Through Stained Glass: Week 5 -- Becoming Neighborly & Transformed

 

The Fifth Sunday of Lent

March 17, 2024 [Celebration of Mister Rogers]

"I've always wanted to have a neighbor just like you. I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you." Mister Rogers

Reflection Title: Becoming Transformed/Neighborly

Scripture: Jeremiah 34.31-34 & John 12.20-33

Our Jeremiah text reminds us what it looks like to become. Surely, this new covenant description – this law written on the heart - breathed life into the weary and downtrodden, the exiled and the hopeless, who first heard it as it does for us today. It's a covenant of transformation, that much seems clear, but a preposition comes next. And I think that matters very much. Often, we hear the preposition "from" after the word "transformed," right? If I may be so bold, what if we considered another preposition here? What if instead of the new covenant transforming us, it transformed us into what we were always made to be? Some have called this the True Self, the Divine spark within us who understands what it means to "know the [Holy One]" and doesn't look to external authority for validation.

The John reading has a story describing a seemingly very different situation. We have "outsiders" wishing to see Jesus. And Jesus answers with some vague words about a grain of wheat falling into the earth and dying. What do these events have to do with the new covenant? Perhaps more than we might notice at first glance.

Transformation into requires a kind of death. Perhaps it's a death to the linear road we would prefer for our life's path; perhaps it's a death to the certainty others seem to promote so glibly; there are many kinds of death this new covenant asks. But the one that appears front and center in the John text is the death to exclusion. Jesus' response of the single grain of wheat dying so that it may multiply has to do with the expansion of the Kin-dom of God wherein ALL are invited to this new covenant of belonging.

As we consider the words transformation into, let us not forget their overlay with the word neighborly. Let us not forget the expansive nature of the Kin-dom of God within us and how it was never meant to stay there but build bridges, listen to stories, and disrupt narratives that exclude. May we become such good neighbors ourselves.

The Questions for the Week:

• When have you felt the comfort of the law written on the heart? Perhaps a sense of "knowing the LORD" that transcended your circumstance?
• Where in your life right now do you sense your prayers echo those of the Greeks (John 12): "[we] wish to see Jesus"?

The Practices for the Week:

• Write, draw, or type out the word "expand." Carry it in your pocket, purse, wallet, or car as you come and go. Let it remind you—as you look at the faces of baristas or fast food employees, at children or grandparents, at friends or partners—that the Kin-dom of God within us is expansive, not exclusive.
• Let your hand open (expand) when you feel the wonder, inspiration, or gratitude well up inside you at the neighborliness of knowing all are welcome to the new covenant. Let this be a physical reminder of the joy of participation in our transformation.

The Prayer for the Week:

Open us, God, to a vision

Bigger than ourselves.

Teach us how to become neighborly

As we live into the law

Your kin-dom invites.

Amen.

Through Stained Glass: Week 4 -- Becoming Committed Loving the World

 Becoming Committed – Loving the World

Morning Psalms for the week: 119, 145 (Monday); 34, 146 (Tuesday); 5, 147:1-11 (Wednesday); 27, 147:12-20 (Thursday); 22, 148 (Friday); 43, 149 (Saturday)

Evening Psalms for the week: 121, 6 (Monday); 25, 91 (Tuesday); 27, 51 (Wednesday); 126, 102 (Thursday); 105, 130 (Friday; 31, 143 (Saturday)

Old Testament: Gen. 49:1 – 50:26; Exod. 1:6 – 3:15

Epistle: 1 Cor. 10:14 – 13:3

Gospel: Mark 7:24 – 9:29

Will you love the ‘you’ you hide if I but call your name? Will you quell the fear inside and

never be the same? Will you use the faith you’ve found to reshape the world around,

through my sight and touch and sound in you and you in me?

