Marsh Chapel Sermon Archive

Hill

Last Sunday our worship service of Word and Table conclude with the singing of an old hymn, written by a Massachusetts minister J. Edgar Park, who was President of Wheaton College, Massachusetts. He was born in Belfast, Ireland, March 7, 1879 and had his theological studies at New College, Edinburgh, The Royal University, Dublin, and Princeton Theological Seminary. His principal pastorate was in the Second Church of Newton, Congregational, West Newton, Massachusetts, which he served 1926 to 1944, going from there to the Presidency of Wheaton. He was the author of many books, including one of the Lyman Beecher Lectures at Yale.

You may not in fact remember the hymn we sang, to conclude our service, which is not any detriment to or criticism of you. The hymn title is ‘We Would See Jesus’, number 256 in our venerable Methodist Hymnal, which Hymnal is about to be revised this coming year with all the attendant disagreements, disputes, and ultimately, we trust, a happy and useful outcome for the use of singing Methodists near and far. One of our own faculty here at Boston University is a member of that committee.

The hymn fits our readings from Mark, and fits Epiphany, the season out of which we come, and traces the ministry of Jesus.

We would see Jesus, lo! His star is shining, above the stable while the angels sing

There in a manger on the hay reclining, haste let us lay our gifts before the King

We would see Jesus, Mary’s Son most holy…

We would see Jesus, on the mountain teaching…

We would see Jesus, in his work of healing…

We would see Jesus, still as of old he calleth ‘Follow me’…

In a few simple verses, the hymn traces the earthly ministry of Jesus, birth, growth, teaching, healing, calling. This is the Jesus most of us most of the time are most comfortable with, and the Jesus, one could add, that most seminarians prefer to study, the Jesus of parables, of the lilies of the field, of the various healings, of the preachments in valley and on mountain—in short, the human Jesus. This is the Jesus known and heard in Matthew, Mark and Luke, with some occasional exceptions, like today’s reading. We can fairly readily approach this Jesus, we would see him as the hymn says, in the verses and chapters of the Synoptic Gospels.

Now pause, for a moment, and hear again the Gospel today, which is none of this. The Mark 9 Transfiguration is like an invasion of the gospel of John into an other-wise happy earliest Gospel of Mark. A high mysterious mountain. Strange choices about booths. The sudden acclamation of Elijah and Moses. A blinding light. MYSTERIUM TREMENDUM. The Holy. Suddenly not just a teacher or preacher or healer or rabbi, but…This is the Jesus of your life and death. Death makes us mortal, facing death makes us human. This is the Jesus of whom it is said, ‘My Lord and My God’. This is the Jesus to whom we turn in the Lenten challenges, whether or not they come in Lent, the Lord of life and death. So, our Charles Wesley hymn, in a few moments, is quite different: Christ whose glory fills the skies, Christ the true the only light, Sun of Righteousness arise, triumph o’er the shades of night, Dayspring from on High be near, Daystar in my heart appear

It is this holy grace, this gracious holiness, to which we turn our ears, not our eyes, on the Sundays, like this one, upon which we hear the Gospel as spoken, but also as sung: A day is coming that will judge the secrets [of humankind], Before which hypocrisy may tremble. For the wrath of His jealousy annihilates What hypocrisy and cunning contrive.

Dr. Jarrett: how shall we listen, this morning, with particular and careful attention, to today’s cantata?

Jarrett

Thank you, Dean Hill. At first read, the texts of today’s cantata surely align more with the MYSTERIUM TREMENDUM depiction you’ve just described. Cantata 136 warns of the day of judgement when our own hypocrisy and cunning-ways threaten to undo us. The bass soloist tells us that the heavens themselves are not clean, and that all are struck by spots of sin, brought upon us by Adam’s Fall. These depictions endure for much of the cantata, until, mercifully, we are reminded that Jesus’s wounds cleanse and redeem. In the final chorale we sing that even a drop of the Blood of Jesus can cleanse the entire world. The image is one of humankind ensnared in the Devil’s jaws, set free and at liberty by the blood of the lamb.

Bach’s anonymous librettist was surely trying to amplify the themes of the lessons heard earlier in the Leipzig service — for Bach these were lessons from Romans and Matthew. They call the Christian to live according to the spirit, not the flesh, along with an admonishment to beware false prophets and hypocrisy. These are the subjects of the internal movements – two recitatives, an alto aria, and a duet for tenor and bass. Bach highlights a few words here with extended melismas for the singers: erzittern or tremble referring to the sinner on judgment day, vernichtet or annihilate describing the wrath of God’s jealousy. In the duet, as if to number our spots of sin, Flecken is set as a melisma. Later in the duet the redeeming Strom or stream of Jesus’s blood is similarly treated, all of which offer aural anchors throughout these two remarkable movements.

A typical cantata libretto draws on several sources for texts. The internal movements were most often newly written poetic texts by someone in close working relationship with Bach. It’s in these texts we find the most theological exegesis worked out. Most often the cantatas concluded with a Chorale by one of the famous Lutheran hymn writers, frequently by Luther himself. The opening movements were typically direct quotes of Scripture, drawing on the Psalms more than any other Biblical source. Bach follows this exact design in Cantata 136, opening his cantata with the 23^rd verse of Psalm 139: Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me and know my thoughts. In the German: “Erforsche mich, Gott, und erfahre mein Herz; Prüfe mich, und erfahre, wie ich’s meine.” Modern German translations of the Luther Bible replace erfahre with erkenne. Regardless, listeners can recognize these four imperative verbs that begin each line, imploring God’s true examination of our inmost thoughts.

Hill

I rely with gratitude on John Ashton, a great NT scholar, to keep the Jesus of Mark and also the Jesus of John, who makes an invasive appearance here in Mark 9, both before us. Both Christmas and Easter. Both Life and Death. Both teaching and crucifixion. Both healing and resurrection. Jesus both human divine, both Mark and John, both Mark 1 and Mark 9. Both ‘We would see Jesus’ and ‘Christ whose glory fills the skies’. Both last Sunday and this Sunday.

No doubt the Synoptic Gospels held their place; but for them Christianity might well have rapidly vaporized into some form of speculative Gnosticism. It did not; the parables of the kingdom and the Sermon on the Mount continued to be regarded as indispensable elements of the Christian message, and—more importantly—the Jesus who preached them remained ever present to the Christian consciousness.

To most modern eyes the portrait painted by the Synoptists is both both simpler and more attractive. It is the portrait of a man with a special relationship with God, whom he addresses by the intimate name of Abba, Father…He was a man of his time; his teaching and preaching, even his healing miracles, can readily be placed in the context of first century Palestinian Judaaism. If he were suddenly to reappear as he really was he would no doubt seem to us, in Albert Schweitzer’s phrase,’ a stranger and an enigma’, but a recognizable human being nonetheless.

Not so the Johannine Christ (we add, here, not so the Christ of the Transfiguration). He does not belong to this world at all: it is almost true to say that he enters it with the purpose of leaving it. He is a pre-existent divine being whose real home is heaven. He enters an alien world with an unprecedented confidence and assurance, knowing who he is, where he comes from, and where he is going…He orchestrates his own passion…he can read Pilate’s heart. There is about him no trace of uncertainty. Master of his fate, captain of his soul… his head bloodied but unbowed, he never had to confront either the fell clutch of circumstance or the bludgeonings of chance. (Ashton, 1991, Understanding the Fourth Gospel, 239)

Well beloved, that is, there is a full and deep mystery here, an unfathomable, an uncanny deep, right here in our Gospel, of the sudden appearance of a Jesus who would fit well in John, but not so well in Mark. And is that not, for us, come Sunday, this Sunday, in the hearing of the word and music, a part of our needed reminder, a reminder about the limits of life, about the mystery of life, about the God gift of life, given us well beyond our capacity to understand it? Perhaps we can carry from the beauty and holiness of these precious gospel and musical moments, a sturdy reminder of the great strangeness, the great mystery, the great, tremendous, yes, unearthly voice and presence and grace of our Lord, who comes to us, this morning, interrupting the rest of his more human appearance in Mark, with this scene befitting John, and interrupting our forgetfulness about mystery. In that spirit, let us pray:

Gracious God, Holy and Just

Thou from whom we come and unto whom our spirits return

Thou source of Wisdom, fount of Wisdom, well spring of saving Wisdom

Make of us, we pray, an addressable community

That we might listen

That we might hear

That we might understand

That we might listen, hear and understand before we analyze or criticize

Make of us, we pray, an addressable community

Make of us, we pray, a benevolent community

That we might polish our proclivity for the second thought, the second try, the second chance

That we might expect to uncover a latent goodness, latent in others and in ourselves and across this great, though troubled, globe

That we might become good in ways that become the Gospel

Make of us, we pray, a benevolent community

Make of us, we pray, a soulful community

Alive to spirit, alive to love, alive to grace

Take away from our souls all strain and stress

Let us breathe again, breathe deeply, breathe the soulful breath of life

Make of us, we pray, a soulful community

For we have gathered and bear witness to Jesus, our beacon not our boundary.

-The Reverend Doctor, Robert Allan Hill, Dean. & Dr. Scott Allen Jarrett, Director of Music

posted in Dr. Scott Allen Jarrett, Director of Music, The Bach Experience, The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 02.11.2018 at 11:00 am
Tags: Bach Experience, Robert Hill, Scott Jarrett

Sunday
February 4

A Winter Communion

By Marsh Chapel

Psalm 147

1 Corinthians 9

Preface

‘Different are the languages of prayer, but the tears are all the same’.

So, Abraham Heschel, whose mighty labors to interpret the Hebrew Prophets were drenched themselves in tears—the joyful tears of adoration, the bitter tears of confession, the heartfelt tears of thanksgiving, the worried tears of supplication.

Prayer is at the heart of communion, especially a winter communion, and its languages are the tongues of adoration, confession, thanksgiving and supplication.

‘Pray without ceasing’, we are taught in the 5^th chapter of the earliest document in our New Testament, 1 Thessalonians. Without ceasing.

We pray in silence before our worship begins, come Sunday. Here, in this sacred hour, we set ourselves for the week to come, and set before ourselves what we hold dear, and all in which we are dearly held.

Then: Monday noon in meditation, Monday evening in Compline, Wednesday morning in theological community, Wednesday evening in communion, Thursday noon, both in sanctuary silence and then over an outdoor common table, and privately, meal by meal, morning by morning, we pray.

