunderstorm. Mary Magdalene laughed so              hard she farted. Matthew said, “Shh! Somebody is going to hear us.” Jesus waved him off, not a              care in the world. Then he said a second time, “Shalom Alechem – peace be with all of you.”                 This time, it wasn’t a greeting. It was a gift.

Tom:    Well, good for you. I’m glad you had that…experience.
            But do you think I can make any sense of this?

Nate:    I tell you, Thomas, the room had changed. I don’t know how that happened. But the Word he                 spoke, it was like the first light of dawn, breaking through the gloom – yet inside that locked                 room. Peace, peace…in the middle of all that has happened. Later on, after he departed, Philip                 said, “It’s just as he promised, his peace is different than any peace the world can give. He’s                     alive, Thomas. Alive! That’s the truth of it. And that’s why the peace is so different, so real. It’s              peace that stays with us. I saw him, the peace is still with me.

Tom:    Well, good for you. It always came easier for you than for me. I tell you, unless I can poke my                 finger in his wounds and touch them myself, I’m not going to give into any of this. I need more              proof.

Nate:     But wait, there’s more!

Tom:     I think you’ve told me enough.

Nate:      Oh, wait ‘til you hear this. He lifted his hands and told us to get on with our work.

Tom:      What?!

Nat:      He said, “As the Father sent me, so I send all of you.”

Tom:     Where?

Nat:      What do you mean, ‘where’?

Tom:      Where is he sending us?

Nate:    Didn’t specify. Or rather, didn’t limit where we should go. But listen: how many times did he                 tell us and others that the Father had sent him?
 Tom:    Never kept track. Hundred times, maybe? It was a lot.

Nate:     “As the Father sent me, so I send you…”

Tom:      Well, that’s a bit troubling. Does he expect us to get arrested, beaten up, and crucified, just like                 him?

Nate:     Oh, Thomas, get your head out of the dirt. Have you remembered nothing? How he lifted the                 little boy in Cana from his death bed? How he asked us to feed that huge, hungry crowd? How                 he took on all the nonsense of those dim-headed religious leaders? How he lived with us,                         laughed with us, challenged us – and how he kept forgiving us, leading us into the truth and life             every step of the Way?

Tom:    I thought all of that got buried with him, that the whole movement was over.

Nate:     Not if he is alive again. He’s come to tell us to get on with his work. “As the Father sent me,”                 he said, “so I send all of you.”

Tom:    Well, good for all of you. I wasn’t there. Sorry I missed all of that.
            And I tell you, not only do I doubt he’s alive, I doubt any of us could do his work like he did it.

Nate:    Oh, Thomas. I’ll tell you one thing more. He showed up in a locked room, he wished us peace,                 he gave us peace, he showed us his wounds, and then – he took a big breath and puffed on us.

Tom:     He…what?

Nate:      He breathed on us…

Tom:      What did his breath smell like? Fish? Stale Passover wine? Like he hadn’t brushed his teeth in                three days? Holy Halitosis!

Nate:   Oh, Thomas, ever the skeptic. As he breathed, he said, “Receive the Holy Ruach – the breath,                the wind, the Spirit.” Right in our faces, a “breathe on me breath of God” moment. I was taken                back to the beginning, when the Father scooped up some mud, formed an earth creature, and                    breathed life into its nostrils, and said, “Let there be Adam.” And I remembered dem bones,                    dem bones, dem dry bones, when all of Israel’s hope had been slaughtered. And God asked                    Ezekiel, “Can these bones live again?” Then God blew the breath, the holy wind, and the ankle                bone connected to the shank bone, and the shank bone connected to the knee bone, and all those             bones started dancing. It was because of the breath, the Holy wind, the Spirit of the Living God.             It brings us alive – and Jesus breathed it on us.

Tom:    What is that breath like?

Nate:    It was earthy, pungent and fertile, kind of sweet and kind of strong. It smells like the scent of the              first daffodils on a morning in Spring, the smell of a charcoal fire on an Autumn evening. It is                 invigorating, bracing like a winter wind or the summer breeze that fills the sail and powers a                 boat across the water.

Tom:     Well, I don’t know. Sounds like you were in the right place at the right time, if, in fact, all of                 this is true.  But I wasn’t there. I can’t be sure.

Nate:     Oh, Thomas, sweet, thoughtful Thomas, I agree it was a “had to be there” moment. But I’ll tell               you this. Since Jesus is alive, since he can come and go where and how he wishes, there’s a                     very good chance he’s listening in on this conversation. He could show up at any moment, in                 any place, but he’s not going to sit around and wait to show us proof. He sends us to get on with              life – his life – and to share that life with everybody we meet, loving, forgiving, offering                         ourselves to the needs of the world. He breathes that life on us, into us, through us, in spite of                 us, ahead of us… He’s alive. He’s still breathing…

Tom:      I don’t know what to say…
              I guess I wish that I could feel some of that Spirit breath, too.

Nate:     Be careful what you wish for. In any case, it’s been a week since we saw him Why don’t you                  stop by for dinner tonight? You know the place. Knock three times. We’ll let you in, and we’ll               lock the door behind you.

Tom:      Can I bring anything?

