The earth’s axis is turning upright.  This Tuesday at 12:14am, the Spring Equinox occurs, and we’ll spin perfectly centered, northern and southern hemispheres, nights and days, of equal length.  And then we slowly tip and turn toward the solstice and the longest day of the year in June.  The weather, however, already feels like the summer solstice!  For a whole week, we’ve had temperatures above average, more like June, which is both delightful, and eerie, at the same time!  The benefits of global warming in our region, are a tearing and striking for others. 

John’s gospel is tuned into the turning we make, from night to day, darkness to light, death to life.  “The light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light…”  John can make us crazy with his simplistic polarities and opposites, if we take him too literally.  But knowing John’s orientation to signs and symbols, can open us up to a deeper truth.  We see it in the corresponding contrast of “the world” and, the gift of “life everlasting.”  For John, the world is often a fallen place, the realm of chaos, full of imperfection and people who do evil, a Domination System [Walter Wink, “Engaging the Powers”].  And he contrasts this with the “life everlasting” that the loving God sends, or in this case, the coming of the light into the world, to change and transform it. 

Jesus, of course, is that light.  Remember John’s prolog, his gospel’s introduction?  Jesus was coming into the world, and he is for us the light and the life, and nothing is created without him?  Instead of Jesus born humbly in a barn, and wise men coming to visit, guided by a brilliant star-lit night, we meet Jesus – light itself, coming into the world – which is intentionally evocative of Genesis Ch. 1, and the creation of light.  Jesus is the light that overcomes the darkness, the “life everlasting” which has invaded the world, and come to save it. 

And so, there is a sense in which we are incapable of doing what is true and good, before the light of the world arrives, whether historically or religiously.  But when the light comes and the world is illuminated, evil deeds are suddenly exposed:  hypocrisy, prejudice, greed, privilege.  None of it can stand, for now what is “true,” shines like a beacon for all to “clearly see.”  And this transformation creates a crisis, a moment of decision.  To believe or reject the light. 

Simple!  Yet immeasurably complex.  Darkness and light, like the two sides of our world at the spring equinox, are inextricably woven through us, as unsearchable as a DNA strand without a microscope.  Or as Luther said, we are a paradox, “both sinners and saints at the same time.” 

In a fascinating report from the BBC called, “the myth of the eight-hour sleep,” both scientific studies and historical data reveal that our understanding of night-time, is really based on culturally created values.  In a study done in the 1990’s by psychiatrist Thomas Wehr, he invited test subjects into a controlled environment where for one month they lived with 14 hours of darkness each night.  When their sleep patterns were allowed to regulate themselves, which took about 3 weeks, they found that people naturally fell into a pattern of a ‘first sleep’ for four hours, and then wakefulness for one or two hours, before falling into ‘a second four-hour sleep.’  Then, about 10 years later, the historian Roger Ekirch published a paper, which came out in book form in 2005 (At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past), showing his research into more than 500 references to this same segmented sleeping pattern: About two hours after night fall, a first sleep began, followed by a waking period of one or two hours and then a second sleep.  “It’s not just the number of references,” as the author says, “it is the way they refer to it, as if it was common knowledge.” 

So what did people do during the 2 hour sleep break?  Lots of things!  Reading in bed, praying, writing, some got up to go to the bathroom, or smoked tobacco.  Some even visited neighbors!  Dream interpretation was popular too.  And, doctors, advised couples that it was, the better time to conceive, and more enjoyable, than trying when first going to bed after a long days work. 

But, over a period of about 300 hundred years, we lost this sleep pattern.  With the advent of street lights, gas lamps in the home, and the popularity of coffee houses opening in big cities, the night, found light and life!  It started small in the late 17th Century with the upper classes, and by the 1920’s in America, the first and second sleep, had become totally unknown.  By then, the idea of the 8 hour sleep, had become firmly entrenched. 

And just as the value of sleep experienced a cultural change, the notion of night as evil, and day as true or good, transitioned too.  Earlier, night was considered only a time for criminals, prostitutes and drunks to be out and about.  But with the advent of street lights and gas lamps, values evolved, and churches were some of the first to change.  In the wake of the Reformation in Europe, Protestants and Catholics both became accustomed to holding secret services at night, due to the waves of persecutions.  And with the advent of the industrial revolution, efficiency and productivity became more highly valued than rest.  Adults, and even children, were encouraged to do away with the second sleep, it was unproductive, so that the eight hour sleep could be accepted as the standard. 

The truth is, light and dark, can be either good or bad.  Today with the economy in recession, many workers work more than one job, or work split-shift jobs, which is not so good for them.  But street lights can be very good for keeping us safe when we do have to, or want to, be up.  A well oiled economy can be a good thing for increasing our standard of living.  But burning more and more fossil fuels can lead to global warming. 

We may never resolve the paradox of light and dark, good and evil, balancing night and day like the Equinox.  But we know that Christ has brought light and life into our world.  The life that is everlasting is now “clearly seen” because of Jesus.  The world has turned, and the Spirit has tipped its hand in Jesus, revealing the God who is pure love and pure life.  And each day we have another chance to decide once again, and make the choice to turn to the font of our baptism.  It’s a journey we make these 40 days of Lent, on our way to the Great Three Days of Jesus’ death and resurrection, a turning toward the life giving light that has come into the world.  Even now, let us come and bathe ourselves in this “life everlasting.”  For, in the God who raised the Son of Man, there is no death, but only light and life.   

If you could travel back in time to take a picture of the church community that first read from the gospel of John, what would that look like?  If you could hold up your I-phone and email the rest of us a photo, no doubt it would be a mixed community, Jews and Gentiles, women and men, rich and poor.  They would be living outside Jerusalem, possibly in Ephesus, or western Turkey today, near Greece.  It would be a rainbow color of people, who embodied a mixture of both eastern and western traditions and values.  And, if you wanted to line them all up for a group photo in front of the church, well, they’d look at you with a strange and perplexing stare!  No one had a church building at that time. 

Still grieving the loss of the Temple in Jerusalem, destroyed in 70AD by the Romans, they knew what a beautiful building for worship could offer.  But, followers of The Way, as the early Christian movement was often called, they were growing so quickly, that meeting in people’s homes continued to meet their needs quite well. 

If you could travel back in time to John’s community and take a digital photo, all you’d see is the people, believers who also understood themselves as evangelists, ready at any time to share a word about why they were the church.  They didn’t know anything else, except that, the church is the people. 

Jesus’ action in the Temple was, clear as mud to the disciples when he drove all the animals and merchants out, and overturned the tables of the moneychangers.  But, one thing we can say now, the term “cleansing of the temple” is not totally accurate, especially if we realize that, moneychangers were only providing a service that was needed then, to change Roman coins with the image of the emperor, into Jewish coins, so as not to break the commandment about “making false idols.”  And the merchants, as long as they weren’t cheating anyone, were welcomed by pilgrims coming long distances, to buy animals for the ritual sacrifices in the Temple.  It would be perplexing if Jesus was simply protesting these ordinary services. 