Prayer is to sit silent before God. Prayer is to give utter attention. Prayer is to think God’s thoughts after God. Prayer, like a poem, is ‘a momentary stay against confusion’ (Frost). Prayer is our winter communion.

Adoration

A language learned in prayer is that of adoration. Here is the tongue of aspiration, delight, hope, imagination, wonder and praise. In the dim-lit daily world, adorational language can be hard to hear, hard to find, for it is the exuberant utterance of ‘why not’?, of ‘how about?’, of ‘oh my’!, sentences concluding in question marks and exclamation points, more enchantment than disenchantment

Our gospel reading, at heart, is an aspiration, a high hope about human being, human loving, and human life—especially about healing.

Here in Mark 1, the early church remembers forty years later a very high view, an aspirational hope for human healing. A prayer in aspiration that demons--begone! That upon this earth there yet might be—real friendship, real fellowship, real love, real marriage, the reality of the union of hearts, for which we are made. For a hint of the eternal, a glimpse of the divine, a glimmer of joy without shade. How we need that hint in our time of humiliation. How we need that height in our culture of degradation.

All this takes time and practice. Our aspirations take the support and help of a community to last.

So, in the same breath, and in the same paragraph, the Jesus of Mark’s gospel, and the Lord of Mark’s community, heals the sick, and offers their innocence (not their ignorance) as aspiration. Innocence is not Holiness. Holiness comes after Innocence, in the aspirations known both in celebration and in defeat. Behold Jesus lifts them, lifts us, in his arms.

Hence, a few weeks ago we did sing, ‘Come Let Us Adore Him’. There is a prayer, a prayer in a wonder-land. What do you adore? Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Where your heart is, there will your treasure be also.

Our January preachers, with their manifold winter gifts, foretold it: remember your baptism, behold plenty good room, save what you love, adore restoration not destruction.

So we sing a hymn each Sunday.

Adoration. A language of prayer.

Confession

A language learned in prayer is that of confession. Such a dialect is much needed, in our time, in our generation. Contrition, compunction, regret, and lament. “I am sorry”. “Forgive Me”.

You probably one day suddenly realized the power of confession. Bishop James Matthews once said, in a memorable sermon, that he came to a day when he just wanted to write down in a list his most memorable shortcomings. (I was thinking of him the other day, visiting our own C Faith Richardson, now 102 years of age, who was his secretary). He wrote down his mistakes and his regrets. His regretful mistakes and his mistaken regrets. That he did, and tossed the list into the fire, and resolved to live a great good life unrestrained by what was past. “I gave the list to God and to the fire”, he said, “and I headed out into the future”. Then he added: “I’m sure you all have done the same, one way or another”. I wasn’t so sure we all had, but I basked in the confidence—in the living pardon—of his confidence in us.

We depend on this reminder of our fragility. It keeps us from becoming naïve about the fragility all around us. Especially the disguised fragility of beloved institutions. Many churches are one decade away from demise. Some countries are one government away from demise. Our schools, halls of government, businesses, families—all these are far more fragile than they sometimes seem. They take constant tending, mending, and befriending. They take daily, careful leadership. And when over time the fabric begins to fray, devastation may ensue. Institutions, like people, are nourished by attention to small things. ‘Yard by yard, life is hard. Inch by inch, it’s a cinch’.

So we offer confession, KYRIE ELEISON, each Sunday.

Confession. A language of prayer.

Thanksgiving

A language learned in prayer is that of thanksgiving. My friend says that all birds are either robins or non-robins. Well, the prayer book of the Bible is the Book of Psalms, and in that same oversimplified way, the psalms are either laments or thanksgivings, and there are more of the latter. So today the psalmist is singing aloud a song of thanksgiving.

We know gratitude in hindsight. Thanksgiving is the gift of the rear view mirror, of real retrospective. We learn, and we grow. But as Ralph Sockman repeated, and we now with him, ‘The larger the body of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of mystery that surrounds it”.

Eucharist is a word that means thanksgiving. It is the marrow this morning of our winter communion. Our Eucharist is a thanksgiving in remembrance and in presence. Eucharist is a thanksgiving in remembrance of our Lord Jesus, his ministry of preaching, teaching and, today, especially healing, his death upon the cross, and his radiant resurrection, our beacon and life. Our Eucharist is a thanksgiving in presence, an announcement of the divine presence, the real presence of God, here and now, in the humblest of forms. Eucharist means thanksgiving.

In the humblest of forms.

In the winter of 1982 the Maundy Thursday Holy Communion service was scheduled to occur in the sanctuary of the larger of the two churches, a two-point charge on the banks of the St. Lawrence River, two churches that shared a minister. And perhaps not too much else. In fact, to gather the two into one, in communion, was a rare event, with or without the sacrament. But Maundy Thursday was generally lightly attended, and, for once, all agreed to share the service, one congregation as host and one as guest. Notice the closeness, the kindred etymology of those to words, host and guest.

Well. The boiler died in the host sanctuary sometime that day, or perhaps the day before, though its demise was not noticed until about an hour before the service, noticed by freezing choir members there to practice. In those ancient days there was no mode or media to announce the dilemma, and relocate. So, after some consider, it was decide to move the service next door into the Methodist Parsonage. You knew this was the parsonage because of a sign on the porch saying so. This was an expansive if drafty country house, with two large living rooms, one a parlor with the piano, and the other with couches and chairs, and a large dining room and big country kitchen. Putting the coats on the porch and the children upstairs, we conjured that we could fit the light Lenten attendance. Sometimes you generalize, sometimes you specialize, and sometimes you improvise. A Trustee sat on the piano bench to turn hymn pages for the pianist. It was crowded. The children behaved upstairs, at least at the start. Later you could hear them rustling to run from east to west, giggling as their feet sounded like a small airplane landing nearby. Then quiet again.

Two churches of people who did not regularly sit together, of an evening, by historical accident and the ingenuity of some lay leaders, sat cheek to jowl. There was good close singing, in four parts, with the choir dispersed into the community. There was a warmth quite welcome at 10 below zero outside. At the time of communion all slowly moved from parlor to living room to dining room into the kitchen to serve and be served. And at the end a long full silence filled the house. A long silence, that is, full of thanksgiving.

Thirty-eight years is about the distance in time between the ministry of Jesus and the writing of Mark. The memory sifts to hold onto what matters, counts, lasts, has meaning. Of all the worship services in those years, from Christmas to Easter to Confirmation, the one most remembered is the crowded household communion, and the silence, and the thanksgiving.

If you are wondering how to pray, start with a word of thanks, a thanksgiving, a generous recognition of a cause of gratitude. You will not have far to look.

Sing to the Lord with Thanksgiving, Psalm 147. I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some. 1 Corinthians 9.

So we read a psalm each Sunday.

Thanksgiving. A language of prayer.

Supplication

A language learned in prayer is that of supplication. We name what we need. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will open. Ask and it shall be given. Not always. Not frequently. Not in a timely way. But…

You don’t easily get what you don’t name as needed.

In supplication, today, we feel or murmur or mutter, perhaps through clenched teeth, a prayer of supplication. How will this happen? We see no easy way.

In supplication, we are reminded of who we are and whose we are. Supplication, the honest statement of what we need, the honest desire to return to a deep personal faith and an active social involvement, against all manner of winds blowing against, helps us build the future, a good future. Prayer is a kind of prop.

Emily Dickinson had her occasional happy moments and happy thoughts and choice, true words of thanksgiving (amid darker hues aplenty to be sure):

The Props assist the House

Until the House is built

And then the Props withdraw

And adequate, erect,

The House support itself

And cease to recollect

The Auger and the Carpenter-

Just such a retrospect

Hath the perfected Life-

A past of Plank and Nail

And slowness-then the Scaffolds drop

Affirming it a Soul.

So we offer our common prayer every Sunday.

Supplication. A language of prayer.

Coda

‘Different are the languages of prayer, but the tears are all the same’.

Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication.

Ye that do truly and earnestly repent, and are in love and charity with your neighbor, and intend to lead a new life, following after the commandments of God, come, draw near in faith, and take this Holy Sacrament, this prayerful winter communion, to your lasting comfort.

- The Reverend Doctor, Robert Allan Hill, Dean.

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 02.4.2018 at 12:00 pm
Tags: Robert Hill

Sunday
January 28

“Have you come to destroy us?”

By Marsh Chapel

Mark 1:21-28

Good morning! What a pleasure and honor it is to share the good news of Jesus Christ with you this morning. I'd like to thank Dean Hill for asking me to preach today and my colleagues here at the chapel for their support and encouragement.

Today is the fourth Sunday after Epiphany. We are in the liminal time between the celebration of the birth of Christ, and Ash Wednesday. It’s not a memorable season like Advent, when we’re so excited to get to the birth of Christ that we sometimes jump ahead into its celebration a bit early. Or one of Lent, during which we fast, meditate, and prepare for the death and resurrection of Christ. No, the season after Epiphany, in some churches, particularly the Catholic Church, referred to as “Ordinary Time”, is when we hear the stories the growth and development of Jesus’ ministry. It’s when we learn of Jesus’ teachings, healings, and interactions with the people he encounters along the way. We use green paraments to highlight not only the growth and development of Jesus’ ministry, but our own spiritual growth and development through hearing and engaging the retelling of Jesus’ ministry on earth. We are then called to go out into the world and share that spiritual growth through the love of Christ that we share with all people.

This liturgical year, we grapple with Mark’s gospel to help us understand this period of Jesus life. Mark is the shortest gospel and believed by scholars to be the earliest retellings of the life of Jesus. The episodes within Mark’s scripture are much abbreviated, or “raw”, as one commentary I read put it. We get the facts and figures of Jesus’ work in the world, but not much flowery description. But in a way, Mark’s gospel is perfect for this Epiphanytide, this “Ordinary Time.” The gospel jumps right into the action of Jesus’ baptism and ministry. There is no description of the birth of Christ or the events leading up to it, like in Luke’s Gospel. Instead, we encounter the fully grown adult Jesus, baptized by John and announced as the Son and Beloved of God who then begins the work of God in the world. Mark is primarily concerned with conveying who Jesus is as the Holy One, the messiah, and that his authority comes from God. This is fully expressed through Jesus' words and deeds.