Nate:      Just an open mind…and an available heart.
                                                                                                    Written by Bill Carter and Jim Thyren,                                                                                                                 April 2023

 Let Loose to Live  -  A Sermon based on John 11. 1-45, preached on March 26, 2023 at                                                           Covenant Presbyterian Church, Scranton, PA

       There is a special place in my heart and soul for the story of the raising of Lazarus.  My very first attempt at a Sermon was based on this text.  It was the last week of July in the summer of 1973 in Oregon. I was two thirds of the way through my first job in ministry as Youth Director of the Brookings Presbyterian Church. The pastor, John Lacy, had been Student Assistant at my home church in New Jersey while he was in seminary.  He had been foolish enough to write to invite a 20 year-old rising college junior to drive across the country to direct an Adventurer’s Club for elementary kids, and youth groups for Junior High and High School students.

            By the time I stood in the pulpit on the last Sunday in July, I had been climbing a learning curve as steep as the mountains to the east of that lovely little town on the Oregon coast just above the California border.  I had scrapes and bruises from the times I slipped up and fell on my face repeatedly as I learned that doing ministry wasn’t as easy as it looked.  My missteps were sometimes well-intentioned. My wounds were often self-inflicted.  Looking back I count it as good fortune to have been mentored by a friend who knew from his own experience “nobody ever said it would be easy.” He had occasion to tell me that often.

            So there I was living on the bluffs overlooking the Pacific one year after my high school sweetheart told me to on a Cape Cod beach that it was time to part ways. There I was about four weeks from the moment I first laid eyes on a blue-eyed blond in bellbottom jeans and platform shoes, who fourteen months later would say “yes” when I asked her to be my wife.  In between had been a rocky rebound year with low-lights in attitude and behavior and poor decision making best summed up by the New Year’s afternoon when I stumbled down from my bedroom and my father offered me an antidote for having been over served the night before. He made me a mixed drink: Alka-Seltzer and water.  It was all uphill from there.

            Caring friends, old and new, those with whom I shared a house, and others who came along at just the right time, helped me move from what had been to what might be.  When John’s letter came inviting me West, I jumped at the chance.  Driving across the country in a Chevy Vega in those gas-shortage days, with the added danger of an extra one gallon can of gas tucked in the trunk, brought me to a place where a fresh set of adults in the Brookings church were waiting to help me learn and grow and discover what Frederick Buechner calls “a self to be.”[i]

            Perhaps that’s why, when I chose to preach on the raising of Lazarus my focus was on the ending, where the once dead man shuffles out of the tomb. Jesus directed those looking on to set him free from the grave clothes that bound him.  Some of those who let me loose, I’ve been able to thank…others are long gone…and the best I can do is to take my thanks to the Lord and ask him to pass them on.

I went down into the archives housed in our basement one day and pulled out the manuscript of that nearly fifty-year-old sermon.  Its pages are yellowed, some are tattered. The sermon bears marks of indecision in the age before computers and the blessed gifts called “cut and paste,” and “scalable fonts.”  Part of it is typewritten in all CAPITAL LETTERS, the unevenness of key strike on page is evident, as is the worn ribbon signature of the old typewriter that sat on the table in the furnace room that served as my office that summer.  The rest is handwritten in black felt-tipped ink.  My final edits are revealed by pages sliced on a paper cutter and scotch-taped together, one paragraph typed, the next two in my own flowing script.

            The first page was once page 10.  The first four lines are crossed out.  Three paragraphs follow recounting a message placed in a church bulletin by an Episcopal priest. It was a cute variation of the old frog kissed by a princess story. It reflected on what it must feel like to be a frog and recalled those times when anyone of us might feel like a frog: “slow, low, ugly, puffy, drooped, pooped.”[ii] Then it retold the frog in need of a kiss story complete with the princess who set the handsome prince free.  It ended with this: “So what is the task of the church? To kiss frogs of course.”

            My sermon went on to make a connection between the frogs all around us in need of a kiss and the direction by Jesus to unbind Lazarus and let him go.  I had quotes from mid-twentieth century pulpiteer Harry Emerson Fosdick and an unbinding story from the then noted and respected Presby-terian professor and author Robert McAffee Brown.  I added a story from one of my boyhood heroes who died the year before from ALS, then known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. 

Wrapping it all up, the sermon ended with an observation and a quote I still love to share:  “It is at the person-al level where the love that Christ has given us is to be passed on.  It has been said that “Christianity is like electricity: it can’t enter a person unless it can pass through.”[iii]

            Well, it is slightly less than fifty years later and a lot of life has happened in the meantime.  To focus on the end of the Lazarus story where the community is called upon to complete the work begun by Christ still holds up well.  That said, there is so much more in the story to help us live as followers of Jesus, who show our love for God by loving our neighbors..

            The story of Lazarus begins by mapping out a web of relationships. There was a man who was ill. His name was Lazarus. He had sisters you will recognize from stories in the other gospels, Martha and Mary.  Lazarus and his sisters knew Jesus and he knew them. We know this because of the message the sisters sent to Jesus when Lazarus fell ill: “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” The bond between Jesus, Lazarus and the sisters is underlined by the curious note about Jesus’ response to that news:  “…though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.” (vv. 5-6).

