Tag: church

A Call from the Edge

Notes for a sermon preached at Holy Trinity (Strathcona/Edmonton), Dec. 10, 2023
Texts: Mark 1:1-8; Isaiah 40:1-11    

I once saw a priest start a kid’s talk with the question, “What’s a prophet?” It’s great when the answers you get lead into what you want to talk about, but this time the response from one young person was “It’s when you make money.” The talk went sideways from there, because the kids really didn’t seem to know the biblical word, and just wanted to talk about money. They understood that! “Prophet” is a word that doesn’t turn up very often in daily speech, and when it does, its usual sense is a person who foretells the future.

Predicting the future can be part of the prophetic role, but it’s not the whole story – not by a long shot! This past fall I thought a lot about prophets, when our Wednesday morning Bible study group read the Book of Ezekiel. If you haven’t read Ezekiel, let me tell you that the group found it very challenging, often harsh and violent, with relatively few signs of hope, notably in the first half. People left some sessions saying things like “I sure hope things get better!” Not a fun read, but if a doom and gloom kind of guy like Ezekiel is considered a major prophet, we might well be excused for wondering why these people play such a large role in Scripture, especially in the Hebrew Bible.

Fr. Richard Rohr says that all the prophets speak from “the edge of the inside,”[i] and Ezekiel is a case in point. The book is set in the early years of the exile to Babylon. A member of the priestly class (an insider), Ezekiel is among the deportees, far removed from the centre of his people’s life – Jerusalem and the Temple. The big question is why this disaster has happened. The prophet condemns the people of Jerusalem, whose faithless ways have led to the departure of God’s glory from the holy city. From the edge of his people’s existence, the previous insider can speak God’s message clearly.

The latter part of the book is devoted to a vision of a restored Temple and land, which bears little resemblance to what actually happened some years later, when a new Temple was eventually built. Before that could happen, the people had to return, an event on the near horizon for the prophet whose words we heard in today’s first reading, so-called “Second Isaiah,” who proclaimed:

Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her
that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.

The exile in Babylon was drawing to its end. The deportees would be led home to the land of Israel, forging their way through the wilderness, protected by God’s hand as they journeyed through a place of great discomfort. God would give them comfort, which is not the same as making them comfortable. This would be no easy chair kind of existence, but a journey through a wilderness transformed and turned upside-down by the hand of God. Like Ezekiel, Isaiah also spoke “from the edge of the inside,” but now of a return to the centre.

Receiving comfort from God means to be strengthened by God for the days ahead. It means being empowered by God to work through and in places of discomfort. The message of all the prophets, including Ezekiel, Isaiah, and John, is not to “get comfortable”, but to seek God’s way, knowing that God’s way may well – may often! – involve discomfort.

Writing in the December 2023 issue of The Christian Century, Pastor Melissa Bills said this:

Discomfort is holy when it leads us to deeper love for God and neighbor. It is sacred when it spurs our hearts to love and good deeds. It is a blessing when it drives us to seek justice and liberation. It does not cut us off from God’s promises of comfort but rather makes space for us to receive them.[ii]

Chapter 40 of Isaiah ends this way:

[God] gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless.
Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted;
but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,
   they shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

This is the prophet whom John invoked in his call to prepare the way of the Lord. John stood in the heritage of Isaiah and all the Hebrew prophets, speaking and acting as God had directed. That’s what makes a prophet a prophet: they don’t speak for themselves, but for God!

John’s message was clear: the Kingdom of God was drawing near, soon to be fulfilled in the one to whom John pointed – Jesus!

John’s life was not comfortable – living in the wilderness, clothed roughly, eating what he could find on the land. But he surely took comfort from knowing that he was doing God’s work, speaking for God, proclaiming the one coming after him, pointing away from himself and his own desires to God’s wishes, pointing to what God would do among those who heeded the call.

I have sometimes heard people say things like “If you say, ‘yes’ to Jesus, your life will be great from then on.” If only that were true! Following Jesus has a cost. It demands much of us. But the good news is that God offers the same comfort – the same strength – that was offered to the Hebrew people in exile. John called the people to repent, and to accept baptism as a token of that repentance – and repentance is hard work. It takes strength and determination, and the courage to refuse the easy way – the comfortable way.

On this Sunday of John the baptizer, let us remember that the need for prophets like John did not end with the coming of Jesus. If anything, the world stands in greater need than ever of hearing the prophet’s call to repentance. We followers of Jesus have inherited the role of John: to point to Jesus, to call people out of their comfortable places, and to proclaim God’s desires for the world.

The great Biblical scholar Walter Brueggemann has said this:

The prophetic tasks of the church are
to tell the truth in a society that lives in an illusion,
grieve in a society that practices denial,
and express hope in a society that lives in despair.

Only by telling the truth, by grieving honestly, and living in hope can we ever begin to find the comfort promised by the prophet so many years ago. Like the prophets before us, we are not called to leave this world behind, but to challenge the world from “the edge of the inside,” as we see in the ministry of the prophets. We must be prepared to leave the comfortable places in the centre, seeking God’s strength as we live into our God-given mission – our prophetic tasks.

So… let’s go back to that first question: What is a prophet?
Better to ask “Who is a prophet?”
Look around you – anyone you see may be called to step out of their comfort zone, to rely on God’s comfort – and to speak God’s word in in a world that desperately needs to hear that Word!

In the name of the one who came to give us holy comfort,

Amen.