In Mark’s gospel, we and the people Jesus encounters come to know who he is through his acts of teaching and healing. The focus is on Jesus’ authority in these situations. In today's gospel reading, he is unknown to the people in the temple, but commands their attention through his words and actions. It is only the unclean spirit, or demon, or evil force which possesses the man in the synagogue who recognizes Jesus for who he is and the power that he can potentially wield. “Have you come to destroy us?” is one of the questions posed to Jesus by this evil force. The unclean spirit recognizes that Jesus possesses the authority of God, and questions how that power and authority will be used. Whether this is a sarcastic comment questioning the power of the Holy One, "Have you come to destroy us?" or a genuine inquiry of fear from the unclean spirit, "Have you come to destroy us?" we are not sure. But it gives us an interesting starting point for understanding the type of authority Jesus brings into the world and how our understanding of this authority can shape the ways we understand our Christian identity.

“Have YOU come to destroy us?”

First, let’s focus on the you in this question: “Have YOU come to destroy us?” The “you” obviously refers to Jesus. But Jesus is relatively unknown to the community he is within. The reaction of the people tells us so – he teaches them as one having authority, but not like the way that they had heard from the scribes. Jesus teaches in a NEW way. Not focusing on traditional interpretation of the Torah, as the scribes do, but by relying on the authority of God. The scripture does not share the words that Jesus spoke, but we know from other passages in Mark that his teachings challenge the systems that have led the participants and the leaders of the service into complacency.

We might be able to relate to this reliance on tradition in our own contexts – we become complacent not only to our styles of worship, but how we find ourselves interacting with the social structures that surround us in our everyday lives. “That’s just the way things are.” “This is the way it’s always been done.” But that blind trust can lead to problems like systemic injustices and oppression. What Mark demonstrates through this teaching is that Jesus points out the inadequacy of the teaching going on in the synagogue to reveal the true meaning of God’s relationship with people on Earth. We are called to seek out justice and righteousness, as the Psalmist today reminds us: God's righteousness endures forever. God is gracious and merciful.

The people in the synagogue are astounded by Jesus' teaching. From the immediate recognition of Jesus' authority the story quickly transitions into the man with the unclean spirit getting up and shouting at Jesus. “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?” Why has Jesus come to this synagogue to teach? How will Jesus’ teachings change the relationship between good and evil forces in the world?

Jesus’ teaching is founded in God, from whom his authority derives. His speech is powerful and authoritative because it speaks the truth. Jesus is a prophet, because he speaks the truth that is found in God and God’s will for the world. This authority is visible to those who hear him speak, as is obvious from last week’s gospel, in which Jesus promises Simon, Andrew, James, and John that he will make them “fishers of people” and they drop their nets and follow him. Jesus’ authority is unmistakable. But it isn’t what we might expect from the Messiah.

"Have you come to DESTROY us?”

It is established that Jesus is authoritative in his teaching, but do his actions match his words? Let us refer back to our guiding quote for this sermon, “Have you come to DESTROY us?” The word used by the unclean spirit is destroy in reference to how Jesus will use his power. Destruction is a violent word. It conjures images of razed lands, where no building is left standing. Or the complete obliteration of a person, a system. It might be what you would expect that the Holy One of God may bring to the Earth in order to control or subdue it. It might be what you would expect if it was your way with engaging with the world – to seek pain, violence and destruction instead of life-giving, healing, community. That is what the unclean spirits do, even to the point of causing self-destruction to their hosts, as described in Mark chapter 5.

We know from our own experiences that those with authority and power can slip into using that power for their own ends, to the point of injuring others. Without concern for the greater well-being, without that direct connection with the divine will for justice and righteousness, a person can create a great deal of damage by favoring certain groups of people with their power in ways that divide and amplify systems of oppression. Jesus has the power of God on his side, and it is precisely because of this connection with the divine that he utilizes that power to restore rather than destroy.

Jesus does not destroy. Yes, Jesus rebukes the unclean spirit telling it to “Be silent” and come out of the man, but there is no destruction. The spirit obeys, albeit putting up a fight on its way out, but it leaves. Jesus doesn’t destroy the spirit – where it goes to, we don’t know. But additionally, he doesn’t destroy the unclean spirit’s host, the man. Instead he restores the man to health. He “heals” the man. Jesus does not seek to obtain power for himself in this situation, as the evil forces might do. He serves humanity instead, restoring the man to his full humanity.

Jesus is a teacher and healer during his ministry; not someone who destroys. Can you imagine describing Jesus as a teacher and destroyer? It just doesn’t seem to fit the conception we have of him. He commands power over those things which are damaging to both the individual body and the communal body. He demonstrates that his authority can overcome the unclean spirits, the powers of evil, through the restoration of the person. We may extend this metaphor to say that this person, who is possessed by the unclean spirit, could also be ostracized from his community if his behavior were to continue. We know as much from the story of the man possessed by the legion of unclean spirits in Mark chapter 5 who is physically removed from the community. Jesus restores both the man in the temple and the man exiled to their communities. And in both instances the communities are amazed.

Jesus has power and authority, but he uses in a way that nonviolently transforms. As the Spider Man movies have taught us “With great power comes great responsibility.” Or as saint Luke states in Chapter 12, verse 48, "From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded." Jesus is tasked with the greatest power and responsibility. In order to do the work of God on Earth, he must use his power and authority in a way that restores the earthly community to one of support, love, and inclusion.

“Have you come to destroy US?”

The final factor in this question posed by the unclean spirit is, who is “us”? Up to now, I have been talking about an unclean spirit. Suddenly it is multiplied by the spirit itself – “us.” We may understand this “us” as all evil forces, as those things which prevent flourishing in the world. If we read this passage with a historical critical lens, we may side with commentators who situate the Jewish community in Capernaum as a community under the Roman Empire – perhaps then the “us” are the imperialists who continue to oppress those in their community. Or it may be that this unclean spirit is an actual pre-scientific understanding of what a health concern looked like. But one thing is clear – the forces that recognize Jesus know who he is and recognize his potential power when no one else can.

Today we may see the “us” as the powerful forces we encounter in our lives that keep us from having a full relationship with the divine and from completely expressing God’s love to ourselves and others. These forces may be spiritual, biological, societal, or political. They may make us feel powerless and out of control, just as the man who is possessed appears to be. We may feel like there is no way of overcoming them or destroying them, as it were.

But there is hope. Because Jesus displays that there is the possibility of healing and hope in the face of such challenges. By bringing us a new way that is full of love and care for others, the healing and restoration of our communities is a possibility. As Paul reminds the church in Corinth, it is love that "builds up." Love builds up our relationships with each other, and it also builds up our relationship with God. We may not be able to destroy the evil that exists in the world, but we are capable of taking away its authority and power over our lives.

Moving toward the future

The gospel for this week reminds us of the great acts of Jesus but also should spark us into action. Jesus, after all, was a radical. And by radical, I mean the definition which comes out of the Latin root, radix, which literally means root. Jesus comes to fundamentally change the way we understand our relationship with God and with each other. His new way of teaching is simplified and relies less on tradition and more on the authentic word of God found within the scriptures. He astounds and amazes the people by using his authority both to teach and to heal and restore. But we must remember that not everyone accepted Jesus’ teachings or his acts of healing as coming from God. He encounters these challenges again and again throughout the gospel of Mark, eventually leading to his own death. He challenges the status quo in a new, nonviolent, but revolutionary way that scares those accustomed to the old ways.

I imagine people’s reactions to Jesus’ teaching to be like the first time I read James Cone’s A Black Theology of Liberation. As a first year Master's level student, it destabilized me. It made me question everything I thought I knew about Christianity and emphasized the inherent privilege I possess as someone who is white. It highlighted the systems of oppression found within American society and particularly within the field of theology, which had been primarily developed by Western, white perspectives up until the writing of this book. It felt foreign to me, a challenge to my what I then thought were my brilliant theological ideas, and I just didn't get it. And, like the unclean spirit in this passage, my reaction, at first, was to reject it. Because it didn’t speak to me. Because it scared me. Because I felt threatened by it. But that kind of teaching is exactly what I needed to grow, to at least try to better understand the lives of those who are oppressed by society. It made me look at the scriptures in a new way. It opened up avenues of many different and varied theological perspectives arising out of theologies of liberation that help shape my personal theological and ethical ideas today. The challenge was a good thing because it opened my eyes to new ways of being in the world. New ways that I am by no means an expert at, but new ways that I can continue to grow into.

There are many times in our lives when I’m sure we wish that Jesus would show up and get rid of the evil and oppressive forces in our lives. That it would be as easy as a command uttered for negative forces to leave us. But it’s not. At least it isn’t for us (it may still be for Jesus himself). We can’t make our personal demons or our societal demons leave us by willing them to go away. But what we can do is recognize them and engage ourselves to reform them. In order to do this properly, however, we must first be able to recognize those forces which have taken priority for us that are in conflict with God’s will. If we can acknowledge the demons then we can take their power away. If we ignore them and pretend they aren’t there, then we allow them to still have power over us. White supremacy, sexism, homophobia, addiction, and hate as well as many other insidious social ills surround us. Our job is to name them for what they are and systematically dismantle the influence they have in our collective lives. This is by no means any easy or pleasant job, but one that speaks to the justice and righteousness found in God.

We are called to be purveyors of Christ’s love in the world. If we recognize Jesus’ authority and how he uses it to bring about change, we can learn from it. Authority and the power that comes with it can easily be mismanaged and improperly used for self-aggrandizement. Jesus is our example – he possesses God’s authority, but uses that authority to serve others. Our power also comes in serving others, as Martin Luther said, being “little Christs” for our neighbors. Through service of others, learning from others, and being in community we can imagine a better future for ourselves. In this Season after Epiphany, this "Ordinary Time," let us continue to grow in spirit and love.

"Have you come to destroy us?" No, Jesus has come to restore us.

Amen.

-Jessica Ann Hittinger Chicka, University Chaplain for International Students

posted in The Rev. Dr. Jessica Chicka, University Chaplain for International Students on 01.28.2018 at 11:00 am
Tags: Jessica Chicka

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Sunday
January 21

Not So Long Ago and Not So Far Away

By Marsh Chapel

Jonah 1:1-5, 10

I Corinthians 7:29-31

Mark 1:14-20

Last weekend I went to the movies. I saw the eighth and latest episode of the “Star Wars” saga, entitled “The Last Jedi”. I am a fan of the story, so I was predisposed to like it, and I did. There were some familiar faces, and some new ones. Of course there will be a sequel. I’m pretty sure that I don’t give away any spoilers when I say that the plot continues. The scrappy ragtag remnants of the republic are up against the relentless and seemingly overwhelming forces of what is now known as the First Order and its Supreme Leader. After incredible challenges and great losses, at least some members of the republic escape to continue the story. While the plot does thicken, it essentially remains the same.