            The delay of Jesus will be mentioned three more times in the course of the storytelling, indicating that it was a feature we ought to think about.  Much as we would like others to drop everything and run to be by our side in a time of crisis or sadness, there are often other commitments that get in the way, other responsibilities not easily shunted to the side. We may have to be understanding when it seems another is taking their sweet time.

            Scholars suggest there is something deeper to discover about the delay.  The late Fred Craddock noted that in the Gospel of John “Jesus acts according to his own time and not according to external pressures. For example, Jesus separates himself from his mother before acting at the wedding feast at Cana.”[iv]  We are often reminded of the difference between God’s timetable and our own. If nothing else, as one writer puts it, the incident “is instructive in the sense that even these beloved disciples cannot snap their fingers expectantly and have their wish fulfilled in the manner they desire.”[v] That is something for us to remember when we are storming God’s throne with our requests. That’s when we need to take a page from the Psalm 130:

“I wait for the Lord; my soul waits,

and in his word I hope.” (Ps. 130.5)

            How disappointing it must have been for Martha and Mary when Lazarus died before Jesus arrived. The one they trusted, the one who had helped others, the one they reached out to in their time of need didn’t get there in time. Their respect for and admiration of Jesus can’t hide their disappoint-ment when each sister greets Jesus:

            “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died!  What we hear beneath their words is the very recognizable stage of grief where the human heart erupts in statements beginning with the words, “If only…”  “If only the cancer had been detected sooner.” “If only she had stayed off those icy roads that night.”  “If only we had taken his sadness seriously.” You get the picture. Mary and Martha had done their part. They sent for Jesus.  He hadn’t come in time. Now there was nothing he could do.

            Or was there?  Significantly, neither Martha nor Mary turn and walk away from Jesus.  Martha keeps the conversation going, even indicating she has a glimmer of hope he might be able to do some-thing. “Even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” This leads to talk of resur-rection and eternal life.  Martha talks about them as something the Pharisees taught happened in the future.Jesus insists they happen in the present, when a person places their trust in him.

            In God’s good time, Jesus gets on the road against the objections of his disciples. When he sets a course for Bethany, (which by the way, means “house of affliction”)[vi], the disciples recoil knowing it will put Jesus’ own life in jeopardy. After some deep and easily misunderstood dialogue about going to wake up his friend, Jesus goes anyway.  Joseph Dayam describes his choice this way:  “He resolutely sets his face toward Bethany to show his oneness with the suf-fering family, to share their tears, and thereby to bring about life.”[vii] Urged on by Thomas, the disciples go with Jesus to do the right thing.

Despite their fears, the disciples followed Jesus to Bethany. There they discovered they were not the only ones who had come to grieve and console the sisters on the loss of their brother.  Others had come to Bethany to sit with Martha and Mary in the time honored tradition that continues today.  The doorbell rings and a neighbor drops off a cake or a casserole. The visitation at the funeral home alter-nates between laughter and tears as stories are shared in the receiving line.  Well-chosen words are helpful but not necessary; being there means so much more. The ministry of presence is powerful even when not a word is spoken, or when most of what you do is listen.

            Read through the story again and notice the kindness of Jesus. He absorbs the questions and disappointment of the sisters in ways that respect their differing personalities.  There are lots of words as Martha’s faith seeks understanding. There’s a flood of tears, even from Jesus, as Mary’s broken heart is on full display.  We are seeing “the Word” who became flesh expressing the anger and emotion of his own breaking heart.

            Then, when his tears are dried, Jesus shows Martha what he meant when he said “I am the resurrection and the life.”  Lazarus is called forth, and must participate in his own resurrection. Lazarus is not, on that day at least, ushered into the many-roomed house of God on high. He’s enabled to live again that day, and the next, which is what the here-and-now gift of eternal life is really all about.

            Twenty-five years ago I bought the purple stole I am wearing in a little gift shop a few steps down the street from the entrance to the tomb of Lazarus in Bethany. Only minutes before I had viewed the place from which Lazarus wiggled his way out when the Good Shepherd called his name.

            It is a small space, and being none too fond of confined places, I chose not to take my turn and limbo my way into the cave.  On another day, Barbara Brown Taylor visited the same spot and descended into the hole from which Lazarus emerged.  She describes climbing out like this: “There is only one way to do it: head first, with your upper body already out while your feet are still finding the three small steps—looking up as you straighten up, trying not to scrape your back.”[viii]

            Reflecting on the experience in a sermon, Taylor said: “If it really is Lazarus’s tomb, then he did not come out of it like a man walking out of prison. He came out of it like a baby being born again—first his poor wrapped face, then his bandaged hands, and finally his feet.”[ix]

            “Like a baby being born again!” Hmm! A couple of years before Jesus told Nicodemus “No one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” Nicodemus came to Jesus at night at-tracted by the light of the world.  As Jesus calls Lazarus out of darkness and into the light, we are allowed to witness what being born from above looks like, not only in Lazarus, but in his sisters, and in those who came to believe in him that day.

            What we also see is that being born from above, like being born the first time, is not easy.  It is a life-changing event that is more than a little messy, comes with no small amount of pain, and puts a strain on relationships as everyone adjusts to what is new.  And as in the case of the child emerging from the womb, who is cared for by physician, nurse, midwife or dula, those who receive the new life in Christ require assistance.

