The Lord is My Banner!

The Lord is my banner! As Joshua prepared to cross the Jordan River he knew that he was terribly out numbered by the inhabitants of the Promised Land. His spies even reported that there were giants! The Israelites trembled but God was faithful. He chose Joshua, a man of great faith and courage to lead his people into the “Land of Milk and Honey.” When faced with doubters, Joshua told the people to do what they wanted “but as for he and his house they would trust and have faith in the Lord.” He knew that the Lord was his banner. He knew that the Lord would go before the people and defeat their enemies. The Lord was their banner!

We often face situations in life that are daunting and overwhelming, causing us to live in fear. We often stand at the rivers edge of this life and simply freeze, afraid to move forward. What if we fail? What if we are unworthy? What if we experience defeat? What if we drown in a river of despair? What if we fall flat on our faces? What if… The list goes on and on.

Like Joshua it is important for us to remember that the Lord is our banner. God goes before us and we are called to follow in faith. Yet faith doesn’t just happen. As James tells us “Faith without works is dead.” This doesn’t necessarily mean physical activity, but spiritual as well. To have faith we must go to God in prayer on a regular basis and cultivate a trusting relationship with God. Joshua had such a spiritual relationship with the Father. Where there was indecisiveness amongst the Hebrew people, Joshua was certain through prayer and faith that God would allow the Israelites to prevail against those they faced in the Promised Land. Joshua knew that God was his banner.

My question for us is simple: Is the Lord our banner? Do we trust him enough to allow God to go before us so that we might follow no matter what difficult odds we face in this life? “As for me and my house we will trust in the Lord.”

Avoiding Toxicity

Nothing rots and corrodes a parish like toxicity. What is toxicity? It is when there are divisive and control issues within the church. Sometimes the priest, sometimes the laity and sometimes both express these traits. Nevertheless, toxicity is detrimental to the life and wellbeing of the parish.

Toxicity is contagious and creates a bitter ailment that can spread through the parish like wildfire if left unchecked. That is exactly what Satan wants to take place. The nature of sin is to divide and when the devil creates division and “sides” he inflicts a wretched wound into the Body we call the Church.

How do we avoid such a terrible situation? How do we live a life that is mutually healthy for the clergy as well as the laity? How do we learn to live with our differences? The answers are really quit simple although many times challenging to do.

These are the traits of a healthy parish: We work together in a mutual and loving manner. We talk and communicate with each other, and treat each person with dignity, civility and respect. We avoid triangulation. We become honest with one another in love and affection, rather than through venomous gossip or the ugly need to be in control (get our way at all costs!).

We have to remember that we are One Body in Christ Jesus. When one part of the Body is sick, it makes the whole Body ill. We want to attend to those areas of pain and suffering, validate them and then address the illness directly. Occasionally this healthy method of dealing with conflict comes at a cost. Perhaps we lose a parishioner or a family. While that is the last thing we want to occur, sometimes its best for the layperson or even the clergy member to move on to another place, but before they leave we strive for reconciliation; otherwise we take the baggage from one place directly into another.

The Apostle Paul was constantly battling toxicity. He wanted to eradicate it through mutual love and unity in Christ.  It hurt him bitterly deep to witness division and disunity. He became an ongoing target of abuse and slander in some areas, but that didn’t matter to him. He was willing to give his very life for his love of the church. He wanted her whole and striving to live as One in Christ.

Can we as a church live as one? Can we avoid the devastating effects of toxicity? Can we feel safe in our church environment? Are we willing to let go of our own wants and needs and embrace our neighbor in love, whether we agree with them or not?

The answer to these questions lie within our spirits and willingness to live as wholesome examples in Christ. It’s up to us to model healthy behavior to the world and keep our focus on what is truly important – the Good News of Jesus Christ!

Frm the Society of Saint John the Evangelist

Struggle

Ephphatha - Be Open!