[i] https://cac.org/daily-meditations/the-true-center-2023-09-10/

[ii] https://www.christiancentury.org/article/lectionary/december-10-advent-2b-isaiah-40-1-11-mark-1-1-8

                                               

Give God What is God’s

Notes for a sermon preached at St. Augustine’s-Parkland Anglican Church, Spruce Grove AB, Oct. 22, 2023. Texts: Matt 22:15-22; (Exodus 33:12-23)

Some years ago, I called my father for a chat, and he said he was glad for the break because he was “rendering unto Caesar.” Of course, what he meant, in the language of the King James Bible, was that he was working on his taxes. Anyone would like a break from that! And this was in the days before user-friendly tax software and e-filing, which meant wading through piles of forms and declarations and receipts, and in the end, often having to write a big cheque.

None of us really like paying taxes, but most of us would recognize their necessity. In words ascribed to the first president of the USA, “No taxes can be devised which are no more or less inconvenient or unpleasant,” but a later president (FDR) said this: “Taxes are the dues we pay for the privilege of membership in an organized society.” For the most part, we don’t question the legality of our taxes, and when we do, we have a legal system to adjudicate it.

Things were different in Jesus’ time. There were at least three reasons for tax collectors to be routinely lumped in with other sinners.
1. They worked on contract to the occupying power (Traitors!).
2. They took what they wanted for themselves, often at extortionate rates above what they were required to raise (Robbers!).
3. They dealt in coinage which many regarded as blasphemous – the tribute denarius – and collected taxes which many Jewish religious authorities regarded as forbidden by the Torah (Blasphemers!).

Today’s Gospel focuses on that third issue.

“Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”

There’s no question of levels of government or constitutional issues. The Roman Empire financed its rule over its territories through taxation. There were some benefits, to be sure, but for faithful Jews, the Romans were faithless and often ruthless occupiers, and paying taxes to them was an affront to their religious and social structure. It’s a legitimate question, but as it is stated, it demands a simple “Yes or No” response. It’s a trap! If Jesus says “Yes,” then his questioners can accuse him of unfaithfulness to Jewish law. If he says “No,” they can accuse him of defying Roman authority. They’re thinking “Gotcha!”

Jesus sees right through them: he is “aware of their malice.” As he so often does, he responds with another question. Asking for the coin shows their hypocrisy – someone in the crowd has the coin! His question is about the offensive coin:

Whose head is this, and whose title?”

Obvious answer: the emperor’s. Then Jesus says this:

Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s,
 and to God the things that are God’s.

The emperor’s image and title are to be given back to him – they belong to him! – but what are we to give to God?

I want to suggest that the crucial thing is the concept of “image.” Remember that “graven images” such as found on this coin are forbidden by the second commandment. Give the image of Caesar back to Caesar, by all means – it offends God! On the other hand, let us recall this:

So God created humankind in his image,
    in the image of God he created them;
    male and female he created them.                                         (Genesis 1:27)

If the image of the emperor is to be found on a silver coin, the image of God is to be found in us – all of humanity, in all our wonderful diversity.

I have heard this text used in a stewardship context, often with the speaker identifying what should be given to God with a 10% tithe, or something like that. That seems to me to do the text a disservice, relativizing what Jesus said, implying that only part of what we are and what we have belongs to God. To get the full impact of Jesus’ words requires us to perceive that nothing we have is of our own making but is a gift from God. As Paul wrote:

What do you have that you did not receive?                                (II Cor 4:7)

Our call is to give to God the image of God, “ourselves, our souls and bodies,” as the post-communion prayer in the Book of Common Prayer puts it. As we hear it in Genesis, “image” does not refer to something visual, like a photograph or statue, but to something much deeper, much broader, much more active.

Being made in God’s image does not mean that we physically look like God. That places God in the realm of the visible and knowable. Even Moses, of whom it was said that he alone met God face to face, did not actually do so, but was only allowed a glimpse of God from behind as God passed by. Artists have struggled with this for centuries. I’m reminded of the story of a little girl who was drawing a picture, when an adult onlooker asked what she was drawing. “I’m making a picture of God,” she said. “But no-one knows what God looks like.” To which the child replied, “They will when I’m done!” Chutzpah!

Pictures and statues are fixed in time and space. We can look at them with awe, but they rarely point toward any kind of action. We must go beyond the visual into the realm of God’s activity: Creating, Redeeming, and Sanctifying. To be made in God’s image means to be called to join with God in God’s activity: caring for and protecting the created order, being one with Christ in living into the redemption of the world, living in the Spirit to help this world become more holy.

The image of God is best found in God’s people seeking to be more like God in all that they do, all that they say, all that they are. It is in our words and deeds that we help make God present to other around us—and everything counts, every word and every deed. Everything matters! To give God what is God’s is to recognize that God has made us in the divine image, to be God’s hands and feet and voices in this world, imaging God in how we live. To give God what is God’s is to dedicate our whole beings to living as beloved children of God—giving all to God. This does not mean that we should all become monks or something like that. It does mean that, as Paul wrote:

“…whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God.”  (1 Cor. 10:31b)

The good news is that when we give our lives to God, God gives to us all that we require to live out our call to be God’s holy people.

Live for the glory of God!

May it be so.

The Mystery of Grace

Notes for a sermon preached at Holy Trinity Anglican Church (Old Strathcona), Edmonton AB, Oct. 15, 2023. Text: Matthew 22:1-14; (Exodus 32:1-14)

In 26 years of parish ministry, I officiated at around 100 weddings, and was a guest at many receptions. I never once heard of a wholesale rejection of an invitation, with a substitute guest list, and if anyone was ever ejected from one of those occasions for how they were dressed, it didn’t come to my attention. But today we hear Jesus telling a story of those two things happening, in a parable told to the leaders of the nation (the chief priests and the elders of the people), clearly aimed at them.

