Readings for Sixth Sunday of Easter, May 17, 2020

• Acts 17:22-31  
• Psalm 66:8-20  
• 1 Peter 3:13-22  
• John 14:15-21

IN COURT Sermon by Pastor Fred
In the highest Courts of democracy in Athens, Paul testifies about Jesus.  Okay, it was also the court of their religion.  They didn’t separate the two institutions like we do.  But Paul was certainly far from Jerusalem and Antioch, when he was dropped in, to the heart of western philosophy and the birthplace of democracy. 
 
This was the city of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.  The city that welcomed, and craved new ideas, and debated them lustily.  It was the place of the Parthenon, and every other famous shrine to the Greek pagan gods, much of which still stands today. 
 
There in Athens, Paul will get in trouble for his preaching, as he so often did.  He will also gain some new followers, even some of their important leaders, according to Acts, like Dionysius the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris.  Actually, he’s already in trouble before that. 
 
Paul starts by reaching out to the Jewish community in Athens, like he does in every city, before visiting the famous Agora, the marketplace, to engage the citizens of Athens, people just shopping and hanging out, if you can remember what that’s like!  And one day, some philosophers of the popular Epicurean and Stoic schools, stepped in to debate him as well.  And it’s around these conversations that apparently some take offense at Paul.  On the one hand, they derogatorily call him a “babbler,” that is, somebody who’s picking up and relating various bits of arguments to puff himself up, while trying to sell them something.  Like your wild west snake oil salesman, or a contemporary Reality TV personality.
 
But others have a more serious charge, that he is a proclaimer of foreign deities – very similar to the charge brought against Socrates himself, 5 centuries earlier.  Though some also think Resurrection, in addition to Jesus, is one of the deities he’s peddling!  Jews, of course, wouldn’t make that mistake, even if they rejected Paul’s message.  But the Athenians, so steeped in a pantheon of gods represented in the many gold, silver and stone statues all around them in the marketplace, confuse Resurrection — the power of salvation, and, font of new life – with just one more possible god they should consider worshipping. 
 
So they bring Paul to a kind of pre-trial discovery hearing to stand before the Areopagus.  Like our word church, meaning both the people and the building, the Areopagus could mean its democratic body of elected’s, or the actual Areopagus building – or maybe both.  In any case, that Paul has spent time discussing religion with Athenians of every stripe, in the days leading up to this moment, must have been, suddenly, very helpful.  And he decides not to give his regular stump speech, but is able to tailor his remarks to his audience. 
 
"Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way,” Paul begins (flattery, will get you everywhere!).  “For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, ‘To an unknown god.’” 
 
Pretty clever, picking up on that one, I thought, among the dozens of gods.  But it makes for something he has in common with them, a starting-off place for Paul’s message.  “What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.  24The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, 25nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things.” 
 
This was pretty bold for Paul to proclaim, even given, that it was true!  There he stood, surrounded by the shrines of Greek religion, housed in some of the most magnificent monuments anywhere, and in so many words, said they were small and inconsequential, compared to the living God and creator of all things! 
 
So, Paul was tactful, but he didn’t mince words.  In his more secular approach, he didn’t slight or misrepresent the glory and grace of the King of kings, and Lord of lords.  And like all good leaders, he ends on a decision point.  “God overlooked our past misunderstandings about religion as long as we didn’t know any better,” said Paul – “but that time is past.  The unknown is now known, and God’s calling for a radical life-change.  God has set a day when the entire human race will be judged and everything set right.  And God has already appointed the judge, confirming him before everyone by raising him from the dead.”  (trans: The Message)
 
In his whole speech, Paul never even uses the name Jesus, or his title, the Christ.  But he has made a strong case for him in the minds of his listeners.  In his pre-trial appearance, he has given them all they need to know, to make a decision.  He has set the stage for those who hear the word, and who will follow, when Paul will have another chance to deepen their faith, and move them toward baptism in Christ. 
 
We also are on trial in this time of COVID-19.  This is our pre-trial in the Agora, in courts of democracy, waning as they are.  We need to bring it to the sacred halls at every level.  The foundations of our faithfulness in Christ are being shaken, as if by an earthquake.  Are the meek to inherit the earth, as Jesus proclaimed?  Are the poor to receive the kingdom of God coming down out of heaven like a bride to meet her bridegroom?  Are those who mourn to be comforted? 
 
Like the earthquake that shook the jail in Philippi, the city that Paul and his companions had recently left, they could have sat stunned and frozen in fear, or they could open their eyes to the possibility starring them in the face – which is what they chose.  They took it as an opportunity to save all those with them, the imprisoned and the jailer.  They lived out their faith in the God who was creator of all, slave and free, and even of earthquakes; they feared not, and continued on faithfully with the opportunity that was afforded them.  Such a trusting and simple choice resulted in the adoration of the jailer, who took them home, fed and clothed them, and he and all his household received the gift of baptism from Paul. 
 
Covid-19 is our earthquake, from which we can choose to act faithfully, or in fear.  The pagan pantheon of false gods that has ruled almost every part of our lives, impoverishing us, pitting us against each other, and filling our heads with propaganda – like we can’t live faithfully in community and support one another in love, that it’s all up to us individually to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps – has been clearly exposed.  Healthcare, housing, and schools, banking, jobs, and our food supply, have all been shaken to the core, and are crumbling in this earthquake, due to the ‘American-Areopagus-Philosophers of austerity,’ who invest in the dead gods of gold and silver.  We were only barely getting by, before.  Now in this earthquake of a pandemic, we can see with clearer eyes – we can’t go back; we cannot go back, to normal.  And why would we want to?! 
 
“God will not leave us orphaned,” Jesus says in our gospel reading.  Indeed, he will send us another in his place, the Spirit of truth, one who will Advocate for us, and abide in, and with us, always. 
 
Jesus provides halls of justice for us.  He has shown us how very near God is, “indeed, God is not far from each one of us,” Paul says.  And having been made God’s “offspring,” he continues, “we live and move and have our being” in God.  In Jesus’ court, the world will be made right and just, through the power of love that is stronger than gold and silver shrines made by human hands, attempting to enshrine themselves. 
 
The power of the Resurrection is not a deity – a mere statuette.  But Jesus, who once was dead, is now alive, and ruling over all – our in-court Advocate – judging with forgiveness, grace and mercy. 
 
Let us bring this message to all the courts of God’s world, until the living One has redeemed and made us right, in the kingdom and realm of God. 

Readings for the 4th Sunday of Easter, GOOD SHEPHERD Sunday, May 3, 2020

• Acts 2:42-47  
• Psalm 23  
• 1 Peter 2:19-25  
• John 10:1-10

"Healthy Shepherding," by Pastor Fred
 7So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.
 
John, we know, uses a lot of shepherd and sheep metaphors in his gospel.  Jesus is the Good Shepherd.  Jesus is the Lamb of God.  And here, Jesus is the gate to the sheepfold. 
 
Psalm 23, gets right to the point.  “The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.” 
 
One of the earliest artistic renderings of Jesus, is, Jesus as the Shepherd, found in the catacombs. It’s the picture of Jesus with the lamb around his shoulders.  So, almost from the beginning, Jesus is known as the Good Shepherd, a descendant of David the shepherd boy, and our ultimate protector and savior – the healer of our every ill. 
 
And that’s what I want to talk with you about today – Jesus as our healer.  Jesus as our healthcare provider.  For the word for health, comes from the Greek word sotor, or Savior, and soteria, or salvation, meaning healing and wholeness, and also one who redeems, restores, sets free, and delivers from.
 
So when Jesus says, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; … Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture,” Jesus is talking about protecting them from the false shepherds, and offering them the wholeness of salvation – a healing for all their oppressions and illnesses. 
 
They could go inside the gate and be safe.  But what’s more, they could – in their new found health and wholeness in Jesus – go out and find safe pasture.  Just as in Psalm 23:  2The Lord makes me lie down in green pastures, and leads me beside still waters. 3You restore my soul, O Lord, and guide me along right pathways for your name’s sake.
 