When Jesus arrives during preparations for the Passover, the rivers of blood, of course, would have been flowing.  Many animals, especially lambs, would be slaughtered for the feast, and there was a built-in drainage system that let the blood flow from the priests’ blades, down into pools in the ground outside the Temple.  But by the time John wrote his gospel, all these traditions had been lost, of course.  The Temple itself had been razed, a generation earlier, “not a stone left on stone.”  So, this is why “his disciples remembered that Jesus” had said, “destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”  They realized “after he was raised from the dead,” that “he was speaking of the temple of his body.” 

Jesus’ anger from that day, no doubt stuck in their minds.  But it wasn’t anger over traditions at Passover.  Jesus celebrated Passover every year of his life.  At this Passover, he gives us a foreshadowing of how at the Passover of his Last Supper, he will transform the symbol of the Cup and the blood poured out, to revitalize God’s word as a Eucharisitic Meal for us – and how he will transform the symbol of Temple, and where God is located.  His anger was for the whole system, about to fall.  It was a belief that the world was about to turn, which was the story that John was telling to his parishioners.  They, were the temple of his body now.  Jesus was angry, not at the animals or the moneychangers in the Temple, but at a false system of “trade” that was blinding people from seeing how the world was turning, in and through Jesus.  Jesus is angry when we don’t care for the poor, for example, incredulous that we don’t have a fire of justice burning in our hearts. 

So, the Temple wasn’t bad in itself, but it could be a temptation to turn inward.  God would not let King David build a temple, and made the Israelites wait for his son Solomon.  Could a structure – even on built so lovingly – contain God?  Even then the prophets warned against it, and the beauty of the Temple remained a constant double edged sword:  a gift to the people and symbol of the majesty of God, but also an idol of the people, an excuse to turn from the faithfulness of the covenant God made with them.  God had chosen them, had set them apart.  But, to be a light to the nations.  And that covenant, when used as a cudgel, or to be exclusionary, dimmed the light, and the message of God to the world, grew faint. 

We have the same double-edged sword today.  And so we must continually ask, are our buildings a beacon for our mission in the world?  Is this building furthering our vision?  Does the message of the gospel good-news reach others through us?  Is this Gathering area a public space where the stranger and new comer are as welcome as our closest friends, that all may be fed by God’s Word and Meal, in order that believers may be Sent out to bear God’s grace and mercy? 

The world is already turning, whether we are ready or not.  I don’t know if you’re aware that there are at least two new church starts in our neighborhood in the past few months?  One, Urban Village Church, an Episcopally funded Emergent congregation, is renting space at the Bethany Methodist facility on Ashland Ave.  And the other, the Christian Community Church, which began in Naperville and has opened nearly a dozen satellites in greater Chicagoland, has opened its newest, here in Edgewater.  It’s easy to see in these communities how the mission and people are front and center.  They begin as gatherings of people in homes, and virtually, online, and they expand to buildings only when more space is needed, and even then, usually just renting or leasing in order to leave room as they expand.  One of the last things they think about is a building. 

I love our church building, especially this beautiful worship space.  But it can never take priority over vision and mission.  We don’t exist for ourselves.  Christianity is not a club, but a public gathering – to proclaim Christ crucified.  God is not just here in this place, but everywhere in the world.  If you were asked to take a picture of your church, you would probably photograph this beautiful sanctuary, or the brick fortress façade outside.  But our picture is missing something if we don’t include the people. 

In fact what if you took a picture of yourself where God is with you, at work, or at home, or volunteering somewhere?  Yesterday I took some pictures at the All American Nursing Home, of some of the people Trudy, Lynette and I have been visiting.  Though they were shy, when I showed them the result, their faces lit up!  And then later as I looked at the pictures on our Unity website it hit me, that they’re mostly about church events, here.  They’re all quite good, but where are the pictures of you, living your faith all the other days of the week, in all the other settings to which God calls you, where you make a difference as a person of faith, or, struggle against systems that don’t know the realm and kingdom of God, and that need to know of the fire of Jesus’ justice, to wipe away all tears, and to know that the world is about to change?  So, I want to invite you to do that.  Send me some pictures from work or home, out with friends or volunteering.  Places and people you want to share, because you know God is there, or needs to be there – and send them to me, and if you give me permission, I’ll put them on our website – because, God is alive in you, the Body of Christ, in the world, every day!  So, get out your camera-phones or your Kodak Brownies!  You don’t have to travel in time to do this!  God is with us now, and not just in our church building, but wherever we are in the world.  The temple of Christ’s body lives in us and through us – for, “the dawn is near, and the world is about to turn.”  

On Friday night, where do you turn?  I was richly rewarded for attending the Unity Players Directors Workshop, and three, very fine, One-Act Plays!  The evening began on “Third and Oak,” at “The Laundromat.”  Two characters, opposites in most every way, meet there by chance, in the middle of the night, and are slowly but surely torn apart, and then, find healing from the tear. 

Alberta is older, reserved and refined, a former school teacher, educated and persnickety.  Dee Dee is younger, very outgoing, lacking both social boundaries and self-esteem, but is smart and yearning for an authentic relationship.  What they have in common is that they are both married, and, both lonely, though for different reasons.  They antagonize each other with their very annoyingly opposite personalities.  Dee Dee is incessantly chatty, and Alberta is the height of decorum and control.  They open each other up, while desperately trying to hide things from each other.  And finally in the most explosive confrontation of the play, when Dee Dee is ripping Alberta a new one for withholding herself, something new is revealed.  "Well, you're either kidding yourself or lying to me,” Dee Dee says, exasperated.  “You act like [your husband]'s a saint. Like he's dead and now you worship the shirts he wore."  And that’s exactly what Alberta has been unwilling to share, hoping that if she kept the news a secret, didn’t utter the words “he’s dead” to anyone, it may not be actually true.  But in that moment, the anxiety and anger give way to the possibility for compassion, and for turning in a new direction - for healing.  They both have been hurt by their husbands, and in sharing the hurt, they each, help open up a path toward healing, for the other.  Dee Dee, for her part, sees how her cheatin’ husband is denying her a life, and she deserves more, and Alberta, frozen in place by the loss of her husband, has been given the chance to voice her worst fears, and now at least, can envision moving on. 

Jesus and Peter have an explosive encounter too, veiling and revealing, tearing and healing the tear, in this significant turning point of Mark’s gospel.  Turning and returning are key, as when Peter pulls Jesus aside one way, privately, to rebuke him for his passion prediction, and Jesus turns the other way, keeping Peter behind him, “looking at his disciples,” to rebuke Peter.  In a sense, Jesus has torn Peter a new one – “get behind me Satan,” he says.  Yet he doesn’t cast Peter out, but immediately turns to heal the tear.  “Come let us return, return to the LORD.”   For, to get behind Jesus, is an opportunity to follow him some more, to have a second chance.

It makes more sense if you read in context, especially the story just before this one, the healing of the blind man at Bethsaida.  There too, when Jesus first puts saliva on the man’s eyes and lays hands on him, it doesn’t open his eyes all the way, and Jesus has to lay hands on his eyes again, before he is completely healed.  So too, like the blind man and Peter, we may need repeated trips to the well –and to our baptismal font- to be healed of the torn nature we have experienced in this life. 