The story may have been directed to a particular group in a particular time, but I believe it has something important to say to us today. I would suggest that the central act of the story is invitation – the King invites the people of the story to a wedding banquet for his son. By their responses, the prospective guests showed themselves unworthy of the invitation. The King’s response seems violently over the top but remember that Jesus often uses hyperbole like this to emphasize a point. The A-list guests won’t come, so the King invites everyone he can find to the banquet – everyone!

The first invitation might have been a matter of asking his usual guest list who might have treated it as nothing special. The prospective guests find something better to do, like the people of Israel at Sinai, who spurned the covenant made through Moses for something much more exciting – a great feast around a golden calf. “…the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to revel.” Note however: in the Exodus story, God does not carry out the threatened destruction, but graciously relents when Moses intercedes. In Jesus’ story, the people with something better to do suffer dire consequences for their rejection of the invitation.

But then comes the great turnaround: if the expected guests won’t come, the King graciously extends the invitation to everyone. The invitation is not made according to the usual criteria. (Who IS on the A-list, anyway?) Instead, the invitation is a matter of pure grace – opening the doors to all who will come, making a place at the table for both good and bad. No one had to qualify for this guest list. They just had to say “yes.”

Except… one man was not wearing a wedding robe, and he was thrown “into the outer darkness.” We are left wondering,

“Where’s the grace in that?”

The grace of the second invitation reflects unconditional love: it doesn’t matter who you are; God loves you and wants you at the banquet. But the removal of the improperly-clad guest looks like love with strings attached – putting limits on God’s infinite love.

Unconditional love means that God loves us just the way we are. God loves all his creation! But with that comes the realization that God’s love is beyond our imagining, and that God loves us too much to want us to stay the way we are.

Or as Anne Lamott wrote:

I do not at all understand the mystery of grace –
only that it meets us where we are
but does not leave us where it found us.[i]

I have encountered many congregations in my life in the church, in a variety of settings and roles. Not once have I heard a church say that they did not want to be welcoming. People generally understand on a very basic level that welcoming all is part of living into God’s grace, but we sometimes forget that just welcoming people is only part of the job. The other side of the equation is that God has expectations of us, as individuals and as a church. The church may be a “come as you are” party, but it’s also a “come prepared to change” party.

Being a church that welcomes all is a good thing, but being a church with a mission is also a good thing. Being only a welcoming church can be self-defeating when it develops into as “anything goes!” This seems to be one of the major subtexts of Matthew’s gospel: some in his audience believed that the Law had been set aside, and they were free to do as they pleased.[ii]

Being only a missional church is likewise self-defeating when it presents as welcoming people only according to their ability to fit into the mission. Down the one road lies chaos as everyone does what pleases them, and the church loses sight of its reason for being. Down the other road lies exclusivity, as insistence on “fitting in” drives people away.

How to fix the chaos? Invite people to share in the church’s mission.

How to fix the exclusivity? Welcome everyone – without question.

The “chaos road” is characterized by what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called cheap grace:

Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves.
Cheap grace is the preaching of
      forgiveness without requiring repentance,
      baptism without church discipline,
      Communion without confession…
Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross,
grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.[iii]

In a church dominated by ideas of cheap grace, nothing really matters. Bonhoeffer challenged the church of his day (in pre-war Germany) to realize that everything matters; that following Christ is a matter of life and death.

He wrote (edited for inclusive language):

When Christ calls a [person], he bids [them] come and die.[iv]

The balance between welcoming and exclusivity is never easy, and it is never static. Churches constantly swing between the two poles. Healthy churches understand that swing as a response to the mystery we call the grace of God, on guard against both chaos and rigid exclusivity. Healthy churches invite and welcome people to join with them in the mystery of grace: meeting us where we are but calling us ever deeper into a life ruled by the love of God, seeking to be part of God’s mission.

All are invited to this place. All are welcome. And all are challenged to learn day by day the mystery of costly grace, which calls us ever forward into new life in Christ. So today and every day:

Come to the table – all are welcome.
Come to the banquet of the King – all are welcome.
Come to the wedding feast of the Lamb – all are welcome.

Yes, come, but come expecting to be changed.
Come with open eyes and ears and hearts and minds.
Come with your spirit laid bare to God.

Put on the wedding robe of those who seek to know and serve Christ in all things. Come into the mystery of God’s grace – and give thanks.

Amen.

[i] From “Traveling Mercies”
[ii] Matthew 5:17-20
[iii] From “The Cost of Discipleship”
[iv] Ibid.

The Sower, the Seed, and the Soil

Notes for a sermon on Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23, July 16, 2023, Holy Trinity (Strathcona), Edmonton

The Gospel readings for today and next Sunday are taken from Chapter 13 of Matthew, sometimes referred to as “The Parabolic Discourse.” This doesn’t mean it’s about parabolas, but rather about parables. Same Greek root, different but related concepts – but you’re not here for a lecture on etymology, are you?

The Discourse comprises seven parables, most with an agricultural theme, plus explanations for the two we are hearing. These are the only parables for which Jesus gives explanations, and then only privately to his disciples. The rest of his listeners get that somewhat maddening exhortation: “Let anyone with ears listen!” In other words, some will understand, and others (maybe most?) will go away puzzled.

It seems that the disciples were among those who were puzzled. Otherwise, why would they ask Jesus for explanations? And why those two parables?

The answer to the first question (the desire for explanations) lies in the nature of parables. Some parables are very short and to the point, while others are longer stories, like the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son. Most parables use imagery from daily life, making them accessible to the hearers. What sets them apart from ordinary stories is that they usually have a twist, something unexpected in the telling, that opens the door to seeing reality in a new way. The standard reaction to this kind of story is “But what does it mean?” and Jesus’ response doesn’t help. Another notable feature of parables is that they are typically capable of different interpretations – in other words, there’s no “right answer.”

