Sit and Eat

Never Yours in the First Place

I preached this sermon at St. Lydia's on Sunday, November 20, 2011.  The text is 2 Corinthians 9:6-15; read it here.

 

I’m the sort of person who’s fairly judicious, I think, about what I repost on facebook.  I’d like to think that, somewhere in the world, there’s someone who relies on me to post only the highest quality videos of cats falling into bathtubs, or whatever the case may be.

 

There’s a really wonderful piece of writing that I lifted from someone a few days ago and posted.  It’s by an anonymous someone, writing in the voice of Cookie Monster, explaining in very clear Cookie Monster terms, exactly what the Occupy Wall Street Movement is all about.  And it's very funny.

 

I watched as this link got “shared” all over the place, and thought to myself that it really is a marvelously egalitarian world that we’re living in these days, where, if you are clever enough, or do something well enough (or maybe do something stupid enough) and put it out there, it will get spread around.

 

 

There’s a certain joy in sharing these little gems on the web.

You pass something on because it is so wonderful

that all you want to do is share it.

And when you share it,

you don’t lose a thing,

because it was never yours in the first place.

 

This is exactly the model for giving

that Paul is lifting up in his letter

to the community in Corinth.

 

First, we give joyfully,

because something is so wonderful

that we feel compelled to share.

 

Second,

we find that our giving

actually enriches us –

that in giving away, we’re not losing anything,

but gaining.

 

Third,

we can give freely,

because everything that we give,

food and possessions and money –

it never belonged to us in the first place.

It’s all a gift from God.

As easy and as delightful to share as something lovely,

or challenging

or wondrous

or silly

that we happened across on the internet.

 

 

Everyone is talking about the economy these days.

Everyone is talking about the recession.

Everyone is talking about how there’s not enough.

Not enough food to feed the world,

not enough jobs to employ those in our country.

 

I read Paul’s words in this letter,

God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance,

and think, “really?”

“Does God really provide us with every blessing in abundance?”

 

Does God provide for the family of four,

both parents unemployed for over a year now?

Does God provide for the man on the street

I passed just this morning?

Does God provide for the elderly woman,

living on only a pension?

For the millions who live in poverty around the world?

For the millions who go hungry or thirst around the world?

Does God provide for them?

 

There are many who do not have enough in this season.

But the hunger of the world

does not point to God’s inability to provide us with all that we need,

but to our own inability to share all that God has given.

 

God’s gift is vast.

Rich, nourishing earth to plant and to harvest,

trees that bear fruit,

oceans teeming with fish,

and great expanses of wilderness:

enough world

to feed the world

if we are both moderate and generous,

trusting that there is enough for everyone.

 

 

Charles Eisenstein, an author and economist who has been active

in the Occupy Wall Street movement these last few months,

speaks convincingly of the difference between a

money economy,

in which more for you is less for me,

and an economy of love,

in which more for you is more for me too,

 

God’s economy is an economy of love.

It’s the youtube video gone viral.

It’s the knowledge that it all belongs to everyone,

and that to share is not to lose,

but to gain.

 

 

One of the things we do here at St. Lydia’s

is work together.

We work together,

and we invite everyone into that work,

setting up before worship and tearing down afterward,

not just because many hands make the job go faster,

but because we know that work is a blessing.

 

Does that sound backward?

 

Work is something that we think we’re supposed to try to avoid, right?  The wealthy hire other people to do it for them, children balk at the idea of doing their chores.

But in God’s economy,

work is not a burden

but an invitation:

to use your mind and your body

to be part of a community, a body of people,

creating something together.

It is a blessing: an opportunity to be human.

A chance to live.

 

Giving is the same.

Giving is an invitation to share what we are and what we have

with the whole world.

An invitation to be part of binding what is broken together

and healing what has been wounded.

An invitation to unburden ourselves of

the illusion that any of this is ours,

and to turn away from our bank accounts and our belongings,

and toward one another;

toward God.

To give is a blessing: an opportunity to be human.

A chance to live, and find that we can feed the whole world.

What. Just. Happened?

I preached this sermon at St. Lydia's on Sunday, November 13, a week after our community's first baptism.  The text is Paul's letter to the Ephesians, chapter 4, verses 1-7.  Read it here. 

 

 

So here we are, still dripping with the waters of baptism. 

And a question hangs in the air:

What 

Just 

Happened?

 

What was that?

 

As it turns out, we are not the only ones who have asked these questions.  The folks in Ephesus were asking them too, which is why they received this letter, its writer instructing them in all the ways of this mysterious, post baptismal, “new life.”  This new body that we are now somehow incorporated into.  But what does that mean?  And how do we live into it?

 

As Rachel put it last week, 

How do we live on the other side of the door?

 

 

This passage throws out all kinds of phrases that make my ears prick up, because they are so, so lovely, and present such an enchanting vision for who we might be as Christians, and as a Church.