Lord, your summons echoes true when you but call my name. Let me turn and follow you and never be the same. In your company I’ll go where your love and footsteps show. Thus I’ll move

and live and grow in you and you in me. (Will You Come and Follow Me, verses 4, 5)

    For God so loved the world…I would bet that these words frequently come to mind for many of us if—on the spur of the moment—we are asked to name our favorite Bible verse. A close second might be to love God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind…and love your neighbor as yourself. Then of course, there is Paul’s beautiful exposition on love in 1 Corinthians. “If we do not have love,” says Paul, “we are nothing.”

    I admit that these days, it can be hard to love the world. There’s so much chaos, pain and confusion; we are bombarded by it every day. It hurts. In 2020, as we were beginning to emerge from the pandemic, I wrote a poem called “Fever Dream.” I thought about sharing it—because I still sometimes feel this way—but thankfully (for you) I decided it was too bleak! Instead, I share this photo from Dauphin Island, Alabama—the place I go to experience the healing beauty of Creation and to let God restore my soul. We all have such places in the world, and they are incredibly important. In these places, we remember that the world was created in love, that love defines our deepest selves, and that love is the summons that calls us to move with Christ to reshape the world. In Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, Zossima says, “What is hell? I maintain that hell is the suffering of being unable to love.” Wow!

    Loving the world takes some practice—and a deep intentionality. It is much easier to join a crowd dedicated to self-interest than to walk in the footsteps of Jesus. The first way promises security and permits the exclusion of uncomfortable reality; the other invites challenge, even suffering. When Peter objects to Jesus talking about his impending suffering, Jesus says, “Get behind me, Satan!” Jesus insists on a multi-dimensional life, reminding us that claiming our faith means leaving our fear and uncertainty behind and participating in the suffering of others. Following the crowd is easy, but it requires us to sacrifice our deepest selves to an ideology. The way of Jesus, on the other hand, leads to freedom and transformation—to self-discovery and ever-deepening commitment. Sometimes it’s easy to look around at our human-distorted “world” and think it is the world God intended. Yet throughout our gospel readings during Lent, we hear Jesus describe a different world, one that originated in undeniable and abundant love, and one that is within reach if we move and live and grow together with Christ.

Jose Andres’ World Central Kitchen goes directly to disaster areas—floods,

earthquakes, hurricanes, etc.—to provide essential meals. Here WCK serves

food to Ukrainians displaced by war.

 

    Loving the world means, of course, loving and respecting and protecting our incredible physical world—our God-gifted garden paradise. It means loving the people who live in it—whoever, whatever, however they are. It also means loving ourselves even when we doubt or fall short of expectations. It means not giving up our commitment to do and be better. It means believing in the possibility of resurrection and restoration. In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul lays out what this looks like. While he is writing to a specific church, his message provides a pathway for all of us, despite our diversity of mind or being, to live together differently—moving and living and growing in, through and with Christ. Into a broken world. 

    Paul writes: “God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, that there be no dissention within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.” (1 Cor. 12:24-26) And he tells us clearly what it is that holds the body together: “If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.” (1Cor. 13:1-3) Love is the original wellspring.

    This sentiment is not unique to Christianity. Many cultures and religions are based on a similar call to love as a means of creating community and counteracting the pervasive influence of rampant and destructive individualism. The African concept of ubuntu, for example, says that one’s sense of self is shaped by one’s relationships with other people—a way of living in relationship with others and with the natural world that begins with the premise, “I am only because we are.”

    I hope that as we come to the end of this week of considering how we become committed, you are inspired to pay attention to relationships, to celebrate the true reciprocity of community, to “love the ‘you’ you hide, to let yourselves be transformed by love. When the English poet John Donne was very ill, he heard funeral bells ringing across the city, and he wrote a short essay that became this poem:

No man is an island,

Entire of itself;

Every man is a piece of the continent,

A part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,

Europe is the less,

As well as if a promontory were:

As well as if a manor of thy friend’s

Or of thine own were.

Any man’s death diminishes me,

Because I am involved in mankind.

And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;

It tolls for thee.

