Marsh Chapel Sermon Archive

By Marsh Chapel

1John 2:12-17; Luke 23:39-42

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Two others died on crosses with Jesus that Friday, according  to Luke.

The old translations of the Bible mistranslated the Greek word used to describe them so Christian legend came to call them thieves. Reza Aslan’s book Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth is now number one on everybody’s best seller list.

Aslan is right that the two men who died on crosses with Jesus were not thieves but probably zealots and revolutionaries. Today we might call them –this is my word not Aslan’s– today we might call them insurgents.

Insurgents are patriots who fight against occupying forces much more powerful than they are. They fight not to win battles, which would be a lost cause, but because they hate oppression and they hate the oppressors and they hate those who collaborate with oppressors.

Israel was occupied by the Roman Empire so militarily advanced that Israel could never defeat them in battle but, lost cause or not, the most radical zealots fought and maimed, wounded and killed whenever and wherever they could.

The zealots hated the Romans. The Romans hated the zealots. The Romans reserved for zealots the worst, most painful, most humiliating form of punishment: execution by crucifixion.

As Reza Aslan argues, the two others dying on crosses near Jesus were most likely zealots. Aslan emphasizes their passion for social justice. He does not emphasize that they probably would have had the blood of Romans and Israelite collaborators on their hands.

In Luke’s story of the conversation between the zealots and Jesus, the crowd who’d come to watch the crucifixions is mocking Jesus and one of the zealots joins them. He mocks Jesus. The other zealot sides with Jesus. He says to the first zealot: You and I are guilty of what we are accused of doing and and deserve our punishment. But Jesus has done nothing wrong and does not deserve to die like this.

This second zealot says to Jesus: “Remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

Part of the reason Luke tells this story is because he wants to convince us that even though he died the death of a zealot, Jesus was not one. There was no blood on Jesus’ hands. Instead his blood is our hands … all we who crucified him or stood by and did nothing, do nothing. This is Luke’s point.

So the controversy that Reza Aslan raises in his book is not a new one. Luke was already trying to address it in his gospel written only a generation or so after Jesus’ death.

What particularly interests me this morning is Jesus’ response in Luke’s story to the second zealot who asks Jesus to remember him when he comes into his kingdom.

Jesus answers: “Amen, I tell you that today you will be with me in paradise.”

Today you will be with me in paradise.

There is a sermon I have been trying to preach for a number of years now. It is a sermon a member of my church back in Washington, DC, asked me to preach.

She was a fascinating person as so many of those who attend my church are. As a young woman she had been recruited to Washington when the federal government was growing rapidly and every office was looking for young intelligent single women to move to DC to be secretaries because they needed someone to, well, actually do the work.

She had grown up in a small rural town in the south, studied at a local small Christian college for a year or two. She was very bright. Someone in Washington knew someone at her college; she wanted to see the world. She ended up in Washington organizing the calendar and life of someone important in the government.

She never married but over the years she developed a wonderful community of friends who became her family: People from the apartment building she lived in, people from the little pub where she spent Friday nights.

A gay friend from the pub first brought her to our church. I mention this only because it amused her so that a gay man was the one to bring her back to church. She once told me her friends were all the people the church she grew up in had told her never to associate with: people of different races and nationalities, gay people, people who had been divorced, people who were a bit cynical and who liked to tell slightly risqué jokes, people who would have been lonely without each other.

One day the friend she attended church with called to tell me that she had been diagnosed with a terminal illness. She had only months to live.

I called to ask if I could visit. She said she didn’t really need me to visit. She had friends to talk to. She didn’t really need me in her living room, she said.

But, if I wanted to do something for her, she said, this is what I could do: I could preach a sermon on a certain topic. The topic she wanted me to preach a sermon about was what happens after we die.

Her request left me fairly speechless. This is not what we focused on in the seminary next door to this chapel when I attended it. What happens after we die?

She has long since died and I trust knows more about the answer to her question than I do, but I have been trying to preach her sermon ever since in one form or another … without much success. But I keep trying, especially when I get a new audience to try to talk about it with, like you.

For a religion based on the story of a resurrection, the Bible really has relatively little to say about what happens after we die and what it says is not very systematic nor frankly is it very consistent.

The Gospel of John quotes Jesus saying his Father’s house has many dwelling places and he will go to prepare a place for us. His disciples get confused during this conversation and, as so often happens with the Gospel of John, when I try to study the passage too literally I get confused too. (John 14:1-9)

Already at the time the Bible was being written people –even Christians– were having a hard time with the idea of resurrection. What is it exactly that is resurrected? The Apostle Paul tries to explain it. The dead will be raised imperishable. The perishable must put on imperishability and the mortal must put on immortality. (I Cor. 14:35-58) Unpack that.

Paul finally admits that for now we see only through a mirror dimly. For now we know only in part. (I Cor. 13:12)

In the Book of Revelation, which you’d think might be the most helpful part of the Bible on this topic, we don’t even go to heaven so far as I can tell. Heaven comes down to earth. (Rev. 21:1-7)

The writer of the First Epistle of John is the most honest and vulnerable and agnostic — What we will be has not yet been revealed, he writes. What we do know is this: When he is revealed, we will be like him. (I John 3:2)

Other religions seem much more knowledgeable and concrete. Tibetan Buddhism describes exactly what happens to us during the first 49 days after we die.

Vedic Hinduism’s Garuda Purana describes what happens after we die in perfect detail including the dark tunnel we pass through as our soul moves from our old body to our new body. The direction we travel in the tunnel is due south.

The Koran says we will enter heaven through one of eight doors depending on which of eight religious practices we prioritized during our life on earth.

Our Bible, in contrast, seems to give us only hints and poetry.

Which is why as I decided to try this sermon one more time I came to focus on Jesus’ words to the zealot on the cross. Jesus says to him “Amen. I tell you that today you will be with me in Paradise.”

The word Paradise appears only three times in the New Testament. It is a word, scholars tell us, that has a different connotation than heaven. Heaven is a reference to fulfillment, completion, culmination, resolution, the end. Heaven is when and where God’s will is finally fully and completely done.

Paradise is a reference backwards … back to the garden … back to Eden … back before history began … before Cain murdered Abel (Gen. 4:8) … before Hamor raped Dinah (Gen. 34:2) … before Shem made Canaan his slave Gen 9:25) … before we learned prejudice and racism and sexism and homophobia and xenophobia and greed and dominion and the fear that if I share with you there may not be enough left over for me.

Jesus says to the zealot whose life is defined by oppression and hate but who reaches out in kindness to him as they hang on crosses together, today you will be with me where and when the world has not yet turned into what it has become.

He says: We are going back to before we were wounded and before we began wounding others until the whole world became a world of woundedness and violence. We are going back to the garden.