Pentecost 15

Proper 18

Year B

Mark 7:24-37

September 9, 2012

“Ephphatha! —Open up!” This is the word that Jesus said to the deaf and mute man in this mornings Gospel. He opened the mans ears to hear and his mouth to speak. This is a truly amazing miracle. Open up! I can’t get that word out of my mind – Ephphatha! What if we as a church were to all (universally) open up? What if we as a church blew the doors off their hinges and invited every single person we encountered into our midst. What if we like Jesus listened to the Syrophoenician woman? What if we invited all of the tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, and outcasts into our very midst? What would this church look like? What would any church and every church look like? To open up is frightening.

When I was in seminary I’ll never forget the first time that I knowingly was hugged by a young man with AIDS. I was terrified that I had opened myself up to that awful disease. Yet I hugged the man anyway. I stood at the point of Ephphatha. I could either remain closed and walk away or I could open up and receive the mans embrace. Years later I was able to be open to a young man and hold him while he died of the same wretched disease. Because I listened to Christ I was open and unafraid. The listening and trusting the voice of the Holy Spirit is important.

Jesus tells us (like the man he healed) to “open up!” Notice he opened the mans ears to hear before he released his tongue to speak. Perhaps it is wise to listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit before we speak, before we act and before we judge. The more we listen the more we hear. The more we hear the less we speak. The less we speak the more we listen to the needs of the other, and not our own chatter about our wants. That is what Christianity is about. It is about listening to those in need such as the syrophoenician woman and the deaf, mute man and opening up our own ears to listen to their needs and then respond to their needs through not only our speech, but actions as well.

Opening up is risky! It means we have to listen to those we disagree or are prejudice towards. It means we have to speak the Gospel message to them as well as those we are close too. To open up is scary! Like the man in today’s Gospel it transforms our lives.

I have two friends who will not come to church. They are both deaf to God and are literally terrified that I might try and preach to them. What if their hearts were to open up? What if their lives could be transformed so that they couldn’t stop talking about the love of Christ? (That would be a true miracle!) But it is scary for me because if I open up to them about Christ, I risk losing them as my friends. Yet Jesus says – Ephphatha!

Jesus took a big risk opening up to the syrophoenician woman. After all she was a gentile and a woman. In Christ’s day and time speaking to her as a good Jewish person would have been scandalous. Yet Jesus set aside prejudice in order to (seemly and reluctantly) help this woman by curing her daughter. He made himself vulnerable to her needs.

When we open up we make ourselves vulnerable to the needs of others. We open ourselves up to risk – perhaps the risk of losing friends; the risk of losing our reputations (there goes another one of those ‘Bible Thumpers’); the risk of losing our place in society. If we blow the doors off the church and invite in all the AIDS victims, the prostitutes, the drug addicts; the poor and needy what will people think about the church and us? I know this sound like rhetorical questions, but they are important to ask.

We are called to be Christ like and vulnerable to our neighbor despite what the rest of the world thinks. As a matter of fact we are to be open to our critics and invite them into the church as well. The man who Jesu healed went and proclaimed the Gospel to everyone – (everyone!) not just a few safe select few. This man would have been looked down on in Jesus’ day. He or his parents would have been judged and treated with ugly prejudice. Yet we hear the words of the Gospel tell us that he proclaimed the Good News to everyone! That is how full of the Spirit he was, and that is how full of the Spirit we are called.

When we are on fire for Christ; when the Gospel (the Good News) is set ablaze inside our hearts we become people open to mission; mission is the heart of the Gospel. We willingly allow ourselves to be vulnerable to the world and all the people in it.

Whether we are criticized or not, afraid or courageous, reluctant or ready - Ephphatha! Be Open!

From the Society of Saint John the Evangelist

Creation

From the Society of Saint John the Evangelist

Mercy

The Peace of God

“The peace of God it is no peace but strife cast in the sod, but brother let us pray for just one thing, the marvelous peace of God” ~They Cast Their Nets in Galilee, 1982 Hymnal

When we think of the peace of God, what do we think about? Do we dream of warm summer days, beautiful meadows or cool ocean breezes? Do we understand the peace of God as something serine and pastoral? Perhaps we think of it as a calm landscape painting such as Stratford on Avon. Nevertheless we are often either taught or assume that the peace of God is something tranquil and calm.