In today’s parable, the Sower, the image is of a farmer sowing seed, seemingly almost at random, not looking carefully at where he tosses it. The seed falls in various places, with various results. The seeds that fell on the path or on rocky ground or among thorns were wasted, bearing no fruit for the harvest. Only the seeds that fell on good soil brought forth grain. Sowing seed is a normal activity, but is it normal to strew the seed around quite so carelessly? Why not take care to make sure that the seed falls where it will do some good? Some have called this parable “The Wasteful Farmer,” which may say something about the disciples’ puzzlement. No-one stays in business long with such a careless attitude. This suggests a possible answer to the second question I posed: why these two parables? Perhaps because they seemed particularly troubling to them as compared to some of the others, and perhaps because Jesus wanted to point to some aspects of discipleship.

The explanation Jesus gives to them suggests to me two things to take from the parable:

First, the disciples are being trained to spread the Good News, the Word of God. They need to understand that picking and choosing with whom they share the Word is not their task. Rather, they are to share the Word with everyone, knowing that not all will bear fruit as they might wish.

That lesson still stands today. Spread the Word to everyone and let those with ears hear! God will take care of the rest.

Second, the disciples themselves are the soil upon which the seed is sowed. Jesus no doubt wished that they all might be good soil, bearing fruit a hundredfold, or sixty, or thirty. But Jesus also knew that they all had cares and worries and difficulties in their lives, and at various times they would be the path, the rocky ground, or the thorn-infested soil. The message: aim to be good fertile soil, understanding that your own lives can sometimes provide less than perfect growing conditions.

That lesson also still stands. No-one is a perfect disciple all the time. Things happen which make it hard to hear God’s Word, difficult to thrive, sometimes impossible to bear much fruit. That’s just the nature of ordinary human life. Strive to bear fruit, knowing that you will fail at times. Our Baptismal Covenant makes that clear, referring to “when you fall into sin,” not “if you fall into sin.” God will use us as we are able – and God is always there, welcoming us back again and again.

I found a piece on the internet this past week called “Rules for Doing Theology.” With a little tweaking, it could easily be re-titled “Rules for Being a Disciple.” The last rule needs no tweaking: “Make a mess. Fail. Try again. Grow in grace. Repent and forgive.” As a friend once said, the Gospel is like playing baseball, except you get to keep swinging until you hit a home run.

And here’s one more way of reading this parable, which played an important role in my early formation as a priest. I had never paid the Sower close attention until one day about a year and a half into my time in my first charge, when it turned up as the Gospel for the day in the Daily Office Lectionary. Life was getting a bit difficult, as some parishioners were expressing disappointment that the church wasn’t growing much, if at all. They believed that having their own priest after 20 years of being half of a shared ministry would result in the parish suddenly blossoming to look something like it did in the ‘50’s and ‘60’s. “We thought the Sunday School would be full again, like it was back then,” was one of the things I heard. In other words, they saw it as my responsibility to make the church grow. And I fell into the trap of beating myself up for not fulfilling their expectations.

When I read this parable that day, it suddenly dawned on me: if I put myself into the role of the Sower, I could see that my job was to spread the seed – to proclaim the Good News by word and example – and it was up to God to make the seed grow and bear fruit. Reflecting on both the Baptismal Covenant and the vows of ordination has shown me how important this distinction can be.

Friends, we are called to be the Sower, the Seed, and the Soil, remembering that people have different roles at various times, as Paul said in I Corinthians 3.6:

I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.

We are called to sow the seed freely, not choosing where but letting God deal with the seed wherever it may fall, giving thanks that growing the seed is not up to us alone. God will give the growth, and God will give fruit in due season.

We are called to seek to be fertile soil for the seed to grow. God the Holy Spirit will open our hearts and minds.

Finally, we are called to be the seed itself: to be and to bear the Word of God in person for others, seeking to let the Good News be visible in all that we say and do.

May it be so!

10 years on…

Ten years ago today, I preached my last sermon at St. Matthew’s Cathedral, Brandon, handed my keys back to the churchwardens, enjoyed a lovely lunch and party with the parish, and then walked away from more than a quarter-century of full-time ordained ministry. The memory of that day has dimmed a bit, but I do remember some feelings — a strange mixture of joy, relief, sadness, and some anxiety and fear.

The years since then have been a whole other adventure, as I became used to being one of those people who are paid not to work, otherwise known as the retired. I have learned to enjoy having the time to do just what I want to do — and also not do what I don’t want to do. A friend said a few years ago “I thought you were retired. You always seem so busy.” “True,” I said, “but I’m as busy as I want to be.” In stipendiary ministry, the busyness of life comes from external, job-related pressures. In retirement, any busyness is my choice. In this time, I have taken on various commitments voluntarily, and have enjoyed working at most of them. Things which no longer gave pleasure could easily be walked away from, as I have done a couple of times.

I have fewer commitments now than I did five years ago, but they are all things that give me life, keeping my mind and body active and engaged. Health considerations aside, life is pretty good as I mark this anniversary, and face a milestone birthday in a couple of weeks.

But those feelings…

There was joy, especially in the way the congregation expressed their gratitude for my ten and a half years among them. Parting can be sorrowful, but in this case it was sweet sorrow. I left knowing that my work had been mostly well received, and I could walk out with head held high.

There was relief, because most of the pressures I had felt in that position, especially in my final year, were being taken away. I could hand off the problems to someone else!

There was sadness, because we were moving far enough away to make continued relationships with many people I had come to treasure very difficult to maintain. This was the sorrowful aspect of parting.