I am not sure. I don’t know. I don’t know if we are going forward towards heaven or backward towards Eden …  but there is something I find hopeful about the idea of being with Jesus in paradise. There is something appealing about the undoing of all we have done to hurt each other and to hurt the earth. There is something appealing about the undoing of all the pain I have caused, all the good I’ve left undone.

First John says: “The world and its desires are passing away but those who do the will of God live forever.” (I John 2:17)

The world and its desires are passing away.

Fred Buechner says people don’t pass away. It is the world that is passing away … the world and its desires. Hate is passing away. Greed is passing away. Ignorance is passing away. Prejudice is passing away.

The world and its desires are passing away but you and I –the you and I created by God in the garden to be companions to one another, the you and I before we began to murder and rape and enslave each other– the real you and The real me will live forever.

If I could preach this sermon to the woman who asked me to preach it I would tell her that the hate and fear the church she grew up in tried to teach her is passing away but the love she discovered with her gay, divorced, irreverent neighbors and her friends at the pub, this love she opened her heart to will never pass away.

Carol Zaleski in a lecture at Harvard reported that six years before his death America’s greatest philosopher William James received a questionnaire from one of his former students.

One of the questions was “Do you believe in personal immortality?”

James answered: “Never keenly, but more strongly as I grow older.”

The next question was: “If so, why?”

James answered: “Because I am just getting fit to live.”[i]

The world damages us so. Not the world God created; the world we have created.   It teaches us to hate those who hate us until we all hate each other. It teaches us to be suspicion of those who seem different from us until we are suspicious of everybody. It teaches us not to trust until we are all distrustful of each other.  It teaches us murder, it teaches us rape, it teaches us domination.

But, take courage,  because the world and its desires are passing away. Even the part of the world that lives inside of me and inside of you is passing away. Even the part of the broken, messed up world that lives inside of me and inside of you is passing away.

As we make our way back to the garden or forward to heaven, whichever it is, I so want to learn how to trust, how to forgive, how to accept forgiveness, how to be unreservedly generous, how to love with all my heart. On the day I die, I want to finally be ready to live.

posted in Guest Preachers on 08.18.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

Genesis 2: 18-25; Matthew 19:3-12

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After I graduated from Boston University School of Theology forty-one years ago and became a local church pastor if you'd told me that I would preach at Marsh Chapel during my last year of active ministry and that the topic I would choose to talk about would be marriage I would not have believed you.

Marriage was a routine part of the life of the church and my work as a pastor, usually more fun than funerals. We did premarital education and counseling with couples but we drew much more heavily on psychology and the social sciences than we did biblical studies or theology or ethics when we taught and counseled.

I am fairly amazed that I have spent so much time these last several years of my ministry trying to understand marriage biblically, theologically, and even politically.

It is in some part your fault, Massachusetts. In 2004 you became the first state in our nation to make same-sex marriage legal, and look what has happened since. Less than ten years later, marriage equality is now the law in 13 states, the District of Columbia, and five Native American tribes.

The Supreme Court has ruled that the federal government must recognize and honor same-sex marriages conducted in states where they are legal.

A recent Gallup poll indicates that 52 percent of Americans would vote for a federal law that made same-sex marriage legal in all 50 states.

It seems increasingly likely what you began here in Massachusetts will eventually reach every state and beyond.

The argument in the courts and on the public square for marriage equality, put simply, is that marriage is a civil right and that we cannot constitutionally deny any group of people their civil rights.

Earl Warren writing the 1967 Loving v Virginia Supreme Court decision said: "The freedom to marry has long been recognized as one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men" ... and presumably by free women as well.

Legally, marriage is a civil right and so marriage equality for adults of all races, nationalities, genders, sexual orientations and identities is undeniable.

Since the principle of equality is rooted in the teachings of all of the Abrahamic religions, you might think the churches, synagogues, mosques and meetings of America would applaud another advance for justice.

This, of course, has not entirely been the case. There have been problems.

One problem is the Bible. The Bible simply always assumes that marriage is between a man and a woman or, in some cases, between a man and women. As the religious opponents of marriage equality like to say, there is no Adam and Steve in the Bible. It is true. There isn't.

So to understand marriage equality people of biblical faith need to take a leap of theological deduction and imagination. We need to ask whether the Bible's teachings about marriage are about anatomy and biology and physiology or whether they are about the quality of relationship between two people who love each other and want to make the profound commitment to each other that we call marriage.

It is a theological leap many find difficult and it is a leap, frankly, it would never have occurred to us to take ...  except that we have known gay and lesbian couples who have demonstrated in their lives together this quality of love and commitment that is the ideal of marriage. It is because of them that we've needed to go back and read the Bible again and see if we can find room for them in the story.

I have tried to read and consider carefully the arguments of those who oppose marriage equality on the basis of biblical teachings. Most now acknowledge that the battle within the American culture is pretty well settled. They acknowledge the secular culture has changed its mind. The secular culture now accepts same-sex marriage.

But, they argue, the church needs to be counter-cultural. They argue that the church cannot allow the secular culture to redefine biblical teaching.

it seems to me this argument is based on the theological assumption that God is not present or at work within the culture, only within the church. The assumption is that the culture is godless while the church holds all godly truth. I find no substantial support for this way of thinking within Scripture or Christian tradition and certainly not experience.

Jesus says the wind blows where it chooses. (John 3:8) The spirit goes where it will.

Biblically God has always resisted being caged inside temple walls built by human hands. God's very name is I am who I am and I will be who I will be. (Exodus 3:14)

The Gallup poll I mentioned that indicates that 52 percent of Americans would vote for a federal law that made same-sex marriage legal in all states has some other interesting data. Among those who said they rarely or never attend church or a house of worship, 67 percent said they would vote for same-sex marriage. Among those who say they attend church monthly or nearly weekly, 51 percent said they would vote for same-sex marriage. Among those who reported that they attend church weekly only 23 percent said they would vote for same-sex marriage and 73 percent said they'd vote against it.

I hate to say this but it may be a mistake to spend too much time in church. God is not contained within church walls nor within the covers of a book. God is in the world --at work in the culture-- and only when we are listening to both the book and the world can we find a path toward understanding God's will and way.

We come to church not because this is where God lives and we want to pay a visit. We come here to recall where God encountered us in our lives in the world last week and to prepare ourselves to meet God in the workplace, the classroom, the bowling alley, the bar, the ballpark in the week to come.

The theologian Karl Barth said that the preacher needs to have a Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other. Christians need to pay attention to both the book and the culture.

Unless our experience in the world helps us always read the Bible anew, it becomes a dead book that keeps us buried in the ancient past instead of the story of a God of justice, inclusion, and love who helps us find our way into the future ... a future the people who wrote the book would have never imagined but which they understand to be consistent with what they began as they watch us from heaven.