It’s an epic struggle, a war of world’s, going on in our gospel today, which is manifested in this exchange between Jesus and Peter as a monumental struggle between good and evil, God and Satan. 

And, it is all spoken “quite openly” at this fulcrum and tipping point of the story, to help reveal to us who the main character is.  Half way through, it is not hard for Peter and the 12 to guess that Jesus is the long awaited Messiah.  But, they’re completely unprepared for the way Jesus turns the meaning of Messiah around.  He “must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” 

Having heard this so many times, all our lives, it actually sounds logical to us.  But for the Disciples, they had an opposite expectation.  As an oppressed people for centuries, they were looking for a Messiah-king like David, and for a resistant movement like the Maccabees, those 2nd Amendment rebels, to fight with a holy power and overthrow their oppressors, the Romans, so that their holy Temple on the hill might be liberated, and they might be restored to the top of the world again. 

So you can understand a little bit better why Peter, so shocked at Jesus’ call to suffer and die, pulls him aside to disabuse Jesus of this notion.  But Jesus will not be tempted to turn down the road of militarism, scape-goating, and lording it over others, just like he overcame the temptation of the devil in the wilderness for 40 days after his baptism.  Just like he didn’t give in to the temptation in the Garden of Gethsemane to let the cup of suffering pass from him, but kept going to the cross. 

Jesus turns away from all these temptations, so that we can see the realm of God dawning in our midst.  Peter’s eyes are not opened all the way, he’s not seeing clearly yet, but we know he will, soon – after the Three Great Days of Jesus death and resurrection.  Two steps forward, one step back.  He knows that Jesus is the Messiah, but he is blind to this, world-transforming, Son of Man, Messiah.  Jesus tears into him when he’s on the wrong path, but also, he will not let Peter go until he is healed completely.  When Peter tried to go ahead of Jesus, he calls Peter to follow behind him. 

“What will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their lives,” Jesus asks?  “Indeed, what can they give in return for their life?”  Nothing, of course!  Jesus boils it down to, life in the realm of God, or, following the Tempter.  Not always a choice that is clear in our lives!  Whatever it means, to take up our cross and follow Jesus, there is no simple prescription, or creed, that guarantees it. 

The journey is a halting and hard fought one.  It often comes in stages of revelation.  We continue to turn, and return, to the font, to receive that holy spittle of Jesus, on our eyes, until the way becomes more clear to us.  At the font, like at the Laundromat, we are agitated by its waters, and we meet those who seem our opposite:  beneath us, or aloof from us.  And yet without the stranger, we are alone, lost.  And it is only in connecting up with them, in finding common interests amidst our differences, that we see the opening to our salvation.  But this entails risking ourselves, and having the “human things” torn open, that the “things of God” may begin to heal us.

It may not be pretty.  But in the laundromat, as Dee Dee ripped Alberta a new one, it opened up her true nature to herself, as well as a truth about Alberta, and her relationship with her husband.  And in that most uncomfortable, most revealing moment, they were able to connect and forge a bond that transcended them.  Through them, each was able to return to the LORD.  Sometimes, an agitating washer, is our baptismal font.  God comes wherever two or three are gathered, tearing and healing, as we go from death to life.  

When we lived in the UP we heard stories of the old days when wolves were king of the forest.  But unlike every other big game animal, there was no restricted hunting season for wolves, but they were always fair game, with a bounty on their heads, and so were driven to the brink of extinction.  Our church Council President – whose father was a leading character in the locally famous documentary, about the life of hunting and trapping, called, “Good Man in the Woods” – claimed his dad was the one to shoot the very last wolf.  Of course, there were more in Canada, but for decades, no one saw any in the lower 48.  In between, the image of wolf as evil predator was debated and largely debunked.  And so they were reintroduced first in Minnesota and Wisconsin, and finally also to Upper Michigan.  Not everyone was happy, but many, including Native Americans, welcome them as a spiritual creature, without whom the environment is lacking something important, and God given.  All agree, at least, that no one wants to actually live with them. 

When Jesus came up out of the waters of his baptism, by John in the Jordan, he saw the heavens torn open.  And, the same Spirit that descended on him, drove him out into the wilderness, where he was “with the wild animals/beasts.”  And so, Jesus, fulfilling the words of the prophet Isaiah, that “the wolf would lie down with the lamb” and “the leopard with the kid,” lives with at least one foot firmly planted in the realm of God, that Isaiah envisioned.  With the wild animals and waited on by angels, Jesus is the vision of peace, when the earth will be renewed and redeemed. 

Noah and his family also entertain the wolf, and all his wild, beastly friends, on the Ark!  It must have been cozy – 7 pairs of all the clean animals, and 1 pair of the wild ones – sharing quarters with, the four pairs of humans.  Somehow, on their 40 day journey, they managed to get along!  You’d think it would have been tempting for the wolf, not to see, in the lamb, his next meal.  Yet no such report exists, and as far as we know, enclosed within the Ark, God makes a sanctuary for all, bobbing along for 40 days, waiting for their return and renewal, from death to life. 

In Lent, God calls us to return, for “it is the LORD who has torn us and the LORD God who will heal the tear.”  And, returning is a process of learning again, learning the way of discipleship.  Returning is a 40 day journey, strengthened by the gifts of word and sacrament, practicing repentance, fasting, and works of love, before we reach the Three Great days of Jesus’ death and resurrection. 

But returning can’t be accomplished by individual journey’s alone.  “Indeed, God… sent the Son into the world … in order that the [whole] world might be saved through him” – and so the new covenant is made with the chosen people of God, as a whole, on behalf of the whole earth. 

In the Ark, Noah and his family, and all the animals, domestic and wild, are encapsulated and entombed, for a time, so that God can wash the earth clean.  While the rest of Noah’s world who had turned their backs on God, forgot their responsibilities to the earth, and did not wish to return to God, are torn asunder, before God then heals the tear.  The world had gone so far off track in the first 5 chapter of Genesis, after the Creation, that God was ready to start over.  And so, God flooding the whole world for forty days, so that God can once again separate the waters from the dry land, and make a safe place for us and all the animals to live, is a brilliant re-creation of the third day of Creation!  And the rainbow is set in the sky to be a reminder, actually, to God, though it also works for us.  It’s God’s covenant of peace with the whole earth.  Through Noah and all animals, we are handed a second chance.  God is hanging up the bow of war, and signaling, in the openness of the sky, that all the earth is safe and renewed. 

Jesus, comes up out of Jordan’s baptismal waters, to order the world in a new way too.  The sky is torn open for the creative voice of God, who blesses Jesus, and is pleased with the good news he will proclaim, for the sake of the whole world.  Jesus is a rainbow of peace for us, come in human form to heal all our tears, and dry our tears. 

God doesn’t solve for us the problem of why there is evil in the world, but God opens the heavenly sky, a little bit wider all the time, revealing through the prophets and Jesus, the light of life, and the good news, that comes as a gift to us, so that we may become healers for each other, and proclaimers’ of the truth.  Our humanness has not essentially changed.  We’ve had all the potential we need since Adam and Eve. 