This time, though, I was struck by two things. They may not be new to the story, but at least they stood out for me in a new way. One was that the remnants of the republic were mostly referred to as “the resistance”, by themselves and even by the First Order. Now those who resist are those who refuse to accept or comply with something, or who attempt to prevent something by action or argument. Resistance can be violent, but it does not have to be. In “The Last Jedi”, this time, even in the midst of all the whiz-bang, characters were told that blowing things up was not always the best way to accomplish the goal. Indeed, retreat could be the best and most viable option in order to resist another day. The second thing I noticed was that while of course the First Order was out to “crush the resistance”, this time the reason they gave to do that was so that any hope, any hope, for continued resistance against the First Order would be crushed as well.

I’ve been thinking a lot about hope in the last year or so. For many of us, if our hope is not crushed, it is a little tattered around the edges. Many of us have faced or are facing personal challenges in terms of health or finances, loss of a loved one or personal calamity. Added to that is the fact that the world is a much more uncertain place than it was a year ago. There are many decisions being made in government that seem to make no sense to many of us, no matter what our personal politics: decisions that will poison the air, earth, and water for generations to come; the escalation of the rhetoric of racism, misogyny, and division; the increased pandering to the very wealthy and to corporate interests; the dismantling of social safety nets and government agencies that promote the public wellbeing; and the flirtation with increasing militarization in national and international policy and with a cavalier attitude toward nuclear war. It is hard to know even where to begin to resist these decisions, when it seems that every week there is some statement, action, or scandal that derails any forward movement.

In our Gospel reading this morning, Jesus begins his ministry in a challenging time. There is resistance to the Roman occupation of the country and to the puppet king. Jesus’ cousin John the Baptist has been arrested for his preaching of repentance, and his preaching of the coming of the one who is powerful and will baptize with the Holy Spirit. Jesus calls his first disciples to his ministry with the good news that the time is now, the realm of God has come near. They can believe in the hope of a new life and turn to God. In this case he calls fishermen in the midst of their daily life to follow him, to use their fishing skills to bring others the good news of the realm of God. And immediately they believe the hope of the good news and follow him.

Now we, as followers of Jesus in our time, are in a little different situation. Jesus preached the realm of God as near, so near that people could believe in its reality in their own lives, and invite others to join them to live that reality. The early church, especially after the resurrection, believed as Paul did in his letter to the church at Corinth. The realm of God was so near that people should live as though the dominant social, economic, and cultural forms no longer operated in this new life. With us, we are more than two thousand years down the road. While we realize that the realm of God is both present and coming in our lives, we live in the midst of a changing, wonderful, and sometimes scary culture. It often promotes a reality that is in direct opposition to the ministry of Jesus and to the reality of life with God in Christ. So how do we as contemporary followers of Jesus keep our hope, keep our belief alive in this challenging time? And just as important, how do we share our hope and our belief with others who may still feel like the least, the last, and the lost, and could use a little hope?

The Psalmist suggests we remember that the basis for our hope is our trust in God. God alone is our rock, our salvation, and our stronghold, so that we will not be shaken from our hope. We can pour out our hearts to God about our concerns and fears, and God will be our refuge. Other forms of seeming power are delusion, vain hopes. They will let us down. God alone has the power we need and God alone is worthy of our love and devotion.

With this as a starting point, with God’s presence and realm not just coming but present in our lives, we might expect that God might do some things we do not see coming, especially where there is opposition to the reality of our life with God. Our reading from Jonah describes one of these unexpected actions.

This is the second time that Jonah is sent to Ninevah. The first time he refused to go, and ended up in the belly of a whale. Apparently this experience at sea changed his thinking, because this second time he does go to Ninevah and he does preach the message that God gives him: Ninevah will be overthrown in forty days. Now the interesting thing is that the word translated here as “overthrown” can also be translated to indicate a turnover or a change of heart. Sure enough, Ninevah, notorious for its wickedness, repents. They really repent, with fasting and sackcloth, and they turn from their evil ways. And in the face of their sincerity, God changes God’s mind, and does not bring calamity to them.

Jonah went to Ninevah, finally, because he was a prophet and that is what prophets do when they accept the call. It was Jonah’s everyday life that God worked with to change a whole city for the better. Sometimes it is just doing what we do normally that can foster hope.

I saw another movie last weekend, “The Post”. This is the story of the discovery and publication of the Pentagon Papers. This publication was instrumental in ending the Viet Nam police action. I don’t think it is a spoiler to say that this publication was brought about by a small group of people. And they did not wake up and intend to start a process of change on a national level. They were living their everyday lives and doing their everyday jobs. Then something showed up that they just could not ignore in terms of the damage that was being done to individuals and the nation by the government process around Viet Nam revealed by the Papers. So at great risk to themselves and their everyday lives they decided to make known what they had discovered, even though that knowledge was forbidden to the general public. When that knowledge was made public, the things that had seemed so hopeless for so long around what was going on in Viet Nam began to change. The police action ended, and there was some measure of hope that now the truth was out, things would be different.

For us, we may not be in everyday positions to bring an evil city to repentance, or to reveal a nation-changing truth. But there may be for us some things we may think need changing, or may even need resistance. How do we find our hope, sustain our hope, in the midst of our personal and communal challenges? How do we respond to Jesus’ ongoing call to believe the good news of the reality of God’s realm, and to share that good news with others? We already know that it will not be easy, after this last year. It was not easy for Jesus and the first disciples, either. Mark is called the “Gospel of Conflict” for a reason, and Jesus and the disciples did not just have conflicts with the religious and political authorities – they had conflicts with each other. Jonah was a reluctant prophet at best, and after he had served to help bring about God’s work of conversion and mercy, he was angry. He thought Ninevah deserved to be overthrown in that sense of true overthrow. He berated God for being too merciful to this foreign city that deserved to be punished. Those who brought to light and those who published the Pentagon Papers risked the loss of long friendships and the threat of jail. And while the Viet Nam police action was ended, the revelations and the process of ending the action almost tore the country apart. and still have repercussions today. The facing of our personal challenges is often fraught with difficulty and pain, as well as resolution and reconciliation.

But we cannot let conflict, or the possibility of conflict, stop us from finding and sustaining hope. In conflict also we can trust that God is at work to do a new thing, as God did at Ninevah, and with Jesus and the disciples and the early church, and as God is still doing, every day, in this world now. We cannot stop because without hope, we die. The First Order and the Supreme Leader are right. Crush the resistance, crush hope, and then we do nothing. We do not look for hope. We do not take the steps we need to take to sustain our hope. Without hope, we do not resist those things that oppress us in our minds, bodies, and relationships, and so our hope is crushed once again, in a vicious cycle. The good news is that we can get better at finding our hope. We can get better in what we hope for. We can get better in what we put our trust to sustain our hope. One of the new characters in “The Last Jedi” puts it this way: It’s not about destroying what we hate; it’s about saving what we love.”

So what do we love enough to save? And when we decide that, who else loves the same thing and wants to save it, and where do we find these folks? And when we’ve found them, what can we do together to save what we love? Because not being alone, because shared purpose and action, give us hope, and help us sustain our hope.

And the great thing is, we often don’t have to look very far, or in unusual places, to find our companions in hope. They, like us, live their everyday lives and try to use their skills to save the things they love. They may be right here at Marsh Chapel. Look around, at a worship service or a book discussion or a dinner or a service event. Or they could be in our neighborhoods. They grow or buy organic vegetables to preserve earth, air, and water that is not poisoned. They may serve those who could use a little hope and help through their work that is the same as ours, or they volunteer in places in which we too can volunteer. They may advocate or organize publicly, to expand the voices and presence of those too often ignored or unjustly maligned. They may produce a movie, documentary, website, or blog, that inspires us to hope and action. They go where the life is, and we can go there too, or even lead the way.

What do we love and want to save? What gives us hope, that hope we want to sustain? It’s not just about what we do. It’s also about who we are and who we want to become. There are people we can join for that too.

Mark Miller is a worship leader, a composer and performer of sacred music, and a musical theologian. He is on the faculty of two universities, is married, and is a father. And in the wider culture, it is also clear that at least some of his ancestors were not from Norway. As an aside, for any Norwegians with us, don’t worry, we know it’s not your fault.

Anyway, Mark Miller in his everyday life and in his music recognizes the challenges to hope that we face both personally and communally. And he presents the perspective that who we are is just as important to the finding and sustaining of hope as what we do – in fact, they are so intertwined as to be inseparable. His latest composition has become something of a touchstone for many of us: we sing it to ourselves, we sing it to and with each other, we sing it with and for those who can relate and who also want to find and sustain their hope. It reminds us that in our faith and trust in God, we can be who we want to be and do what we want to do as our own best selves. We can save what we love. We can find our hope and sustain it. The song is called, “Prayer Chant (We Resist)”, and it goes like this. (sings):

“We resist. We refuse to let hatred in. We rise up. We won’t back down.

We’re in this ‘til the end.

Pray for your enemies. Welcome the stranger. Show love to your neighbor.

We’re in this ‘til the end.”[1]

Where do we find our hope? Not so long ago and not so far away. But right here. Right now. “ … ‘til the end.” Amen.

- The Reverend Victoria Hart Gaskell

[1] © Mark A. Miller 2017. http://www.markamillermusic.com/product/prayer-chant-we-resist/ Accessed January 29, 2018

posted in The Rev. Dr. Victoria Hart Gaskell, Minister for Visitation on 01.21.2018 at 12:00 pm
Tags: Victoria Gaskell

Sunday
January 14

Plenty Good Room

By Marsh Chapel

John 14:1-7

A text copy of this sermon is not available.

-The Reverend Dr. Walter Earl Fluker, Martin Luther King, Jr., Professor of Ethical Leadership, Boston University School of Theology

posted in Guest Preachers, Services Honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on 01.14.2018 at 11:00 am
Tags: guest preacher

Sunday
January 7

By Water and the Spirit

By Marsh Chapel

Mark 1:4-11

Good morning friends,

It is indeed a good morning, even if a particularly cold, sub-zero one here on the banks of the Charles River today. Streets are mostly cleared, the T is running on a normal schedule, and even if the sidewalks are more like tunnels and valleys through snowy mountain peaks, we are slowly returning to going about our normal business. The bombcyclone has passed, the Snow Days are over, and the city has returned to winter normalcy. For many of us in greater Boston, we observed a snow day (or two) this week, a brief moment of pause, an interruption in our normal rhythms, a time to observe, to take stock of where we are, to wonder, and to think. In the liturgical calendar, today is also something of a snow day. Yes, the wise ones have returned to their homes in the east. (Yesterday was Epiphany, that day in our calendar when we remember the adoration of the Christ-child by learned ones from afar, bearing gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.) But as we move into a season of ordinary time, there is also a pause in the calendar (today) to remember Jesus’ baptism that provides us with the opportunity to remember our own baptism and reflect on our relationship with the divine.

