Sermon – Luke 14.25-33, P18, YC, September 8, 2019

Tags

blessing, community, cost, cross, decisions, discipleship, easy, hard, hate, Jesus, light, possessions, priorities, rainbows, Sermon, sunshine

One of the things I enjoyed about living on Long Island was the directness of communication.  Now do not get me wrong, having been raised in the South, I know all too well that when your mom says, “You’re wearing that?” or if your grandma says, “Don’t you want to wear lipstick?” or if your friend says, “Well those new shoes are utilitarian,” they are not actually saying what they mean.  On Long Island things are much clearer.  Instead you’ll be told, “Don’t wear that,” “Put on some lipstick; I’ll show you which one,” and “Those shoes are awful.”  The words always sting, but at least you know you what people think.

Today’s gospel has me convinced some of Jesus’ relatives were from Long Island.  In these short eight verses, Jesus says if we want to follow him, we will need to sell our possessions, carry our cross, and hate our parents, spouse, children, siblings, and even life itself.  I have to say, on this Rally Sunday, on the day we return to the fullness of Hickory Neck, and we feast and laugh and worship together, I could have used a little more southern-speak from Jesus today.  At least Jesus could have saved the hard sell for Stewardship season!

But as we start putting our calendars together for the fall, as our children sign up for the extracurricular activities, and as we think about what ministries we may want to try at Hickory Neck this fall, I suppose there is no time like the present to get real.  This is a season of hard choices.  I know in our household alone, there were two awesome opportunities for afterschool activities that fell on the exact same time and day.  And so we had to make a hard decision.  As I have mapped out my own calendar, I have realized that there are things I can say yes to and things to which I have to say no.  And on the really tricky days, there are times when our family has to bring in a third adult to help us juggle four people’s commitments.  This is a season of hard choices and consequences.  This is a season of priorities.

I do not actually think Jesus is being harsh today.  I know we sometimes get so used to the inclusive, loving, embracing God that we forget that following Jesus is not all rainbows and sunshine.  Jesus, like our beloved Long Islanders, is not harsh – just honest.  And Jesus is not saying there will be no health, healing, and wholeness; no justice, mercy, and grace; no forgiveness, salvation, and eternal life.  But Jesus is saying those things will cost us.  All those rainbows and sunshine we will receive come at the cost of redistributing wealth, of being faithful even when being faithful gets us ostracized from our social circles, of being intolerant of injustice even if doing so risks our most valued relationships with others.

If we can agree that Jesus is just being honest, understanding why he is setting such a high standard can be helpful.  Starting with one of the trickier things Jesus says today may be best.  Jesus says in the final verse today, “None of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.”  Though money is a taboo subject for most people, Jesus talks about money perhaps more than any other subject in scripture.  Jesus talks about money so much because Jesus knows the power money has over us.  Jesus tells us to give up our possessions, to stop worrying about what is mine because my obsession with owning, possessing, or claiming things as my own can make me think ownership is my exclusive, inviolable right.  Jesus knows having possessions can make me think all things are my own:  my money, my time, my comfortable lifestyle, my political or religious beliefs, my closest relationship, my independence.  Jesus knows when I get possessive, I cling to things that are not God, and create habits in myself leading me to smother, not love; to exploit, not steward; to hoard, not appreciate.[i]

On the podcast “On Being,” Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie retells an old Talmudic parable.  In the parable there is “a ship that is sailing, and there are many cabins.  And one of the people in the cabins on the lower floor decides to dig a hole in the floor of his cabin, and does so, and sure enough, the ship begins to sink.  And the other passengers suddenly discover what’s going on and see this guy with a hole in the floor.  And they say, ‘What are you doing?’ And he says, ‘Well, it’s my cabin. I paid for it.’  And down goes the ship.”[ii]  What this parable and what Jesus are trying to do is help us see that possessions tempt us to live like the man in the cabin – to believe our ownership negates our relationship to others.  Our possessions can create an obsession with “me, me, me,” with a disregard for the “we” to which we belong as followers of Christ.