 

At they same time, they are daunting.  The standards seem really high, and they make me feel destined to fail.  Are we really expected to be able to live up to these lofty goals for our new life? 

No.  I don’t think we are. 

 

I think that, rather than living up to them, 

we are asked to live into them. 

 

In fact, the writer of this letter uses just slightly different language.  He instructs us to “grow into” them.   In verse 15 he writes, “we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ.”

 

We must grow up into him. 

It’s a strange image – the church, the body of Christ, growing in maturity and in stature to meet the head, which is already mature. 

 

Just like a child, we’re growing into our new role, 

growing into our new lives. 

 

 

In the letter to the Galatians, Paul talks about those who have been baptized as “putting on Christ,” as if Christ is a new set of baptismal garments.  In this letter, it seems as if those baptismal garments are just a bit too big for us: clothes that we’ve been given to grow into. 

 

Still wet from the water, we put them on, and they drag a bit on the floor behind us.  But this new life is a life of growth, one that we’re constantly maturing into. 

 

How do we live on the other side of the door?

It’s not about performance and not about perfection. 

But it sure is about growth. 

 

 

It’s also about hope. 

There is one body and one Spirit,

the letter-writer inscribes,

just as you were called to the one hope of your calling.

 

It turns out that God has hopes. 

Hopes for each of us, 

that manifest themselves in a call on our lives. 

But unlike the hopes of those around us, 

this is not a hope that we can let down, 

but a hope that will only continue to blossom. 

A hope that will live and breathe and grow

just as surely as we do, 

as we continue to grow up 

into this new life. 

 

So, we’re standing here dripping. 

 

What just happened?

 

I invite you to reflect for a moment in silence on the text we read, the words I shared, and the experience of the last few weeks.  If they spark a story, share it, briefly. 

Word for the Baptized

I preached this sermon on Sunday, November 6 at St. Lydia's.  That night, we celebrated our first baptism as a community.  After hearing Rachel's testimony, congregants read fragments from the first letter of Peter, which appear in italics below.  

 

*

 

A reading from the first letter of Peter:

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ,

To the exiles of the Dispersion, may grace and peace be yours in abundance. 

 

In the early days, 

they wrote letters. 

 

They wrote letters to one another 

and waited months to receive them, 

to hear word from the leaders of the other communities that were springing up,

the other communities of people who were following Christ. 

 

The letters were exhortations.

In the letters, they wrote about how everything was different now, 

and what that meant for how they should live. 

 

Now that you have purified your souls by your obedience to the truth so that you have genuine mutual love, love one another deeply from the heart. You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God. 

 

We can press our ears to the wall, 

listen back through the centuries 

to the things they had to say to one another. 

The letter we hear tonight, 

was written by someone 

whose name has been lost. 

He writes under the name of Peter, 

because his words are not just for those who he’s writing to, 

but for all of us. 

For his church, and for our church, in every age. 

 

Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

 

They gathered in upper rooms like this one, 

to read the letters aloud. 

To hear, once more, a story 

that confused and bewildered them, 

and at the same time, 

filled them with an wild, widening hope 

they could not begin to understand. 

 

They gathered because they had caught a glimpse, 

of something that they felt they needed. 

A light in the darkness. 

A way in the waters. 

A drink in the desert. 

A spring in the wilderness. 

 

A door that, one day, swung open.  

 

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
 Once you were no people,
   but now you are God’s people;
once you had not received mercy,
   but now you have received mercy.

 

These letters are our inheritance.

Passages that have been passed down from hand to hand, 

They were read again and again. 

They were copied by hand, 

on scraps or in books. 

 

A word. 

A phrase. 

A fragment, 

a shard, 

of a story, 

of a memory, 

of something someone said once, 

long ago.  

so that we might listen, 

so that we might hear, 

So that we might recognize the voice of God. 

 

Finally, all of you, have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind. Do not repay evil for evil or abuse for abuse; but, on the contrary, repay with a blessing.

Always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an account of the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and reverence.

 

And we call it holy. 

Sacred scripture. 

Read it and turn it over. 

Feel the ancient, worn words in our mouths. 

 

Startle as they chip away at our hearts of stone, 

and reveal what lies beneath:

a living, beating, heart of flesh. 

 

The word is a chisel that breaks us open. 

 

Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another without complaining. Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received. Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God. 

 

The word is a gift:

a gift for all of those who have walked to the edge of the water. 

For all who have been drawn down into its depths 

and emerged gasping on the shore. 

For all who stand on the banks and wait, or wonder. 

 

The word is a promise:

a promise that this wild, widening hope 

will confuse the chaos 

into an upside down order 

in which the last shall be first, and the first shall be last.  

 

Through Silvanus, whom I consider a faithful brother, I have written this short letter to encourage you, and to testify that this is the true grace of God. Stand fast in it. Your sister church in Babylon, chosen together with you, sends you greetings; and so does my son Mark. Greet one another with a kiss of love.

Peace to all of you who are in Christ.