            So, we are back to the part of the story I focused on in Oregon fifty years ago. Veronice Miles writes eloquently of our frog-kissing, bandage unwrapping responsibility toward those Jesus brings back to life.  She says:

            “Resurrected women, men and children today also require caring communities that are willing to nurture and strengthen them until they are able to walk alone; to remove the grave clothes of self-doubt, social isolation, marginalization, and oppression; to tear away the fear, anxiety, loss and grief, so that unbound women, men and children might walk in dignity and become creative agents in the world.”[x]

            Jesus still calls the dead from their living deaths.

 Jesus still calls on those nearby to help finish the job.

A refugee family lands in a strange city in a new country and church folk provide a roof over their heads, food to eat, a table to serve it on, & help to learn a new language.

One called from the tomb of substance abuse is helped along by the others who sip strong coffee in the give and  take of the circle of support provided by 12-step program.

            A young person brought low by shattered dreams and destructive decisions, is let loose to live by people of faith who offer encouragement and guidance in response to the command of Jesus.

            What a gift it is to proclaim with the Psalmist:

People of God “hope in the Lord!

For with the Lord there is steadfast love,

and with him is great power to redeem

[i] Frederick Buechner, The Sacred Journey, (New York, HarperSanFrancisco, 1982) p. 72
[ii] Apologies…the book from which this was taken…was lost in the 2011 flood of the Susquehanna River. The frog story was widely used in the early 70’s. Thinking it came from one of the Word Publishing books of that era by one of the “Faith at Work” authors.
[iii] No clue where that one came from…do your own Google search!
[iv] Fred B. Craddock, “A Twofold Death and Resurrection (Jn. 11. 25-26) The Christian Century, March 21-28, p. 299, copyright by the Christian Century Foundation and used by permission.
[v] Stephen P. Bauman, Feasting on the Gospels, John, Vol. 2, Chapters 10-21, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2015), p. 42
[vi] Joseph Prabhakar Dayam, Feasting on the Gospels, John, Vol. 2, Chapters 10-21, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2015), p. 42
[vii] ibid. p. 44
[viii] Barbara Brown Taylor, “The Dress Rehearsal,” God in Pain, Teaching Sermons on Suffering, Nashville, TN: Abingdon Pres, 1998), p. 66
[ix] ibid.
[x] Veronice Miles, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 2, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), p. 144

Notes from Night School and Beyond – A Sermon based on John 3. 1-17 – preached on March 3, 2023 at First Presbyterian Church, Clarks Summit, PA 

       I stand before you as a recovering Pharisee. My name is Nicodemus.  I was a teacher in Jerusalem, and took pride in my ability to understand and interpret the Word of God as it came to us  in the scrolls of the Torah, the Prophets, and the Books of Wisdom.  I was well versed in the teachings of the rabbis who debated the proper ways to live faithfully. Even so, I was always ready to discover new truths, and hungry to fill an emptiness all my learning failed to satisfy.

            And so it was that I found myself one night seeking out a new rabbi who showed up in the city just before the Passover.  Believe you me, he made quite a scene when he entered the temple.  He marched right in like he owned the place. He went to the spot where animals were sold for sacrifice. Grabbing some strands of rope, he cracked them above the sheep and cattle, and without touching their flesh sent them stampeding into the street.

            Coins clanged on the stones as he turned over the tables of the money changers. Pigeons and doves flew the coop.  In the quiet after all the commotion he shouted: “Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”

            Someone stood up to challenge him: “What sign can you give for doing this?” Said he: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”

What an audacious claim!  Our Temple rebuilding project was in its forty-sixth year. Thousands of workers had labored to build this monument of praise to God.  There was no way one man could build it in a mere 3 days!

            For the rest of the week we kept our eye on him. We watched what he did. We listened to what he said. There was power behind his words. There was love displayed in the way he touched people. It was as if everything he did and said pointed beyond himself to God.

            Into the mix stories were poured of his teaching in synagogues up north.  “He doesn’t mince words,” someone said. Another added: “No hiding behind a wall of quotations for him.” He had been so bold as to claim that he had “come to fulfill the law.”

            We also heard reports of water turned to wine at a wedding at Cana, and healings per-formed along the way: A crazed man he’d spoken to became a model citizen. Lepers were left without lesions, blind eyes took in the sights, deaf ears let in the sound, and some who were lame no longer limped along.

            It was all quite puzzling. Everything about him became a subject for debate among us.  Was he a force to be reckoned with, or just another bright light that would fizzle out?  Should we celebrate him as a prophet who came from God, or denounce him as a fraud who did not?

            I was curious to know more. It felt like he had the piece I was missing …that something I hungered for.  So, I went to see him at night. Many of my colleagues were al-ready convinced he was a trouble-maker who needed to be silenced, so I had to be cautious about my curiosity.

            I greeted the teacher respectfully. What I couldn’t say in public, I said to him in private. Addressing him as his disciples did, I said.  “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher sent by God. No one could perform the miracles you are doing unless God were with him.”