Jesus also says in verse 27, “Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.”  Part of Jesus’ cross is a redefining of the “we,” we were just talking about.  If you have read your September Nuggets, our newsletter, you know one of the rallying calls of stewardship this fall is going to be “We are Hickory Neck!”  When I thought about that call, I immediately thought about the movie We Are Marshall.  In the film, the rally call “We Are,” answered vigorously by “Marshall!” is a definitive moment about not letting tragedy overcome goodness – not letting death squash life.  When we start our own rallying, “We are Hickory Neck,” we probably all have things about Hickory Neck that are dear to our heart, that inspire our belonging here, and motivate our involvement here.  One of the things we are doing in the call, “We are Hickory Neck,” is also defining who the “we” is in that call.  In carrying our cross as Jesus invites today, we are not just talking about personal sacrifice.  We are also asking, to whom and for whom we are responsible.  We are widening the circle of “my people,” to consider who the people are we will love, welcome, serve, and for which we would make sacrifices.  We are taking on the task of widening our “we” to be broader and riskier than we have previously embraced.  By taking up our cross, we are saying the whole ship, not just my cabin on the ship, but the whole ship has an irrefutable claim on my life.[iii]

Perhaps the hardest thing Jesus says comes right at the beginning, in verse 26.  Jesus says, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”  Hate is a strong word – a word we have banned in our home, especially when talking about other family members.  I will not be going home today and telling our children they can pick up that word again.  But I do think Jesus uses a powerful word because the power of discipleship will involve taking on some powerful experiences.  We will need to be willing to hate some things about this life.  We will need to ask which customs, beliefs, or traditions we have inherited we need to renounce in order to follow Jesus.  We will need to look at what baggage we need to abandon, what ties we must loosen, what relationships we must subordinate.  What scholar Debie Thomas says is “Jesus spoke his hard words about ‘hating’ one’s family in a cultural context where the extended family was the source of a person’s security and stability.  Jewish families in first century Palestine were self-sustaining economic units.  No one in their right mind would leave such a unit behind in order to follow a homeless, controversial preacher into some uncertain future.”  What Thomas asks us to consider is what sources of modern-day security and stability we trust more than we trust God.[iv]

So if this is what discipleship looks like, where is the Good News in Jesus’ challenge today?  Why would we do all this hard stuff?  We do all the hard stuff of discipleship because of the rainbows and sunshine.  We give up a sense of possession, we take on crosses, and we renounce things we have loved because we have experienced the rainbows and sunshine of Hickory Neck:  we have experienced life-altering community here; we have experienced love, joy, and blessing we did not know we needed here; we have found purpose, meaning, and value here.  We also take on Jesus’ intense notion of discipleship because we have experienced the rainbows and sunshine of the world around us:  we have experienced the profundity of loving our neighbor as ourselves; we have experienced the blessing of seeing God in someone we thought unworthy of our love; we have experienced being transformed by walking right out of our comfort zones into life-giving discomfort zones.  We accept the invitation of illogical discipleship because of the more cosmic rainbows and sunshine of faith:  of being known and accepted by a loving, living God; of the promise of forgiveness of our most heinous sins; of the reality of eternal life made possible through Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection.  Once we start thinking about the rewards of the life of discipleship, the cost seems surmountable.  Once we look at the depth of Christ’s rainbows and sunshine, letting go of possessions, taking up crosses, and hating the stuff of life that only brings death seems much less scary.  Once we realize we may not be able to do whatever we want to in our cabin, we realize we have a ship full of people ready to hold our hands as we take on the burden of discipleship together – because the burden is easy and the yoke is light.  Amen.

[i] Debie Thomas, “What It Will Cost You,” Journey with Jesus, September 1, 2019, as found at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/lectionary-essays/current-essay?id=2346 on September 4, 2019.

[ii] Amichai Lau-Lavee, “First Aid for Spiritual Seekers,” On Being with Krista Tippet, July 13, 2017, as found at https://onbeing.org/programs/amichai-lau-lavie-first-aid-for-spiritual-seekers/ on September 6, 2019.

[iii] Thomas.

[iv] Thomas.