The real revelation, as we begin this Lenten journey, is that God changes, over the course of salvation history, as much or more than us.  We witness it here in the Flood story where God’s initial desire is to do away with the whole human race, all animals, and everything, because his heart was so grieved.  But when he finds Noah, God is struck by the idea that if mercy is shown to a few, a remnant, God can re-new the covenant, and not have to start completely over.  The Ark will be the means of salvation, a sanctuary, to plant the good seed that will renew the creation God loves. 

Today, our relationship with the creation continues to change.  Sometimes, for example, we hear of the wild animals, “with us” in the city, wandering in from the wilderness, and walking our streets.  A mountain lion was reported in Roscoe Village three years ago – no one was able to ask it why it had come, before it was shot!  And many people have seen deer in the city – we had one in the community garden across our alley in Logan Square.  Out west, coyotes are a constant urban companion, and here and there, sightings of opossums, red fox, and raccoons, are reported.  But it’s not because the animals have gone crazy, but only because we have gone crazy with over development, encroaching on their territory. 

The animals are a bell weather for us.  And within God’s good green earth – the intensified hurricanes and earthquakes, the droughts and flooding – all call out to us.  Not just as signs of exploitation and climate change, but as signs that the whole Body of Christ, all of us as the people of faith, are failing to return, and are not living up to the covenant God has given us as creatures and care-takers of God’s creation.  

The excesses of our world are perhaps greater in some ways than the excesses of the times of Noah.  But because of Jesus, our capacity to return is greater too.  This Lent we have the opportunity to return, to come to the font, and renew the covenant of our baptism.  There, we die and rise with Christ, and are re-created.  If God can change God’s mind and renew the creation, we can return too. 

And then, the world may yet see in us, just a glimpse of the realm of God, where wolf and lamb lie down together, that we may have a clear vision who Christ is, and where all creation needs to go. 

The prophet Joel talks about returning.  “Return to the LORD, your God…”  A theme that will resonate throughout our 40 day journey of Lent, a journey from death to life. 

Yesterday I emailed you an invitation to join me in the church’s 3 disciplines of Lent – repentance, fasting, and works of love.  We can and do have our own journey’s, our own decisions to make, each of us, as a person of faith.  But there is more.  We have our corporate and public responsibility to return, as church, ekklesia, as the people of God, as well.  They are not divorced from each other.  It's often said that, in the end, we can only be responsible for our own choices, and we can’t force the other person to, do the right thing, or any thing!  But God comes to save the whole world, as the gospels so often say, and not just individual souls.  And so what does it mean for us to return, or repent, as a community?

The prophetic decree, “Return to the LORD, your God,” was a call to the whole community, and assembly, of Israel. 

If you were hear 4 weeks ago, you heard God's call to return, from the prophet Jonah.  Jonah reluctantly gave in, like a pouting teenager, or spurned adult.  After he ran away from God, was thrown overboard and swallowed by the whale, entombed for 3 days, was spit up on dry land, Jonah is still not willingly repentant!  He will go, as God has asked, and proclaim to his arch enemy, the Ninevites, to repent.  But his heart is not in it, he does only the minimum required, which is clear in the brevity of his message, the shortest prophetic warning call in all the OT!  And even before that, he complains to God: “I knew you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing.”  That’s why Jonah doesn’t want to go.  He acccuses God of all that goog stuff because he doesn’t want to give the Assyrians even the chance, to return! 

Jonah, it turns out, copied the same creed, that Joel uses in our 1st Reading.  In fact, it appears like this 8 times throughout the Hebrew scriptures: 3 times in Psalms, and once each in Exodus, Numbers, Nehemiah, Nahum, and of course, Jonah.  They all recite this belief that God is “gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing!”  In each, God invites us to return as the whole assembly.  There is still time – that's the prophetic good news.  God’s nature is to relent and make room for our return.  God is merciful, like the love of a mother or father for their child, and is gracious, as a person who holds power over an inferior, but who uses that power for forgiveness. 

So, what if we do want to return!  What do we return from?  And where do we return to?  Joel’s plea to Israel, was to return from exile in Babylon, and to return to their home in Judah.  The clue to our return may be found in the words of our Confession tonight.  We confess that we, like Jonah, have run the other way from God, and have not kept the great command of Jesus, 'to love God and to love our neighbor,' but instead have turned to ourselves, “our self-indulgent appetites and ways,” and so we are reminded that we need to return – return to the LORD, our God. 

We start there, with our own personal turning.  But the whole assembly is then called to return, from “our exploitation of other people,” as the confession states, “our indifference to injustice and cruelty,” and “our waste and pollution of [God’s] creation.”   Israel was once the military and economic power of the world, and the reason God brought the nation down and sent it into exile was for it's “exploitation of other nations,” and its “indifference to injustice” at  home.  Not until a cleansing of 2 generations had passed in Exile, did God return them home. 

We are on that precipice now, of military and economic world power.  By some measures we are still number one.  But since 911, a Great Recession, and our heavy responsibility for climate change, we are holding our breath, trying to  figure out who we are.  We have not yet been exiled, but still, we are in dire need of returning. 

God shows us the way, and invites us to it – through  grace and mercy, slowness to anger and a great abundance of faith and love, and a postponing of punishment.  That’s how we are called to return, for returning is nothing if not a process, a journey that comes in the  “the gifts of God's grace in baptism and communion.”  And so on our journey in Lent, we return to the font, from which God first turned us around, changed our identity, and branded us with a tattoo, that cross on our foreheads.  In Lent we also return to the table, where we gather each time we are together, to be fed with the broken body of Christ, our LORD.  On the night in which he was betrayed, God relented of our punishment, while Jesus gave us a new command, to love one another.  Jesus went from death to life, that we may know the hope, of our passage too. 

On this day alone, we add a very specific tattoo  alongside the cross of our baptisms, which is the cross of ashes.  When God spoke to Adam and Eve, the first humans, who represent all humans, God reminded them of their mortality, and their dependence on grace and God's relenting from punishment.  Remember that “you are dust and to dust you shall return,” God said.  We receive this reminder of our human condition tonight, knowing that we also have been blessed with the promise of new life. 

We begin our journey in Lent then, as a people who are able to squarely face up to our fate, and the truth which claims us.  As we make the journey from death to life, let us “Return to the LORD, our God,” as the church, the whole people of God. 

Where are you on the road to seeing Jesus?  Thinking about following?  Marching, dancing or singing, in the light of God, to show how committed you are?  Quietly hanging back, hoping someone will invite you into the action?  Maybe already in there, talking and mixing it up with Jesus, Moses and Elijah?  Of feeling and experiencing the mystery of the moment – his dazzlingly white clothes, the holy cloud?  Or, cursing Jesus out, as you pull off your hiking boots to reveal a huge painful blister? 

I remember a trip Kim and I took out west, how exciting it was to plan our vacation, the anticipation of seeing old friends, and imagining the beauty of new sites along the way.  And one of the high points was Glacier National Park, where we couldn’t wait to spend the day hiking and exploring. 