Baptisms are often amusing events for a family and a whole church community. A wily aunt takes guesses from a host of cousins about whether their new baby cousin will squeal when the pastor pours water on her head. A congregation quietly wonders if the new pastor has the touch to hold a squirmy child and pour water at the same time. When the pastor’s off-balance attempt to take the baby turns the squirming to a wail, congregants smile and whisper to one another that the young pastor will improve when he has children himself someday. And for that young pastor, the terror of attempting to hold a squirming infant, recite a prayer, and sprinkle water all at the same time soon gives way to shared smiles with the child’s family when the fantastic juggling act is over. The sight of a child’s baptism is sure to bring a smile or two, if only for the odd spectacle of the occasion.

Do you remember your baptism? Do you remember being thrust underwater in an inflatable pool behind Marsh Chapel on a frosty Easter’s Eve? Maybe you had water sprinkled on your head in the warmth of the church you grew up in? Perhaps all you remember is water. But that occasion was about a whole lot more than water. The place may or may not have been familiar, but certainly the people surrounding you on that special occasion were: a parent, god-parents, an aunt, a grandparent, close friends.

However, for many of us, our memories of baptism are not our own. We were baptized as infants. Our parents or other special people in our lives made a commitment to God and to the church to nurture us. They promised that through their teaching and example in our lives we might be guided to accept God’s grace for ourselves and profess our own faith openly.

Perhaps the words of commitment in baptism are familiar to you as you shared in the joy of the baptism of a loved one. Your memories of baptism may come from hearing a crying infant alarmed by the surprising sprinkling of water on the forehead or through seeing a partner renew her baptismal vows on the nearly always balmy banks of the Jordan just a few miles north of the Dead Sea. Perhaps you, yourself, have committed to nurture a child in the church so that by your teaching and example they may be guided to accept God’s grace for themselves and to profess their faith openly.

Or perhaps you are able to recall your own baptism: You freely elected to accept a special relationship with God and the church universal. You entered into a covenant. Your baptism marked not only your commitment to God and to a community but also that community’s commitment of thoughtful support and nurturing care to you. You were submerged fully, in a swimming pool or a lake, and you confidently recited your own baptismal promises for yourself.

Churches come in all shapes and sizes, and they have different ways of doing baptism. Chances are (if you are listening to this sermon) that you will encounter or be joined to a handful or more of Christian communities in your life. No matter what your experience or expectations about baptism, I know Marsh Chapel to be one of those places of thoughtful support and nurturing care. While the chapel is a community of support for a university community, we understand ourselves to be in relationship with the wider community and to anyone who is seeking authentic Christian community. I say this by way of invitation, especially to those listening on the radio or via the internet; we, at Marsh Chapel, are delighted to be in relationship with you. Whether you entered into the sacrament as an infant, a young person, or an adult, baptism binds you to God in love through mutual commitment. We here at Marsh Chapel affirm that relationship and seek to support your spiritual journey. And for those who wish to learn more about the sacrament and further cultivate their relationship with God, we are a community of support and love. If baptism is something you are interested in exploring, please speak with one of our staff after the service today or contact the chapel office by email at chapel@bu.edu or give us a call at 617-353-3560. The next regular opportunity for adult baptism will be at the Easter Vigil service.

In the liturgical calendar, much like the gospel of Mark, we fast forward through Jesus’ childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, and find him standing at the edge of the river Jordan about to begin a season of ministry teaching and healing.

Jesus’ childhood is largely absent from the Gospel accounts. We know very little about Jesus’ first thirty years of life, and we know even less about the community which supported Jesus during those thirty years. But we know there were people who surrounded him, shared happy occasions with him, and who grieved with him. He was formed by a community, Mary, Joseph, and many, many others. And it was that community of support which helped prepare him to head to the Jordan. We too need a community of support to prepare us and form us for the journey of life.

In Mark’s account, John the Baptist serves as herald for Jesus, his ministry, and the great gift he offers humanity. John the Baptist, the wild man living in the desert, wearing animal skin and eating locusts, was proclaiming Good News to all of Israel, inviting them to repentance of sins and foretelling of the gift of God’s real presence with us in the Holy Spirit. Mark writes of John the Baptist’s description of Jesus: “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals.” But soon the one about whom John was proclaiming appeared on the river’s edge to greet John and to be baptized.

This powerful prophet, divine healer, the one about whom John had been preaching was coming to John to be baptized. Jesus did not have any need to repent of anything and be baptized. Rather, he asked for baptism for the sake of others. Jesus took part in John’s baptism by water to be united with all people who earnestly seek to be in relationship with God.

In Jesus’ baptism, God acted in a very powerful, very visible way. Mark tells us that the heavens were torn apart and the Spirit of God descended like a dove and rested on Jesus. This visible sign of the Spirit’s presence with Jesus in his baptism is part of God’s promise of the Spirit’s presence with us in baptism. In the sacrament of baptism, we remember Jesus’ own baptism. We are baptized by water for repentance of sins and baptized by the spirit in covenant relationship with God. In trust of God’s continued covenant with all baptized persons we baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, acknowledging in the sacrament that the individual being baptized accepts a special relationship with the divine and desires God’s already present grace. This joins us with Christians all over the world and welcomes us into God’s family; we are not only children of God but we are adopted into a global family of sisters and brothers in Christ. While we may not see the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending in baptism, we know and trust that God is fully present in the sacrament and in the lives of all people. Baptism, like communion, is “an outward sign of inward grace, and a means whereby we receive the same.” God pursues us for relationship relentlessly, and God loves us unceasingly.

John Wesley taught that in baptism a person was cleansed of the guilt of original sin, initiated in to the covenant with God, admitted into the church, made an heir of the divine kingdom, and spiritually born anew. A lot is going on in the few moments of baptism. Sometimes we don’t realize the full wonder and mystery of the moment. Perhaps that has been our own experience of baptism. Have we felt the full wonder of the miracle of the sacrament? Have we felt cleansed? Initiated into covenant with God? Received into the church? Made an heir of the divine kingdom? Born anew?

Sometimes as we go through life, we don’t always recognize the gravity and magnitude of the events unfolding around us until after they have happened. For many, a college graduation may be one of those moments that we didn’t fully comprehend as it unfolded. The Commencement ceremony might rush by in a blur – red robe, black hat, forgettable speeches, and then a 20 foot walk across a stage and a small piece of paper in hand. A small 20 foot walk doesn’t take very long, but it means something, even if we don’t recognize it in the moment. Receiving a diploma in May but not starting the new job until August 1st might mean we don’t fully appreciate days of sleeping until 10:30 for class until we are up at 5:30 each day to beat the morning commuter rush to arrive on-time to the job we had longed for.

Now baptism is certainly a more deeply transformational experience than a college graduation, but perhaps you are still contemplating its meaning in your life, whether you were baptized last Easter or decades ago as an infant. Baptism is more than our pledge and dedication to God and to the church; it is our acceptance of God’s grace – the opportunity to be in communion with the divine, to experience forgiveness and reconciliation, to fellowship in and with the Holy Spirit.

Through baptism we come to know the assurance of pardon offered in the gift of Christ’s life. Here at Marsh we include in the liturgy an assurance of pardon as a reminder of the gift God freely gives and which we accepted in baptism. Most weeks, you hear a member of the ministry staff share this good news saying: “If we confess our sins, God who is faithful and just will forgive our sins, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” On Sundays when communion is celebrated we are reminded: “Hear the Good News: Christ died for us while we were yet sinners, that proves God’s love for us. In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven!” This is meant to be an ongoing reminder of the gift we receive through Jesus Christ. Indeed if we earnestly repent and accept God, we are forgiven.

Accepting God’s gift of love is at the heart of our passage from Acts today. The disciples that Paul encounters in Ephesus had repented of their sins but had not accepted the gift of the Spirit. Their baptism was incomplete because it was the baptism of repentance of John. They had not heard the totality of the Good News of Christ’s baptism. Through it they could join in fellowship with the divine, be born anew, given a fresh start. And in the sacrament of baptism, we are joined in this fellowship, born anew, and given a fresh start.

During the Christmas season, the hustle and bustle, the traveling, the visiting relatives, the special gift of God to us – that is forgiveness and fellowship – may not have been at the forefront of our minds. Perhaps we did not think of it at all. Perhaps in quiet and lonesome moments, we longed for fellowship and did not experience what we had hoped for. I think that very often when we are journeying through advent in expectation of the celebration of the birth of the infant, we lose sight of the gift that the infant brings. In Christ’s birth, life, and ministry, God does come to dwell among us to be with us.

So often during the Christmas season we hear about Emanuel – “God with us” – God born into the world as a babe in a stable and laid in a manger. Indeed, God was made flesh in Jesus and dwelt among us. And God continues to be with us through the Holy Spirit. In baptism, we invite God to be with us in a very special way. We commit ourselves to God and know that God will be with us during all of life’s trials and toils. We trust that in the Spirit, whose presence we accept in baptism, God will be our constant companion and supporter. God does not abandon God’s covenant with us, even if we wander from it. The Spirit remains steadfast, chasing after us as a tireless friend even when we turn away. Today is a moment in the life of the church in which we are invited to be reminded of God’s real presence with us.

In a moment this morning, we will observe an order of reaffirmation of the baptismal covenant. For those who have received baptism and who wish to renew their relationship with God, you will be invited to renew the promises made at your baptism, touch the water, and remember that you are a beloved child of God in covenant relationship with God and the church. As you renew your baptismal vows today, I invite you to recommit yourself to God and to accept the presence of the Spirit in your life anew. Amen.