            I was totally unprepared for his response. Yet the more I think back on it, I realize he cut through the fluff and got right to the heart of the matter.  What I wanted deep down was to gain entrance to this kingdom he talked about.  He told me what was necessary, but the way he said it was very much like a riddle. He said: “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”

            The curious thing about the word Jesus used about being born is that it can mean “from above,” or it can mean “again or anew.”  He meant it one way; I took it the other. Had anyone witnessed our discussion they would have said we were talking past each other.

            I know now he was saying the kingdom of God can’t be experienced without being “born from above.” That is, access to God is a gift that comes only to those who are open and receptive to a new beginning initiated by God. At the time, all I could hear was “No one can see the king-dom of God without being born again.” How preposterous. What a physical impossibility. As any infant would tell you if it could, one trip through the birth canal is plenty!

            When I pointed this out to him, my misunderstanding became an opportunity for the teacher to teach.  My protest led to a deeper explanation, the meaning of which I did not get at the time. As a teacher of Israel I should have remembered how often  God met impossible situ-ations with new possibilities. Think of Abraham and Sarah outfitting a nursery for Isaac, young David swinging a stone at Goliath, or Ezekiel encouraging exiles with a vision of a valley of dry bones brought to life by the breath of God.

            When I asked, “Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” His answer was this: “No one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.” That went right over my head. Now, long after his death and resurrection, I know he was talking about the waters of baptism and the empowering of the Holy Spirit.

              Have you noticed that some truths, like seeds, have to sink in, take root, and grow slowly before the heart and mind are ready to accept them?  He was telling me to be born from above has everything to do with the miraculous new start that comes as one accepts—all at once or gradually over time—that Jesus is the Son of God sent in love “not to condemn the world,” but to save it.

            He wasn’t talking about starting over from the beginning. He was talking about making a fresh start with the help of God’s Spirit.  He was talking about being open and trusting toward God.  My friend Mark helped me under-stand this. He told me about a day when some people tried to bring children to Jesus so he could bless them.  The disciples tried to head the kids off, but Jesus welcomed them and said, “I assure you that whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”

            A child is a marvelous creation. In its innocence a child learns to trust those who provide its care. Unencumbered by the so-called “laws of nature,” the child believes stories filled with impossible happenings and learn useful lessons.

            Instead of a story, Jesus spoke of the wind to teach me the ways of the Spirit.  You absolutely cannot see the wind. You can see the leaves of a tree shaken by it, you can hear the sound of it passing as it roars through its branches, but you can’t see the wind. You can’t see where it comes from or where it stops. All you can see is the evidence of its presence. It is the same with the Spirit. We can’t see it, but we can feel it and see the evidence of its presence.

            Truth be told, I was still in the dark as Jesus laid this lesson on me. “How can these things be?” I asked. To his credit Jesus did not dismiss me in disgust. Like many a wise teacher, he knew that even if I didn’t put it all together in one night’s class, time and reflection would allow his teaching to take hold.  The older I get, the more I have come to appreciate how often my “new” insights are the result of bits of learning pieced together over time.

            Reading my eyes to see I was still lost, Jesus switched to storytelling. He told a story he knew I would know from the time of Moses.  In the wilderness, the recently freed Hebrew slaves were in one of their “what has God done for us lately” moods. They accused Moses and God of bringing them out into the desert to die. Tired of their murmuring, God brought forth poisonous snakes to nip at their ankles and put an end to their complaining.

            Repenting of their short memory of God’s gracious gift of bread from heaven, some Israelites approached Moses confessing their sin. Moses prayed to God and God provided an antidote to the snake bites. The One who had forbidden Israel to make images of anything, commanded Moses to make a bronze snake, stick it on a pole, and lift it up where the people could see it.  Anyone bitten was told to look up at the snake. Despite the poison coursing through their bodies, they would live.

            Even though I knew the story, what Jesus said about it next made no sense to me at the time. He said “…just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” Who could have guessed what he meant. But on the day he died, when Joseph of Arimethea and I came to claim the body of Jesus, I looked up at the cross and chills ran up  my spine.

            I’ve thought about his words and that moment a lot. His words start me thinking about where or to whom I look for help and guidance. The people who inhabited the land before us looked up the hilltops where they built shrines to the various gods they worshiped. From cradle to cross and beyond, Jesus sets our sights higher, as did the psalmist who wrote: “Our help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth.” (Psalm 121. 2)

            The Hebrews who looked up at the serpent were given the gift of life.  As we know now, those who look up at the cross of Jesus and believe him to be the Son God sent to save, are given what Jesus called “eternal life.” Jesus spoke of it the night I visited him. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.”

            Some people claim that “eternal life” starts after you die. But that doesn’t fit with a lot of what Jesus taught. He spoke of eternal life as beginning when you first believe. He said, “I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly.” He never said you have to wait for it. Eternal life is about more than life after death. It is about is living in the presence of God here and now, now and always—even when it doesn’t seem to be so.

            There are days when my faith is as strong as the walls of Jerusalem; but there are others when it is as fragile as a clay pot.  Some nights, after a full day of surprise blessings, I think to myself, ‘no way I’ll ever forget this.’ Comes the next day, full of unexpected challenges, and you would think I’d never heard of God or Jesus or the Spirit’s helpful presence.  But strong or weak, confident or confused, what I learned that night holds true: God is for us, not against us.  As Jesus told me that night, “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

            Just like Jesus took time to lead me from curiosity toward commitment, God is patient about allowing us the time to receive his Word, take it into our hearts, and choose to live in the ways he taught us to. 