There was anxiety and fear, because I was moving into a wholly new phase of my life, and I was quite unsure about how that would work out. I’m not a person who deals well with surprises, so we had made reasonable plans, but I was well aware that these plans could come unstuck in the twinkling of an eye.

But over-riding all of that was the sense that I had followed God’s call to that place, striven to serve to the best of my abilities there, and was now following God’s call to a new place.

I haven’t achieved most of the projects I had envisioned for retirement, but that doesn’t matter. I am still trying to follow the call day by day in this adventure we call life. As it has been said, “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.”

And now onward, to wherever God may lead.

What is Tradition?

Is tradition this saying (maybe not from Mahler, BTW):


Or this meme from Facebook?

Or this?

“The accumulated wisdom and experience of the past.” – Michael J. Pitts

The word is one which is used in in a variety of ways in different places and groups. There is some truth in all of the above three, but in my view none of them really get to the heart of the matter.

The issue is that “Tradition” is most often used as a noun, but must also be seen more as a verb. What I call “small-t traditions” are customs and practices that we have received from people in the past — perhaps the near past, perhaps antiquity, or something in between. They can be things we do, truths we believe, symbols we hold dear. For many, these things are of great importance, helping to provide a link to where we have come from and who we are.

I distinguish the small-t variety from “big-T Tradition,” which is, above all else, a process devoted to connecting us to our roots. By means of Tradition, we keep our group’s story alive. A biblical example may be found in I Corinthians 15:1-5:

Now I should remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received, in which also you stand, through which also you are being saved, if you hold firmly to the message that I proclaimed to you—unless you have come to believe in vain. For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.

Paul is here describing a process and a message, which he describes “as of first importance.” He received this message and handed it on to his Corinthian converts, and it has been handed on to Christians through two millennia “as of first importance.” Here is the central story of the Christian faith, without which we become disconnected from our roots.

Christianity is not the only group to have a foundational story. Other faiths, nations, organizations, ethnic groups, families: all tend to look to where they have come from to know who they are and what their purpose in life may be. The process of Tradition aims to keep these threads unbroken, often giving rise to traditions (small-t) which help to tell the main story.

And here’s the problem: sometimes the small-t things end up being treated as big-T matters. To quote a friend of mine, “We end up majoring in the minors,” and can run the risk of diminishing the power of our root story. Michael Pitts is correct in his assessment of Tradition quoted above, which summarizes nicely the result of attending to the process of making sure that the Big Story is kept central. Lore from the past may be wisdom, but it may also be nonsense. Careful handing on the big truths helps us sort out the two.

The point of the Tradition process is not to enshrine the past, but to learn from it so that our future may be in continuity with the past in creative ways. I think that Pablo Picasso’s rather earthy definition points in this direction:

“Tradition is not wearing your grandfather’s hat; tradition is begetting a baby.”

Whatever group you may align yourself with (for me that’s the Christian faith in its Canadian Anglican manifestation), you may be assured that the group has a root story that needs to be remembered, taught to our children, and learned from to be used as a guide for the future.

Caveat #1:

Root stories are often written by the dominant people of history, and can obscure or even deny the stories of others. I was taught Canadian history from a settler/colonial point of view, which saw our indigenous peoples as proper subjects of displacement, assimilation, and cultural genocide. I believe I know better now, but I was the recipient of a historical tradition that denied much of its own truth. Just because our elders taught us in that way does not make it right.

One example from church history: Mary Magdalene is sometimes described as a former prostitute, but the biblical offers no support for this idea. Rather, it came from a misreading of various texts that became enshrined in our teaching. Today, we are able to see Mary as the first witness of the Resurrection, a leading member of the early church, and one whom Jesus loved.

Caveat #2:

Small-t traditions very easily acquire a life of their own, and must be treated with caution. Here’s a tongue-in-cheek view of how easily things become entrenched:

The Growth of (Church) Tradition
Year 1: “That was different for a change.”
Year 2: “That’s what we did last year.”
Year 3: “We’ve always done it that way.”

If we have a beloved tradition (or custom, the word I prefer), we need to ask ourselves from time to time whether it is still helping us to hand on the Story. Is it part of Tradition, or are we just doing it because “We’ve always done it that way?” If we’re doing the latter, we are indeed succumbing to peer pressure from dead people.

So let’s not wear our grandfather’s hat and call it tradition. Let’s continue to tell our stories so that the babies we beget will grow to know them in all their truth. Let’s hand on the fire!

35 and counting…

Notes for a sermon preached at Holy Trinity Anglican Church, Edmonton, Alberta
May 29, 2020, the Seventh Sunday of Easter

When the Rector asked me to cover services this Sunday, I said “Sure”, and than looked at my calendar and realized it was the 7th Sunday of Easter, only two days before May 31. 35 years ago, the 7th Sunday of Easter fell on May 31, when I was ordained a Deacon. (It was also the night that the Edmonton Oilers won their 3rd Stanley Cup, so I can take no credit for the street party outside afterwards.) When I realized what the day was, I told the Rector that I wanted to take the opportunity to reflect on my time in ordained ministry, and she quickly agreed.

Then I looked at the readings and came up against the closing portion of Jesus’ “high-priestly prayer” from John’s Gospel. As John tells it, these are the last words Jesus spoke to his disciples before his death, praying for those who will come after “that they may be one.” That’s us!

When I was involved in campus ministry as an undergraduate (U. of Alberta, B.Sc. ’69), the big thing was the Ecumenical Movement, after Rome had started to open its doors through Vatican II. I recall starry-eyed students – yours truly included – running around proclaiming unity, singing “They’ll know we are Christians by our love,” and expecting organic unity among the churches – soon! By the time I was ordained, I knew that organic unity was a pipe dream, but I still had some hope for all Christians to be one. I still hold that hope after 35 years, but the history of these years has been very mixed in this respect, even within the Anglican Church.