ELCA Pastor, Samuel Cruz says, “In Jesus’ day, those [elites] who could afford good healthcare and medicine, were not happy when the marginalized received good healthcare and medicine, from Jesus.”  We have thieves and bandits today, just like they did back then, and there is always a struggle for who is in control of healthcare. 
 
Jesus was nothing if not a healer in his ministry.  A quick search, in Matthew’s gospel alone, reveals how universal and inclusive his appeal, as healer and bringer of salvation, was. 

In Matthew 8.3-13
3He stretched out his hand and touched [the man with leprosy], saying, …Be made clean!’ Immediately his leprosy* was cleansed. 
And in the very next verse:
5 When [Jesus] entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him 6and saying, ‘Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, in terrible distress.’ 7And [Jesus] said to him, ‘I will come and cure him.’ 8The centurion answered, ‘Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed… 10When Jesus heard him, he was amazed  …13And to the centurion Jesus said, ‘Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.’ And the servant was healed in that hour.
 
In Mt. Chapter 14;
34 When [Jesus and the disciples] had crossed over [Lake Galilee], they came to land at Gennesaret. 35After the people of that place recognized him, they sent word throughout the region and brought all who were sick to him, 36and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.
 
And in the very next chapter, (Mt. 15):
30Great crowds came to him, bringing with them the lame, the maimed, the blind, the mute, and many others. They put them at his feet, and he cured them, 31so that the crowd was amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the maimed whole, the lame walking, and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel.
 
Every healthcare system is a reflection of its morals and beliefs.  How a society treats its sick and elderly, says everything about its values.  And the systems of healing, are at the same time, all about who gets healed, and who’s worth saving.  Even before the pandemic, our American healthcare was really, just a triage system of care.
 
Jesus preached and lived his healthcare values, when he made healing the sick, the lame, the rejected and the dying, central to his vision of the dawning kingdom of God, as he journeyed to Jerusalem, and toward his own suffering and death.  Fundamental to his message, was that, Healthcare was a human right; salvation is a gift from God; and there are always opposing systems and powers to such a belief, which he confronted and revealed.  In fact, his healings and exorcisms have been called, enacted parables, because of how they demonstrably reveal the life-giving power of the kingdom of God, in the presence of our enemies – as Psalm 23 says. 
 
When it comes to people’s health, Jesus seems to be saying, you don’t cut corners, and you don’t ration care!  You raise-up those who are forgotten.  You include those who are left out.  You heal everyone, rich and poor.  Jesus’ health plan was universal, a gift of salvation and redemption for all. 
 
On the other hand, public health scientist, Dr. Edgar Rivera Colón, painted a stark picture of our current system in America.  “The deaths that we're seeing today [in this pandemic] are directly related to the model of health care that's based upon just-in-time production.  You have as little inventory as you can and you cut costs as much as you can,” Colón said.  But, “You can't do that with healthcare without killing people. Throughout the last 40 years,” he says, “hospital beds have been cut, healthcare has been privatized more in this country, health care workers have been treated poorly. Very simply, [the American system] of healthcare [is] kill[ing] people.” 
 
Jesus’ system is – Everyone in, no one out!  Jesus is the gate-keeper.  He invites all to come into his sheep-pen to find safety and protection.  He heals us, and equips us to live, his life – a life of deep faith and spirituality, a life of active non-violence and speaking truth to the powers of evil, so that we can go out into green pastures as the people of God, knowing that baptized in Christ Jesus, we’ve already been made as dead as we ever can be, and so, we’re un-afraid to live in this world, as examples of love, healing, and wholeness. 
 
Jesus our Good Shepherd, protects and heals us, leads us beside still waters and guides us into pathways of justice and righteousness, all our days. 
 
We are, locked-in, the sheep-pen of our homes now, in this pandemic.  But we also have the Good Shepherd by our side, deepening our faith as the baptized people of God, to make us ready to go out into a ‘new normal’ – to embrace our good news message, and live it fully and confidently for the sake of the world – including, for a universal healthcare, that Jesus lived and revealed to all, in his saving love and grace, as God’s anointed one. 
 
Jesus is our gate, watching over our coming in and our going out – healing us, redeeming us, restoring us, and bringing us salvation.  

Readings for the Fourth Sunday in Lent, March 22, 2020

• Psalm 23  
• Ephesians 5:8-14  
• John 9:1-41

My Favorite Thing about Sheep, sermon by Pastor Fred Kinsey
​I want to reflect with you on the 23rd Psalm this morning.  Normally, I would have chosen this gospel reading, perhaps my favorite story in John, of the man born blind.  But, this has not been a normal week!
 
The 23rd Psalm is everyone’s, most favorite Psalm – so beautiful, so comforting, so simple and direct.  It seems like divine intervention, that we have won in lectionary lottery, and been dealt Psalm 23 today! 
 
So then, sheep!  For me – when I think about it – the thing I like most about sheep is – wool sweaters!  Right?!  I’ve been wearing my favorite Marino Wool sweater almost all winter.  It’s so thin and sheer, and yet it’s so amazingly warm.  I love it!  And, it’s basic black, which is perfect for me.  So, thank you, Marino Sheep! 
 
But the 23rd Psalm isn’t about what we, or I, like about the sheep, but it’s all about imagining, we are the sheep, and God is our Good Shepherd.  David – who came from a family of sheep herders – is credited with writing this Psalm, and imagining he is part of the flock, he doesn’t just talk about God, but talks to God.  It’s personal for him.  “The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want.” 
 
The thing about sheep is, they are not the sharpest tool in the shed in the animal kingdom!  Basically they love to graze – to eat all day.  And the reason sheep need a shepherd is because, on their own, they’ll ‘nibble themselves lost!’ James Howell  With their heads to the ground, they follow the greenest and most delicious grass wherever it goes.  And, they were known for walking off a cliff’s edge into a ravine, or wandering too far from the flock, where wolves might cash in their meal of mutton Groupon! 
 
Dog walkers today can use leashes, but with 50 or a 100 sheep, that’s not possible for Shepherds.  They used a rod or a staff to keep all of them together in safety – which David says, comforts me.  “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. The LORD makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me beside still waters.”  David imagines himself beyond wanting, and beyond danger, because his Good Shepherd provides the perfect space, green pastures and cool still waters, for him.  It’s all good! 
 
And so, it’s in times such as these – the past couple of weeks that have been anything but serene, green pastures – that we need the comfort of the 23rd Psalm.  As we came closer and closer to the Governor’s decision, to Shelter in Place, and stay home, I don’t know about you, but I felt more and more anxiety about how to handle it all.  I’ve always worked at home at least one day a week.  But seeing everything shut down, and for me, changing the whole way we do worship and meeting together, put me on the ravine’s edge.
 
I know some, if not all of you, have had similar reactions and feelings.  There are so many unknowns!  This has never happened before!  How do we get our food now without having any human contact?  How do we negotiate the grocery store?  Or order out from the local restaurant?  How do we work from home?  How do we share our new home office with our partner or spouse – what are the boundaries?  How do we stay in touch with our friends and family while we can’t be with them in person?  Do I have to sanitize my own home? – is my food safe to eat?  How long will this last?  What if I’m laid off and will soon have no paycheck coming in?  Maybe this coronavirus really isn’t that contagious, as some suggest? 
 
Or just, how do I work this Zoom meeting??!!
 
“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.”  Even “though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for You are with me…” 
 
If we haven’t quite yet - for this is still the beginning - I think we’ll come to see that in this confined and cocooned life, shuttered in place, cooped up with our feelings of insecurity and the unknown, God will become more real than ever.  In the depths of our despair, in this shadowy valley, God will enter thru the liminal crags of our yearning, our prayers, our wants.  
 
We desire the LORD to be our Good Shepherd.  What, or who else, can satisfy our deepest longings, wants, and desires?  Cut off from the marketplace – where we can never quite satisfy our wants anyway – we have time and space now to ask God once again to be our Good Shepherd.  To come and guide our lives, completely, always. 
 