I serve a church in the Dupont Circle neighborhood of Washington, DC. We reflect our neighborhood. On an average Sunday, a fourth to a third of our congregation are openly gay and lesbian men and women.

We are part of a denomination that forbids same-sex commitment ceremonies or weddings. The rules say these ceremonies shall not be celebrated in our buildings or by our clergy.

Back before marriage equality came to the district we started doing what we called services to honor gay and lesbian committed relationships. Couples would come here to Massachusetts to be married or they would have private ceremonies in their homes where they exchanged vows and then we would have a public service in church to honor their commitment. We were careful not to celebrate until we'd left the building. We didn't break the rules.

Then in the fall of 2009 friends started telling me that marriage equality was coming to the district. I went to my board and asked, "If it happens, what do we do?"

Clergy and congregations in my denomination had been punished in the past for doing same- sex weddings.  Pastors had been suspended or even defrocked, the ministries of congregations had been disrupted.

We were engaged in a dozen ministries in our community as well as trying to provide quality religious education for our children and youth and all the ordinary programs congregations do. We were working with others to end homelessness. We were engaged in global mission in Haiti. We were trying to address the ridiculously high incarceration rate of young African-American men in our city.

We didn't want our ministries disrupted. And we had no desire to break any rules.

We started a congregational conversation that lasted for several months.

The conversation was a bit chaotic and confusing. We were all over the place in our thinking. No path ahead was emerging.

Then during yet another disjointed, somewhat frustrating, congregational meeting Doug stood up and walked to the front of the sanctuary. Doug of Sam and Doug. Known by everyone in the congregation. Between Doug and Sam they had served on countless committees and task forces and mission groups. They were faithful, generous, always offering their home for meetings. They were loving towards each other, caring towards others, especially the elderly and weak of the congregation.

Doug stood before the congregation and simply said "I want to be married in my church by my pastor."

I want to be married in my church by my pastor.

The tone and direction of the conversation changed. We were no longer talking about theories or strategies or consequences. We were talking about Sam and Doug.

In September 2010, Foundry Church members adopted a policy of marriage equality by a vote of 367 to 8.

We just cannot read the Bible as though Sam and Doug do not exist. We cannot be the church as though Sam and Doug were invisible.

Marriage equality as the law of the land is good and right, but the struggle will not be over until it is settled in our faith communities.

While marriage is a civil legal status, it is more than that. We don't go to our lawyers to marry us.   We go, most of us, to our priests, pastors, rabbis and imams.

The latest edition of the textbook Choices in Relationships: Introduction to Marriage and Family by David Knox and Caroline Schacht says that 80 percent of marriage ceremonies in America are conducted by clergy. A 2011 article[i] by Michelle Boorstein in the Washington Post suggests this percentage may be declining but the majority of Americans still go to a person they believe to be a man or woman of God to be married. Even those who don’t, Michelle Boorstein reports, still often include religious rituals in their ceremonies.

There is a deep intuition within us that marriage is more than just a secular legal contract. In the love and intimacy of marriage, even in the times of distance and disagreement and disappointment that we need to painfully work our way through, even in the experience of brokenness of a marriage ... in the joys and struggles of marriage we experience something that is like the relationship between humanity and God. We know deep down that our marriages are not just legal but also holy and sacramental.

The creation story of Genesis 2 talks about the purpose of marriage. Genesis 2:24 and 25 say: "Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife and they become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and they were not ashamed."

The holy purposes of marriage are, first, to get you out of your parent's home. Then –holiest of all-- it is to give you someone to hold on to ... to cling to in bad times, to hug in good times, to hold on to when holding on is hard … to give you someone to become one flesh with even as your flesh grows old … and to give you someone to be naked with without shame.

How could we be so unimaginative, so incapable of translation and deduction, so densely literal that we would deny such a holy marriage to Sam and Doug? If we don't start doing it, the rocks in the walls of our buildings will start putting on our robes and stoles and doing weddings themselves.

Jesus said it -- Those whom God has joined together, let no one separate.

posted in Guest Preachers on 08.11.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

Mark 10:35-45

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It’s a boy!  George Alexander Louis.  On Monday afternoon, the world waited on pins and needles to hear about the birth of the new heir to the throne of England. It was, by all accounts, a momentous occasion. Filled with shouts of joy, the ringing of bells, and many many souvenirs.  Sure, there were and continue to be some critics—those who ask, rightly, why we would celebrate the birth of one uber-privileged child when we virtually ignore the hundreds of thousands of poor children being born into this world every day.

And to be fair, they have a point.  After all, as a people of faith we know that every child born into this world matters just as much as the royal baby.

But as a people of faith, we also know that new life is new life.  And whenever we witness it, wherever we witness it, we have reason to celebrate.

And frankly, couldn’t the world use a reason celebrate? Couldn’t we use a little good news about now? After all, we’ve definitely experienced our fair share of bad news lately, we’ve felt our fair share of pain and strife and death. We’ve felt it here on the sidewalks of Boston, we’ve felt in the courtrooms of Florida, we’ve felt it on the streets of Egypt and Syria.

And as we know from experience, sometimes it’s only those little reminders of new life that keep us going.  So when we find it, we have reason to celebrate.

But as we also know from experience, whether we celebrate it or not, new life isn’t easy.  No! As William and Kate are no doubt discovering with their new, very tangible form of new life…it isn’t always easy.  It doesn’t matter if you are rich or poor, young or old, black or white, gay or straight, having a baby is not easy.  It’s not.  It’s an entirely new way of life.  There’s crying...lots and lots of it.  There’s feeding…lots and lots of it.  There’s…the end result of feeding…lots and lots of it.

In other words, friends, even new life itself comes with challenges.  It’s worth it, but it’s hard.

And we, of all people, should understand.  After all, as Christians we, too believe in a way of life that is much more than we could have ever bargained for, full of responsibilities and frustrations, but like a new parent, once we have experienced it, fully experienced it, we couldn’t live any other way.

And so today, after a week in which people around the world paused to celebrate new life in our midst, we pause a moment longer to consider what new life means.

We get assistance in our quest today from the Gospel of Mark.

Now some will know that the Gospel of Mark was the first gospel written, as early as 30 years after the death of Jesus.  It was written to a community that would have had to face its own fair share of pain and strife and death, and who were no doubt starting to recognize that being a community of faith was not all sunshine and roses.  We can hear that tension in our story today.

Our passage begins just after Jesus has shared some hard news with his disciples; news of pain and strife and death.  Jesus has told the disciples for the third and final time in Mark’s gospel that the son of man will be given over to the chief priests and that he will be condemned and killed and that after three days he will rise again.

He has shared this same thing with the disciples two other times in Mark’s gospel. And in each of those other times, we are told that the disciples ask questions and express confusion.