    This poem reminds me of Paul’s message: “If all were a single member, where would the body be?” Will You Come and Follow Me? is my favorite hymn because it exudes love and reminds me that God is present to us all through love and community.…”wherever two or more are gathered in my name,” says Jesus. It renews my own commitment and gives me strength. In The Longing for Home, Frederick Buechner wrote, “Sometimes, by the grace of God, I have it in me to be Christ to other people. And so, of course, have we all—the life-giving, life-saving, and healing power to be saints, to be Christs, maybe at rare moments even to ourselves.” May it be so.

The Pando (“I spread’) Aspen Grove, located in Utah’s Fishlake National Forest, is the largest, most dense organism ever found at nearly 13 million pounds. It originated from a single seed and spreads by sending up new shoots from the expanding root system. The clone spreads over 106 acres and consists of over 40,000 individual trees. The exact age of the clone and its root system is difficult to calculate, but it is estimated to have started at the end of the last ice age. Scientists are concerned today because the clone is showing signs of decline. For more information check out www.friendsofpando.org.

Through Stained Glass: Week 4 of Lent -- Becoming Committed

 Becoming Committed – “Tired of giving in…” 

Morning Psalms for the week: 119, 145 (Monday); 34, 146 (Tuesday); 5, 147:1-11 (Wednesday); 27, 147:12-20 (Thursday); 22, 148 (Friday); 43, 149 (Saturday)

Evening Psalms for the week: 121, 6 (Monday); 25, 91 (Tuesday); 27, 51 (Wednesday); 126, 102 (Thursday); 105, 130 (Friday; 31, 143 (Saturday)

Old Testament: Gen. 49:1 – 50:26; Exod. 1:6 – 3:15

Epistle: 1 Cor. 10:14 – 13:3

Gospel: Mark 7:24 – 9:29

Will you let the blinded see if I but call your name? Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same? Will you kiss the leper clean, and do such as this unseen and admit to what I am you and you in me? (Verse 3, “Will You Come and Follow Me?)

                                             

    

Rosa Parks Library and Museum

                                                              

Montgomery, AL

 

I imagine everyone has a favorite historical action figure, but mine is Rosa Parks. Miss Rosa was born in 1913 in Tuskegee, Alabama. Her mother was a teacher and her father a carpenter. She suffered from chronic illness as a child and was repeatedly bullied. After her parents separated, she moved with her mother to Montgomery where she later worked as a seamstress and became active in the Civil Rights Movement. We (and I mean we white people) generally turn Rosa Parks into a romanticized, even non-threatening, hero, imagining her as a diminutive woman whose signature act of defiance was more serendipitous than intentional. But nothing could be further from the truth. Rosa Parks was a disrupter—a powerhouse of determination and commitment who devoted herself to advancing racial justice until her death in 2005 at the age of 92. A keen observer of human behavior, she recalled her grandfather guarding their front door with a shotgun as the KKK marched down the street; she saw the buses passing that carried only white students to school while she and her friends walked. Parks later wrote, “As far back as I can remember, I could never think in terms of accepting physical abuse without some form of retaliation if possible.”

 

In 1943, Rosa Parks joined the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP and became its secretary. In 1945, despite Jim Crow laws and discrimination by poll workers, she finally succeeded in registering to vote on her third try. She and her husband became early members of the League of Women Voters. Sponsored by liberal white friends, she attended the Highlander Folk School, an education center for activism in workers’ rights and racial equality. She turned that education into her life’s work.

 

Rosa Parks was not an accidental activist. She is perhaps best known for her role in the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955. Challenging segregation on the city buses had been tried unsuccessfully before, but following her refusal to give up her seat in the “colored section” of a bus driven by James Blake (who had left her standing in the rain 12 years earlier), leaders of the NAACP believed she was the best candidate to see through a challenge in the courts. Of her experience, Parks said, “People always say that I didn’t give up my seat because I was tired, but that isn’t true. I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was forty-two. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in.” 