So maybe this is a time to reassess what is most valuable in our lives – the things we surround ourselves with, both tangible and beyond our grasp.  “He leads me on pathways of justice,” David concludes.  And in the end, the road of our deepest desire is always to go home.  To return to what is the greatest comfort of our hopes and dreams, or, to have a second chance to right the wrongs, of home. 
 
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.” 
 
For me, I hope, going home will be something like feeling surrounded by all my friends and family, and snuggling in my sheer warm Marino wool sweater/blanket – with an overflowing cup of wine – and the LORD as my Shepherd. 
 
In Psalm 23, these are the things God desires for us, even today, in the very presence of this enemy, this coronavirus, this shadow of death threatening to take away our green pastures and still waters. 
 
The Good Shepherd has herded us inside for now.  But, sheltered in place, we can still comfort one another with the promise that goodness and mercy wins.  Let us look forward to dwelling together on the other side of this pandemic.  And let us continue to faithfully trust in our Good Shepherd, whose rod and staff comforts us, and brings us home.  

Readings for the Third Sunday in Lent, March 15, 2020

• Exodus 17:1-7 
• Psalm 95 
• Romans 5:1-11 
• John 4:5-42

"Social Distancing," Rev. Fred Kinsey
Are Jesus and the woman at the well practicing social distancing?!  Jesus, for his part, stays behind at the well all by himself while his disciples trudge into town to get some lunch.  And the woman who comes to draw water – who remains nameless in this story – comes in the heat of mid-day, when she knows no one else will be coming.  She expects to be alone.  All the others will come early in the morning, or late in the afternoon. 
 
No doubt, Jesus and the woman, kept their distance at the well.  But their social distancing was not due to any Coronavirus outbreak.  Neither did they have leprosy, which by the laws of Leviticus demanded the shunned lepers shout out “unclean, unclean!” when approaching others, to warn them to keep their distance. 
 
We know, of course, there was a social distancing of men and women, in public places.  But in this story, most importantly, is the separation, and distancing, of Jews and Samaritans.  Ever since the death of King Solomon (10C BC) – when the kingdom of Israel split in two, and Samaritans no longer recognized Jerusalem as the capital, but worshiped on their own holy mountain, at She-chem, or what’s called here, Sychar – their social distancing hardened into a begrudging rift!  Jews considered Samaritans apostates, and they each became fierce cross-town rivals.  It only grew worse after the Exile to Babylon and Israel’s return in the 500’s, because the Samaritans had been able to hide out and stay in the hilly region of Samaria.  They didn’t suffer, Exile.  So by the time of Jesus in the 1st C. they were so rigidly separate, that John says matter-of-factly, “Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.” 
 
So like most Jews, Jesus and his family and clan, took the easier route along the Jordan valley, skirting Samaria, when traveling back and forth from Jerusalem to Galilee.  But not Jesus and his disciples!  They deliberately cut through Samaria, as if to provoke this encounter. 
 
So there Jesus sat, by the well, and as soon as the Samaritan woman appeared, he bids her ‘Give me a drink!’ – a gender, social distancing, no-no.  I hope he said please, but that’s probably just me!  You can tell by her response, though, that her biggest surprise is that he, a Jew, should even address her, a Samaritan!  Because of course, that bridge is closed.  But Jesus is not concerned about dead laws and customs that don’t serve God.  “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’” Jesus replies, “you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” 
 
Unfazed and curious now, she replies, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep.  Where do you get that living water?”  And then she shows him she knows her stuff, “Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?”  Though they share the same scriptures, the strength of the Samaritan interpretation, is the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
 
No, not at all, says Jesus.  What I’m saying is, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” 
 
I think that would have knocked my socks off, and right then and there, I would have fallen down and worshiped him!  But the woman’s not yet convinced, and she decides to call his bluff!  “Sir, give me this water, so that I many never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.” 
 
But that leaves her caught in a kind of either/or bind.  ‘Water is life, and life is water!’  We need both: real tangible clean and delicious water to drink from the well.  And, the spiritual water that bubbles up from the life of Jesus.
 
To get to his point, Jesus changes the subject.  “Go, call your husband, and come back.”  She only says, “I have no husband,” perhaps distrustful where this is going.  And Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying , ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband…”  Aaha, says the woman, back on track, “I see that you are a prophet.”  And she continues challenging their differences between Jewish and Samaritan beliefs, noting that although she’s impressed he’s a prophet, they unfortunately worship separately at different locations – Shechem and Jerusalem – and who are either of them to change that?! 
 
But Jesus’ answer would have scandalized, both Samaritans, and Jews.  “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.  …But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth…” 
 
“I know that Messiah is coming,” who is called Christ, said the woman.  “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.”  It seems to be dawning on her now.  But to make it crystal clear, Jesus reveals that, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.” 
 
Just then the disciples came back, astonished he was speaking with a Samaritan woman.  They don’t know the half of it!  But, at least they manage to hold their tongues from saying the derogatory and demeaning things on their minds, about her.
 
The woman leaves her water jar by the well, and turns to hurry back to the city.  Immediately she said to those in town, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?”  And her testimony was so moving that they all joined her to go back and meet this Jesus.  And when they arrived at Jacob’s well, Jesus was talking to his disciples about ‘fields that were ripe for harvesting.’ 
 
“So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked Jesus to stay with them; and he stayed [in Sychar] two days.  And many more believed,” concluding for themselves now, that, “we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.” 
 
Once again, the disciples don’t come off especially good in this story!  Maybe as Deacon’s who do the grocery shopping, but the true evangelists here, are the enemy-Samaritans, the woman and her followers, whose lives are turned around and who become enthusiastic followers of Jesus. 
 
The woman at the well was the key to unlock this door.  She’s not only an evangelist, but a wonderful debating partner with Jesus!  She doesn’t give up or give in, but contributes and learns, through it all.  She leaves her old life behind, which is symbolized so well by forgetting her bucket at the well, which she no longer needs.  She has found the water that will truly quench her thirst, and has been baptized with the deep well-water that will save her life.  No more does she have to be, one more faithless man’s property, in a series of loveless marriages.  She has fallen in love with the Messiah who is called Christ. 
 
Perhaps, for the first time, she has found her true vocation in spreading the good news.  What if that’s what we all have found, those of us who believe, and who gather in Christ’s name?  Here, we find our true calling.  Here, and when we are Sent out into the world to put our faith into action, we are our most fulfilled selves. 
 
As Liz Goodman says, “…Imagine the church as a place where people who don’t fit their type, find a place for realizing their potential.  Imagine [church] as a people among whom each can find good purpose for power that is otherwise ill-fitting.  The church can’t be a context for conformity.  To follow Christ is to tap into some deep truth ourselves and to cultivate its growth, a process by which is built up, the beloved community of God’s reign.”
 
Perhaps we are a people who have already, felt, social distancing in our lives, long before COVID-19 arrived.  Perhaps we have more importantly found our good health and deepest love through this humble assembly, being baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection, that has saved us, and made us one. 
 
So, let us go out – be Sent forth – to share the good news of this deep, deep, spring of water gushing up to life in the new age!  

Readings for First Sunday in Lent, March 1, 2020

• Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7  
• Psalm 32  
• Romans 5:12-19  
• Matthew 4:1-11

"The Devil Doesn't Come in Red Leotards," sermon by Pastor Fred
The best Halloween costume in our family growing up was, the Devil!  I mean, it was elaborate for its time, which was admittedly, some time ago.  Long before scary video games.  Long before the Joker came to life on the screen, back when Marvel Super Heroes were only available in comic book form! 
 
I don’t know where my mom got the Devil costume, but, it was so good, it was the only Halloween costume all of us kids took turns wearing.  It was a first-generation rubber mask, truly scary with its devilish horns.  And the full body costume was a fire-y red.  It even had a long tail to the suit, and a pitchfork that you carried. 
 
When my little brother was probably not even 10 years old, and I had the suit on getting ready for trick or treating, I scared the living stuffing’s out of him, when we met suddenly on the stairway!  He ran the other direction, screaming and balling, and afraid for years after that.  Which, of course, I felt bad about! 
 
No one really believes in the Devil like that, anymore – do they?  The Devil doesn’t come in red leotards carrying a pitchfork! 
 
