Sermon Lent II Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 Mark 8:31-38 February 25 2018 Year B

         Suffering seems to be part of the deal when you sign on as a Christian. Anyone who thinks otherwise hasn’t really read scripture. Suffering is unavoidable, and anyone who preaches or teaches that being a Christian is all beer and skittles misses the point. Being a Christian, that is a disciple, a follower of Christ, involves suffering. Jesus’ life and death and the lives of countless Christians bear witness to what happens when you sign up.

In this morning’s Gospel, Jesus is trying desperately to turn his rag-tag bunch of semi-interested parties and hangers-on into disciples. Imagine that, real disciples who will follow him. And Peter, caught up in fear, tries to deflect Jesus from explaining what discipleship means.

When you become a disciple and set your mind on “divine things” rather than human things, you’ll find out what happens. The outcome is amply demonstrated both in what Jesus says in this morning’s Gospel and what he proceeds to do with the rest of his life. Jesus experiences suffering. He is in the midst of it rather than looking at it from the sidelines. He suffers out of obedience to God; obedience grounded in God. True obedience comes with a price.

In his novel Lying Awake, Mark Salzman has his protagonist thinking that with Christ we wonder again about the cost of Christianity and whether or not we are prepared to pay the cost.

I think that is what Peter is doing. He has finally realized the cost is the cross and he wonders if he is capable of paying it with his life. In his reaction we see his fear of suffering. Peter tries to get Jesus to avoid suffering. Fear of suffering drives his conversation with Jesus. Fear is what makes Peter deny that suffering in part of being a disciple of Jesus. And fear is what makes Peter later deny Jesus three times.

Fear is a powerful motivator to avoid suffering. It can lead us astray from divine things and into human things that have nothing to do with what God would have us do.

Well then…if suffering is inherent in being a disciple of Jesus, yet fear makes us avoid suffering, what that does that say about us? Is it possible that in this place where people make a decision to be disciples of Jesus, we can open the red door and say good-bye to fear?

What would happen if we counted the cost and said we were willing to pay it? What if we admitted there are things to be afraid of, things to suffer from, but life with Jesus is the choice of heavenly things. What if we chose the greater part: being willing to lose our life of fear for the sake of Christ Jesus and the Gospel?

It might be appropriate, given the average age of this parish, to remind us all that God called Sarah and Abraham when they thought their lives were over, when time had run out. God called them when they were tired and retired; members of what Dr. Massey calls the “check out generation.”

Surely Abraham and Sarah were fearful their lives would end without offspring. That everything they had worked for and suffered for would die with them. Surely they thought God had nothing left for them to do or be.

Yet God did a new thing with Abraham and Sarah. Centuries later St Paul was right when he said in First Corinthians that the good news of the cross - of suffering, the kind of suffering Sarah and Abraham endured - makes a mockery of our human ideas of success.[1] It is a mockery because even Jesus’ enemies became part of God’s work with their fear, anger, and hostility.

Maybe the next thing St. Alban’s grows into will involve taking up a cross. Not the cross of the sigh and the martyred, “Oh that’s my cross to bear,” when we’re complaining about our mother-in-law or our misbehaving child or the politics of a long-time friend who seems suddenly to have turned into either an insufferable liberal or an angry conservative. Instead, the cross we will bear is the cross of suffering that brings joy on the day of resurrection; the cross of suffering that is compassionate, kind, and helps those who suffer by standing with them and helping them to bear their crosses.

The blessing in the midst of any possible suffering is that Jesus calls us as his disciples. Jesus is with us as we give up our lives to find our lives in Christ. And whether we are nine or ninety, God will make disciples of us and use us for those divine things God has in mind for us here. AMEN.   

The Rev Nicolette Papanek

©2018

---

[1] 1Corinthians 1:18-25

Sermon Lent I Mark 1:9-15 18 February 2018 Year B

-->

            Philippe Petit is a high-wire artist. Those of you who are old enough may remember him from 1974 when he walked a high wire between the twin towers of the World Trade Center, those two towers that no longer exist. In his book, released in 2009, Petit talks about the experience. He sounds matter-of-fact about an experience that makes most of us cringe in terror. When asked why he balanced precariously on a tiny steel cable and walked between the twin towers, he said.  “When I see three oranges, I juggle. When I see two towers, I walk.” Unlike most of us though, Petit chooses to walk many feet above the earth with nothing to protect him from falling except his own skill and the grace of God.