Going up was easy compared to coming down.  Up and up we went, switching back and forth, the trail went from paved, to gravel, to less and less traveled dirt paths.  Hours later we arrived at a little clearing with a magnificent view.  Though it had taken longer than we had planned, the climb was well worth it.  There were snow capped peaks in its glorious mountain range, miles and miles of majestic hemlock and pine, Douglas fur and aspen.  We hadn’t been lucky enough to see the black bear, that other hikers told us about – or maybe we were! – but we had seen lots of other wildlife, including a big horn sheep, perched precariously on cliffs edge. 

We couldn’t stay long.  We only had so much food, and we didn’t want to be caught on the trail after sunset.  So down, down, we went.  Now all the good views were behind us.  The surprise and beauty of the journey up, and reaching the top, were fading memories.  And the longer we hiked down, the more my knees began to ache, and finally near the end, my legs started cramping up.  Why was coming down always so much harder?

As we sat gazing at the stars over a camp fire dinner that evening, Kim and I recalled the mystical moment of grandeur atop the mountain, and were now able to joke about the hard journey back down.  And, we were glad that it was in the middle of our trip, and we still had other peaks to look forward to. 

Jesus led Peter and James and John up to a high mountain privately, by themselves, and he was transformed/figured before them, and there appeared to them, Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus.  For the disciples, they had anticipated this moment and imagined the glorious places Jesus would give them in this heavenly realm.  But it was over so quickly, and the beauty and wonder of it all seemed lost in their march back down the mountain.   

But the journey is real, and takes on flesh, down in the valley.  Jesus came to heal the sick and preach good news to the poor, down here in the city with us.  He invites us on this journey.  You can join today if you want – just like our Council members will reaffirm their commitment as Unity’s elected leaders!  And of course, we’ll work on it together in the season of Lent, beginning with Ash Wednesday, and continuing through a 40 day journey to the cross and resurrection. It’s a practice that we have here in worship on Sundays and Wednesdays, supporting one another’s faith in worship and discussion, and then, we take it out to the streets, as we make our beliefs take on flesh and become incarnate in the real world, and our whole lives. 

Where are you on the road to seeing Jesus?  Thinking about following?  Marching, dancing, or singing?  Quietly hanging back?  Already in there, talking with Jesus?  Experiencing a mystical moment?  Or, cursing Jesus out? 

The good news of this gospel story is that it’s not the end of the journey.  It’s the midway point.  The first peak was at Jesus’ baptism when that voice came out of the cloud, and God named Jesus his “beloved Son,” adding, “with whom I am well pleased.”  Here, on the mount of Transfiguration, God says out of the cloud, “you are my beloved son, listen to him.”  And at the end of the gospel, when Jesus breathes his last from the cross, it’s the Roman centurion, who says, “Truly this man was God’s Son!” God gives us voice, because the grace and peace of Jesus who came to take on flesh, now lives in and through us.  

If we’re only living inside our faith, and have never gotten outside of it, to see how it really works in the real world, we’re as stuck as Peter and James and John would have been if Jesus allowed them to build three tents on his mount of Transfiguration and stay up there, basking in the dazzling light.  If we have it all figured out intellectually, but have lost touch with the way our society has changed and transformed, we’re only fooling ourselves, locked in the rigid boundaries of our own heads. 

Jesus comes down the mountain, a much more difficult journey than going up, to engage the world as it is.  Escapism, running away from the truth, avoiding a confrontation, is not going to do it, for a life of faith, as a follower of Jesus.  Our journey’s are not simply hiking trips that go up for the great view and return by the same trail, unchanged.  But we aim for the new life of resurrection, that includes our cross filled journeys in the valley, so that Jesus might transform us.  Where are you on that road to seeing Jesus? 

Robert Jay Lifton, an Air Force psychologist, in his recent memoir, details his journey from, rigid dogmatist, to open, self-critical, reformer.  The part of his work that helped him the most was interviewing the doctors, and their families, who were charged with war crimes, who said they were only following orders.  It was the daughter of one of those convicted doctors, who had only experienced her father at home as a loving, caring man, who asked Lifton, ‘is it possible for a good man to do bad things?’  Lifton’s response was, “Yes, but then he’s no longer a good man.”  Moral coherence, Lifton insists, is striving to have the same morality in every situation, and to be open and self-critical enough to scrutinize it.  For Lifton himself, it was a painful, but life transforming lesson learned, down in the valley. 

Jesus does not stand for pie-in-the-sky, stuck in your head faith, but invites us to come down the mountain with him, and put it into practice.  Joined together in his Spirit, we live it out as consistently as we can, from one day to the next, in every situation.  That’s the road were on, with all its joys and pains, excitement and fearful beauty, where we are transformed and changed, as Jesus' faithful followers.  

It’s nice to know that we’re not the only ones with a broken health care system!  When it comes to legislating a cure, Syria and Israel, Naaman and the priests of Jerusalem, are just as polarized, and dug in to their ideological positions, as the US Congress is! 

Naaman, the David Patraeus of Syria, is a “great commander,” says 1st Kings, and is adored by his king.  He can do no wrong, and there’s nothing he can not do, until, one day he’s afflicted with an unspeakable skin disease.  And any skin disease, was considered reason for banishment from the community, back then, sort of like how we treat those with mental illnesses, all too often today.  There were strict social expectations and special laws spelling out the way you were to dress and present yourself as a class of people we might call, the walking dead.  It was a way of saying, ‘to me you do not exist!’ 

Now, God had given Syria, Israel’s enemy, victory, literally, salvation, thru Naaman, and in that battle, he had taken a young Israelite girl captive, who now serves Naaman’s wife in their home.  As the skin disease became an issue in the household, the young girl speaks up and tells the commander’s wife, “If only your husband were with the prophet [Elisha] who is in Israel!  He would cure him of his leprosy.” 

So Naaman makes plans to go to Israel’s hospital where the famous doctor, Elisha practices.  Coming from Syria, Naaman’s not, of course, In Network.  But that’s not a problem, he brings cash, and lots of it: “ten talents, or 750lbs. of silver, and six thousand shekels of gold,” which probably says more about his ego than the cost of health care.  But instead of going to the hospital, he tries to check in with the Insurance Provider first.  Naaman shows him the letter from his king, which all but demands a cure, and, the Insurance provider becomes defensive and hostile.  ‘Who do you think I am?  I can’t cure anyone, I just take your money.’  But Naaman, unfamiliar to a health care system of seemingly unnecessary middle men, wants to pay the doctor directly.  He’s ready to put up a fight and do battle with the Administrator, but thankfully, Elisha steps in and invites him to come directly to his clinic, and bloodshed is averted. 

So Naaman takes his silver and gold, loaded on his chariots, and resets his GPS for Elisha’s clinic in Samaria.  As he walks in, a nurse greets him, weighs him in and takes his vitals, and then gives Naaman Dr. Elisha’s prescription: “go, wash in the River Jordan 7 times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean.”  But this seems too easy to Naaman, who “becomes angry,” it says.

Some people think they know better than the doctor!  In my first parish in northern MI it was Stanley, the most stubborn guy I’ve ever met.  In his later days he was a pussy-cat, but when he was younger he was totally impossible!  Once, after waiting too long, he went in to see Dr. Koivonen at our little rural hospital for an unspecified gastric distress problem, and Dr. Koivonen, after checking him thoroughly, told him to “go,” go and eat better – you need a healthier diet!  But Stanley was incensed, and went and found another doctor, who agreed to give him one pill after another, none of which ultimately helped him.  Finally, Stanley went to the larger regional health care facility, which, after giving him lots of personal attention and diagnostic tests, convinced him to get off the many medications he had been taking, and suddenly, he felt much better.  Stanley had spent boat loads of money all for nothing, because a simple diet seemed beneath him, he expected something more extravagant, and he had to be in control. 