Being born from above brings no exemption from life’s trials, but it does guarantee help for those who seek it. There are times when I still ask for God’s help to get through a dark passage. Yet not a day goes by when I am not thankful for the gift of eternal life. And how would I describe this most wonderful of gifts? God’s presence is with us always.  My own words don’t quite do it justice, so I’ll borrow words from one of David’s psalms. Speaking about what God does for the faithful, David captures what makes me treasure this gift:

The Lord will keep you from all evil;

he will keep your life.

The Lord will keep your going out

and your coming in

from this time on and forever more.

(Psalm 121. 7-8)

Amen!

 Graveside Devotions

The sun was a welcome companion

on my daily circuit of the paths 

in our township’s lovely little park.

Across the road a cemetery’s rutted lanes

provide an alternate route to travel

between rows of graves both ancient and new.

As I traversed the park footpath

beside a flowing stream

crushed stones crunching beneath my feet

a car pulled into the graveyard

and came to a stop

a few car lengths from the road.

A man emerged and cautiously stepped

on the crusty remnants

of a recent dusting of snow.

Beyond the first row of stones

he did and about face and bowed his head.

I looked away out of respect for his private moment of grief or gratitude.

Following the turn of the trail,

I wondered whose memory brought him to that place:

wife or mother, father or brother, sister, co-worker, friend?

Then came to mind “all the saints

who from their labors rest”

whose lives brought blessings my way.

 

As the Pages Drop 

In the movies or on TV in the old days

the passage of time

was marked by

pages falling from a calendar on the wall.

As the last page of this year

is about to drop

the mind pauses

to review what was written on each completed page.

Gratitude arises for accomplishments:

the list of books read

challenges overcome

repurposed wood as bridge, ramp, shed & widgets.

Contemplation continues in celebration

of those whose lives

brought blessings and lessons

now cherished in loving memory.

Thankfulness tumbles in torrents

for present companions

whose presence beside us

is welcomed as a gift from above.

On the morning of this year’s last day

awaiting tomorrow’s dawn

past blessings provide hope

"For all we're about to receive."

James E. Thyren

December 31, 2022

“for all we’re about to receive.”

 Walking in the Light

“The

light

shines in

the darkness,

and the darkness

did not overcome it.”[i]

So says the Gospel of John.

With our Advent candles ablaze

to poke holes in December darkness

our world’s need for that overcoming light

is evidenced by bombs raining down in the

evil attempt to plunge a nation into darkness.

Our nation’s need for heaven sent illumination

is communicated in the sad, all-too-frequent reports

of gunfire bringing death to people trying to enjoy life.

Our own soul’s need for Christ’s light is revealed by all that

weighs our hearts down: disappointment, disillusionment, despair.

“Come,

let us walk

in the light of the Lord!”[ii]

The prophet Isaiah’s invitation,

issued to people in darkness long ago,

is a timeless summons to the privilege of pilgrimage.

The seer said it after picturing a purposeful procession

to begin on a day when “the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be

established as the highest of mountains, and shall be raised above the hills.”

The envisioned voyage pictured as a human stream flowing from every nation

shouting together their journey’s goal and purpose:

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

that he may teach us his ways

and that we may walk in his paths…”[iii]

We too are called to walk in the light of the Lord and to make it our purpose

to learn the Lord’s ways and walk in the paths the Christ blazed.

We are do so on the strength of the witness of those who have gone before us:

“though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil, for you are with me”[iv]

May your path be lit by the Light darkness cannot quench!

James E. Thyren

December 2022

---

[i] John 1. 5
[ii] Isaiah 2. 5
[iii] Isaiah 2. 3
[iv] Psalm 23. 4

[iv] Psalm 23. 4

 

Still the One – A Sermon based on Matthew 11. 2-11 –preached at Covenant Presbyterian  Church, Scranton, PA on December 11, 2022 

Jill Duffield, the former editor of The Presbyterian Outlook, offers a modern image to help us live with today’s readings from Isaiah and Matthew.  She says reading these words from scripture “brought to mind a recording of a 9-1-1 call,” because they gave her “a sense of a calm stranger on the other end of a panicked plea for help.”[i]

            “We have heard those recordings of two desperate voices,” writes Duffield, “one laced with fear and pain, the other methodically asking questions, staying on the line, giving instructtion, reminding the traumatized other that someone is on the way to intervene, to bring assistance, to rescue and to save.  These readings bring forth those intense emotions: danger is present, but we aren’t left alone to face its wrath…” they “offer the reassurance that as desperate as the situation may be, help is right now on the way, so hang on and hang in and don’t lose hope.”[ii]

            When Isaiah took on the role of 9-1-1 operator, the people of Israel were in exile. Their depor-tation had taken place in large part because of their willingness to leave the ways of God behind while embracing the spiritual practices of their neighbors. They had been hauled away from everything familiar. Having neglected to build up their spiritual reserves to keep going when the going got tough, they were at a loss as to how to reconnect with the only source of strength and help that can be counted upon.