And, frankly, we get it. After all, when we’re confronted with hard news in our own lives, our first impulse is often to question it; to want a second opinion; to pretend like it isn’t really about us. It’s a way of protecting ourselves from the pain of the news.

But one of the hard lessons of life, friends, is that simply ignoring something doesn’t make it go away…just ask the people of Syria.

And we get the sense in Mark’s telling of this story that it took until this third time hearing it for the reality of what Jesus had been saying to set in; because in our story today, instead of questions, or confusion, or denial, the disciples are not reported as saying anything.

They were silent.

And, if we’re honest, we get this too. We know that sometimes when we are confronted with hard news, when we are forced to finally hear it and acknowledge it and accept it, we just don’t know what to say.

We don’t know what to say and so we don’t say anything. Sometimes, friends, we just need that sweet grace of silence.

Certainly this is a lesson our world could afford to hear; a reminder that, believe it or not, sometimes it’s ok to be silent.  Sometimes we don’t need a 100 cannon blasts, or a million tweets, or a full running commentary.  Sometimes we just need silence.

Imagine how different our world would be if each time a child was born we had a moment of silence.  It might make some kids harder to ignore.

But just as in our world, in our story, the silence doesn’t last forever.  James and John, two of the first disciples called in Mark’s gospel, two of the witnesses to the transfiguration of Jesus a chapter earlier, break the silence by saying to Jesus. “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”

“Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”

It’s a pretty bold demand. So bold in fact that Matthew changes this passage to have their mother ask on their behalf, perhaps recognizing that it takes some chutzpah to stand in front of Jesus, their teacher, the messiah, and ask for their wishes to be granted.

And frankly, if we knew it worked that way, we’d no doubt have a few things to ask ourselves.

But Jesus, ever patient, simply responds, “What is it that you want me to do for you?”

And we think, aha! Now’s their chance!  Now’s their moment to get answers to all of life’s troubling questions, why do bad things happen to good people, what is the meaning of life, what’s up with the name Louis? And our excitement starts to build as they open their mouths and say to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left hand in your glory.”

What?!? What does that mean?  They have just been told that their teacher, their master, their friend is not going to be with them anymore and they are worried about seating arrangements?  What gives?

But then we remember the sweet grace of silence and take a moment to listen again. “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left hand in your glory.” –and it starts to make sense. Friends, this is not just about seating arrangements in some heavenly throne room.  No! It’s the disciples expressing fear about being left alone.  It’s the disciples starting to get what Jesus has been saying.  Jesus has just told them that he is not going to be with them forever.  This man whom they had given up everything in their lives to follow is now going to be leaving them and they are basically saying, “take us with you.”

A chapter earlier these same disciples witnessed Jesus standing in his glory as he was transfigured. They witnessed a taste of the beauty of God and didn’t know how they were going to find that again alone. Do you see? They had been witnesses to what life could be and didn’t want to live with what actually is.

Friends, we know what this is like. We know what it’s like to face a long hard road ahead and want to just be there.  Every four years The United Methodist Church meets to make decisions about the doctrine and practice of our beloved denomination.  And every four years for the past 40 we have failed to recognize the full humanity of gay and lesbian people.  And although some of us have glimpsed the possibility of what could be, we are forced to live with what actually is.  And if we’re honest, we dread it, we’re embarrassed by it, we just want to be there.

But that’s not the way it works.  No.  For better or worse, a big part of the way of life taught by Jesus Christ is life itself, in all its gory details.

Friends, our faith is about life. Not after death, but right now.  And Jesus understood this. He understood that our faith is not about earning a place at the table in the sweet by and by, it is about opening a place at our tables right now.

In other words, life is not a means to an end, it is the end itself. And make no mistake, what we have been given as a people of faith is life, new life, precious life; we’ve been given an example of what it means to fully live.

“I came that you might have life and have it abundantly.”

But here’s the kicker: new life takes work.  It takes work. It takes not just accepting the world as it is, but working to make it what it could be.

Jesus responds to them, “You do not know what you are asking for.”

He says, “Can you drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”

In other words, be careful what you wish for because when we skip the hard work and jump straight to the end, we miss out on the most important part…life.  Not a life free from pain, but life nonetheless.

It was announced this week that the Rev. Stephen Heiss, a United Methodist Minister from my home conference in Upper New York will be brought up on charges for performing homosexual marriages, one of which was for his own daughter.  Rev. Heiss is an example of someone who does not just see the world for how it is, but how it could be, and is doing the hard work of living.  It’s not easy, but it’s life.

Friends, there is and will always be pain and strife and death, that is part of life, but there is also always the possibility of new life. And whether we know it or not, whether we like it or not, we have a part in it. A vital part. And if we don’t live into it, no one else will.

Not wanting to hear what Jesus is saying, the disciples respond that they are able to drink the cup and be baptized with the water, but again Jesus says to them, that you may be able to drink the cup and be baptized in the water, but in the end, it is not his to grant.
This is admittedly strange language, implying that Jesus doesn’t have the power to snap his fingers and make things happen, but we also know this to be true.

Friends, we know that we have been given freedom to live in this world. We know that God doesn’t cause pain and strife and death.  No! Those things are part of the freedom God has given us to live in this world, but so is joy and hope and love.  In other words, the promise of our faith is not that bad things are not going to happen to us.  No. They will.  The promise is that we don’t have to face them alone.

Friends, do you hear?  We are not alone.

Surely, the language of the cup and the water in this passage is a reminder. After all, Mark’s audience would certainly have recognized these two symbols of the Christian faith. These two sacraments that remind us over and over again that we are now the body of Christ for the world; that we are part of the family of God.

As the epistle lesson for today reminds us, we are God’s children now, what we will be is yet to be revealed. It’s a reminder both that we are not God, but also that we’re not only children.

Or said another way, we might not be able to sit on the throne of God, but as Howard Thurman might say, we have certainly all been given a crown to grow into.  In the example of Christ, we have had a crown placed over our head which for the rest of our lives we will keep trying to grow tall enough to wear.

Friends, we might not be heirs to the throne of England, but each of us by virtue of our birth has a crown.  Surely that’s worth a celebration.

Do you see? James and John saw what they thought they wanted, to sit at the right and left hand of Jesus, and like so many of us wanted the end without the means and in the process missed the point of our faith entirely.

As Christians we are not called to a destination, we are called to a journey; a way of life.  And by not granting them their wish, Jesus offered them a chance to truly live.

When the other ten disciples heard the conversation going on we are told that they became angry. We don’t quite know which part angered the others, but we know that it was enough that Jesus again reminded them that they were called to a different way of life.

He reminds them that there are those in the world who lord power over one another, but that they are called to serve one another; to care for one another; to love one another.  In other words, he reminds them again that whatever they do, they do it together.  And as many have learned in recent months, we can face a lot if we know we don’t have to face it alone.  Friends, the good news of the gospel is that we are not alone.