The author of our Lutheran Sundays and Seasons resource wrote, “This Lent we are called to expunge the fantastical images of the devil from our minds and think seriously about the real presence of evil in our world. We know firsthand about the sin that caused, causes, and will cause suffering to us, our loved ones, our neighbors, our global communities, and creation itself.  Sin is real; suffering is real; evil is real; indeed, the devil is real.  This oppressive, tangible reality is as real as the air we breathe—felt but not always seen.  Greed, envy, rage, hatred, war, discrimination, and apathy are just some of the ways the devil’s forces wreak havoc upon us. These forces have one goal and one goal only: to turn us away from the will of God.” (Sundays & Seasons)
 
Every year on the first Sunday of Lent, we hear from one of the Synoptic Gospel Temptation-of-Jesus stories.  But what strikes me today in this Temptation by the Devil, from the gospel of Matthew’s account is: We are both like Jesus, and not like Jesus.
 
Certainly we are like Jesus when, after fasting for a long time, he is famished.  Most of us, I dare say, don’t go without our “3 squares” every day.  I remember the days when it seemed like, I could eat as much as I wanted and never gain a pound – and I never missed a meal!  So fasting can challenge our normal order, and perception of comfort, and taking for granted the good things we have.  The meaning and value of food on the table can become much deeper, and clearer.  Maybe some of you have fasted before.  Maybe some grew up poor and didn’t have enough, or like more and more students, even college athletes on scholarship, you have been food-insecure and survived on Ramen noodles or gone without meals sometimes.  Jesus knew hunger too, he was completely human in that way, but leaned into his belief that God’s word was more nourishing even, than daily bread. 
 
Jesus was human like us, in that he was subject to the laws of nature too.  Jumping off the top of a large building like the Temple, or a very high mountain, would be certain death.  God has created us mind, body and spirit, and given us this awesome and ‘very good’ physical world.  And God has formed boundaries for us that are meant to be life-giving, though they sometimes seem restrictive or unfair.  We may be tempted toward speeding down the highway, especially after a drink or two, to prove our – I don’t know what, more than human capacity, glorifying ourselves in some way – but of course, that can end badly, for you, or someone else.  Jesus decided not to jump – leaning into the laws of nature God set up for the world, and letting the Devil know, us followers will too. 
 
But we are also, not like Jesus.  We cannot fast for 40 days and 40 nights, I’m guessing.  We cannot turn stones into loaves of bread, as the Devil assumed the Son of God could.  We cannot command God’s angels to bear us up, if we’re bunging jumping and the cable snaps.  We cannot glimpse, even half the kingdoms of the world that the Devil showed to Jesus.  Though in our humanness we are certainly tempted to indulge in some of the ones we have seen – the love of money, the priveledge of popularity and white supremacy, the lure to eat-drink-and-be merry, for tomorrow we die! 
 
As Gil Bailie put it so well, “…the story of the wilderness temptations shows, the essence of [Jesus].  His triumph over demonic snares in the wilderness, [which] was a triumph over the glamour of [imitating the Devil], …an achievement made possible, not by Jesus’ strength of will, but by the superior strength of another [imitative] desire: the desire “to do his Father’s will,” to become the image and likeness of the One in whose image and likeness he knew himself to have been made.” (Violence Unveiled p. 207)
 
We are like Jesus – and, we are not like Jesus.  We are only human, not divine.  But we are made in God’s image, which is another way of saying, we have the same desire of Jesus’ more perfect obedience to God.  We can and do lean into our desire to imitate Jesus, who imitates God.  And the more we do, not just individually, but collectively, together as the ecclesia, the church and community of followers, the more we fulfill the justice and peace of the kingdom and realm of God, and the more we bring that kingdom on earth, as well as it is in heaven. 
 
Because the Devil is real, real in our temptation away from God’s will – and not just pious individual temptations to commit individual sins, for those can be used to pit us against each other for the benefit of the powerful and exploitation of the kingdoms of this world – but the Devil is real, as the power tempting us all to live in those ‘kingdoms of the world’ in ‘collective sin,’ like racism and sexism, like the love of money and excesses of Capitalism, like ill-begotten and unfettered power and the false holiness of war. 
 
The Devil doesn’t come in red leotards, we know, but is subtle, more than overt.  Evil often comes as temptations we already desire!  We see it in the gospel story 3 times: 1) Jesus is hungry – the Devil is prepared to step in and offer a quick fix, bread, that you can purchase right here on the corner from the PayDay Lender, at 400% APR.  2) And the devil knows that Jesus loves the Temple and wants to reform a corrupt religion – wouldn’t doing amazing tricks like being saved from a high-wire act gain him so many more followers?  If you but take the first step, the devil is ready to assist!  3) And Jesus, the Son of God, has been preaching the good news of the kingdom and realm of God arriving in his very person.  So, how about I give you all the kingdoms of the world, if you but worship me, says the devil! 
 
Diablos is there to give us everything we want – the easy way, in a moment.  Follow me, he says, I know some shortcuts!  Tired of all the rules of the world God has made for us?  The devil has an array of kingdoms of this world, more glitzy and attractive, free for indulging your libertarian self-pleasure.  
 
But the more the devil wins, the deeper in debt we become, like a millstone hung around our necks.  ‘Here, come up to this mountaintop and let me show you all the oil fields around the globe.  I’ll give you them all to burn up for energy, to build homes and cities and nations, and make a handful of you rich beyond your wildest dreams, Diablos said.  And now, with our addiction to oil, we are on the brink of a global climate crisis. 
 
But if we say, with Jesus, we will “worship the Lord our God, and serve God only,” we will be able to truly see, and follow in a new direction.  A life-giving direction.  Then, the devil will leave us, and suddenly angels will come and wait on us, begin to bind up our wounds, and open our eyes.  A change is gunna come!  The world is about to turn!  If we live by the grace of God.
 
As Lenny Duncan says, we are in the midst of a theological crisis, more than an economic or social crisis.  So first, we have to realize, and believe, that we are like Jesus, and, we’re not like Jesus – both at the same time.  Then, we will be able to laugh at all our temptations!  And we will begin to desire the kingdom of heaven. 
 
We are created in the image of God.  And God is working for our redemption already.  ?What did we promise in our baptism, but ‘to renounce all the forces that defy God, all the powers of this world that rebel against God, all the ways of sin that draw us from God?’  So, let us deepen our journey these 40 days, as followers of Jesus, who is God’s anointed one. 

Readings for the Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, Feb. 16, 2020

• Deuteronomy 30:15-20 
• Psalm 119:1-8  
• 1 Corinthians 3:1-9  
• Matthew 5:21-37

Choose Life, sermon by Pastor Fred
The God of Israel cares about life — we see in our Deuteronomy passage – not only our lives, but also the life of the world. God is a God of life.
 
And then in our Gospel in Matthew – as we continue this week reading from the Sermon on the Mount – Jesus digs deeper into its meaning.  ‘How can we live together as God’s people, people who flow with God’s eternal life, pouring out blessing on all people?’  Jesus came, to fulfill the law and the prophets, not to abolish them – and to ‘tell us what it means to be people who choose life for the world.’  How can we live together as God’s people, people who flow with God’s eternal life?  That’s the question Pastor Isaac S. Villegas poses to our readings today.  (@Isaacsvillegas)   
 
Jesus – by the time of his public ministry – was steeped in the Law and the Prophets.  And the primary Meta story of the Torah, the first five books of the bible, is that Moses led the Israelites for 40 years wandering in the desert, out of Slavery into the freedom of the Promised Land.  In our reading today, they were finally on the verge of entering this land of ‘milk and honey.’  And so, in his penultimate Farewell Speech, Moses gives a passionate plea: “15See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. 16If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I am commanding you today, … then you shall live and become numerous, and the LORD your God will bless you …17But if your heart turns away and you do not hear, but are led astray …, 18I declare to you today that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.”
 