            Yet someone had a little address book tucked a way and in it they found a number to call, and when Isaiah in the Emergency Call Center answered, he had words of reassurance to share. “The changed times you are experiencing will not last forever. A new springtime for people of faith will come around in its season, and the hopeless landscape that breaks your heart will begin to blossom. Watch for the crocus to emerge from the ground!”

            Calmly, steadily, the prophet offers instruction to the listening ears on the other end of the line: “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear!’ Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come to save you.”

            The caller breathes a little easier having heard that all is not lost; there is help to face it all.  “Hang on, hang in there, don’t lose hope. Help is on the way.” 

            Though written long ago, the prophet’s words come to us as if they were penned yesterday. Living in these times when the Christian church as we know it is in transition, and the shape of Christendom as it will be is still unknown, the prophet’s counsel to strengthen and encourage one another is timely. God is still at work. Get in on it. Don’t sit there; do something.

            When the going gets tough, those who have endured and survived hard times have gifts to offer those who lack such experience. Back when vaccinations against Covid began to be available my forty-something niece asked her ninety-something grandmother if she remembered what it was like to live before the polio vaccine. My mother responded by telling the story of what a relief it had been after her mother and aunt dragged five young cousins to the local hospital to line up for their shots. 

Our been there/done that stories can serve to “strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees” near-by. The Church with a capital “C” and every congregation with a small “c” have endured ups and downs and times of transition. Sharing the stories is a way to open hearts to remember that the God never gives up on us.  As the beloved hymn reminds us: “Our God, our help in ages past, our hope for years to come.” One day you may be the encourager; on another you may be in need of the pep talk.  It is one of the ways we can help each other along the way.

When John the Baptist dialed 9-1-1 by sending his disciples to ask his question of Jesus, it was not quite the panicked call of one seeking to be talked through CPR while performing it on a loved one. John’s call was more like the call to Tech Support when the program you downloaded or the appliance you purchased is not working the way it should.  You thought it would do this, but instead it does that, and you want to know, “did I order the right item, or is there another that better meets those expectations.”

            When we meet John the Baptist in his prison cell in Matthew, he becomes less of a cardboard cut-out figure. Gone is the fiery preacher who attracted people to the wilderness. Gone are the confident ultimatums. Gone is the demand to “bear fruits that befit repentance.”

            As Lutheran pastor Katie Hines-Shaw puts it: Instead of the open air, sun scorched desert, surrounded by pilgrims, “John finds himself alone in a dark prison cell. Suddenly, he who recognized Jesus as the Messiah seems to harbor doubts. ‘Are you the one who is to come,’ John sends his disciples to ask Jesus, “or are we to wait for another?”[iii]

            How did we get from “one who is more powerful than I is coming after me;” to “are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” We get there precisely because John is in prison. Wisconsin pastor Mark Yurs spells it out for us:

            John “has been arrested and jailed as a political enemy of King Herod.  Prison can put doubt into anybody’s heart.  It is easy to believe in God in the bright sunlight when all is joyful and free, but let the iron bars of difficulty slam shut and doubt lurks in the darkness. ‘Are you for real Jesus?’ ‘Can religion matter in my case, in my condition, with my concerns, or has it reached the end of its usefullness?’ Hard experiences, like John’s prison bars press such questions upon us.”[iv]

            Herod’s prison accommodations were nothing like the jails and prisons that dot the land-scape around here. There were no uniforms or bedding provided and laundered. No meals either. One’s needs were met by family and friends, or not at all. John’s disciples would have been his lifeline, his support system, his link to what was going on outside those prison walls.

            With the meals they brought, John’s disciples delivered news of what Jesus was doing.  They told John the stories the Gospel of Matthew recorded in the chapters leading up to our reading.  Katie Hines-Shaw sums it by noting: “In the preceding chapters of Matthew, Jesus has cleansed a leper, caused the lame to walk, restored sight to the blind, and raised the dead. Surely John knows all these stories.”

            She continues: “He may also know that this litany of miracles follows a pattern set by Isaiah. In today’s first reading familiar themes emerge: the eyes of the blind are opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped; the lame leap like a deer. Jesus’ reply to John references not just this passage from Isaiah but others as well.”[v]

            One of those other passages is Isaiah 61. After speaking of bringing good news to the oppressed and binding up the brokenhearted, Isaiah added: “to proclaim liberty to the captives and to release the prisoners.” That leads some commentators to wonder if John, sitting in the shadows of his prison cell was waiting for Jesus to get with the program and bust him out of jail! 