-The Reverend Soren Hessler, Chapel Associate for Leadership Development

posted in The Rev. Dr. Soren Hessler on 01.7.2018 at 11:00 am
Tags: Soren Hessler

Sunday
December 31

Ruminations at Christmas

By Marsh Chapel

Click here to listen to the sermon only

Luke 2: 22-40

The story of Christmas, the birthday of the Lord, begins with the nation of Israel, ‘the hopes and fears of all the years’, the longings and dreams of God’s chosen people for a clearer sense of His presence and a clearer vision of his purpose. In the reign of King Herod, only 60 generations ago, a poor carpenter and his pregnant wife went to Bethlehem to pay the state tax. Mary was close to her time, and so, rather than camp as usual with the other poor travelers, Joseph decided to get a room in an inn. He was too late. They camped in a cave that also was a covering for the innkeeper’s animals. And that night a child was born, among cattle, yet visited by Kings, a child whose mature life would change the course of time and history. ‘Behold I bring you glad tidings of great joy which shall be to all people!’. This story is very close to us. Bethlehem is not that far away. The year 1 is not that long ago. The conditions into which Jesus was born are not that different from the conditions into which poor babies today are born. This story is close to us. As Galatians teaches, ‘born of woman, born under the law’.

The message of the birthday story is a glorious one. The message: a simple Hebrew word ‘Emmanuel’, ‘God with us’, ‘God with us’, ‘Gott mit uns’. ‘Dios con nosotros’. ‘Dieu avec nous’. “God with us’. ‘Emmanuel’. It requires a lifetime, a full exposure to the patterns of grace, to know this truth. We hear of it in the greatest words in Western literature and language:

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in the land of deep darkness on them has light shined (Isaiah). Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men (Luke). In Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them (Paul). The Lord will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations (Isaiah, today). There is something shattering about this message, this mystery: that the Lord God Creator, the first, the last, beyond all thought, would stoop so low as to become a poor peasant child. But that is the simple, shocking, difficult message. ‘God above, man below, holy is the name I know’. ‘God with us’ is the message. Emmanuel. With us, as in today’s Gospel, in others: Simeon, Mary, Anna, others.

The meaning in the message of the Christmas story is that God is with us in our weakness, limitation, and smallness, in order that we might respond to Him, that we might become like Him…

God with us, miraculously, in weakness. God touching us before and without our response. This is the meaning of baptism. In the light of God’s care, one can never be or become a means to an end, become commodified. One baptized is an end in himself. He has been blessed by God. This is a saving act, being born again. Martin Luther knew it when, locked in the Wittenberg Castle and tormented by demons cried out, ‘I am baptized!’

God with us, miraculously, in our limitation. The most hateful aspects of life—we all know this—are its limitations: illness, poverty, society (warfare), mind (ignorance), heart (we do what we would not do), relationship (we glide past each other), nature (winter weather), and the final limit, death itself. God with us in suffering, with the victims of fire in the South Bronx, God with us even—especially—at the point of limitation (sin and death and the threat of meaninglessness).

God with us, miraculously, in the smallness of our lives, the pettiness, to be negative, and the delightful detail, to be positive, of our few days on earth. God taking on our smallness to give us a model of how to live. We all need models, like the French architect of the Statue of Liberty, who modeled that on his own mother. If we are to grow in the knowledge of God we benefit from a model, a model on our own level, of our own scale.

God with us, miraculously, in our response to Him. This is the church, the Body of Christ, God with us in our response to God. Where does change occur? In the church. At best, the church embodies ultimate reasons for real change.

The hope in the meaning of the message of the story of Christmas is the oreal hope for this world, that we will live together in the spirit of Christ, as Longfellow sang at Christmas: ‘till ringing, singing on its way, the world revolved from night to day, a voice, a chime, a chant sublime, of ‘Peace on Earth, Good will to Men’. This is the hope in our gospel in our fellowship, in our preaching, in our life together, now.

Included in our gospel as pronounced today are the sick, the broken of body. The rail at which we gather is their rail, too. The hymns and prayers are theirs, too. The spirit of love is present to the broken of body. In this political season, we may be subtly encouraged to forget the broken. In the rush to build and develop our church, or our nation, we may be encouraged to leave the weak behind. But for whom is this preachment, if not for the sick? For whom is the life of the church, if not for the sick? For whom has Christ died, if not for the sick? For whom has Christ died, if not for you in your brokenness? You have time to visit one sick person this week. The sick are included, centrally, in our Christmas gospel.

Included in our fellowship are the poor, those still left outside the party. This rail is their rail. Hymns and prayers are meant for them. The spirit of love struggles in our institutions to take from the rich and give to the poor. Right now we are set to take from the poor to give to the rich. Yes, the poor ye have always with you. Yes, the poor share responsibility for their condition (one dime on a dollar at best). Yes the poor—with us all—stumble in the sin of sloth. They are able to give us, we lucky enough to have so much more, nothing. But love becomes mercenary if it depends on the advantage each wants to gain. The poor depend on the free service of our wills, and so, strangely, and powerfully, can help us love. For whom is this preachment, if not for the poor? You can remember the poor this week. The poor are included in our fellowship at Christmas.

Included in our preaching come Christmas are the brokenhearted, who have lost an irreplaceable person or dream. The rail, hymns and prayers—and another day, the supper of the Lord—are comfort to the heartsick, to the poor in spirit. When we are heartbroken, heartsick, when we are poor in spirit, we lean on God. Faith is most faith when it is all you have left. We need God, heartsick, because, just now, we have a gaping hole, a crying need, a sorrow. In the desert, we learn to appreciate water. In the tundra, we learn to appreciate warmth. In isolation and loneliness, we appreciate a kind word. You can speak kindly to someone today and tomorrow. You can. Think how good tomorrow might be if you will brighten it with care, with kindness. The brokenhearted are included in our preaching here.

Here is hope at Christmas, and with powerful specificity, hope for the sick, the poor, and the brokenhearted. We give thanks for the story, the message, the meaning, and the hope of Christmas, the birth of the Lord.

My father died seven years ago. One of his set of gifts to me was his genuine, authentic unsentimental experience and endurance of poverty, of illness, and of sorrow. Those of us who have not known lack, poverty, loss, or need much in our own lives, keenly need to remember, in 2018, what life outside in the cold is like. We may need to delve into memories that are generation or two or more old, when we, our people, you, your people, knew what it meant to be poor. Much of our civil strife right know is enforced by this amnesia, this lack of memory of hurt. This month I came across a story my dad had told, for me and my congregation, on Christmas Eve, 1995, the day on which his sister died.

Christmas 1938 came a few days before December 25. Not only did my mother and uncle, with whom we lived, have to work on Christmas day, but my sister and I were to travel by train to Norwood, NY, to spend Christmas with my Grandfather Hill, another Aunt, and my Dad, separated from my mother for years. So on the evening before we were to go the adults in our family arranged to have a full fledged Christmas morning, in the evening!

After a holiday supper, my sister and I were allowed into the living room where our stockings were filled, presents were wrapped and under the tree, and carols were playing on the Victrola.

That Christmas was very special because we knew my mother did not want us to be so far away on this very special day, but she recognized that our father and his father and our Aunt needed to have the sound of our young voices on Christmas morning.

She arranged fantastic gifts: a Shirley Temple doll for my sister and a pair of hickory skis for me. I still have them. How she found the money in the depths of the depression for those fantastic gifts I’ll never know. How she could have let us go I’ll never know. But that was my mom.

In retrospect through this experience she taught Jean and me the meaning of giving and sacrifice, love and hope, joy in faith. It changed our view of Christmas.

My sister died this morning full of grace and now has answers that some of us will continue to search for!

Christ came into the world filled with grace and truth to show how God wants us to live from birth to death and beyond death and until we can demonstrate that we have learned these lessons we will be living by faith, through these difficult penultimate days—but we know God is with us!

(Irving Hill, Erwin UMC, Syracuse, 12/24/95)

How shall we resolve then to hear this gospel of love, to acquaint ourselves with it and adjust ourselves to it, and then, with gladness to live it, as 2018 opens out before us? Upon what actual, special interests and explorations shall we, shall you, shall I, bring our faith, lived in the glorious shadow of the faithfulness of God in Christ, this year?

Shall we attend to one or another of the issues of personal health which may have impeded our glad living, in the past?

Shall we give ourselves in extra measure to the growth of some dear institution, dear to us, now, for many years?

Shall we go ahead and go out and write a book, or write another book, under the apprehension that everyone has at least one good book in them?

Shall we bear down, and buckle down, and make a plan to make a plan to invest ourselves in the betterment of our culture, our society, our civilization, by joining up, attending to, giving for a just, participatory, and sustainable common hope, in our time?

Shall we learn another language, koine greek, or esperanoto, or Japanese, in order to see in detail another way to see in detail the detail of every day?

Shall we return in reading and thought to an abandoned farm, barns and fences all a-kilter, that of biblical theology, biblical theology, as a way of understanding not just sincerity and authenticity, but irony as well in the spiritual background and moral accompaniment of our time?

Health, growth, book, betterment, language, theology—et toi, and you, and me, and all? What ruminations have you this Christmastide, this New Year’s Eve?

- The Reverend Doctor, Robert Allan Hill, Dean.

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 12.31.2017 at 11:00 am
Tags: Robert Hill

Sunday
December 24

Christmas Nuptials

By Marsh Chapel

Click here to listen to the sermon only

Luke 1:26-38

Away in a manger no crib for a bed

The little Lord Jesus lay down his sweet head

The stars in the bright sky Looked down where he lay

The little Lord Jesus Asleep on the hay

Be near me Lord Jesus I ask thee to stay

Close by me forever, and love me I pray

Bless all the dear children in thy tender care

And fit us for heaven to live with thee there.

People imagine proposals and weddings at Christmas. Often the images are of cities, bright lights, jewelry, red dresses and handsome ties and mink coats.

But Samuel tells of a shepherd king. Mary sings of low estate. Luke recalls an exurban story, in one sense, a story like this one.

In the winter of 1982 we were stationed an hour and a half south west of Montreal. We lived in a large, ungainly, and drafty country parsonage. You knew it was a parsonage because on the front of the house there was a sign, to the left of the porch door, which read: Methodist Parsonage. Just so you know. Whether the sign was meant to apologize for the down at the heal condition of the house, or was meant as a point of clarification about ownership, or was, as it certainly proved to be, meant as a guide for hoboes in need of sandwiches, as they drifted through that little town, know one ever said. But it was more than adequate, more than reasonably adequate for two young parents, and two little children, and one child on the way.

The parsonage was big enough, with two living rooms and an ample dining room, to accommodate some 75 people at one time. We had learned this, and this number, because on the previous Maundy Thursday, the heat in the church had failed, at 10 below zero. So, the service of Holy Communion that evening was convened in the parsonage, with hymns played on the baby grand piano, and people scattered from couch to kitchen to pantry to stairs to window sills. One elderly gentleman sat with the minister’s wife accompanist, right on the piano bench. I think he felt honored. Most later agreed that it was not only the coziest but easily the most memorable communion service they could recall.