Naaman nearly walked out of Elisha’s Clinic to look for another doctor too, any other doctor, who would do it Naaman’s way.  “I thought that for me Dr. Elisha would surely come out,” and meet me face to face, said Naaman, “and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy!”  And as for bathing in the Jordan, he said “Are not… the rivers of Damascus [in Syria] better than all the waters of Israel?  Could I not wash in them, and be clean?”  And “he turned and went away in a rage.” 

But Naaman’s servants talk him down, using a little reverse psychology on the “great commander.”  “If the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you have not done it?” they asked.  “How much more, when all he said to you was, ‘Wash, and be clean’?”  Maybe too, Naaman remembers the “young Israelite girl,” in his household, and her confident words about Elisha’s healing powers.  And so he went and dunked in the liberating waters of the Jordan seven times, and came up from this baptism, with “his flesh restored like the flesh of a young boy.” 

Naaman is transformed, and he tells Elisha, “now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel.”  And in thanksgiving Naaman offers Dr. Elisha the gifts of silver and gold he brought.  But Elisha tells him, “As the LORD lives, whom I serve, I will accept nothing!” 

Now, if I thought I could get one over on you, I’d say this was the perfect example of universal health care – Free treatment for all!  But I know you can tell that this is really the plot of European socialists! 

But seriously, I think as a people of faith, we do need to begin talking like we believe that access to health care is a fundamental right, of all, in our society.  What Elisha does for us, is model the care for our neighbor, that goes beyond divisions of race, ethnicity, and ability to pay, in his healing of Naaman the foreigner.  The outsider is welcomed and cared for, just like an insider!  And if you don’t think this is central to the story, keep reading, and you’ll find how Elisha’s own servant, who secretly goes after Naaman to falsely illicit part of his large stash of cash, is the one who becomes the outsider.  Because when Elisha finds out about his servants extortion, he inflicts the leprosy of Naaman, on to him, who receives the curse of the walking dead, and banishment from community. 

Jesus – who in our gospel story healed a man with a skin disease – is often compared to Elisha in the gospels.  Jesus too is from the rural north, is a wonder worker, and doesn’t accept payment for his cures; and most notably, he gives salvation, the ultimate cure, as a gift, free of charge, to all of us, in giving his life on the cross.  Jesus brings the outsider in, in order to unite us all.  He reveals to us the one creator-God of the whole world, manifest in the complexity of many peoples, various colors and creeds, diverse sexual orientations and gender identities, rich and poor. 

And finally, what is revealed, is that the Spirit of Christ is what empowers us, to overcome the stigma between insiders and outsiders, and provide the gift of forgiveness and grace to our neighbor in the balm of healing, that can unite all people together.  Like Naaman, we must learn to give up our stubborn and controlling ways, and let the simple, yet profound cure, of the waters of baptism, wash us clean.  

“The devil’s in the details:” a euphemism we use to alert one another that there might be a surprise inside if we don’t pay attention.  But I want to make the case with you that sometimes, the devil really is there, in the minutia of the details, hiding in plain sight!    

I remember back in middle school in the rebellious days of about 1970, that a class-mate, Sarah, picked up on a new term that was coined at the time, “busy-work.”  In our school newspaper, she denounced the whole system of education she had grown up in, as full of way too much, busy-work!  It was a provocative editorial.   Worthless busy-work was harmful to her, and every other student, she argued, whether it was in class, or for home-work.  It was an affront to her intellect, she made clear – and she was the class valedictorian.  But more than that, it was a whole attitude of indoctrinated mindlessness, she claimed, instead of teaching us how to think critically for ourselves. 

I respected her –  though secretly I had a crush on Gina, the girl who bent the dress code rules, and was expelled for wearing, of all things, a mini-skirt, just standard fare now-a-days!  But anyway, I backed Sarah’s call for an education system that taught us to think for ourselves, in a world of great challenges to come.  We didn’t exactly change the system, but it occurs to me now, that she was clearly against “the devil in the details,” and getting bogged down in the minutia of mind-numbing learning and scholastic baby-sitting, and demanded that education teach us how to master the details, in all we did! 

Back in Martin Luther’s day, they were copiously familiar with the devil’s work.  They saw it all around them in The Plague that snuck up on you and killed, 4 out of 10, of your family and friends.  There was no other explanation than, this was the devil’s work, which some believed was punishment for immorality, exactly like TV preachers who blame their favorite targets, whoever they are, today.  Luther mostly stayed away from the blame game, even back in the 16th century, but he did try for a time to save himself as a young monk, through self-flagellation, that nasty exercise of repeating the blows Christ took from his torturers, to somehow, masochistically escape the punishment of death.  The opposite, ironically, of how Christ came to “raise us up,” so that we might live!  But, the plague made everyone a little crazy!  And, that it might signal the end of the world, was in the back of everyone’s mind.  So, no one doubted that the devil was at work, whatever, or whoever, the intended target was.  “The devil was in the details” of every life. 

If you saw “The Dark Knight,” the second movie in the Christopher Nolan’s Batman series, filmed right here in Chicago, you saw a horrifically mesmerizing picture of pure evil.  Health Ledger, who played the Joker, and who died suddenly at the end of shooting the film, portrayed a perfect embodiment of chaos, a kind of arch-sadist, who derives pleasure out of doing others harm, and can’t be bargained with.  He can only be defeated by, The Batman.  And the Joker knows who he is and demands he take off his mask, and The Batman silences him, as best he can. At the end – and I don’t want to spoil it for you – but, in a very Christ-like way, The Batman has to almost-die – he couldn’t actually die because there’s a sequel, a third film in the works – but he, almost-dies a criminals death, to take on the sins of Gotham, and save the people. 

Just so, the Jesus of Mark’s gospel, has come to clean the evil spirits, out the house!  He comes to die a criminals death to save us, but first he proclaims the message of good news, with authority, and when the demons recognize him, he does not permit them to speak, but casts them out.  The devil has been in the details a long time, and Jesus sweeps them away everywhere he goes.  To those blind to the devil in the details, the leaders of the community, it seems that Jesus is attacking them, because they have grown comfortable living within the boundaries that the evil one has bent in their favor.  The boundaries that once gave life and were set-up to protect, had become exclusionary instead.  ‘Do not work on the Sabbath,’ was infiltrated with hundreds of detailed sub-rules.  Jesus bent, and even broke, some of those rules, based on God’s life-giving meaning behind them.  So for instance, he defended his disciples’ eating grain in the fields on the Sabbath, if they were hungry, and he dismissed hand-washing before eating, saying it’s not what goes in the mouth that defiles, but what comes out of the mouth.  But, this casting the devil out of the details, fundamentally threatened the whole system.  And after these first few weeks of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee, the leaders in Jerusalem are already plotting how to “destroy him.” 