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Sermon – Luke 6.27-38, EP7, YC, February 24, 2019

Tags

change, commands, discipleship, God, hard, intentional, Jesus, kindness, love, loving kindness, mercy, Sermon, shelter, sickness, symptoms, system

Last week, we joined the entire community of Williamsburg in performing acts of kindness.  When we issued the charge two weeks ago to go out and perform three acts of kindness, the reactions were pretty wide-ranging at Hickory Neck.  Several parishioners addressed me with concern, “I have to do three?  Can’t I just do one act before next Sunday?”  Other parishioners took on the challenge with gusto – with several parishioners plotting out what they were going to do before they even got back to the parking lot.  While other parishioners noted during the week and the days afterwards how shockingly easy the challenge was.  “I felt silly writing down my acts of kindness.  I mean, I do acts of kindness every week,” shared one parishioner.

I am not sure which perspective was predominant, but I can tell you that Hickory Neck performed over 100 acts of kindness that week.  There were some simple acts:  holding doors for strangers, paying people compliments, and writing thank you notes.  Some were a little more labor intensive:  volunteering at a food pantry, helping out at your child’s school, going through your closet to donate clothes.  Others showed some real effort:  listening to a stranger who seemed to need a friend, making Valentines for the whole class – even the kids you do not like, visiting someone in the hospital – even though you hate hospitals.

Now I know several parishioners who thought our challenge was a bit silly or who felt uncomfortable with the idea of drawing attention to our own good works.  Surely we should just be doing acts of kindness every week.  But for those of you who jumped in with both feet, my hope is that you got a tiny glimpse into what can happen when you start living out kindness more intentionally:  your whole way of being starts to shift.  When you do acts of kindness, the more opportunities for additional kindness seem to appear.  The more you think about kindness, the more you start to notice kindness all around you.  And the more you engage in kindness, the more your whole demeanor shifts – from one of staying in your lane, attending to your daily routine, to lifting up you head and noticing how you can shift the community around you.

That seismic shift is what Jesus is talking about in Luke’s gospel today.  Many of us hear the instructions from Jesus as a list of commands or a checklist of duties:  love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you; do not judge, do not condemn, forgive, and give.  If we look at today as a list of commands from Jesus, then we might as well consider this week as Week Two of an acts of kindness challenge – except this time, Jesus asks us to do acts of kindness for those to whom showing kindness is the hardest.  When we read Jesus’ words like a weighty list of to-do items, this gospel feels just that – full of weight and guilt with no promise of hope or encouragement.  And part of what Jesus is saying is just that:  showing kindness is actually pretty hard when we show kindness to those who are hardest to love.  We do not mind showing kindness to friends, and we do not even really mind showing kindness to strangers.  But asking us to show kindness to those who we actively dislike or to those who have hurt us?  Now Jesus is pushing us way out of our comfort zones!

At the beginning of February, the Greater Williamsburg area kicked off a commitment to becoming a community of kindness with a rallying event.  The former Mayor of Anaheim, California, Tom Tait, who had run on a campaign of kindness, was the keynote speaker.  Mayor Tait talked about his time on City Council in Anaheim, how part of his work felt like a game of whack-a-mole.  Each month, some crisis or community problem would arise – violence in the community, the prevalence of drugs, problems in the public schools.  And the City Council’s response felt like trying to whack at the problem to temporarily knock the problem out.  But those solutions never really made a deep impact.  What Mayor Tait saw was all those problems were like symptoms – symptoms of a city that was facing an internal sickness.  The only way to heal the internal sickness was to commit as a city to transform its entire way of operating.  Mayor Tait believed transformation would occur by committing to kindness.  To many, the idea sounded a little too pie-in-the-sky.  But once elected, Mayor Tait was forced to try to live out the reality of kindness.  With every decision, every major action, the community wondered together what would reflect kindness.  And slowly, the illness in the system began to heal.  Kindness was not a Band-Aid, but a system-altering antidote to a host of problems.