Our passage today closes with these words from Jesus. “For the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

A ransom is that which frees us from captivity.

Friends, what is it that holds us captive? What is it that keeps us from fully living? Money, family, fear?  Christ is our ransom. Not as some sacrifice sent from God, but as one who frees us from our captivity. He breaks us out of our bonds and shows us how to fully live. He takes away the identities that society tries to place on us and reminds us over and over again that whether we know it or not, whether we like it or not, we are all children of God.  All of us, young and old, black and white, gay and straight, male and female, royal or common.  Which ultimately means that we all have a chance at life.

Will it be easy? No. Like having a baby, living as a person of faith in the world means having some late nights, it means taking some unwanted responsibilities, it means shelling out some hard-earned cash, and it even means having to put our hands in some things that we never want to touch, but the truth is, we couldn’t live any other way.

Amen.

~The Rev. Stephen M. Cady, II

Pastor, Asbury First UMC, Rochester, NY

posted in Guest Preachers on 07.28.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

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The text for this sermon is currently unavailable.

~The Rev. Stephen Bauman

Senior Minister, Christ Church (UMC), New York

posted in Guest Preachers on 07.21.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

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The text for this sermon is currently unavailable.

~The Rev. Stephen Bauman

Senior Minister, Christ Church (UMC), New York

posted in Guest Preachers on 07.14.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

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~ Rev. Dr. Christopher H Evans

Professor of History of Christianity and Methodist Studies, BU School of Theology

posted in Guest Preachers on 06.30.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

Click here to listen to the service, including the Baccalaureate Address.

Click here to watch the video from BU Today.

Boston University’s 2013 Baccalaureate speaker was Bishop Peter D. Beaver, Retired Bishop of the New England Conference of the United Methodist Church. Additionally, he served on the Board of Trustees of Boston University from 2004-2012. For more information, please see the BU Today article.

There will be no sermon text posted for this Baccalaureate address.

posted in Baccalaureate, Guest Preachers on 05.19.2013 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

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Introduction (Nico Romeijn-Stout):

Three days before Life triumphed over sin and death, Jesus, knowing what was about to happen, took the time to gather with his closest community to celebrate a ritual meal.  His disciples thought that they were present to celebrate the Passover, but the evening did not unfold as any of them had imagined.  Instead their time together in the Upper Room was full of new experiences, of new rituals.

Here tonight we will embody three ancient Christian traditions associated with Maundy Thursday: foot washing, communion, and the stripping of the sanctuary.  This worship service can become a bit overwhelming with so many rituals back to back.  We challenge you, as we navigate this service together, to be mindful of the reasons for the rituals.

As we hear in today’s Gospel lesson, during the meal Jesus got up, took off his outer robe, and washed his disciples’ feet.  The Teacher and Lord humbled himself in service to his disciples.  Jesus set for them and for us an example, a pattern of service which we should emulate.

In that same meal, Jesus also set for us an example of how we should eat as a community.  In the breaking of the bread and the sharing of the cup, Jesus gave us a pattern by which to remember him.  When we eat the bread and drink the cup, we are reminded of the Life and Covenant through Jesus Christ.

Tonight we also follow in ancient Christian tradition by stripping our sanctuary of all decorative and liturgical objects as a reminder of both the barrenness of a world without Christ, and also to make room for the new Life we find in the resurrection of Easter.

Jesus, who is the path to Life Eternal, recognized that we would need nourishment in order to thrive.  And so he gave us Life-giving rituals to sustain us.  Tonight we remember those rituals.

Stripping (Caitlin White):

Stripping of the altar is an ancient tradition that Christian communities celebrate in many different ways. Some, like Marsh Chapel, believe that this is a time of reflection on the weighty emotions and issues of the passion and resurrection. Here at Marsh Chapel, we strip our sanctuary of liturgical decorations to reflect the barrenness of a world without Christ. We make the space to reflect on the worst of human deeds on Good Friday and Holy Saturday. Ours is a theological position that allows people to embrace whatever truths they might find in their own reflection- whatever personal narratives relate for them, whatever view of sin and redemption they understand, whatever beauty or disgust they behold in the crucifixion- it makes room for the truths of many people.

Many communities with a similar understanding of the ritual also strip the sanctuary of everything but leave a single cross shrouded in dark cloth, a symbol of the spiritual weight and mourning of the season.

Many Christian communities are much more fixed upon the notion of atonement- the idea that Jesus had to suffer and die for us to be forgiven. Many strip the altar to remember how Jesus was stripped of dignity, clothes, and finally his life, but that may not be a theology that all of us embrace. At least, that might only be one aspect of all that the cross can be for you.

As Dean Hill reminded us in his meditation on the Passion this past Sunday, “Easter defines Holy Week, and not the other way around. The resurrection follows but does not replace the cross. The cross precedes but does not overshadow the resurrection. It is Life that has the last word.”

My challenge therefore to those who hold an atoning, sacrificial way of thinking about this ritual is not that I necessary disagree, but that Christians in our culture (myself included) have a poor understanding of sacrifice, of waiting and of loss. How can we? In a world of fast food, fad diets, and disposable everything, we have forgotten patience and the seasons of life.

Perhaps the question for us today should be: What are you being stripped of? Why did we just do Lenten reflections?  Why give up chocolate – is it just a way to not gain weight in time for spring break and the beginning of summer, or is there something more there? I often think we get caught up in the altar mentality- we give up things because it is hard, not because they are wiser left behind.

Any good gardener knows that the first thing you must do in the spring is pull up all the weeds that have taken over your soil. If anything good and intentional is to take root, it can’t be bumping into other forces, other agendas that rob it of the resources to survive.

The purpose of our ritual should be to root out what distracts us, those noisy things that rob us of positivity, purpose, and connectedness to God, ourselves, and one another. We need to give our time, resources, and communal creativity to something that feeds our spiritual growth and brings more light into the world.

Communion (Nico)

An incredibly intelligent 9 year-old named Becca, in order to be allowed to recieve communion, explained it like this:   Jesus knew that his friends would miss him. He also knew they had to eat every day. So, he told them to remember him when they ate and that they should eat together. That way they'd be able to be friends and get through anything.”

The communion liturgy I am most familiar draws upon 1 Corinthians 10:17 in which Paul writes “Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.”  Elsewhere in 1 Corinthians, Paul chastises members of the community for the way in which they are eating their communal meals – a practice probably tied closely to practices of communion.  What was happening was that some members of the community were beginning to eat before others had even arrived, causing a rift in the body.