So Moses is about to set them free, to be the people of God, in the most awesome and powerful way!  Life, or death?  Prosperity, or adversity?  Your choice, says Moses – who is literally standing on the other side of the Jordan River, on the eastern bank, at the doorstep of the Promised Land, which he himself will not enter, his work now almost complete, and realizing a new work must be acknowledged by the Israelites, and re-covenanted with their God.  I say to you, says Moses, “Choose life!”  “Choose life so that you and your descendants may live… so that you may live in the land that the LORD swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” 
 
But the most curious thing ‘you never knew’ about this speech from Deuteronomy – the last of the Five Books of Moses, that started in the beginning with Genesis, and continued through Exodus, the exit from Egypt, through the Laws of Leviticus, and the census and number of sojourners recorded in Numbers, to finally, Deuteronomy, meaning “a second Law,”  …the most curious thing is that it was actually written 100’s of years later – almost 1,000 years – when they were exiled in Babylon!  Yes!  Though it was in development since the time of Moses, as an oral tradition, and some parts of Deuteronomy were written down even as the threat of destruction by Babylon was imminent, some decades prior to the Exile – these last chapters, from which we’ve read today, came together and were compiled in their final form, only when Israel had already been carted away, and so, had lost everything – their homes, their government, their land – and become captives once again, like they were in Egypt, this time, slaves to King Nebuchadnezzar, in Babylon. 
 
And what they needed then at that moment, most desperately, was somehow to have hope for the future, in the midst of this Exile, this second wilderness wandering, this loss and deep grief.  At this, their lowest ebb, was when  this theological speech was written, as a ‘salve’ to bind the wounds of their exile, to remember their God of promise and life.  Deuteronomy recalls how Moses, on the precipice of entering the Land God brought them back to, offered them a choice between life or death, to accept the gift of re-covenanting with God, and live lives of justice and peace – or, to turn their hearts, and lives, away.
 
Where do we get our hope today, to live for the future?  In the midst of this escalating slide into separate systems of truth, fueled by everyday modes of slick, but never-quite-satisfied social media bots and controversies, manipulated by elites within and without, by oligarchs dripping with ill-gotten wealth, threatening our 246 year experiment in democracy, and the very institutions of church and state – In the midst of this seemingly uncontrollable earthquake in our lives, and deep fissure shaking our social fabric – where do we get our hope to live for the future? 
 
The font of life and light of the world comes in the person and message who offers us a new interpretation of the Law – not to abolish it, but to fulfill it.  “You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder…’ but I say to you” says Jesus, “that if you are angry… if you insult a brother or sister… if you say, ‘You fool,’” you have already violated the Commandment not to murder. 
 
And so, four times in these verses, Matthew quotes Jesus using this same formula, “you have heard that it was said,” so and so… “but I say to you,” this and that…  This second interpretation of the Law, in Matthew – or third even, if you count Deuteronomy – was written at the end of the first century of the Common Era, addressed to a whole new crowd, a wider audience, a couple, 2 to 3 generations after Jesus. 
 
For those followers of Jesus who were then forming the church, this new interpretation of the 10 Commandments was meant to permeate their lives, and social institutions, rejecting all ‘nativism,’ with the practical-ideal of ‘the kingdom of heaven’ that Jesus had already ushered in.  “You have heard it said that you should not murder, but I say to you,” you should not even harm the reputation of your neighbors. 
- It’s not just actually stabbing someone that breaks my covenant of love and life, says Jesus, but stabbing someone in the back!
         - It’s not just anger, but the hate in the anger, and cutting someone down with your words. 
          - It’s not just pushing someone off a cliff, but bullying and crushing the very light, salt and spirit out of them.
          - It’s not just speaking falsely against your neighbor, as Martin Luther explained in the Small Catechism, but failing to take responsibility to put the best construction on their intentions. 
The Command against killing, doesn’t just avoid being an axe murderer.  It creates the law of Love, and shows no hostility.    
 
Jesus took the “thou shalt not’s,” of the Ten Commandments – that in our time in some quarters, have come to be used as a bludgeon against each other in the name of God – and transformed them into a New Covenant that placed the responsibility for life in the midst of the ‘people of faith,’ to live as ‘lights and salt’ for the world.  “Choose Life, so that you and your descendants may live, …”
 
Finally, Jesus’ re-do of Deuteronomy – created an opening for a new Covenant, between God and the Gentiles.  It was built on the original rock-solid Hebrew foundation, but sprang up again from the root of Jesse, in the self-giving grace of the cross, so that it could not fail to bring new life.  And so it continues to teach us to build on those foundations of justice and love. 
 
Jesus, light of the world, shines and exposes the deep, hidden places we don’t want to look at, because sin isn’t pretty, and we don’t like that look on us!  But in Jesus sin is no longer the last word.  Where once the punishment for making a wrong choice, for falling off the path with God, was death, Jesus comes to us as the new covenant – a washing in baptism, and present-gracious-gift-of-life in bread and wine.
 
Jesus writes the new covenant, the will of God for our lives in the flesh, in the deep red of his own blood, and pours it out for us even today, for the forgiveness of sins.  As the anointed one, Jesus not only teaches us the way, but models for us on the cross, the consequences of human-inability to choose well, so we can be picked-up when we falter and fail, and choose life. 
 
And so, in the light of Epiphany, we can begin to see that ‘Jesus came not to abolish the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfill them.’  He asked us to live every aspect of our lives built on the foundation of justice and love, leaning-in to the gift of life God offers us in the kingdom of heaven – right now.  In a word, Jesus says – from the cross, and journeying with us by the power of the Holy Spirit – “Choose life.”  

Readings for 5th Sunday after Epiphany, 2/9/2020

• Isaiah 58:1-9a (9b-12)  
• Psalm 112:1-9 (10)  
• 1 Corinthians 2:1-12 (13-16)  
• Matthew 5:13-20

Salt and Light, sermon by Pastor Fred Kinsey
I have a friend that loves using salt on his food.  Whatever fine dining establishment or self-serve joint we go to, he always asks for the salt shaker.  The thing is, he has borderline high blood-pressure, so it’s not a particularly healthy choice!  And his boyfriend always intervenes, saying, no, that’s enough!  You know you’re not supposed to do that!  Stop it right now!  Please, for me?!? 
 
But he can’t help himself.  The taste of food for him is just not the same without more salt! – dinner would lose its taste and its value for him, he just can’t stop himself!  He puts it on his pasta and his salad, on his chicken and his brisket, on his vegetables, and, I’ve even seen him put it on tortillas chips, that are needless to say, already very salty! 
 
I gave up salting my food long ago.  And I found that it doesn’t take that long for your palate to get used to the change.  In due time you begin to appreciate the intrinsic flavors of the actual food you’re eating.  You begin desiring all the spices that are found in the many and various ethnic cuisines, that are so readily available all over this diverse restaurant city.  Your palate begins to discover savory, and sweet, and spicy flavors, much deeper and surprising-delicious, than you knew imaginable!  But my aforementioned friend is sticking to the saltiness of salt!
 
Salt, of course, way back when, before refrigeration, was used mostly to preserve meats, and fish, from spoiling.  It was a treasured and valuable commodity, and absolutely necessary to feed the multitudes in 1st century Palestine.  It was also used as an antiseptic, and even as the currency, Roman soldiers were paid in. 
 
If salt were to lose its saltiness, become dissipated or diluted, a very important commodity was lost.  And then, you might as well throw it out on the ground and let people trample it, Jesus said.
 
And so, with this image, Jesus calls us, to be salt – a salt that doesn’t lose its potency, but remains tasty and valuable.  To be salt – like it is for the food chain – a salvation for the world. 
 
And then Jesus also said, ‘you are the light of the world.’  Don’t hide your lamp underneath a big bushel-basket, shutting it off from the world!  You must put your lamp on the lampstand where it can light up the whole house.  (Or course, compared to us, they had rather small houses, two millennia ago!) 
 
I’m calling you to a high calling, says Jesus.  ‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.  …For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’ 
 
It’s a wonder that anyone is a follower of Jesus!  What, with Jesus’ railing against Jerusalem’s leadership and accusing them of hypocrisy – on the one hand.  And then this, holding all the rest of us, to the impossible standards, of the Sermon on the Mount!
 