Sometime well after the snow had begun to cover the farms and valleys of Burke NY, sometime after November 1, that is, the minister had a phone call from a neighboring farmer. The man asked whether the preacher would conduct a wedding for a non-member. Certainly he would and had and the farmer knew this as well as the preacher so the question in the air or over the phone line was the unspoken question: what are we talking about?

Well, North Franklin County is not a place of endless talk. There is in fact little said, week by week, and month by month, in the north country. Most would agree there that this is the way things should be, allowing as how most things said don’t need saying at all, and those that do need saying need better saying than they mostly get. I personally knew a beautiful young couple, prosperous potato farmers with two children, for three years, and never once heard the husband say a single word. Further, when there is talking it mostly the women talking. The preacher is also allowed and expected to talk, there being I guess some uncertainty about how to categorize the status of the clergy. But even so, the briefer the better, if you please, pastor.

In any event, after a long while of hemming and hawing and not saying, the minister wrangled out of the farmer that the farmer’s hired man wanted to get married. Actually: he needed to get married. He wanted to get married, but he also was in a situation where he needed to get married, too. This took the not usually talkative farmer a long while to explain because he did not directly explain what he was trying to explain. Phrases like ‘unexpected circumstance’ and ‘things moving pretty fast’ and ‘sometimes these things happen’ and ‘they are really good young folks’ were clearly spoken but their actually footing on planet earth was hard, or not possible, to ascertain. Finally the preacher said simply, ‘send them up, I am glad to talk to them’. This led to a meeting in the church office, on a day when the oil furnace was working, and some lumbering, awkward planning for a service to solemnize their marriage.

The couple lived on the farm where the husband worked. They lived in a single wide trailer, which is a trailer exactly half as big as a double wide trailer. Hay bales stuffed around the edges and thankfully covered with much snow for half the year mostly kept the pipes from freezing. Housing was provided for the hired man, just like for the minister, but the trailer was a whole lot smaller and a whole lot more dangerous than the parsonage (at least in most physical ways). Milking at 4am and 4pm, every day, and work, all day, in between, every day. You could rent the movie Frozen River and then know quite a lot about this neck of the woods.

After some talk with his wife that night, the minister suggested that the couple be married on Christmas Eve day, at noon, in the parsonage. It would be a small wedding, and, as his wife thoughtfully suggested, they could put the children down for nap, early, and then use the piano, have some refreshments, and make something happy and pretty.

Christmas Eve day came, with a gust of bitter wind, a snow shower, and then a bleak barely visible sun at midday. A little late, the bride and groom appeared. But their friends, who would sign for them (New York, the Empire State, being one which requires witnesses other than the clergy) had somehow not appeared. The three year-old daughter could be heard crawling and listening from the top of the stairs. The wind blew and the snow fell. Finally, to make the matter potentially legal, a neighbor lady was invited to come and join the service. She and the minister’s wife later signed the license. The minister performed the ceremony. Two carols were sung, Away in a Manger and Hark the Herald Angels Sing. The three year old would appear, and disappear, as the service progressed, and appeared for good when the cookies were served. Other than the words of the wedding themselves, I do not recall that anything else was said. I refer you to the remarks made some moments ago about the paucity of speech along the great frozen St Lawrence river. But no words really were needed. The farm wife, young and pregnant, was simply dressed in a light dress. Her smile, her gleaming eyes, her red cheeks and smile, her evident enjoyment of the home and homely setting were a full epic poem of happy gratitude. And her husband, scrubbed and crammed head long into a tight black suit and wayward tie, was as dignified, reverent, true and terrified as any groom at any time in the 900 or so weddings the minister has thus far done. “Do you?” “I do”. The three year old’s face looked down from the stairs. “Do you?” “I do.” The piano played softly, a little meditation, Love Came Down at Christmas.

One loving neighbor, a jubilant three year old, a fairly green preacher, and his creatively generous wife, were present to attest to a wedding, a union of hearts and souls, on a cold winter day, in a forgotten patch of rough land, now some thirty five years ago. I can see that piano, taste the cookies, hear the carols, feel the hands, sense the candles as if it were an hour ago, and in some ways it was, just an hour ago.

There are a lot of fine and treasured forms of theological learning which one can and must acquire in the six brief semesters of divinity school. Augustine and Pelagius, Luther and Erasmus, Wesley and Calvin, Barth and Tillich, Amoun of Nitria, the documentary hypothesis, the second aorist, filioque and the teleological suspension of the ethical. All of these and all that stands in between one can and must receive, while there is the time and freedom to meet and know them.

The practice of ministry, the privilege of the practice of ministry, however, is learned on the piano bench, over cookies, in the smaller living room, at $9,000 a year, in a drafty old manse, with a toddler spying, and a tiny but ever so majestic event—declaration of love, ‘til death us do part. There is a temptation, when one is in school, to think reality begins and ends with the library or the internet or the reputation of a beloved teacher. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, reasoned like a child, thought like a child. When I moved into the parsonage, I had to give up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly. It is a big world, full of need and waiting for love.

When the boots were donned, and the gloves and coats put on, the bride, in the hour of her wedding, kissed the child and hugged the pianist. To the minister she gave her hand, and with that Methodist handshake gave the gift of meaning, lasting meaning, in the work and struggle of ministry, wherein one works and struggles to find and keep the grace to put oneself at the disposal of others. On the last day of Advent, in the year of our Lord 1982, at least one preacher was given the privilege of seeing the privilege of life in ministry. It was a sort of Advent Carol. An Advent Carol, lingering like lasting beauty always does, in the eternity of memory. What a privilege to live and be in ministry. There is nothing like it, not in all creation. What a privilege. Amos Wilder saw and said so, in his poem of a similar event:

Brother and sister in this world’s poor family,

Jack and Jill out of this gypsy camp of earth,

Here is where the injustice is greatest

And you feel it obscurely,

And you have a right to storm within yourselves

And seek sanctuary in one another’s shabbiness.

This boy and this girl with all their abandonment and futility,

Folly and dereliction,

Whirled from ignominy to ignominy,

Condemned to all the wretched chores of the community-

O tribute of forlorn humanity! Come for his benediction whom they have

blasphemed,

And somehow sense that they touch- what?

God, the Higher, all that they have missed:

Innocence and mercy and compassion…

But the Son of Man of the wedding feast haunts such occasions

and understands you.

He can turn water into wine and such shame and loss into gain

In some world, some time;

I heard the organ roll behind the snowfall

and saw in it the confetti of the heavenly bride chamber,

Glimpsed the sons of the bride chamber rejoicing

In that City which is full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof,

Before the Father whose face the angels of

little children do always behold.

That 1982 North Country Christmas Eve, the door closed, and the minister and his wife smiled and hugged each other, and sent the daughter back up to nap.

Then a knock came again at the door. There stood the groom, gloves off. He had something he had forgotten. He had something he wanted to give. Not to say, but to do. Not to speak, but to act. Not to describe, but to give. I refer you to the demography of verbal silence along the frozen St Lawrence offered some moments ago. He held out his hand, with bills rumpled and folded there in. He looked down, and then quickly up at the pastor. He gave four dollars. He was truly proud to give it. And I was truly proud to receive it. I only wish I had had the sense to put the bills away as a physical reminder of the day, that day of blessed, real Christmas Nuptials.

At every turn, as we come to Christmas, we are reminded that faith is born in trouble, like that little bit of faithfulness was born on Christmas Eve so far away and so many years ago. We are reminded of the lowly entrance our Lord makes into life. That night, at age three, our daughter sang in church, for the first but not the last time:

Away in a manger no crib for a bed

The little Lord Jesus lay down his sweet head

The stars in the bright sky Looked down where he lay

The little Lord Jesus Asleep on the hay

Be near me Lord Jesus I ask thee to stay

Close by me forever, and love me I pray

Bless all the dear children in thy tender care

And fit us for heaven to live with thee there.

- The Reverend Doctor, Robert Allan Hill, Dean.

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 12.24.2017 at 11:00 am
Tags: Robert Hill

Sunday
December 17

He Is the Way

By Marsh Chapel

Click here to listen to the sermon only

John 1: 6-8, 19-28

Auden

He is the Way

Follow him through the land of unlikeness;

You will see rare beasts and have unique adventures

He is the Truth

Seek him in the kingdom of anxiety

You will come to a great city that has expected

Your return for years.

He is the Life

Love him in the world of the flesh

And at your marriage all its occasions shall

Dance for joy.

Advent accosts us with the command to remember and to hope, with promise in memory and in hope.

Remembrance

The Gospel of John gives us a form of remembrance, in the figure of John the Baptist, who came to bear witness to the light. The Baptist is present to remind us, in Advent, of the circumstances which did occasion the birth of the Son of Man. He recalls for us the long history of the law, prophets and writings, our bequest from Judaism. He recalls for us the contest and conflict which emerged, Law and Grace, Moses and Jesus. He recalls for us the struggles, the sheer bone jarring challenges, both in the ministry of Jesus and in the ministry of the church. He places us unmistakably in a particular place, at a certain time, within a specific tradition, and alongside a unique moment. Like no other. This is eternal life, that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. Je me souviens. I remember. I follow myself. I remember.

This year, with our emphasis on ‘voice, vocation, and volume’ in our shared life, we are using as a focus for our work the word remembrance. Our fall and spring term worship and community life are laden with moments of remembrance. 2017-2018 is a full season of remembrance. On September 17 we remembered Elie Wiesel. On October 29 (and again in November) we remembered Martin Luther. In Lent 2018 we will remember Thomas Merton. Then in April 2018, in the week following Easter, we remember the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Come and join us throughout this year in a special season of remembrance! And do remember…

Elie Wiesel said, ‘He who hears a witness becomes a witness’. He reminds us of who we are at Boston University.

Martin Luther said, ‘Here I stand, I can do no other, God help me’. He reminds us of who we are in Religious Life.

Thomas Merton said, ‘Love is my true identity. Selflessness is my true self. Love is my true character. Love is my name’. He reminds us who we are as Christian people.

Martin Luther King, Jr. said, ‘The moral arm of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice’. He reminds us of who we are at Marsh Chapel.

Come and join us! I mean it. Come and join us for this year in worship, fellowship, and discipleship. Come and join us in this season of remembrance!