You see, from Paul’s first-century pen to Becca’s twenty-first century lips, Christian understandings of communion have always been founded upon community.  When we gather at the table, we are united in this meal.  When we break bread, we are one body.  This is a meal to cast off divisions, to cast off hierarchies and inequalities and simply to come, in unity as one body.

In the tradition of Marsh Chapel the communion table is open.  All are welcome to come forward and receive communion.  But the question we must ask is not so much who is welcome, but who is invited? And that question must begin to be asked not in the middle of a service of worship, but rather after  the service, when we leave the sanctuary, go into the streets of Boston, into our neighborhoods.  It is a question we must carry with us as we prepare to gather again every Sunday for ordered worship.  It is a question which must dwell as much with pew-dwellers as with pulpit-dwellers.

The ritual of Holy Communion is a life-giving ritual.  It is a meal in which we may be physically and spiritually fed.  Jesus gave us this ritual of community, a ritual to sustain the lives of his followers.    Given its life-sustaining nature, perhaps we should interpret communion in light of the example-giving life Jesus led.  In his life, Jesus gave us the example by which we should be in community, by which we should feed ourselves and others.  In his life, Jesus gave us the example by which we should live, and by which we should serve.

Foot washing – service (Caitlin):

The service of foot washing- that moment you have all been waiting for, grooming for, wondering how many days your neighbor has recycled those heavy wool socks for. It isn’t a very common spiritual practice for many people and I will be the first to admit that it can be awkward. I will also tell you that it can be thought provoking and spiritually enriching as well- precisely because it is uncomfortable. So why of all the ways to display service did Jesus chose this strange ritual? Why did Jesus choose a ritual at all?

Psychologist, speaker, and activist, Staci Haines might have some insights for my questions. In 2011, I attended a Calling Congregations conference offered by the Fund for Theological Education where she spoke to a crowd of both clergy and laity who seek to renew the church particularly by involving and equipping its young people. She challenged them with the findings of psychology that in recent years has begun to understand that our memories are really in our muscles. The body, in time of panic and adversity, will bypass logic and emotionalism and shortcut to whatever patterns we have trained our muscles for. Aristotle was right- we are what we habitually do. Our problem in the church, she observed, is that our vision- our ideals- our mission statements do not sync up with our practices. We want to put an end to suffering and hunger but we treat service like an event, not a life style. We want to throw our doors open to everyone with love but we haven’t gotten to know anyone who doesn’t look, act, and live like us in so long we’ve forgotten how. We have to retrain our practices to look more like our hopes.

Perhaps, Jesus also understood that rituals can retrain our bodies and our practices. So he took this last chance to serve his disciples.

In tonight’s service, we sing hymns, read lessons, and receive communion, all before foot washing. Honestly, that is because we think it is gross to touch feet and then food. However, in the Jewish custom of Jesus’ time, foot washing would have been the first event of the evening. Ritual cleaning is how you prepared for a meal, for Jesus’ breaking of the bread, to hear his message… Jesus started the evening with service. In times of danger and doubt, serving others was his first reflex, his instinctive response. And he asked them to imitate their Lord- to learn to serve one another in the same humbling way.

Of all the things Jesus could have saved to say for that moment- that last meal- he said, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another… Just as I have loved you.” At least that is how the writer of John reports it to us. But was it really a new commandment? Didn’t that whole love other people concept show up a few times by then? I’m not convinced that it was all that groundbreaking for Jesus. I suspect that this has a lot more to do with our human tendency to need reminding.  And given how absentminded the disciples are portrayed throughout the gospels, I’d guess that they were no exception to the rule. Jesus knew that we need practices that Remind us that love was the way of Christ- Remove us from old habits to try-try again until service is our first instinct- AND Reform our vision for the future so that we might live into it more fully.

Conclusion:

(Nico) In removing us from our old habits of living in isolation from our neighbors, isolation even from those who sit at the table with us; in reforming our vision so that we may see a future in which we are all more fully alive, Jesus has shown us the way.

(Caitlin) In showing us the way, Jesus last teaching to his community was love – and so it should be ours as well.

(Nico) We walk in the footsteps of Jesus when we… Love others.

(Caitlin) We walk in the footsteps of Jesus when we… Serve others.

(Nico) We walk in the footsteps of Jesus when we…Break bread with community.

(Caitlin) As we are stripping the sanctuary, we are stripping it of things, not of people.  As we prepare to remember the death of Christ, let’s not strip Jesus’ message of Life.  It is Life that has the last word – and that word is Love.

~Nico Romeijn-Stout and Caitlin White, Ministry Associates

posted in Guest Preachers on 03.28.2013 at 6:00 pm

By Marsh Chapel

Luke 2:41-52

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Some of you know that I have practiced, for decades, the spiritual discipline of tree climbing. I have surprised neighbors all across the country as I’ve tumbled out of moving vans and immediately ascended my way to a view of the new heaven and new earth on my new street.  It’s a matter of seeking new perspective.

Well, today, December 30^th,  we’ve all  figuratively climbed up to the top of year, and we’re perched way out on the tree limb of 2012, still holding on to the days of Christmastide, remembering the events of this year…the branch sways a bit under weight of both the joys and agonies of these 12 months. From this lofty vantage we can see ahead to new branch of 2013 just over yonder.  With the dropping of a ball and raising of cheer, with the flip of a calendar page we can just about see it.   It is already, but not yet.

Or another metaphor, this one requiring not a courage of heights, but a courage of imagination-  this is a time when we are called to live on the threshold. Abiding in the liminal places, not quite in the past, not quite in the future.  Pitching tent with Emmanuel who comes to camp out with us. Pausing with our sister Mary to ponder many things in our hearts.  A time to recollect back and wonder forward.

This is a day for a gem of a story from Luke, told with dual perspectives.  This is a day where two generations meet, where youth ministers and campus chaplains engage young adults precisely in the context of their journeys, where parents and children perplex and irritate one another- can you imagine! Where professors and students sit in the Temple and wrestle with texts and traditions.

Some of us live today with Mary on the Parental threshold of holding on and letting go- today her 12 year old son Jesus stretches out beyond her protection into a world that she already knows  is piercingly beautiful but piercingly violent as well.  Mary says today, “Kids, they grow up so fast.  It seems like it was just this past Tuesday that Jesus was born!  My baby! And now he’s 12 going on 20.”

Some of us live today with Jesus on the Emerging Adulthood threshold of “hello world, ready or not here I come!”  and  “yikes, this economy, this multitude of options and yet restrictions, hello Parent’s basement, I’m baaack!”  Jesus says today, “Give me some room at the Inn to learn more and become more until I am really ready to launch.”

Let’s climb into our Lukan story and see the world from one another’s perspectives.

Let’s begin with Mary.  Revered Mother of Jesus.  And here in today’s gospel, a very real Mom, one many of us recognize in the mirror or in the family portrait.   Clueless, panicked, relieved, angry, perplexed, astonished, perseverant.  All those experiences of parenthood the owner’s manual never mentions.