How can we – today’s disciples – fulfill the law and the prophets? 
 
Barbara Lundblad understood the difficulty of this passage, when she commented recently: “For Jesus, salt and light came out of a long tradition of biblical teaching: salt and light were images for the law of God.  Salt and light must take us back to the fullness of the law and the prophets, and the fullness of Jesus’ radical teaching in this Sermon on the Mount.  The prophets plead for fullness of life: freedom from oppression, bread for the hungry, homes for those who have none, clothing for the naked (as in our reading today from the prophet Isaiah).  
Is this not what it means to be the salt of the earth, to keep this prophetic word alive in the midst of our world?  If we lose this vision, if we give in to other values, if we forget God’s longing for justice, our salt has lost its taste.  
If you think Jesus’ call is impossible, remember that the One who is our bread is with us and within us, empowering us to be salt and light in this world.”  From ELCA Sundays & Seasons, 2/9/2020
 
God gives us the will and the tools to be salt that stays valuable, and light that shines brightly in our world.  So it is not us who do it – but God in us.  Like the bread of Holy Communion that we chew and take in, God is with us, and within us, always. 
 
And this gives us the room and confidence we need to be salty-lights! – for our God is big enough to enter all our realities, all our good days and bad ones too.  God’s gift of love and grace is unending, in Christ’s empting himself for the life of the world. 
 
This is captured well, I think, in a recent meditation by Kat Banakis, “Sometimes the worst things that we can imagine actually do happen, and when they do there are moments when we do indeed lose our saltiness and the light goes out.  There are moments when we are in need of basic care, when we are not up to showing up and certainly could not imagine leading the revolution.  … sometimes we are hungry and thirsty just to get through the day.  In those moments, we need one another to nurse us back to life, singing songs when we cannot make a sound on our own behalf.  … Sometimes we need to let rage and sadness enter (to speak their truth) and to sit with those inevitable realities as well.” Kat Banakis CC, January 21, 2020
 
 
We cannot always be the light for the world.  Sometimes, we are the oppressed and downtrodden Jesus loves, just where we are.  Sometimes our health lets us down, whether we’re young or old, and we cannot be the light and salt we so desperately want to be.  Sometimes we try and we fail, and we are afraid of God’s judgement.  Sometimes we are not strong enough to speak up against the injustices we see all around us.  Sometimes we cannot imagine leading the revolution Jesus calls us to. 
 
But that’s when our community of faith steps up for us – and we know they’re our community when we can ask them!  That’s when we become the Body of Christ together, one the feet, another the eyes, another the ears, and so on – and we learn to wrestle with our value, as salt and light together, led by the Spirit. 
 
And, after this past week, we need each other more than ever!  We now know (some would say, once again!) that the bones of our social fabric, the salt of our elected leaders, have truly lost their saltiness, and it’s left – I’m guessing – a bad taste in our mouths.  Our Constitutional rule of law has been put under a bushel – its light has lost its luster.  The separation of powers, of our government, has been made a mockery of. 
 
Now we know, we have ourselves, alone – the communities God has given us – to trust.  We have the high calling of being God’s lights in the world, of being salty and valuable, for the sake of Christ’s mission, in our neighborhoods, and country, and world.  “For truly I tell you,” said Jesus, “until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter will pass from the law until all is accomplished.” 
 
‘Let your light’ – our light – ‘shine [for the world], so that they may see y/our good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.’  We are valuable!  And as God’s people, we have a calling that only we can accomplish together – a mission that God will work through us, for us, and with us – Christ’s mission of righteousness and justice, that is announcing the arrival of the kingdom of heaven – in our midst!  

Readings for Presentation of Our Lord, 02/02/2020

• Malachi 3:1-4  
• Psalm 84 
• Hebrews 2:14-18  
• Luke 2:22-40

​Last Christmas Present, sermon by Pastor Fred KInsey
Our favorite place for camping ever, was at TRNP – Tedi Roosevelt National Park, which is the smaller section of the Badlands, up in North Dakota.  Back when Kim and I used to visit, it was one of the most under-used of our national parks. 
 
We used to go the 2nd week of October, just after the camping services for RV’s were shut down for the season, and we’d have the place almost entirely to ourselves.  I remember one week we were there during a full moon, and when we turned in for the night, and snuggled into our sleeping bags, our tent was lit up as bright as day!  You could see the moon rising right through the nylon domed ceiling.  And through the front screen door, you could see the deer as they quietly walked down to the Little Missouri River, shimmering in the moonlight, for a cool evening drink.  The light shining in our darkness was a magical revelation!
 
It reminds me of the verse from Psalm 139, “even the darkness in not dark to you (O LORD); the night is as bright as the day, for darkness, is as light to you.” 
 
Today, we have brought out the hand-held Christmas candles, one last time, lighting them up for this festival that always fall on February 2.  The Presentation of Our Lord has been called, the last day of the Christmas season – even though it’s, now, clearly, the season of Epiphany!  But our gospel reading today, directing our liturgy, is chosen from the birth narratives of Luke, to shamelessly orient us back to the time of Christmas! 
 
It was on the 40th day, not quite 6 weeks after Jesus’ birth, that Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus, went to the Temple in Jerusalem to fulfill all that is written in the law of Moses – for Mary’s purification, and to present Jesus as the first-born son with a thank offering to the Lord.  They offered – what was the option prescribed for the poor – a pair of turtledoves or pigeons, instead of a young lamb.  Or, maybe because Jesus is the Lamb of God, and his sacrifice, as such, will come later, at the gospel’s end.
 
But there is another way in which Jesus is blessed on this day, not from fulfilling the requirements of the traditions, but from the moving of the Holy Spirit, made visible in the gracious presence of the prophets, Simeon and Anna. 
 
Simeon is introduced as one who is righteous and devout, and, like at Jesus’ baptism, the ‘Holy Spirit’ rested on him – and it is the Spirit is the One who revealed to Simeon that he would not see death before he had seen the LORD’s Messiah!  Three times Luke tells us how the Holy Spirit is with Simeon, and then, how he just happened to be in the Temple that day when Mary and Joseph came.  And when Simeon happens to run into them, he was so excited, he asked to hold little Jesus.  This was the one, he knew!  This child!  And Simeon, cradling Jesus in his arms, praised God, saying, my eyes have seen your salvation… a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.  Thank you my Master, for dismissing me, your servant, to go in peace! 
 
And Mary and Joseph were amazed!  This was not a revelation about their child which they could have gotten through the traditions prescribed by the religious laws.  And as if to confirm this prophetic announcement, Anna, who lived in the temple as a widow, for maybe 60 years – she was now 84 – she too praised God and spoke about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem. 
 
Jesus is a light for revelation to the Gentiles!  We light our candles today, as a token to Christ’s light!  Even as an infant, Jesus is hailed as our Savior, and the glory of Israel.  Jesus is born into the world as a great and saving light. 
 
But we also discover, that not all will react with joy, and praise the Lord!  In the midst of this mind-blowing good news, Simeon takes Mary and Joseph aside, to also, give them a warning.  “This child,” says Simeon, “is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed, so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed – and a sword will pierce your own soul too.” 
 
Jesus, it seems, is a polarizing figure.  The coming of the Messiah is a light to all the nations, a Savior of the world.  There is no darkness, in the coming age that Jesus announces, for ‘darkness and light are both alike’ to him.  The Messiah has come to reconcile us! 
 
But at the same time, some will be rankled at his presence, and to them, he will appear as a sign to be opposed.  He comes to raise us up, yet some will stumble and fall, through arrogance and fear.  His gift of pure love and grace will reveal and expose our innermost thoughts.  A sword of truth will pierce our deepest souls.  And we will learn to follow, or not. 
 
And so this infant narrative about the baby Jesus, already points us forward toward the Good Friday ending.  Jesus, the Lamb of God, knowing his opponents, and indeed, having confronted them and offered a way out, goes uncomplaining forth to the cross, offers himself in pure love for the sake of the world.  And we, looking up at his tree, will have our conscience pierced, and our inner thoughts nakedly revealed.  And the world was enabled to see in a new way, as if for the first time, our sin and our bondage – as a whole people – to our stubborn hubris and self-destructive ways.  This ‘sign’ of Jesus can be a gift of faith, or a rock-hard refusal, to see. 
 