Memory

With mother and grandmother, aunt and others, all teachers, there was an impatience with forgetfulness, in our growing up years. A good and loving impatience, but an impatience nonetheless. In the windswept, hot Las Vegas summer car port, after the castle of sand had fallen, at age 4, there came a maternal voice, dimly in memory from age four, ‘Remember, a wise man built his house upon the rock…’ Come age 9 and the multiplication tables, across the still covered dining room table, and before the dishwashing, ‘Remember, 7 times 7 is 49, 9 times 7 is 63. Then, a few years later, say age 12, on hearing strange words like itinerancy, bishop, new church, move, district, another house, also, a very loving word, “Remember, it will be fine, we will be together, we will help each other, there are good people everywhere”. Of course, by junior high school, say 14, the time came for Latin declensions, conjugations, aphorisms. “Remember, Agricola, agricolae…Remember hic, haec hoc…Remember, porto, portare, portavi, portatum…Remember, Veni, vidi, Vici…” Until this year, that maternal voice could carry full memory across decades, and disciplines, and declensions and decisions.

Now, without memory, she has only one full form of consciousness. She knows, and articulates, only, that she does not know. “Let’s see…I’m not sure…What am I supposed to be doing?...Jane will know…” What once was a precious cornucopia, waterfall, avalanche, fortress, and endless bank account of memory, now has gone, disappeared, evaporated, melted. She knows that she does not know, at least that she knows. Is that better than knowing nothing at all? Here is where we as honest Christians, as existential apophatic theologians, can also rest.

When it comes to God, what we know is the sheer cliff of one thing. We know that we do not know. God is hidden. God is mystery. God is the great deep, the dark ground of being, the cloud of unknowing. God is transcendent. And our spiritual reflection, biblical interpretation, philosophical theology, and homiletical cadence do best, just here, when we can, in utter even desperate but honest ignorance be truly apophatic. Like my mother, what we know is, only, that we do not know. Dionysius the Areopagite (thanks to Cyril Richardson, who died one week before the end of term): “That divine Darkness is the unapproachable light in which God dwells. Into this Darkness, rendered invisible by its own excessive brilliance and unapproachable by the intensity of its transcendent flood of light, come to be all those who are worthy to know and to see God.”

Coffin

We can in part to this Marsh pulpit, now our twelfth Christmas here, in part out of memory, a remembrance of what William Sloane Coffin had brought us in the pulpit of Riverside Church, along a similar river, alongside a similar University, along by a similar School of Theology, along with similar citizens and scholars, teachers and students, religious and un-religious. Coffin:

Faith is being grasped by the power of love.

God provides minimum protection and maximum support. Guilt is the last stronghold of pride.

The rational mind is no match for the irrational will.

There is more mercy in God than there is sin in us.

Romero said not ‘pobres’ but ‘apobprecidos’.

Pastoral concern for the rich must match prophetic concern for the poor.

I’m not OK and you’re not OK—but that’s OK!

They say religion is a crutch: what makes you think you don’t limp?

The religious norm is love.

Faith gives the strength to confront unpleasant truth. Faith puts you on the road and hope keeps you on the road.

A Humorous Interlude

Boy

John teaches memory. Isaiah teaches hope. To give them a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit…

Our friend Beth Neville tells this story of being pushed out of despair, and back into life:

“I never learned the young boy’s name but after our encounter I decided to call him, BOY. He was an attractive, open-faced kid about 10 years old, the same age as my grandson. So our ages were separated by about 70 years.

Sitting in the corridor at drab rehabilitation facility, struggling to recover from hip surgery, my spirits were low. At the end of the long corridor a large window opened out onto a beautiful view of fall colors, russets and tawny gold colors of fall Oaks against the autumn blue sky, it resembled a Gothic cathedral’s stained glass. But inside the rehab center, the color was gray. Old people in faded gowns sat in wheelchairs, some spending hours in a curled up state. The walls, bed covers, and people’s faces all faded to the same ashen grey, creating a miasma of age and sadness. Five days earlier, my worn out hip had been replaced by a piece of metal and the constant pain and discomfort was wearing at me. Before the surgery I began using metaphor of a Marathon to get me through the trauma. I was on a marathon and, every physical or emotional set back was a curve or a long stretch. But right now in the gray rehab I was on Heart Break Hill and I was beginning to loose site of the goal. After all I was almost 80 and had lived a full life, why bother to go on? I’d rather die than endure more pain. Old age was surrounding me, why not just stop here and drop out of the race? What more in life could I do to be useful? I wanted to quit.

Up the corridor came a boy and his father and they sat down next to me to enjoy the golden fall view. The boy never said his name but he had an inquisitive look . BOY’s opening question to me was a stunner, “Well, what’s your era, 1940’s?” Me laughing, “That’s close, I was born in 1937. Are you visiting your Grandmother?” BOY: “Yes. Well, what do you do?” Me: “I teach art.” BOY: “How do you do that?” Bemused, I explained an art lesson using the glowing trees outdoors as a painting example.” BOY: “Well, what else do you do?” Me: “I teach art history.” Boy, “Well, why did people start making art?” Now this was getting to be an interesting, a real challenge, Me,” People began making art because they were worried about having babies and keeping their families going, so they made female fertility figures. They chipped stone pebbles to make a pregnant woman, and maybe then they would have more babies. And people liked to decorate themselves with shells and beads.” He liked that answer. BOY, “Well, tell me about fire?” and we were on to the invention of fire, and carrying water in buckets, and cooking over fires. Boy, “Well, what about Mesopotamia!” Whoaa, this conversation is really getting interesting! Me: “I studied Mesopotamia in graduate school,” and we talked of the use of clay tablets for writing and irrigation” and off we went. BOY,” Well, what about cunnieform?” By now I’d stopped being surprised, and I dissected the use of writing with clay tablets versus Egyptian papyrus. BOY: “Well, why was Mathematics invented?” We discussed masthematics in keeping track of the seasons and crop yields. He wasn’t showing off, just interested. At one point I said, “I don’t know how yeast was invented, it is so important for making bread,” and BOY said, “Well, Yes! just one of ‘Histories’ Mysteries’ my teacher says.” Yes, I laughed, I’ll remember that line. His Dad put down his cell phone and said, “O.K. son, let’s go visit Grandma,” off they went.

BOY will never know it, but he had pushed me up and over Heartbreak Hill,! I felt I could still contribute something to life. It was time for me to get back to overcoming pain and start the exercises. Where did BOY come from that beautiful afternoon? I don’t believe in extra-terrestrial beings from either Mars or Heaven. But BOY did have an angelic look about him and he had pushed me out of despair, back to life and blessed me.

Birmingham

Sometimes hope takes time. Less than a month after MLK’s ‘I Have A Dream’ speech, four girls were killed in Birmingham by a bomb set at the 16^th Street Baptist Church there. There is much that we do not fully remember about those years, that era, the civil rights struggle, and, especially, those who suffered, and how they suffered, in that time. Over the next three decades, three KKK leaders and members were brought to trial, and convicted of the crime. In that way, it was case like that of the Scottsboro Boys, which my namesake, Allan Knight Chalmers, Homiletics Professor at BUSTH, tracked for several decades, earlier in the century. The names of the girls: Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Denise McNair.

In 1977, as the principal bomber, Robert Chambliss, was put on trial, a young second year law student skipped classes to sit in the courtroom. Twenty years after that, the young lawyer worked to convict two of Chambliss’s accomplices. Decades passed before the convictions were decided early in this century. You may be aware that the young lawyer who skipped his classes in school to attend classes in life, and who later brought a measure of justice to others, was just recently elected to the Senate in Alabama. Doug Jones. There is a self-correcting spirit of truth loose in the universe. There is a self-correcting spirit of truth loose in the universe.

Hoping

We harbor a common, shared hope:

That our warming globe, caught in climate change, will be cooled by cooler heads and calmer hearts and careful minds.

That our dangerous world, armed to the teeth with nuclear proliferation, will find peace through deft leadership toward nuclear détente.

That our culture, awash in part in hooliganism, will find again the language and the song and the spirit of the better angels of our nature.

That our country, fractured by massive inequality between rich children and poor children, will rise up and make education, free education, available to all children, poor and rich.

That our nation, fractured by flagrant unjust inequality between rich and poor children, will stand up and make health care, free health care, available to all children, poor and rich.

That our schools, colleges and universities, will balance a love of learning with a sense of meaning, a pride in knowledge with a respect for goodness, a drive for discovery with a regard for recovery.

That our families, torn apart by abuse and distrust and anger and jealousy and unkindness, will sit at a long holiday table, this week, and share the roast beef, and pass the potatoes, and slice the pie, and, if grudgingly, show kindness and pity to one another.

That our decisions in life about our callings, how we are to use our time and spend our money, how we make a life not just a living, will be illumined by grace and generosity.

That our grandfathers and mothers, in their age and infirmity, will receive care and kindness that accords with the warning to honor father and mother that you own days be long upon the earth.

That women—our grandmothers, mothers, sisters, daughters, granddaughters, all—granted suffrage less than 100 years ago, will be spared any and all forms of harassment and abuse, verbal or physical, on college campuses, in homes and families, in offices and bars, in life and work, and long having suffered and now having suffrage, will in our time rise up to be honored, revered, and compensated, without reserve, but with justice and mercy.

A common hope, finally a hope not of this world, but of this world as a field of formation for another, not just creation but new creation, not just life but eternal life, not just health but salvation, not just heart but soul, not just earth, but heaven.

Thurman

When the song of the angels is stilled,

When the star in the sky is gone,

When the kings and princes are home,

When the shepherds are back with their flock,

The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,

To heal the broken,

To feed the hungry,

To release the prisoner,

To rebuild the nations,

To bring peace among brothers,

To make music in the heart.

Auden

He is the Way

Follow him through the land of unlikeness;

You will see rare beasts and have unique adventures

He is the Truth

Seek him in the kingdom of anxiety

You will come to a great city that has expected

Your return for years.

He is the Life

Love him in the world of the flesh

And at your marriage all its occasions shall

Dance for joy.

- The Reverend Doctor, Robert Allan Hill, Dean.

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 12.17.2017 at 11:00 am
Tags: Robert Hill

Sunday
December 10

Lessons & Carols

By Marsh Chapel

No sermon was preached today as Marsh Chapel celebrates the annual service of Lessons & Carols. Please enjoy the beautiful service by following the link below:

posted in Lessons And Carols on 12.10.2017 at 11:00 am
Tags: Lessons & Carols