Jesus “came out” to proclaim this message and enact it in exorcisms, to change the entrenched systems of evil that had overgrown the beauty of God’s world.  The devil is in the details, because he’s in hiding from Jesus, silenced and inaudible to our ears, but at work in a new, more insidious way, than ever. 

In 1985, the film Shoah, a 9.5 hour documentary, came out, giving voice to the stories of survivors, perpetrators and bystanders.  Without even one emotional shot of actual Holocaust footage, it exposed the crime, which we have a hard time understanding, amidst the unimaginable horror of, the 6 million murdered by a single crazy man, in endless, everyday, banal details.  Three or four times longer than the average movie, the documentary engages us in such bland details as a barber telling of cutting the hair of those who don’t yet know they’re going to the gas chambers.  Of villagers recalling how they saw a steady flow of trains stuffed with people going into the camps, but returning empty, never bothered enough to tell the authorities.  Of conscripts in to the army, filing paper work, which sanitized and compartmentalized their individual, minute, piece of the operation, so that it seemed like no more than sending out invoices from mom and pop’s small business back home.  In Shoah, the documentary, the horror of The Final Solution was, “the devil in the details.”  Everything was normal; everything was slowly possessed by death, in front of their very eyes, in plain sight. 

We could look at our generation, if we dare, and ask if evil is at work!  We have recently wrapped up a war, founded on lies, that has needlessly destroyed much of a civilized country.  A war paid for, outside of the Congressionally approved budget, straight out of the national debt, while at the same time, banks, given the green light by our elected leaders, sold toxic mortgages to get rich, even faster, knowing it wasn’t them who’d be stuck with the default.  Meanwhile, more than 20% of children in America live below the poverty line, and 1% of the people own 40% of the nation’s wealth, in the midst of the deepest recession in 80 years.  It’s as if the chaos of the Joker himself, has infected us!  Does everything seem normal to you? 

But Jesus showed us how to stand up to the devil in the details.  One by one, two by two, church by church, we pray for the Holy Spirit, to organize and empower us to cast out the demons.  Today we have the opportunity to participate in one tiny action – to fight hunger.  It’s not all that deeply, an organized event or movement, but it is a much broader organization than just our congregation alone.  The Soup-er Bowl of Caring will raise over a million dollars from hundreds of churches and faith-communities today, and all we have to do is give a dollar.  It’s just one simple example of organized people and money, to stand up against the devil in the details, to make a difference. 

And so, as the church, we continue to cast out the demons of hunger, and then we celebrate it, as we do every week, around the life-giving table, where Jesus feeds us with the very bread of life, and bread of and peace.   

Our gospel today is all about exercising(sic) demons!  I suppose they have to get out and stretch every once and a while too!  Sorry, that’s all the jokes I have on exorcisms! 

So instead, let me take a moment of introduction to say that today, the last Sunday of January, is Reconciling in Christ Sunday, a Sunday we celebrate with many other congregations across the country in our welcome of neighbors and friends who identify as gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgender, and queer.  And we remember proudly our official Lutherans Concerned statement of welcome, that, “people of all sexual orientations and gender identities are welcome to the gathering, membership and leadership of [Unity] and encouraged to share in its sacramental and community life.” 

This is only the fourth birthday of adopting this statement at our Annual Meeting.  We have been making some good progress; gotten past the terrible two’s, and I guess that means we’re ready for Kindergarten!  Today, I encourage you, if you haven’t already, to take a moment after worship and sign-up online to be a Reconciling Lutheran.  This is an opportunity to stand up and be counted individually.  We are already a Reconciling in Christ congregation, but each of us can show our support of this Reconciling movement to the church, by signing up ourselves too. 

As you know, our Lutheran Church voted only two years ago to allow GLBT pastors to serve in “publicly accountable, life-long, monogamous same-gender relationships.”  And so, liberation, and respect of one another’s beliefs around these types of welcome, is still quite new.  And it’s important for us to continue remembering, and living into, our statement of welcome. 

Thankfully, Jesus just so happens to tackle the issue of human liberation in our gospel today, and in some ways was well ahead of his time!  “They were blown out of their minds at his teaching,” says the gospel of Mark, “for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.”  At that moment, awareness dawns on them, and they were set on their own path of liberation, and eventually would write a statement of welcome too, a gospel.   But as of yet, the worshipers have not figured out who this Jesus is, or what he has come to do.  They only know that he has an authority in his teaching that is unlike any they have ever encountered.  He has entered their lives, as well as their synagogue, with a power that is captivating.  All they know is that they desire the truth that Jesus obviously holds. 

And what strikes me, is how there are three forces in this story, a triangulation of classic proportion, which work for and against each other, a triangulation that must be resolved before liberation can be realized.  Jesus is one force.  He’s entered their synagogue at Capernaum and brought this powerful and authoritative new teaching to the believers there – who are the second force.  But, as happens when Jesus walks in, the balance of power is shifted!  And Jesus shakes loose what lurks underneath, the opposite of all piety, the Tempter himself, who is party number three!  This “unclean spirit” cries out, “What have you to do with us Jesus of Nazareth?”  Or, this Hebrew idiom could also be translated: “What do we have to do with you?”  And no doubt, both meanings apply.  The demonic spirit is afraid of Jesus’ power over them, saying, “have you come to destroy us?”  But on the other hand, with their power of recognition and their uninhibited nature, they can’t help identifying him, “I know who you are – the holy one of God.”  So my question is: why didn’t he surface earlier, before Jesus entered?  Why, before Jesus arrived, was the demon content to stay hidden?

It’s curious, to say the least, that this “unclean spirit” would arise right out of the synagogue, the home and gathering of the believers.  This is the part that blows our minds, even though the amazement that the believers in the story have, is over Jesus’ teaching.  But can you imagine a possessed man jumping up and shouting out like that in worship?  What would it mean to realize we have demons in our midst?  Who or what are they?  How do they present themselves or materialize in our modern lives?  Where do they live?  How would we exorcise them?  And I don’t mean run around the block with them! 

What we do know is that Jesus breaks the triangulation.  He comes to liberate and make free, teaching the good news.  He exorcises the “unclean spirit,” the ‘they’ plural, spirit, out of the man so he can be well, whole, and saved – the definition of salvation.  “The holy one of God” is a gift that lives in our congregation as a whole, too.  But each of us have some of the good and some of the evil in us, individually.  Each of us desires the power and life giving spirit of Jesus, but we are also tempted to listen to the power of the unclean spirits, who want to let us off the hook when we shouldn’t be, to tell us it’s alright to do it our own way and blame others, or to rest on our laurels. 

And so Jesus comes to liberate us from this merry-go-round of foolishness, the triangulation that never moves us forward into the dominion of God, the realm that he brings.  When Jesus walks in the door, the “unclean spirits” are revealed.  But because Jesus is no longer available in the flesh, he has sent us “the Holy Spirit of God” to live in the Body of Christ, which is the church, which is us.  The church is the people.  We, have the power to exorcise the “unclean spirits” from our midst.  “Be silent, and come out!”  Leave us alone!  And it can and does happen when we stand up together for the same liberation that Jesus revealed, a new teaching with authority. 