This is the way Robert Powers in “Overstory,” in our last Book Discussion, described the characters.  That, there were those protagonists of the story who could see in the darkness what was right in front of us all, plain as daylight – how we are destroying our eco-system in the de-forestation of the planet, and all the rest – and yet, we seem to walk blindly into the valley of death.
 
What holds us back?  That’s the question many are asking this last week, in the Impeachment hearings too, I’m sure.  Our President is also a polarizing figure, but in false and manipulating ways.  Not as a light to the nations, not as a Messiah – contrary to what some preachers have proclaimed.  But now that the truth has been illuminated in the Senate trial, our conscience has been pierced, and the inner thoughts of many are being revealed. 
 
We know that God is bigger, much bigger than our short-sightedness, and God’s Light, will prevail, even as we scratch our heads and worry that the country’s traditions and rule of law, are failing and falling. 
 
We see in Luke’s gospel, how the family of Jesus took God’s laws and traditions seriously.  In going to the Temple, they did all they could to follow in God’s ways.  And at the same time, God sends the gift of the Holy Spirit, in Simeon and Anna, to enlighten us, and to creatively use us, to shine forth, and be God’s people in the world.  Jesus himself, as the anointed Messiah of God, does not escape the pain of this world, and even endures an agonizing death.  His light shines more brightly than any candle, and yet it was opposed. 
 
But in his cross and resurrection, our conscience is pierced, and our eyes are opened, and we see, as if for the first time, that the path forward, the lamp-Light, illuminating our steps, is never the way of using force or coercion, never a path of unjust hierarchies, or lording it over others, just to insure our own pleasures and self-serving desires. 
 
Jesus is the law of love.  The way of pure light.  And we see too, that night is as bright as the day!  And in that, we can be dismissed in peace, and serve one another, with joy.  

Readings for the Epiphany of the Lord, January 5, 2020

• Isaiah 60:1-6  
• Psalm 72:1-7, 10-14  
• Ephesians 3:1-12  
• Matthew 2:1-12

"Bursting In," Pastor KInsey
So, sometimes the church calendar twists the order of our scripture readings in weird and awkward ways!  Like today!  Today we’re reading the story for, The Epiphany of Our Lord about the magi, which is the story just before the gospel reading we already read last week!  And the gospel story we read last week is the story after today’s reading!  Backwards!  Go figure!  A reversal of Matthew’s order! 
 
Yes, it makes sense in the way that each speaks to the theme of the churchseason.  Last week was the First Sunday of Christmas.  Today we celebrate the first Sunday of Epiphany.  Last week was The Slaughter of the Innocents, when Herod tried to kill the baby Jesus – Christmas theme!  Today is the visit of the magi, or wise men, coming to worship the new born king, who was revealed – Epiphany theme! – revealed as the Messiah and Savior of the whole world. 
 
But, the contrast and reversal by the church calendar, is actually not that weird for the gospel of Matthew.  Matthew maintains a theme of two kingdoms – the kingdom of this world, and the kingdom of God – throughout, all the way from Jesus’ birth to his death. 
 
For example, Time and Place in this gospel reading are also a study in contrasts.  Our gospel reading begins, “In the time of King Herod…”  That first, small, clause speaks volumes.  King Herod is the client king of Rome, the appointed ruler of Israel-Palestine, and a perfect choice to insure the unbending, and brutal if necessary, rule of the kingdom of this world. 
 
On the other hand, there is Israel, God’s chosen people, though, for centuries, struggling to follow where God wants them to go, trying their best to remain faithful, hopeful and on edge, in anticipation of a new Messiah to come and give them a sign, and lead them. 
 
So, King Herod, in Jerusalem, is a representative of the center of power of the world’s kingdom.  But the very next clause of our opening verse is, “after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea…”  Jesus, we find, is born on the margins, in the town that is in the shadows of the capital and its Temple, a po’dunk shepherd’s town, ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem.’ 
 
And this is the scene that the magi, the wise men from the east, enter into.  And they come, it seems to me, with a super naiveté about who they encounter in King Herod.  Or else they are magicians who cast a spell on him, posing as guileless wanderers.  I’m not really sure which!  Magi were indeed employed as magicians, at least some of the time.  But this is a different kind of a spell, and one that is courting danger, in dealing with a king like Herod.  One thing is for sure, and that’s that the magi are also, from the margins, 1,000 miles from the center of power, astrologers that follow the stars, and are crazy enough to come all this way to offer homage to a baby they claim is a new-born king of the Jews, the Messiah! 
 
And they certainly have aroused Herod’s curiosity, actually scared him, with their news.  But tyrants like him turn their fear outward, on others!  They will lash out and find a target, a scapegoat, and make them pay, create chaos, so as to tighten their grip on control, and thereby keep all the privileges and resources for themselves.  This is how, unchecked, the ‘kingdom of the world’ works. 
 
Surely, this is an example of sin in the world.  When we, as Christians, talk about the sinful nature of people, it is true that we all have faults, we all sin, as individuals.  But there is also collective sin.  The sin of tribalism, if you will – very much a modern concept – whereby we herd ourselves into opposition groups and factions.  The ‘Us against Them’ mentality, which is, at least, one way to talk about collective sin.  Sin that is learned from others, and accepted, en masse, based on values of the kingdom of this world, like success, wealth, prestige, and power in the form of survival-of-the-fittest.  What Jesus called, ‘lording it over others,’ and hypocrisy.    
 
The antidote to this collective sin, is to base our values on the kingdom of God which Jesus taught us, and modeled in his own life: loving your neighbor as yourself, serving God-not-Mammon, sharing the world’s resources that cannot be bought, but are God-given to us.  These too are collective values, not individual accomplishments, but what some have called, the ‘kin-dom’ values – that is, K-I-N – kin-dom, shared values with all God’s people, and thus, an antidote to collective sins. 
 
The threat of war, or at least the escalation of conflicts between Iran and the U.S., is a good example of collective sin.  It’s actually been brewing ever since President Trump pulled the U.S. out of the “Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,” or so-called, Iran deal, brokered under President Obama with 5 other allies.  And the contrast between the two approaches could not be more stark, like the difference between the kingdom of this world, and the kin-dom of God.  The two approaches lead in opposite directions.  And the road we are on today, unfortunately, is based on the herd-mentality of ‘Us vs. Them,’ and neglects the teachings of Jesus to ‘love our neighbor as ourselves.’  The path we are on now, I think it’s fair to say, is the path of Herod.
 
In our gospel reading, Herod claimed he wanted the magi to go and search diligently for the new born child, so that when they found him, they could bring him word, and then Herod too might also ‘go and pay him homage,’ or worship Jesus. 
 
The magi might be naïve, but I’d say, it’s easy for the rest of us to see that this tyrant only wants to find out Jesus’ whereabouts in order to eliminate him as a rival king.  And that’s confirmed when we hear that God warns the magi in a dream to go home by a different route, and NOT to report back to King Herod. 
 
The magi’s trip from the far-away margins of the East, through the center of the Empire, and out again to the margins of Bethlehem, finally brought them to “the child and his mother,” Matthew tells us, where they “knelt down and paid him homage.  Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered [the 2 year old] gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh,” extravagant presents fit for a king, the ruler from the kin-dom of God! 
 
“In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, ‘Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.’”
 
Into the center of the kingdom of this world, bursts the Christ-child, born of the kin-dom of heaven!  The rule of God, has invaded our realm!  And we sing, “Joy to the world!” 
 
And so, the slaughter of the Innocents, immediately following this good news, is sobering, but is not surprising or defeating.  The weeping of Bethlehem is real – that they are inconsolable, is truly tragic, but unfortunately, not unique.  It is just another example of the kind of collective sin which continues to perpetuate itself, until the time I in which the suffering of the Messiah permeates all our hearts and minds, and arms us with the collective value of neighbor-love as our weapon, to lead to the victory of the kin-dom of God. 
 