 

The Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, which I visited in 2022, documents the history of racial discrimination in transportation, including the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The Boycott was a monumental undertaking. Local leaders formed the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) to spearhead the effort; 50,000 protest leaflets were distributed around town; Martin Luther King was recruited to lead the MIA. Under King’s leadership, a one-day Boycott was an astonishing success. In order to continue it, the MIA established a carpool system, with over 200 drivers and 100 pick-up stations. At the center of the effort were African American churches, which held meetings and raised funds to support the Boycott. Not just one person, but a whole community of people who were “tired of giving in.” The Bus Boycott lasted for 382 days, financially crippling the city’s transportation system and drawing national attention. On November 13, 1956, the Supreme Court declared Alabama’s racial segregation laws for buses unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment.

 

In No Name on the Street, James Baldwin wrote, “It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.” Perhaps what Jesus shows us above all is that it is our sacred duty to resist the domination of an empire that relies for its strength on the ignorance of the governed and the disenfranchisement of the powerless. Rosa Parks was tired of giving in. When Jesus caused a riot in the temple, he was tired of giving in. By his own example, Jesus tells us that we, too, must be tired of giving in to injustice in all its manifestations. We, too, must overcome the fear of being uncomfortable, of facing fear and criticism. We, too, must resist the temptation to hide anonymously behind conformist practices or the conventions of the dominant culture. ‘Why are you talking about having no bread,” says Jesus to the disciples in frustration, reminding them to rely on him and not the “yeast” of empire. Through Jesus, wrote Marcus Borg, God becomes an “experiential reality.” God is not to be thought of “as a remote and transcendent creator far removed from the world, but imaged all around us.” 

 

Throughout the stories in Mark, we see Jesus engaging directly and intimately with the marginalized, elevating and celebrating them. His engagement is physical and personal—using dirt and his own saliva to heal, lifting the suffering by the hand, feeding the multitudes of outsiders who come hungry—literally and figuratively—to hear him preach. His frustration with the disciples is often palpable. “Do you still not perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes, and fail to see? Do you have ears and fail to hear?” (Mark 8:17-18) He might be talking to us as well! 

 

Pay attention to this world, says Jesus. Admit to what I am in you and you in me. Serve the needs of justice—not to be seen or recognized as those in power do to expand their influence, but because it is right. Lead when called to do so, but be willing to relinquish your privilege and take a back seat on the bus, ceding power to others who can speak for themselves. Jesus says, “If any want to be my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their crosses and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?” (Mark 8:34-35) Courage, persistence, intimacy, attention, compassion—these are the requirements of a commitment that is “tired of giving in.” The questions for us, surely, are these: What do we see that will cause us not just to bear witness, but to act? How will we use our privilege, our spiritual gifts, and our faith—the dirt and saliva of our lives—for the cause of justice and liberation?

 

                                      

                        This is me in Montgomery with Miss Rosa and Keelan Adams 

                                               of Montgomery Deep History Tours

Through Stained Glass: Lent Week 4 -- Will You Come and Follow Me?

 Becoming Committed – Will you Come and Follow Me?

Morning Psalms for the week: 119, 145 (Monday); 34, 146 (Tuesday); 5, 147:1-11 (Wednesday); 27, 147:12-20 (Thursday); 22, 148 (Friday); 43, 149 (Saturday)

Evening Psalms for the week: 121, 6 (Monday); 25, 91 (Tuesday); 27, 51 (Wednesday); 126, 102 (Thursday); 105, 130 (Friday; 31, 143 (Saturday)

Old Testament: Gen. 49:1 – 50:26; Exod. 1:6 – 3:15

Epistle: 1 Cor. 10:14 – 13:3

Gospel: Mark 7:24 – 9:29

Believing in Jesus does not mean believing doctrines about him. Rather, it means to give one’s heart, one’s self, at its deepest level. Marcus Borg, Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time

             

                                  Detail from Caravaggio’s The Calling of Saint Matthew

        Will you come and follow me if I but call your name? Will you go where you

        don’t know and never be the same? Will you let my love be shown; will you

        let my name be known; will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?

       Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name? Will you care for cruel

       and kind and never be the same? Will you risk the hostile stare should your

       life attract or scare? Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?