         Lent is our invitation to walk the high wire. Jesus is an invitation to risk, an invitation to engage in a life that goes beyond the mundane and the predictable and enters the sphere of adventure.

I don’t know about any of you, but I am terrified of heights. Just reading about Philippe Petit’s exploits makes me a little dizzy. Watching him on the T.E.D. talk he gave in 2012 reminds me again that I have no temptation at all to try it out. And yet…and yet, there’s something about him, even for those of us who are terrified of heights that fascinates us. His books sell worldwide. And his illegal artistic adventure of walking between the twin towers captured the eyes of people around the world. Anyone near a television tuned in to watch. Perhaps it was the foolishness of risk that drew us.

In his T.E.D. talk in 2012, https://www.ted.com/talks/philippe_petit_the_journey_across_the_high_wire#t-1158395, Petit talks about the beginnings of his magic, his juggling, and his walking the high wire. He gives a list of what got him to where he is.

Passion

Tenacity

Intuition

Faith

Improvisation

Inspiration

These are the qualities we seek in the Christian life. These are the things that keep us going even when we are tired and discouraged. Petit describes each quality in his talk, but the last three are the ones that can capture our imagination and give us strength for following Jesus. They are the qualities Jesus exhibits is his life, death, and resurrection.

Petit describes Faith as what replaces doubt, improvisation as knowing that you can cheat the impossible, and inspiration that by inspiring yourself you can inspire others.

Stepping onto the wire requires preparation. It requires knowing it is you and Christ. Petit says when he puts his foot on the wire he knows he will not fall because there is nothing there except him and the wire. When we step out there is nothing but Jesus and us. And this is everything.

This is what Jesus encounters in his walk to the cross: nothing but himself and God and that is everything.

To see that we stay on the wire, rather than slip and fall, requires there being nothing there except Christ and us.

The world is a seductive and powerful place, it waits for us in the wilderness of our lives, in the same way the evil one waited for Jesus in the wilderness. Our foot will slip and our concentration will waver if we take our eyes off Christ.

Lent is our time to refocus our eyes on Christ.

We all are at risk of falling, yet we have a God who bears us up and sends us out. Go ahead; put your foot on the wire. Step out. Keep your eye on Christ. It is you and he. Keep your eyes on him. AMEN.

Sermon Epiphany Last Mark 9:2-9 11 February 2018 Year B

Preachers these days are urged to do what some people call “life application” sermons. That is, to preach a sermon that applies to each of your lives so you can take it home with you. To preach in a way that teaches each of you what to do about whatever scripture you heard in church. I often think, though, that preaching a “take home” sermon is one more way of letting the world dictate to the gospel instead of the gospel dictate to the world. Yes, I’d love it if you took something home from a sermon that made you think about it all week, but not necessarily in a practical or even relevant way. I think, as I friend of mine always says, “I’d rather be faithful than relevant.” I believe that. I believe it because I think in the act of being faithful we become relevant by doing what God calls us to do.

Mind you, I wish preaching the gospel was as easy as an instruction booklet labeled “Relevant Preaching.” I could look up the scripture in the booklet and know just what to say to tell you how to lead your life. That seldom works though, because so much of the gospel of Jesus Christ asks us to step far beyond an instruction booklet and into a world of mystery and transfiguration. To let the world dictate the gospel is to let the gospel become relevant by taming it down, when what we really have is a gospel that is extra-relevant, extra-revelatory, and extra-ordinary.

         We trivialize the gospel when we try to “make it personal.” The Transfiguration of Jesus on the mountain is hardly personal. The Transfiguration is neither personal nor individual. The Transfiguration has to do with God.

The Transfiguration shows Jesus transformed into a being of shining light, dressed in white garments. There is nothing personal about this. The Transfiguration is probably one of the most impersonal things Christians believe in! The birth of Jesus is personal; all of us were born the same way. Maybe shepherds and angels didn’t attend us, but we were born of a human mother. The death on the cross is personal. One of the things theologians will tell us is God sacrificed for each one of us. And the same thing can apply to the Resurrection; each of us can lay hold of eternal life through the promise of the Resurrection.

All these are personal; they can, in fact, apply to our current lives. We all need a God who understands what it is to be human. We all need a God who suffers with us. We all need a God who offers us eternal life. But do we need the Transfiguration?