            In an Advent meditation accompanying one of her many scripture based hymns, Carolyn Winfrey Gillette writes “I wonder how John felt when he heard about Jesus from his own disci-ples, and when he heard that Jesus was not living up to the Messiah job description that he ex-pected the Lord to have?”[vi]

            Bringing John’s disappointment in Jesus closer to home, Carolyn adds: “We know what it is to throw our-selves at a cause, a calling, or a project and then to be disappointed or confused about it. I think about the times when Christians today have been disappointed by other people, by circumstances, or by roadblocks to what we believe we are called to do.”[vii]

            At the heart of John’s disappointment with Jesus are unfulfilled expectations.  Montague Williams explains: “While his main task is to point people to Jesus, he (John) generates certain expec-tations of what Jesus will accomplish and how.  John even has a group of disciples who are ready to move in support of Jesus’ upcoming cosmic display of authority.  The problem is that Jesus is taking too long. John has a lot riding on being right about Jesus, but now he is wondering if he is wrong.”[viii]

            The professor narrows the focus further: “Previously, John claimed that the ax was at the root of the trees that bore no fruit (3:10), but Jesus seems to lack the ability to swing. Rather than raising a powerful winnowing fork and throwing chaff into fire (3:12), Jesus’ actions identify him more and more with people who hold zero social power. Healing and forgiving are important and generate a significant following, but John expects the Christ to be doing much more.  As strange as this may sound, John is not sure Jesus is acting in a Christlike manner.”[ix]

            Stanley Saunders puts it more bluntly: “Jesus’ minis-try is strong on healing and restor-ation, but weak on judgment and vindication.  As John sits in Herod’s prison, awaiting death (14.1-12), he may be wondering whether and when the liberation of God’s people from bondage and oppression will really take place. So far, the dominion of Rome and of local leaders like Herod and the Jerusalem priesthood remains undisturbed. What kind of Messiah leaves the forerunner in prison?”[x]

            That leads Saunders to point out that “Today, many Christians have similar question: If Jesus is the one who brings God’s rule to fruition, why is our world still marked by exploitation, injustice, polarization, and violence? Why are we still waiting? How long must we wait? Will Jesus really come to redeem those who suffer, or should we look for another? The answer lies,” he says, “in what one makes of the signs Jesus performs: do we believe that when the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the good news pro-claimed to them that we are seeing God’s power? Or are we looking for something else?  How is God’s power evident today?  Will we experience the good news as redemption or judgment?”[xi]

            The John we meet in prison is familiar because his doubts resemble those we bring.  The John we meet in prison is recognizable because we have wrestled with the distance between our expectations of Jesus and the kind of savior he turns out to be.  Like the John we meet in prison, it is up to us to reconsider our position once Jesus explains where his priorities and ours part ways.

            Will we, will John, hear the answer Jesus gave as the 9-1-1 message Jill Duffield heard: “Hang on, hang in, don’t lose hope. Help is on the way?”  Matthew doesn’t tell us what John made of the answer Jesus sent him.  At least one commentator points out that in the end of today’s passage Jesus doesn’t condemn John’s doubt. Instead, he confirms John’s role as preparer of the way, going onto call him a great prophet.  Montague Williams concludes by saying: “In this passage, we find that even a prophet committed to holiness who Jesus calls one of the greatest remains a work in progress.  Jesus makes room for John to doubt and grow in faith, understanding, and calling. This is good news for us.”[xii]

            Yes, this is good news! The works Jesus spoke of, fulfilling as they do the promises of Isaiah, all point to lives made whole by the touch of Christ.  Though we are distracted by all the bad news around us, the wholeness restoring work of Christ continues all around us. If we look and listen carefully we’ll discover where it is happening now.

            You might see it at an Advent workshop, where the grandfather whose grandkids are thousands of miles away sits beside the fatherless child who loves having the old man help make an ornament.  You might hear of it in the story of a trucker who was told to find a dumpster for the broken case of steaks refused by the grocer. Instead he stopped at a church, knocked on the door, and asked the pastor if he could pass them along to someone in need. By sundown those steaks were in the hands of the director of a homeless shelter.  You might rejoice at the news that a family member brought low by drug use has been welcomed into a program run by a father and the two sons he rescued from the grip of their addictions.

            Yes, Jesus was the one. John need not wait for another.  Neither do we. He is still the one…and the miraculous thing is that even as we do our Advent waiting, the Lord is already near. He is already here.

            He is in each person who takes the time to help another discover a new way of looking at things. He is in each individual who speaks a kind word to someone who has been deafened by criticism.  He is present in the volunteer who pushes a wheelchair to the activity room. He is visible on that Mitten Tree over there, and as the pile of Angel Tree gifts back there are distributed, opened and cherished.

           Jesus is still the one…and always will be.
           To God be the glory!
            Amen.

[i] Jill Duffield, “Looking into the Lectionary for Dec. 11” 3rd Sunday of Advent – a blog dated Dec. 5, 2016, p. 1
[ii] ibid.
[iii] Katie Hines-Shaw, The Christian Century, November 23, 2016, “Living the Word, Reflections on the Lectionary, December 11, Third Sunday of Advent,” p. 22 
[iv] Mark E. Yurs, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 1, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), p. 71
[v] ibid., Hines-Shaw
[vi] Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, God’s World is Changing, ”Ponder Dissapointments,” ISBN 9798362981679, ©Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, 2022, # 21
[vii] ibid.
[viii] Montague Williams, “In the Lectionary,” The Christian Century, Vol. 139, No. 20, December 2022, p. 25
[ix] ibid.
[x] Stanley Saunders, “Third Sunday of Advent, Commentary on Matthew 11.2-11, workingpreacher.com, 2022, p. 1
[xi] ibid.
[xii] ibid., Willliams