There’s been a lot of change. For some people, the best change is no change at all. Others say we have not changed nearly enough. What I do know is that change is inevitable. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus held that “impermanence is the characteristic feature of the world,” which certainly rings true for me. It has certainly been true in the Anglican world in recent years.

It’s hard to proclaim unity among Christians when our own church has seen divisions, mostly arising from changes in the church which some people reject. One predates my ordination, the ordination of women to the priesthood and later to the episcopacy. The Anglican Church of Canada first ordained female priests in 1979, and some clergy and laity responded by moving to Roman Catholicism or Orthodoxy. It was an issue for some of my classmates during my time at seminary. It remains an issue for some today, even at Holy Trinity. For me, it has been one of the most positive changes in our church in the past half-century, bringing a new wholeness to our understanding of Christian ministry.

Another change which I regard as positive, but which has led to division in our ranks, is in gender and sexuality issues. As we have moved toward fuller inclusiveness in welcome, ordination, and marriage, some people who disagreed have gone elsewhere, including establishing a parallel Anglican Church. Some others stay, but reluctantly.

A big positive: the development of a closer relationship with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada. Again, some saw this as negative, but for me, it was long overdue. When our two churches sat down to talk, we quickly discovered that we agreed on almost everything and had done for centuries. We used different theological languages, and came at church order from different directions, but these proved easy to deal with. I was privileged to be a delegate to General Synod 2001, and to take part in the great celebration of the signing of the Full Communion agreement. I doubt that I’ll ever forget seeing our Primate and the Lutheran National Bishop dancing together around the arena in Waterloo. Our two churches have been enriched by this relationship, a visible sign of being one as Christ prayed for us.

Shortly after my ordination, we began to be aware of the issues around Residential Schools, a subject about which I had been woefully ignorant. As lawsuits began to pile up, there was some real fear that our whole institutional structure would collapse if we didn’t properly address the matter. Our Primate gave an apology to the Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples’ Sacred Circle in 1993, opening the door to the work of healing and reconciliation. Since that time, we have become more aware of our colonial history and its effects on indigenous people. Healing and reconciliation will take years – well beyond my lifetime! – but we are on the road towards being one with our indigenous brothers and sisters.

One place where change has been at best mixed is our response to sexual abuse and harassment within the church. In times past everything was left up to Bishops’ discretion, but it became clear that this was inadequate, at times leading to greater harm. (The pattern of moving offending clergy to other parishes is not solely the province of the Roman Catholic Church. It has happened in the ACC. Most dioceses now have policies and procedures in place, but they lack consistency across the church, and a tendency to protect the institution before the victims persists. The “#ACCToo” issue is the most recent and visible example, dealing with how our national office handled a draft story intended for the Anglican Journal, potentially identifying victims when confidentiality had been assured. An open letter circulated around the national church, gathering hundreds of signatures, calling for accountability and for care for the complainants. The Primate responded in an interview on CBC News. I found her words less than helpful, but I do understand that the situation is still unfolding. Assurances that steps are being taken to ensure that it won’t happen again are not enough when people have been hurt. We have made some positive changes here, but much remains to be done.

That’s a bit of a downer, but now let’s look at one of the most positive areas of change – the growing understanding of the church as “missional.”

I served in three parishes before retiring. Two of those had long histories, and their understanding of the church had been deeply shaped by history. One was characterized by the “chaplaincy model,” seeing their role as ministering to people like them – mostly of British heritage. The other had played a big role in local history, and people looked back to the glorious past when the church was full and there were 200 children in Sunday School. I’m not criticizing them, rather observing that their sense of mission had been formed through many years of ministry practises that seemed to me to no longer fit the societal situation.

What I have experienced in other places and very much at Holy Trinity is a growing sense of the church as missional – existing for the benefit of others, not just those who are “on the list.” There will always be echoes of our history, but I don’t find it driving our agenda. The agenda continues to evolve. In some ways, the pandemic has been a blessing, forcing us to find new ways to be the Church, but God’s mission is still the same, as Jesus handed it to his disciples on the night before his death.

The church of 2022 is facing some huge challenges. With the Holy Spirit as our guide, we may move forward contributing our share of God’s mission in this world. Things won’t ever again be the same – but that’s always been true.

It has been a joy and a privilege – and at times a great challenge – to be part of the changes of the past 35 years. I do not expect to see the next 35 to their completion. But I am certain they will happen, and I believe that God will be glorified in God’s people.

May we all be one.

Amen.

The economy of Grace

Some years ago I spent a few weeks volunteering full-time at Edmonton’s Bissell Centre, an agency which exists to help the city’s underprivileged people. One of the programs they had was a work exchange program. People could call the Centre looking for day laborers, and the Centre would send workers out as they were available. On occasional days there was more work than people, but mostly there were people left behind after all the jobs had been allotted. Some worked, others did not.

The Gospel reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for September 20 always reminds me of this program. The parable of the workers in the vineyard begins with a farmer needing to bring in his crops. He goes to the town square and finds people available for a day’s work. He hires some and leaves the others behind. Perhaps he grew fearful that the work would not all be done that day, so he returns to the square three times to get more workers, even recruiting some unlucky folk who had hung around until five o’clock because no-one else would hire them. It’s a pretty simple and predictable story — so far!

The twist (there’s always a twist in a parable) comes at the end of work when he doles out payment to the workers. To the astonishment of all and the anger of the early birds, he pays everyone the same amount – one denarius, a normal day’s wage.