In ancient Roman mythology, “Janus” is the god of beginnings and transitions, the god of gates, doors, and thresholds. Janus is depicted as a god with dual profiles, looking at once to the future and to the past. “January” was named in honor of this threshold - inhabiting Janus.  Now, I confess that I know this not because I am a classics scholar.  I know this because I am a Mom and I have a 529 college savings plan with a firm called “Janus Investments,” and this two-faced image of Janus has been stamped on my statements for the last dozen years.  I inhabit a world lately with many conversations including these particular numbers – a sort of secret code of American parenthood: 529. For many years my husband and I have clink clinked our quarters into the savings plate, fretting over its too slow expansion.

Our son Andrew is now a High School senior, living on the threshold between HS and College…. Between clicking “submit” on the Common App and the arrival of satisfactorily large and thick acceptance envelopes in the mail.  With Mary I shake my head and remember my son’s first day of Kindergarten, which seemed like last Tuesday.   On that very first day of the big yellow bus, Andrew was treated to a one on one visit from the school principal.  A kind man who very gently suggested that biting your neighbor’s forearm on the bus-ride to school was not the best start to an academic career.  This I cannot help but remember as my 17 year old stands before me and requests the car keys – himself a Latin scholar, a fine writer,  a person of sterling character, now with advanced bus-riding social skills. The forward facing Janus Mom says, “I’m so proud of you!”  The backward facing Janus Mom cannot resist to comment, “but don’t bite anybody.” Already but not yet.

Mary, today I companion with you as we parent sons so close to stepping into new worlds beyond our doors.   I like to think of Mary as the biblical Soccer Mom. Now, if this has not occurred to you, bear with me for a moment.  Her eldest child is 12, and we know from biblical text that she has at least another 6 children by the time Jesus is an adult.  Four of Jesus’ brothers are named, and references are made to his unnamed sisters.  Before I thought about this fact of Mary as parent of 7 or more children- I admit to a more serene image of Mary-  quietly pondering, piously robed in blue, sitting beside a well-behaved  baby, shining a halo or two in daily housework chores.   But now I imagine she and Joseph busy with all the demands of running a large household bursting with children’s activities and religious practices and carpentry projects.

I can understand how Jesus got lost in the caravan that day, on the annual pilgrimage to and from Jerusalem for the Passover festival. The original HOME ALONE screen play.  It was a 150 mile round trip journey– 3 days there and 3 days back- from the sleepy hill country of Nazareth to the bustling epicenter of the city of Jerusalem, bordering the Negev desert to the south.  2 places so very different from one another.  2 members of one family, having such very different experiences of the same event.

I imagine that Jesus the first born had been declaring his desire for some independence from good ole Imma and Abba for some time- so they  relented on their vigilance and said OK, son, you can travel further back in our caravan with extended family.  Mary probably couldn’t stop herself and called out parting advice, “Don’t bite anybody!”  OK- all you young adults, You totally get to roll your eyes here at your parents for all our awkward comments.

It’s really more the world’s bite that Mary is afraid of.  She knows the reality of injustice and state sanctioned violence.  She knows the powerlessness of being young, poor, female, occupied, from the no-account back country. She and Joseph and baby Jesus fled Bethlehem 12 years ago, narrowly escaping the murderous arm of Herod who commanded that all male babies under age of 2 be killed.  Her family was refugees in Egypt, relying daily on the kindness of strangers, relying daily on the magnificent promises of God.

Mary knows that in 2012 alone over 153,000 refugees fled her neighboring Syria, running from violence and terror. Mary knows that in our country there have been some 30,000 deaths in 2012 from gun violence.  Mary knows that the Slaughter of Innocents is not some ancient biblical tale, but a reality proximate to our lives.  Mary weeps for the innocents. Christmas Eve- next door to my recent home town- Webster NY -  2 first responders to a house fire,  were ambushed and killed by gunshot.  One a 19 year old, covering for older firefighters so they could be home with their families.  Mary weeps for the innocents. Sweet babes at an elementary school in Connecticut, an Oregon shopping mall, a Colorado movie theatre, an off-campus street in Allston. Off campus- our campus. These towns -our towns.  These streets - our streets. These children –our  precious family.  Let us wake up and let our collective tears become a tidal wave flow of change – in hearts and minds and legislation.

And here’s why I Iove Mary.  And here’s how she is a vessel of God’s love.  Mary lives on the threshold of the world, seeing all its pain and darkness and she chooses life.  She chooses to open the door of her heart, a familiar expression of Howard Thurman.  Thurman who prays let the door of my heart be swinging. Secured in place by the axis of identity as a beloved child of God,  yet swinging open, welcoming love, attentive to splendor, open to new insight.  Mary doesn’t hide out in Nazareth, with firmly locked doors to protect her very special child.  She lives.  She trusts.  She reflects. She acts.

Mary sees the bleakness and chooses to light a candle of blessing rather than curse the darkness.  Perhaps Mary is tempted to lock the door and live in fear- to insist that Jesus never leave the protection of Nazareth again.  But Mary does NOT place an armed guard at every threshold we hold most dear- she does not armor backpacks – instead she clothes herself in “compassion, kindness, humility, patience, and most of all love.”

When Mary and Joseph discover that Jesus is missing, they abruptly change all plans and rush back to Jerusalem to find their son.  They are panicked.  They know what can happen out there in the big world.

After 3 days of searching, they find him! In the Temple of all places!  Not in the market squandering shekels on sweet cakes.  In the temple! Sitting there with the elders deep in discussion about matters of Torah.  Holding his own.  Mary’s panic gives way to relief, gives way to anger.  She raises her voice and says “SON!  How could you do this to me?”  And Jesus answers her, “why were you searching for me? Didn’t you know I must be in my Father’s house?”  Not without a little attitude.  In this moment, Mary really doesn’t understand her son.   But she pauses.  She doesn’t react, she reflects.  She’s good at pondering life’s mysteries, even when they come in the package of a misbehaving child.

Jesus leaves with his parents, and back home in Nazareth they give him some remedial lessons in the commandments.  Like, hey Jesus, remember # 5 of the top 10?  “Honor thy father and mother.”  Mary continues her stewardship of the home, observing the beauty of each Sabbath eve and day, encouraging her children in the living of the law, trusting the words of the angelic visitor so long ago “FEAR NOT.”  She does her best.  And her son grows in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favor.

But we have climbed our tree today to gaze out in two perspectives.  Jesus also lives in the threshold of emerging adulthood today, almost there but not quite yet.  Jesus of Nazareth, Son of God, Wonderful Counselor, Light of Lights, Hope of the Ages.  Perhaps we’re better versed in the full divinity of Jesus Christ than in his full humanity. But here in today’s treasure of a story we see a young adult some of us recognize in the mirror or in the family portrait - eager, idealistic, curious, confident, hopeful, and determined.