         The Transfiguration holds within it the idea that metamorphosis, that transformation is possible. The Transfiguration holds within it the idea that God finds the world, no matter how bad it may seem, how troubled, or how violent, and transfigures the world with blessing. The Transfiguration tells us, as the African-American artist Henry Tanner once remarked, “The world doesn’t have to be made perfect before it can be made new.”[1]

         The Transfiguration is the event that revealed Jesus fully as both gloriously human and gloriously divine. The Transfiguration is the moment when time both stood still and kept right on going and the reign of God was truly past, present and yet-to-come. The mystery and the glory and the blessing of this event is neither personal nor relevant, or for that matter, practical. Instead the Transfiguration is extra-relevant, extra-revelatory, and extra-ordinary.

         The transfiguration is about changing the way we understand the world and God working in the world. It is far more than the surface change of shining garments. In the Transfiguration, the surface change is not the focus, it is that the entire way of understanding God and time and how the past, present and yet-to-come meet when God interrupts death to give new life. And the Transfiguration, while it can seem personal, is really extra-relevant, extra-revelatory, and extra-ordinary.

The Transfiguration, because it consists of God doing an entirely new thing, sends out that new thing far beyond the person or thing God touches and transforms. Instead, God transfigures the world itself.

The light of the transfigured Christ now beckons us to look beyond the personal and the individual to how we are in the world. The light of the transfigured Christ calls us to see where God does new things. The light of the transfigured Christ invites us to join with that new thing God has done and is doing and will continue to do. And that is the light God gave us and gives to take the shining Christ as a candle into the world’s darkness. AMEN.        

The Rev Nicolette Papanek

©2018

---

[1] Tanner, Henry Ossawa (1859-1937) African-American artist best known for his paintings of religious subjects and his depictions of African-American subjects as whole persons rather than the typical caricatures of his time.

Sermon Epiphany V Mark 1:29-38 4 February 2018 Year B

Saved to get up and serve others! I don’t know how you feel about that, but I think if I were sick, I’d rather stay in bed than be healed just to get up and get to serving.

Today’s Gospel is an intimate little scene in the life of Jesus. He’s going to visit his friends Simon and Andrew in their home. He’s only taking along a couple of good friends. We don’t know if he’s met Simon’s mother-in-law before. Jesus was invited to Simon’s home, and because of the Mediterranean culture of which Jesus was a part, the invitation would involve refreshments: food and drink.

Jesus arrives at Simon’s, and all is in confusion. Has this ever happened to you? You’ve received a dinner invitation for six o’clock. You arrive fashionably late at 6:10, only to find your hostess still holding a screaming baby and the house in disarray because the baby sitter hasn’t arrived yet. The smells wafting out of the kitchen are slightly burnt. The white lace tablecloth put on for your arrival is slightly grubby. The candles are still unlit.

Jesus very likely walked into the biblical equivalent of that scene. The senior member of the household, the hostess, the woman in charge, was ill. Now doubt there were other members of the household who were perfectly capable of taking hold, but the heart of the household was ill. She whose role it was to provide hospitality was not capable of fulfilling the duty to which she was called. Simon’s mother-in-law was called to her role of hospitality because she was born into a Jewish household and married into one. She had children, or at least a child, Simon’s wife. She was called to her role of hospitality because she was a woman. And in addition, she was the senior woman in the household, the mother-in-law. This meant the other women – and even the men – in the household deferred to her in matters of entertainment and hospitality. It sounds like a role of being in the background. It was likely a role that included daily trips to the market place and the well or at least supervising the other women of the household in their roles as part of a well-run household. It was a role of seeing that there was always enough food on the table, even when unexpected guests arrived, a role of service. To us, it may sound like an insignificant role.

Yet can you picture poor Simon explaining to Jesus about his mother-in-law? He’s arrived home expecting his friend, the honored guest, to be greeted by the ritual of water for washing. He expected food and drink to be forthcoming. Instead, Simon was quite likely confronted by people tending the ailing hostess. They were running about with cool compresses and herbal drinks for her since a fever could be the beginning of a dangerous illness.