The Workers in the Vineyard | The Catholic Word

Now, as my grandson would say, “How is that fair?” Surely there should be equal pay for equal work, and the late comers should not get the same as the first hired. But no, the farmer pays a day’s wage to everyone.

Here’s the rub, as I see it: the pay of one denarius would allow the worker to feed the family for the day. In this economy everyone gets to eat. There’s a parallel here to the story of the feeding of the 5,000: Jesus shows up, and people get fed. It doesn’t matter what we might have done to earn it, how much labour we might have put in, or anything. God is generous to all, even to those whom we may not believe deserve God’s generosity.

The economy of grace is not nice and neat. It can’t be reduced to an input/output table, or the law of supply and demand. God’s grace is poured out on all. Our economy doesn’t usually work that way. Instead, we put limits on how God’s generosity is apportioned among the populace and are often outraged when someone seems to get what they don’t deserve. Are we similarly outraged when someone doesn’t get what they do deserve? It seems to me that such responses tend to be more muted.

In God’s economy, all are fed, all are treated as deserving of respect, all contribute what they can as they are able.

How should we respond to this divine generosity? Surely not by grumbling about someone else’s good fortune. God has provided for them. Who are we to complain? I am reminded of a verse from “The Servant Song,” one of my favorite hymns:

I will weep when you are weeping,
when you laugh I’ll laugh with you.
I will share your joy and sorrow
till we’ve seen this journey through.

Richard Gillard © Scripture in Song

The journey in and with Christ is not a race with the winner taking home the medal. Rather, it is a journey of fellow-travelers, all seeking each other’s good.

Jesus shows up, and people are fed. Hallelujah!

Three Journeys

Notes for a sermon on Transfiguration Sunday, February 23, 2020  at Holy Trinity Anglican Church, Edmonton

Today, I invite you to join me on three journeys.

  • From the Hand Hills to the Rockies.

(If it helps your imagination, you may close your eyes.)

Picture a high flat-topped hill, with short grass fields down its sides. You’re looking west, towards the setting sun, and the day is very clear. Looking down the hill, the hillside flattens out into rolling fields. There is a valley visible in the distance, with more farmland beyond. And far, far away, silhouetted against the evening light, is a dark jagged line.

(You can open your eyes now.)

I have stood on that hill, known locally as Mother’s Mountain. It is the highest point of the Hand Hills, northeast of my hometown of Drumheller, the second highest range of hills on the prairies. On a clear day you can see the Rocky Mountains on the horizon, about 200 km away as the crow flies.

Satellite image of the Hand Hills, from Google Maps

To drive from the Hand Hills to the Rockies takes less than 3 hours. The mountains disappear as you leave the hills. You soon come to the valley of the Red Deer River, perhaps travelling down a steep and winding coulee. Across the river, you ascend on a similar route, reaching the prairieland once more, back “up on top,” as valley residents would say. The terrain between Drumheller and Calgary is not flat, but broadly rolling. Places appear ahead in the distance as you crest each hill, only to disappear again as you descend. There is a point in the trip when the Rockies again become visible. Shortly after, they remain in view for the rest of the journey.

As you go, you see ranch land, badlands, farmland, urban areas, and forest. All of them have their attractions. Turning aside for a while to enjoy one of these environments only enhances the journey. In fact, it helps us to see that the journey itself may be more important than the goal. It also reminds us that the journey is best made with others, so that we can help each other enjoy the day in each place where we arrive.

But the goal always lies ahead of us. And as we drive, the goal becomes clearer and clearer. Finally, we reach the Rockies, known from Anthony Henday’s annals as the “Shining mountains.”

  • From Transfiguration to Resurrection

In our revised calendar today is Transfiguration Sunday. Today we remember a strange event recounted in three of the Gospels, when Jesus took three of his closest disciples up “the mountain” where he was revealed in glory, and a voice from heaven declared him God’s beloved Son.

The Transfiguration has an important narrative role in the first three Gospels. The traditional calendar didn’t pay it much mind, fixing it on a August 6, commemorating a 15th-Century battle. The new calendar has put it in its proper context in the Gospel account. In Matthew, it’s the second-last of five mountain events, looking ahead to the final one in Ch. 28, when the Risen Christ sends the disciples out to be his messengers, and to build the Church.

The journey between these two mountains takes us through the last days of Jesus’ life on earth, as he goes to Jerusalem, engages the religious authorities in the temple, and is crucified. This is the journey we remember each year as we approach the most important festival of our faith – Easter. We call the season of this journey Lent, and it begins on Wednesday. We descend into the valley, and then set our face to the mountain of the great promise.

In the early church this period before Easter was the time when catechumens made their final preparation for their baptism at the Great Vigil of Easter. Preparation included disciplines such as prayer and fasting, aimed at strengthening the candidates for the commitment to the life of faith before them. Members of the church would join the candidates in their preparations. The traditional Lenten disciplines reflect this communal commitment. Lent is a journey towards the renewal of our baptismal covenant at the Paschal festival – we remind ourselves of who we are, and where we are headed.

Placing the story of the Transfiguration just before Lent gives us an opportunity to stand on one mountain-top, looking ahead to the next – the shared goal of all the faithful, the Kingdom of God in its fullness.

We climb the mountain with Jesus, beholding him in his already-but-not-yet glory. And then we go to the valley and the plains and we work our way ahead, with the goal always in mind.

The goal lies before us, but – like driving from the Hand Hills to the Rockies – the journey is at least as important as its end. We don’t jump straight to the Resurrection, but rather follow Jesus to Jerusalem, to the cross and the tomb.

  • From Baptism to the Kingdom

We are baptizing today, on this day when we look ahead to the glory to come, when we stand on one mountain with another just in sight.