Now, we know most definitively that Jesus is 12 here.  What the text does not say, and we can imagine, is that he is reaching the age of majority, or of recognition as an adult in his religious circle.  B’nai mitzvah- the coming of age of Jewish boys at 13 and girls at 12 is not yet an established practice in first century Judaism.  I suspect Jesus is on the threshold of what we call today becoming a bar mitzvah, a son of the commandments, one with personal accountability for observing the Law.  A bar or bat mitzvah is full of questions and obligated to study biblical passages in depth.  So, just where else would Jesus be, but at the steps of the Temple, taking the rare opportunity to dialogue with and learn from the greatest scholars of his day.  Indeed, when reproached by his mother, “how could you do this to me?,”  he is likewise astonished- do my parents understand nothing about me?  How is this not obvious?

In our era, a new term has surfaced for coming of age, called “Emerging Adulthood.”  It’s generally associated with the ages between 18-29, and is understood not as a generational characteristic particular to the Millennials, but as a new life stage.  Nearby in Worcester MA our colleagues at Clark University are spearheading this research.  Dr. Jeffrey Jenson Arnett and his grad assistant Joseph Schwab have just released their poll on American Emerging Adults, and find that these folks are overall: Thriving, Struggling, and Hopeful.   Sounds a bit like our own emerging Jesus to me.

“Life is not easy for emerging adults,” state the researchers.  We know this. Our own WBUR ran a series in December called Gen Stuck.  Ouch. I learned that 30% of young adults are boomeranging back home to the not-so-empty nest, the highest percentage since the 1950s.  Merry Christmas, young adults, here’s a present called Fiscal Cliff.  Happy New Year!

I quote from the Clark report, “Emerging adults have an unemployment  rate that is consistently double the overall rate.  Those who have a job usually make very little money for most of their twenties.  Nearly all aspire to a college degree, but fewer than 1/3 have attained one by ages 25-29. Most move away from the comfort and support of the family home to take on the formidable task of finding a place in the world.  It’s not surprising, given these circumstances, that so many of them say they often feel stressed, anxious, or depressed. “

Hold on, though, recall that 12 year old energy, confidence, and curiosity of Jesus.

“What may be more surprising is that, despite the challenges of the emerging adult life stage, most of them remain hopeful that their lives will ultimately work out well.  Nearly 90% agree that they are confident that they eventually  will get what they want out of life:  almost as many agree that “At this time of my  life, it still seems like anything is possible.”  And, despite frequent claims that they face a diminished future and will be the first generation in American history to do worse economically than their parents, more than 3/4s agree that “I believe, overall, my life will be better than my parent’s lives have been.”  End quote.

Jesus, God with skin on, knows this in-between time.  He stands in the threshold right there. And he is present in the silent waiting years.  From ages 12-30 we know nothing about Jesus’  life.  We can imagine he is home preparing, living faithfully, and getting ready to launch into public ministry – finally at the age of 30.

Young adults- if your Baby Boomer or Gen X parents get a little impatient with your travelling through this life stage, say, “hey I’m  Emerging right on target with Jesus.”

Jesus had a hunger for discovery.  So do the young adults I know and love.

3 dozen Emerging Adults- also known as “Students” gathered at Marsh Chapel  just before finals for a “Reading Retreat” – a day set apart for study and reflection.  We focused our spiritual practices on one of the masters from this holy Temple– Howard Thurman- absorbed his words and wisdom.  Each participant went around room declaring the study intent for the day- and it was fascinating to hear the variety of subjects embraced by 6 of the schools of our university.  I am making my way through a 500 page tome on international relations and the CIA,  I am immersed in my reams of Hebrew Bible class notes for final exam, I am writing a paper about cross-cultural pedagogical implication, I am simulating human voice through a prototype robot I am making, and so on and so on.  Fascinating!

They remind me each day to be a  life-long learner. To appreciate excellence all around.

For instance, our ushers, right here at Marsh Chapel are superb in hospitality.  Each Sunday they are greeting at our doors with smiles and welcoming information for first timers.  Now, I come up the stairs from the lower level  - not in our ushers’ line of duty.  So most weeks I go out the front door, so I can turn right around and come back in. And I say to the usher, I want my greeting!  I want my smile and handshake or hug.  I want to start my day by receiving the excellence of your mission.  And Charles, 7 year old Charles who is head usher of the balcony.  Cannot have a Sunday without a Charles smile and high five.

Friends, this day we look back, we look forward, and we look from many perspectives.  We go out of our way to cross thresholds into places of joy and love.  Let us go into the New Year, with hearts as swinging doors –opening to the comfort of God’s grace, moving out to the needs of the world.

Amen.

~ The Rev. Dr. Robin Olson

See: Clark University Poll of Emerging Adults, December 2012: http://www.clarku.edu/clarkpoll/

posted in Guest Preachers on 12.30.2012 at 11:00 am

By Marsh Chapel

Mark 15:33-41

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It seems all we have is a promise and open hands.  Yet I suspect Jesus would understand.  When he cries out on the cross, he laments before God his being abandoned:  “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”  The words he uses are the familiar words of Psalm 22.  In that moment, we see Jesus sharing in the most radical, Godforsaken state of what it means to be a human being in the face of injustice, abandonment, and death.  Yet as Adela Yarbro Collins points out, absolute despair is a retreat in silence. Jesus shouts, yes, but he shouts to God.  Jesus cries out, yes, but he cries out to God.  Jesus speaks words of Godforsaken-ness on the cross, yes, but he speaks them to God.

In doing so, his lament itself is a form of holding on to the promise.  His complaint to God makes no sense unless he holds up the promise to God and asks:  is it still good?  Is it?  The cry, the shout, the Godforsakenness all belong there—because lament is the flipside of a life lived according to promise.

In his book Meditations of the Heart, BU’s Howard Thurman expanded this idea even further to include human encounter with death as a whole.  Thurman writes:

...the glorious thing about man’s encounter with death is that fact that what a man discovers about the meaning of life as he lives it, need not undergo any change as he meets death.  It is a final tribute to the character of an individual’s living if he can die “unshriven” but full-blown as he lived.  Such a man goes down to his grave with a shout.

At Jesus’ death, at his apocalyptic death things are revealed as they really are.  It is not about nobility or virtue.  It is about the turning of the ages, the strange mysterious place that speaks from death and yet bears witness--shouting witness--to the promise.  It is a strange, shadowy place…of God’s new creation.

~Rev. Dr. David Schasa Jacobsen

Professor of Homiletics, Boston University

posted in Guest Preachers on 08.19.2012 at 11:00 am