We aren’t told in the Gospel that Simon asked to have his mother-in-law healed. We aren’t told that she asked for healing either. Maybe she was enjoying a little enforced rest. Maybe she was thinking, “Let them cope. I finally have a day off.” All we are told is, “they told him (Jesus) about her at once.” Jesus may have simply been told why this senior member of the household was not serving him. Or he may have been appealed to because she was sick. We don’t know. What we do know is that Jesus “lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.”

Lifting. Healing. Serving. In those acts, the social and religious conventions of the day were cast aside. This simple story of lifting and healing and serving is radical news. Good news. News of a new thing!

We don't know Simon’s mother-in-law's name. She is introduced to us through the role of her male kinsman. This was an appropriate social convention of the time. A woman’s role and place were home and family, and this is how Simon’s mother-in-law was defined. In fact, the social conventions were probably followed in telling Jesus about her illness. Male relatives no doubt told Jesus what was wrong. Essentially, they spoke on behalf of the woman. Again, that was observing a proper social convention.

But now convention is thrown down. Jesus is about to do a new thing. Jesus, a stranger, not even a relative, goes to the sick woman and touches her! Do you understand how radical this would be? Do you know how shameful it would be, at that time, and in that culture, for a strange man to be found near the bed of a woman to whom he was not related? And not only does Jesus approach the bed, he touches her! He lifts her up.

And the fever leaves her. And she gets up from her bed and resumes her role. Her role is one of service. She is “saved to serve.”[1] Simon’s mother-in-law ministered to Jesus. She was healed. She served. She was made well; she waited on Him. She was also reintegrated into her role in her household community. She was “saved to serve.”

This Gospel today makes me wonder and then stand in awe of people and congregations who continue to serve regardless of mental and physical issues that try to separate them from their community of faith. It makes me wonder how we as a faith community can find more people who are hungry to serve and help them figure out ways to do so. How can we lift people up, help them to heal by becoming fully part of a loving community, and find ways for them to serve with joy? How can we save to serve?

In one community of faith there is a highly efficient older woman who worked for years as an executive assistant to an oil company president. She is frail now and uses a motorized wheel chair. She can still write beautifully after years of ghost writing authoritative letters for the executive. Now, she is the birthday and anniversary card writer in a parish. Even to people she has never met, her hand written notes are personal and caring. And. She’ll be teaching her successor, a much younger person how to write well. She is saving her to serve.

There is a parish with several children who are learning challenged. The children delight in standing with a parent and handing out worship bulletins and greeting people with a huge welcoming smile. The children never fail to add there will be goodies at coffee hour and please come and talk to them there. As soon as church begins, the run to their Sunday school room, filled with the importance of their welcoming role. The children’s welcoming and joyful smile has brought new members because new people see children really are welcome and are saved to serve.

There’s a young man in one church who delights in serving at the altar. He is so proud to serve. Yes, sometimes he forgets things, but then, so does everyone and a little gentle coaching works just fine to save him to serve!

There is a very elderly couple that can’t attend church any more. Yet they pray together daily for the sick, the troubled, and the thankful in their parish. The parish calls them their “prayer warriors” and they are the first people to call when someone wants prayer. By their joyous service of intercession and thanksgiving they are surely lifted up by their calls from those in need of prayer, healed by being needed, and saved to serve.

There’s a parish with an “odd couple.” They only came to church. Shortly after they began attending, the person in charge of the homeless meals resigned after many years. This couple came to the priest and said they would be honored to take charge. The parish was shocked. Especially since on the rare occasions they did help out, they didn’t seem very organized. They certainly didn’t do things the way they’d always been done there. But, it turned out they had both worked in food services for years. Despite a lot of what Moses might have called “murmuring” in the congregation, the outreach team accepted their offer. Soon the ministry expanded to include other churches. The children began serving the desserts. The teens filled water glasses and rolled napkins and flatware together, giggling and getting to know one another. More people were fed, and more people from church were saved to serve. I always find it comforting to remember Jesus loves the odd ones too. Many were lifted up, relationships were healed, and people were saved to serve.

Saved to serve. And being served by the hands and hearts and minds of those we tend to dismiss as less able: The mentally challenged, the physically challenged, the ill, the elderly, the teenagers, the very young, and the odd. If these are saved to serve, we too are saved to serve. AMEN.

The Rev Nicolette Papanek

©2018

---

[1] Barclay. (Page 38) “A great Scottish family has the motto “Saved to Serve.”