Several weeks ago during worship we sang these words from my favorite hymn. I cry every time I sing them. On the most immediate level, I am moved by such a simple and explicit invitation—one that calls for our intentional and uncompromising response. On a more subliminal level, I can’t help but remember all the stories we have inherited through Scripture that speak to us of calling. God cries to Moses from a burning bush: “Moses, Moses!” And Moses responds, “Here I am.” God calls to Samuel, “Samuel, Samuel!” Again the response is “Here I am”—though of course it takes the boy Samuel several tries before he realizes it is God who is speaking to him. Finally, he says to God, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” When God sends the angel Gabriel to Mary, she says, “Here I am, the servant of the Lord; let it be according to your word.” Then, of course, are all the invitations of Jesus, originating with his call to the first disciples and echoed down to us now for over two thousand years. Will you come and follow me? 

           Maybe the reason this hymn always brings tears to my eyes is that it just feels so darn personal. As Marcus Borg suggests, it speaks to my heart at its deepest level. What else can you do if you hear Jesus calling you by name other than answer? How else can you respond except to offer your own commitment in response? When a friend or family member asks you to do something, you don’t ask questions. When an injustice requires your response, you don’t run and hide. When you see a way to bring your special gifts to bear on behalf of another or for your community, you gladly share them. You don’t ask what’s in it for you…all you see is the holy gesture—the hand of a friend reaching out for your support. You “leave yourself behind.” The beautiful thing about the words of this hymn is that they resonate not with command, but with invitation and intimacy. 

           The other thing that really grabs me is the emphasis on reciprocity. “Will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?” These are words about relationship—a relationship that develops through our becoming committed with, through and in Christ to show love, spread good news, and care for others despite their cruelty or kindness. The idea that we grow through Christ (and through this effort) is nothing new. That Christ grows through us? Now that is something to think about! To believe that we have a role in expanding the cosmic presence of Christ—the Christ—in the world is perhaps the most powerful invitation of all. Love, equity, reciprocity, transformation….that is what Jesus’ call to the disciples—and to us—involves. Throughout Paul’s first letter to the Church in Corinth, we see him exploring what it means to live a Spirit-guided life, as individuals and as part of a community—combining ideas of freedom and love, living from the heart and being moral agents in the wider world, celebrating one’s unique gifts and using them for the greater good. For Paul, our Christian faith is lived in community—and in loving relationship.

           This challenge is not without risk. We are to be bold, even if that means risking a “hostile stare.” Marcus Borg writes: “As a journeying with Jesus, discipleship means being on the road with him. It means to be an itinerant, a sojourner…it means undertaking the journey from the life of conventional wisdom, from life in our Egypt and life in our Babylon, to the alternative wisdom of life in the Spirit….to become part of the alternate community of Jesus.” It is not always easy, as the stories in Mark this week show us. But as Frederick Buechner writes in The Longing for Home, “We have God’s joy in our blood,” and the reward of our commitment to following Jesus into the unknown is that we are irrevocably changed—as the hymn says, “Will you go where you don’t know and never be the same?” 

           In her famous description of being visited by an angel of God, Saint Teresa talks about the “gentle wooing” between God and the soul. As you make your way through this week, may you find ways to create the space in your heart and soul to hear Jesus calling you—ever so gently and intimately, so softly and tenderly—by name. And may you find the love, courage and commitment to answer, “Here I am.” I leave you with these moving words of Albert Schweitzer from The Quest for the Historical Jesus as inspiration:

He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside, He came to those who knew Him. He speaks to us the same word: “Follow thou me!” and sets us to the tasks which He has to fulfill for our time. He commands. And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal Himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship, and, as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He is.

AMEN

                                                 

                     Sunrise on the freedom highway between Selma and Montgomery

                                                          

       October 2022.

It was not enough to come out and listen to a great sermon or message every Sunday morning and be confined to those four walls and those four corners. You had to get out and do something. John Lewis following the death of George Floyd