The candidates may or may not have the shining mountains in view, but those who promise to uphold them in their life in Christ do. It is our responsibility – both sponsors and congregation – to hold that vision before them, to help them to grow into their full stature in Christ. It our responsibility to walk with them on the journey of faith, supporting and upholding them wherever they may find themselves as they go.

The road ahead may not be easy for these young people. We may pray that it will be so, and by God’s grace it may be so. But there is nothing certain, except for the promise that we, like Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration, are God’s beloved.

God’s beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, went from the Mount of Transfiguration to the Mount of Commissioning, journeying through trials, tribulations, and testing.

Today, as we move into Lent, in our lives of faith, we journey with Jesus from a glimpse of his glory to its full revelation. The beauty of the journey is that we are with Jesus, with all Jesus’ people here, throughout the world, and across the ages.

We are not alone in this journey. The Shining Mountain of the Resurrection beckons. So come! Let us journey together. The Kingdom – what God wishes for this world – lies before us.

In the name of Jesus, who made this journey first, AMEN.

Believing is Seeing

Notes for a sermon at Holy Trinity Edmonton, April 28, 2019
Text: John 20:19-31

Many of us will be familiar with the adage “seeing is believing,” which may well originate in today’s Gospel story, and is sometimes taken to be the point of the story. I don’t think so. There’s a lot more happening in the story of Thomas’ encounter with the Risen Christ than how we often over-simplify it:

  1. Thomas hears the news from the other disciples and demands visual evidence before he believes.
  2. Jesus appears to Thomas and gives him the proof.
  3. Thomas believes. Seeing is believing. End of story.

Or is it? Has anyone else noticed that there’s a big gap in this story? There are two scenes, a whole week apart. A week can be a very long time: much can happen in seven short days, especially when something like the Resurrection has happened. The text is maddeningly silent about what went on between those two Sundays. We could speculate endlessly, but it seems to me the least likely answer is that “nothing happened”. Things surely happened—for Thomas, for the rest of the Twelve, and for all the disciples who received the Holy Spirit and were sent by Jesus on that first day. When he sent them, did they just sit there? Surely not—I have to believe that they went out from that room and told many people what they had seen and heard. In that week, there would have been time for Thomas to see what was going on, to talk to his companions, to ponder what was happening around him.

What happened when Jesus appeared again with Thomas present? Thomas saw and believed: that much is clear. But he would not have been there at all had he not believed on some level in his friends’ veracity. He knew something had happened, and he had not abandoned the group. He believed—and so he saw! Proof was offered, Thomas believed, and then he made the great acclamation that climaxes John’s Gospel: “My Lord and my God!” Belief in the reality of Jesus’s Resurrection led to this colossal insight. First among his companions, he now saw Jesus as he truly was and is.

Believing became seeing.

Something like this happened recently in the world of science. On April 10 an international team of scientists announced the first successful imaging of a black hole. The existence of these strange objects was first proposed over a century ago as a result of Einstein’s theory of general relativity. Half a century ago, when I was an undergraduate taking a course in astrophysics, they were believed to exist, but there was little evidence available. Succeeding years led to more and more evidence, almost to the level of complete proof. The announcement three weeks ago was the culmination of over a decade’s work, involving eight separate observatories and hundreds of people. Looking like a fuzzy yellow-orange doughnut, the image agrees almost exactly with theoretical predictions. Einstein was right!

I could go on at length about the science of black holes, but that’s not where we want to go.

What struck me about this achievement was the team’s dogged determination, and their clear belief that what they were seeking was truly there. If they had not trusted the theory and the mounting body of evidence, they would never had invested so much time and energy (not to say money!) in this arcane quest.

If they had not believed in black holes, they (and we) would never have seen one. Believing led to seeing!

The Risen Christ said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” We can certainly include ourselves in this number.  The fact that we are gathered here today in this place testifies to our belief in the Resurrection – in a variety of ways and understandings, to be sure – and to the church’s continued faithfulness in proclaiming this central truth of the Gospel.

The contemporary Christian writer Diana Butler Bass (in “Christianity After Religion”) has suggested that the church needs to pay more attention to HOW we believe. We’ve been pretty good at enunciating WHAT we believe, in creeds and catechisms, but we have been less effective in putting wheels on the bus.

If we say we believe, what comes next?

What difference does it make in our lives?

Will our proclamation of the Resurrection be anything more than words?

Think of those scientists. They believed in the existence of black holes enough to devote over a decade’s work and many millions of dollars to produce the image they presented to the world. They believed, and so we see.

Friends, belief in the Resurrection can never be just a head game. It has consequences far beyond that upper room, consequences reaching into every aspect of our lives, consequences that give us a wholly new way of seeing the world.

We believe and proclaim that Christ rose from the dead. We affirm that this was not just a “one-off,” but as Paul wrote in 1 Cor 15:20, it is the “first fruits of those who have died.” The promise of the Resurrection is that death will never again have the last word.

Believing in the Resurrection of Jesus is a truly eye-opening event. To the believing eye, the world no longer needs to look like a medieval map, with “here be dragons” on its margins. Rather, we are enabled to see a world destined for renewal and resurrection – a world in which the forces of evil, while still present and active, are fighting a rearguard battle. As Fr. Chris said last Sunday, “We shall overcome,” and we can and should affirm that in our words and our actions.

Believing is seeing—seeing the world as the creation of a good and loving God, seeing death not as defeat but as the next step in God’s renewal of creation, seeing all others as heirs with us of God’s eternal kingdom.

As we believe, so may we see.

As we see, so may we act.

As we act, so may we proclaim.

And may our proclamation always be
“Alleluia! Christ is Risen!”