Well, in the words of sports host Lee Corso on ESPN College Game Day, “Not so fast my friend!”  The peace of God is much more in line with the hymn lyrics above. If we believe for one second that God’s peace is something serine as a lazy winding river then we are sadly mistaken. When we accept Christ in our lives we take on the weight of the cross. At this point one might ask, “What is so peaceful about that?!”  The fact is the peace of God is not defined by our terms but by God’s. We gain peace of heart and mind by living the self-sacrificial life of Christ Jesus. Peace flows out of a Gospel centered life – living outside the box of self-centeredness.

Peace flows from the hard work of caring for the sick, the friendless and the needy. Peace arises out of forgiveness and reconciliation. It requires us to let go of all those burdensome, yet well fed resentments we tend to harbor. The peace of God means accepting the driving painful nails of repentance and admitting our shortcomings. The peace of God sometimes creates strife, because as Christians we are called to live within our baptismal covenant, honoring the dignity of all people; even those we may not like or consider enemies.  Or perhaps those we find on the other side of the theological coin.

So when we pray for God’s peace remember the words of a good friend of mine: “Be careful what you pray for, you just might get it!” 

From the Society of Saint John the Evangelist

Word

From the Society of Saint John the Evangelist

Name

Riding the Storm Out; Discovering Faith in the Tempest

Riding on loud rolling thunder the storm clouds reel ever forward causing my spirit to tremble in fear. The last tiny ray of sunlight is finally diminished and extinguished by the endless row of opaque density. The dark, ominous tempest appears to gain strength with every exhaled breath of brutal gusting wind. I feel so alone and lost. Where do I turn? How can I avoid this pitch-black fiend that seeks to overtake and ultimately destroy my life? Where is my hope? Where is the allusive faith that I learned as a child? In the face of this daunting storm my questions go unheeded as if God has abandoned me to a fatal spiritual providence that seems inescapable. Where is God in this darkness? Why doesn’t he heed my desperate prayers cast like darts at the highest heaven?  Apparently they fall short, perhaps cast ever downward by the tumultuous storm. All seems lost, as there is no escape. My fate is sealed as the first drops of heavy rain pelt my weary face. The autumn sadness of my spiritual illness has finally prevailed. What is left but to face the storm? Knowing that I stare directly into the hungry eyes of death. 

Such is the life of the spiritually destitute. Without a strong faith foundation we are nothing more than reeds blowing in the wind. James tells us that we are like waves of water being blown to and fro at the mercy of the elements. Yet we want faith. We desire faith. We long to live lives that are deeply grounded in faith. However, we often don’t wish to pay the price of a life lived by faith, thus we live hollow lives of spiritual destitution, not knowing where to lay our hearts or even trusting that there is safety in Christ.

Life is full of unexpected storms and violent tempests. We see people suffer not only in this country from poverty and lack of health, but all around the world as well. But there is hope. In his letter to the Philippians Paul writes, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” This means that life is not hopeless despite the unpredictable storms and hardships. We simply have to let go of our need to control our lives and give it to God.  Does this mean that the storms of life will go away? Absolutely not! If anything they sometimes increase as the Adversary attempts to plant his seeds of doubt within our spirits, and cut us off from God.

We’ve all experienced anger at God because we feel like he doesn’t listen to us. We have all experienced the disappointment of unanswered prayers. We have all questioned our faith in God. But the truth is, God is in the storm. God is a part of the tempest seeking to ground us in a true reliance on him.  This doesn’t mean that God puts us to the test all the time; it simply means that God meets us where we are in life, even in the storms.  And that my friends is where we find faith; we discover it in the challenges of life.  We experience a deeper and more sincere faith when we bare the scares of Christ and live into his sacrificial love for one another.

It’s not easy to live the true Christian life. It cuts against the instant gratification driven society we live. We want deep and secure faith, but wish to avoid the very hardships that create that faith. Sometimes we have to stand and face the frightening storm with a trembling heart and know that Christ is with us and will never abandon us.