This liberation is not a matter of party politics, but is part of the generative spirit of the holy one of God, a freedom from our old lives and a transformation we so desire.  We work on it individually, and pray for strength and guidance.  But for those “unclean spirits” that are many, God enlivens us as the corporate body of Christ, so that, the more we let this authority of Jesus enter our gathering, the more we stand together, a unity of one body, one soul, one mind. 

What a great time to be part of the church, as we adopt statements of welcome for people of all sexual orientations and gender identities, people of all colors and ethnic identities, both male and female equally, even a welcome and new respect for all God’s creatures and the care of the earth.  We are still young and in the early days of living into such statements, so we cannot yet fully shelve the chapters of our mistakes and sins, our privilege and entitlement, until liberation is complete for all.  We know, ‘we’ve come this far by faith!’  And in our ‘songs of thankfulness and praise,’ the more we live out our statements of welcome and they become who we are, the more God’s dominion and reign blossom and grow.  We say with courage and confidence, “Be silent and come out!”  Let the liberation of Jesus ring!  

When Jesus calls, he is faithful to the end.  Again and again, beginning now, he calls, "for the time has been fulfilled."  

But when the prophet Jonah hears God’s call, he’s more like a high school drop-out!  When God calls him to go to Nineveh to prophesy against the enemy of Israel, he actually packs his bags for the other side of the world!  He rushes to the nearest shipping port, buys a ticket to sail the friendly seas, making sure to carry his passport, so as to flee the country, as far as he can possible go!  Jonah is so relatable!

Remember what happens next?  God makes a giant storm to rock the boat.  So the sailors start throwing luggage overboard to lighten the load, but God stirs up the waters all the more!  Then the sailors pray to their many and various gods for a reprieve, but to no avail.  Finally they figure out it’s got something to do with Jonah, who they discover is resting comfortably down below in the hold of the ship!  So Jonah, the reluctant prophet, speaks for the first time in this tale, and admits that yes, the God that he knows, is creating the storm, because, as a Hebrew, he “worships YHWH, the God of heaven, who even made even the sea and the dry land.”  This terrifies the sailors all the more, but Jonah matter-of-factly tells them, that in order to calm the waters, they should feel free to, throw him overboard, knowing that God is really angry, at him.  So, in the last scene of Act 1, the sailors are swinging Jonah by all fours, even as they pray now to YHWH, Jonah’s God, asking for forgiveness, before they give him the heave-ho into the deep of the Mediterranean Sea. 

And sure enough, the storm ceases, and the sailors, in total awe of this God, pledge to worship YHWH alone, from that moment on.  And, as for Jonah the chapter concludes that, “the LORD provided a large fish to swallow up Jonah; and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.” 

The two pairs of Galilean brothers that Jesus calls, who are quite familiar with the sea and its fish, show none of the reluctance to follow, that Jonah did, on the day their Rabbi invited them to “break with business as usual.” (Ched Myers)  Jesus has come in the name of YHWH, the maker of heaven and earth, to call us into the dominion of this God, which, in Jesus, “has come near.”  And business as usual is challenged already in these opening verses of his public ministry.  For example, no one’s ever thought to put these two pairs of brothers together in the same boat!  It’s significant, you see, that Peter and Andrew actually have no boat.  They are the 99% who live a subsistence life, working each day to bring home the bacon, or in their case, the carp and mackerel, enough to feed family their “daily bread.”  James and John, on the other hand, have a boat, a family business passed down from their dad, Mr. Zebedee, and capital and pay roll enough to hire servants.  That puts them, not quite in the 1%, but, in the rare, in those days, middle class. 

And so, as Jesus gathers disciples, we find they will be from many walks of life, different economic, ethnic, gender, sexual and social classes.  But what brings them together, is their response to the good news of God in Jesus, above everything else.  “Business as usual” was disrupted as soon as the dominion of God moved in!  The brothers turn around from their old ways, and “come after” Jesus, “immediately.”  Something new is being created: your kingdom come… on earth as in heaven. 

When Jonah’s three days of solitary confinement in the belly of the big fish are over – preserved but not pickled, apparently! – God has the fish spit Jonah up, literally throw-up, on the beach, on the “dry land,” God’s created safe space, “made” for us.  And then, “the word of the LORD came to Jonah a 2nd time.”  You didn’t think God was giving up, did you?!  Turn around from your defiant disobedience, says our persistent God to Jonah!  I heard you on the boat confessing your faith in me!  Do not be afraid to go to Nineveh, your enemy, and say what I ask you to say. 

Now Nineveh, was the elephant in the room.  This is the story of going to your enemy and telling them they are wrong.  Nineveh was the capital of Assyria, the country that had conquered Israel brutally, and was known for torture and being, well, merciless.  Jonah didn’t want to ask them to be forgiven, not to mention he was rightly afraid for his life, if he even showed up there! 

Nineveh was a massive metropolis, three days walk across, was the claim.  Jonah walked for one day and figured, close enough!  And he “cried out” what was the shortest message of any of the OT prophets, saying simply, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”  Instead of arresting Jonah, as he feared, it was worse yet.  The evil Assyrians “believed God; they proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small,” repented.  And even the cattle, and the goats, and the sheep, were said to, “put on sackcloth!”  And they prayed loudly and movingly to the God of Israel, renouncing their terrorist ways, turning around and “going after” now, the sovereign God of Israel. 

What an odd and funny story!  A fish saves a disobedient prophet by swallowing him for three days.  The evil torturous Assyrians act like ladies and gentleman, dressing up their herds of animals in sack cloth and ashes to repent along with them.  And, God changes God’s mind!  Is God clueless or just terribly irresponsible?  How can justice be served in the face of such mercy?  How on earth can human beings hope to make sense of such a God?  

Jesus is odd and funny in his own way too.  ‘Business as usual’ is broken up.  “The call of Jesus,” as Ched Myers said, “disrupts the lives of potential recruits, promising them only a ‘school’ from which there is no graduation.”  Which is good news, of course, because now we begin a new life with him, that is forever.  The invitation is a free turning around from all that enslaves us, to enter the gates of mercy and the power of love. 

So how does this affect us?  Where are we in the story?  Sure, we are Jonah, sometimes reluctant to answer the call and follow, taking a doomed cruise ship just like the Costa Concordia, running dangerously ashore.  But we are also the brothers and sisters of diverse backgrounds that want to go after Jesus, with all our hearts and minds and strength, leaving our small boats behind.  And, we are the Ninevites, who turn around and trust God to pardon and forgive us. 

In God’s story, we are the chosen ones, here in Andersonville and Edgewater.  A unique diversity of every kind, which God has made – the people that God calls into one boat – Jesus does not let us drop out!  Rabbinic schools, much like our universities today, let their students self-select who they wanted to follow and enroll with.  But Jesus does his own calling, knocking on our door, calling us by name, insistent that we follow.  He calls us: the lost and the lonely, the rich and the poor, the outcasts and winners.  He turns us around from what we were doing, and makes us into that bright shining beacon, an Epiphany Star, so that others will see him, in us, and together we leave ‘business as usual’ to make a difference in God’s world, to live in the joy of divine dominion.