But it is that suffering for the sake of the gospel, the sake of the truth, the sake of the kin-dom of God, that has broken into our world, and that has given us hope.  This kind of Suffering knows no time, and cannot be defeated.  The old ‘kingdom of Herod’ has one foot in the grave, but the kin-dom of God, never ends.  As Stanley Hauerwas has said, “The [collective] movement that Jesus begins is constituted by people who believe that they have all the time in the world, made possible by God’s patience, to challenge the world’s impatient violence, by cross and resurrection.” 
 
And so, Matthew’s gospel launches us into the chaotic clash of the kingdoms, and resolves it through the patience of the cross and resurrection of Jesus, who is revealed already in chapter 2, at the margins, by the magi, worshipping Jesus when he was, as yet, an infant in a manger. 
 
Let us join with the collective movement of followers of this king, offering our very best gifts, until the time that God’s love will take residence at the center, once and for all.

Readings for the First Sunday of Advent, December 1, 2019

• Isaiah 2:1-5  
• Psalm 122  
• Romans 13:11-14  
• Matthew 24:36-44

Clash of Worlds, Pastor Fred
 
Our Christian faith is built on a clash of worlds, a clash of cultures, a clash of kingdoms!  Isaiah – called as a prophet in the midst of these clashes – hoped and prophesied in the name of Yahweh, our God, that “they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” 
 
Welcome to Advent, the time of the judgement of the nations, and the four weeks of waiting, and hoping, and preparing, for the coming of the LORD.  Advent anticipates the birth of the Messiah, and the second and final coming of the Son of Man – both.  Advent is the time before the Christ child is ‘born unto us,’ and the time before the end of this age of death, ‘when war will be no more,’ and our weapons will be transformed into instruments of farming and harvesting for the life of the world. 
 
Advent evokes, and makes real for us, this tension we live under as humans, and as a called people of God – that we live with the promise of the resurrection to come, but we also live in the midst of a world enslaved to our fallen nature, our blinded eyes, our repeated sinfulness, and our structural imprisonment to poverty and war. 
 
Thankfully, Advent – with all its apocalyptic clashes – is only 4 weeks!  And it’s design is not merely to prepare us for the 12 Days of Christmas to come – it is not an aide to comfort us in our anxiousness of waiting, and our busy-ness of planning for ‘the most wonderful time of the year.’ 
 
Originally, Advent was a penitential season, like Lent, but it’s not quite that either.  It is less about, repenting of sins, than about acknowledging the clash of worlds, cultures, and kingdoms, those that tempt us away from “learning war no more” keeping us from ‘waking from the sleep’ we are hypnotized into, and instead, ‘putting on the armor of light,’ as Paul said in Romans!    
 
The season of Advent helps us to know and understand this spiritually.  And in his prophecy in our gospel reading, Jesus nails this Advent theme, insisting that: “About that day and hour [of the resurrection and 2nd coming] no one knows…  For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man.”
 
Noah and his family were saved in the Ark God had told them to build.  Every other citizen, who were engaged in their everyday lives of putting food on the table, and growing up, getting married, and continuing the cycle of life, were swept away.  It is better to endure the flood here, than to be taken away!  So, “Keep awake therefore,” said Jesus, “for you do not know on what day your LORD is coming.” 
 
This is the call, to us in our lives, which Advent highlights!  We live in this in-between time.  But we are not without knowledge of what is to come, and the dilemma of two worlds, two cultures, two kingdoms.  We are called as the followers of Jesus, the baptized believers of God, to live in response to this tension.  As St. Paul said, “salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near …let us live honorably as [we would live] in the day,” that is coming. 
 
This is – spiritually – good news!  Our salvation has come.  We can claim, and name it, and live into it already!  But, spirituality is not just an intellectual message to give a thumbs up or down to.  And the clash of worlds, cultures, and kingdoms, is more than an intellectual exercise of choosing an ideology and a creed, for it plays out in the kingdom of this world that Jesus came to save.  It intrudes into every aspect of our lives, and we cannot just wait and hope and confess, and call it a day, without preparing.  ‘Learning war no more, as Isaiah said,’ is also connected to the action, of ‘beating our swords into plowshares.’  What if we spent as much time and energy on preparing for peaceful engagement, as we do on the patriotism of preparing for, building up for, and celebrating, war? 
 
Ever since I was a teenager, when I was within a year of two of being drafted into the Vietnam war, I have tried to prepare for peace and seek to learn war no more.  I vowed to stand up against the next Vietnam, and to teach and live an alternative way.
 
When I became a pastor and was called to our two-point parish in the Upper Peninsula of MI, and the drum beat for retaliation for the 911 attacks began to grow, Kim and I learned about a group calling itself the Northwoods Peace Coalition of Iron County.  It was a cross section of concerned citizens, a small, but mighty band.  The call of the administration to suddenly widen the war with Afghanistan, and to enter Iraq, based on false claims, was too obviously an illegal action, another Vietnam.  And we started protesting in the streets along with ‘war no more’ groups, across the country. 
 
Of course, the decision was made to go ahead, and the mighty American empire did indeed walk into Bagdad and crush the seemingly weak defenses of Saddam Hussein, in a matter of days – but the shock and awe, were only just beginning.  So many needless lives lost on both sides!  So much money wasted.  We seem to have ‘taught war’ more than anything, and like a Pandora’s Box, resistance groups proliferated, and a civil conflict was unleased, that devastates countries on the other side of the world, as well as our own, with no end-game in sight.  A war that did not have to start, and like Vietnam, has no winners.
 
Isaiah envisioned a day when we would ‘learn war no more.’  When we’d throw away our weapons, and cease the waste of war, creating instruments of peaceful coexistence, using our time and energy to build-up our lives and our families. 
 
This is the world, and culture, and kingdom of God, that the prophets have been telling us about for centuries.  And it’s tied up in the coming of the LORD, once and for all.  Jesus came to bring a new way, God’s way, to us.  It was a world and culture and kingdom, that lives with us still, side by side, alongside the world and culture and kingdoms, of death.  They coexist, like the parable of the wheat and the weeds.  One is hierarchical, and lord’s it over others, over the underdogs, who are demonized as ‘less-than.’  The ones on the top in this worldly kingdom, set the rules and cleverly find ways to make us play by them, often to our own detriment, playing us off against one another, fomenting and fertilizing hatred and distrust, as we fight for the scraps of a world, that supposedly can never produce enough for everyone. 
 
The world and culture and kingdom that Jesus announced, on behalf of the God of Israel, who he called his own dear father, is a world of abundance, shared generously with the neighbor, where no one is demonized, but differences and diversity are celebrated as God-given gifts that can enrich us all.  In this culture, we love our neighbor as ourselves, and we don’t need to scapegoat or create enemies to make a place for us to live and have value.  We are fulfilled by living within the promised created-purpose of God’s (world, culture, and) kingdom, by living in the ways of righteousness, (justice), and love. 
 
This is our spirituality – and our way of life! 
 
Our nearest modern day prophet, martyred in 1968, identified the three evils of the kingdoms of this world as, war, racism, and poverty.  Or in Dr. Kings own words, “the giant triplets of Racism, Economic Exploitation, and Militarism,” a continuation of his speech 4 months earlier in 1967, which no one had liked for its calling for an end to the Vietnam war, just one year before he died. 
 
Our Christian faith is built on a clash of worlds, a clash of cultures, a clash of kingdoms!  Advent, is this in-between season, in-between the coming birth of Christ, and the 2nd coming.  What is our role in learning, teaching, and bringing in the kingdom, as the people of God?  Are we just marionettes, to be manipulated in God’s great plan?  Or are we called to enact the world, the culture, and the kingdom that Jesus invited us to?  These are still questions not completely answered – and perhaps they account for Advent’s unpopularity of all the seasons of the Church Year!  But they are questions that won’t go away, not even by ignoring them. 
 
The clashes that our Christian faith are built on, must be resolved, and we must find our place in them.  “Therefore,” said Jesus, “you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”