In a lot of ways, that is what Jesus is talking about today.  Yes, the things Jesus is talking about are commands – a list of ways to be kind, even to the persons to whom being kind is most difficult.  But Jesus is not just talking about commands.  As one scholar describes, “Jesus isn’t offering a set of simple rules by which to get by or get ahead in this world but is inviting us into a whole other world.  A world that is not about measuring and counting and weighing and competing and judging and paying back and hating and all the rest.  But instead is about love. Love for those who have loved you.  Love for those who haven’t.  Love even for those who have hated you.  That love gets expressed in all kinds of creative ways, but often come through by caring – extending care and compassion and help and comfort to those in need – and forgiveness – not paying back but instead releasing one’s claim on another and opening up a future where a relationship of …love is still possible.”[i]

What Jesus is doing is trying to, “inculcate, and illustrate, an attitude of heart, a lightness of spirit in the face of all that the world can throw at you.”  We are to assume this new way of being because “that’s what God is like.  God is generous to all people, generous…to a fault:  [God] provides good things for all to enjoy, the undeserving as well as the deserving.  [God] is astonishingly merciful…”  As N. T. Wright adds, “…this list of instructions is all about which God you believe in – and about the way of life that follows as a result.”[ii]  When we take Jesus seriously, and embrace this new way of being, the way of kindness that leads to love, life can be “exuberant, different, astonishing.  People [will] stare.”[iii]

In a lot of ways, what Jesus does to today is saying, “I see your week of kindness, and I raise you to life of loving-kindness.”  In other words, keep going.  Now, fortunately for us, Hickory Neck has set up the perfect set of circumstances for you to try on this new life of loving-kindness.  Tonight, we open our doors to strangers.  Tonight, we open our doors to some people we will find easy to love, and some people that will make us uncomfortable.  Tonight, we open our doors to some late nights, really early mornings, and hard labor.  But tonight, we also open our doors to a new way of being – a way of opening ourselves to live exuberantly, differently, astonishingly – to live like God.

Now I know one week (or even the one shift or duty you signed up for at the Winter Shelter, or even the financial contribution you made) may not change the world necessarily.  Jesus is talking about a seismic change in the way we live our lives every day.  But the Winter Shelter is a pretty good start.  And the good news for you, is Lent is coming, and we’ve set up all kinds of tools for you to embrace this way of loving-kindness.  Instead of a week of kindness, we have a whole 40-day kindness challenge.  We have a devotional set of readings that reflect on kindness, story, and scripture for forty days.  We will be studying kindness in scripture.  Hickory Neck has assembled the tools to help you not just try simple deeds for a week, or not just try the hard stuff of relationship with the homeless for a week – but instead to try on a new way of being – to take on the way of God.  Part of what Hickory Neck is all about is empowering discipleship – empowering you to go out into the world and live as faithful witnesses of Christ.  This is what discipleship is all about.  And Hickory Neck is here to help – to walk with you, to lift you up when you fall, to hold your hand in the hard parts, and to revel in the joy of watching love win.  We cannot wait to enter in to this most sacred time of loving-kindness with you!  Amen.

[i] David Lose, “Epiphany 7 C:  Command or Promise?” February 22, 2019, as found at http://www.davidlose.net/2019/02/epiphany-7-c-command-or-promise/ on February 22, 2019.

[ii] N.T. Wright, Luke for Everyone (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2004), 73-74.

[iii] Wright, 74.

On Discipleship and Decisions…

Tags

decisions, disciple, discipleship, Episcopal, Episcopal Church, General Convention, identity, Jesus, prayer

Photo credit:  https://religionnews.com/2015/07/02/episcopal-church-expansive-inclusive-thanks-gay-marriage-votes-commentary/

Today, I am traveling to Austin for the General Convention of the Episcopal Church.  General Convention meets every three years and is a bicameral legislature that includes the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops, composed of deputies and bishops from each diocese. During General Convention, deputies and bishops consider a wide range of important matters facing the Church.  Some years the issues have a huge impact (examples include the ordination of women and members of the LGBTQ community, as well as same-sex marriage).  Other years, General Convention works on important issues that are less flashy.  Regardless of the news cycle, the work of General Convention is about continuing to define who and whose we are, and making sure our work reflects our identity.

I am attending this year as an alternate clergy deputy for the Diocese of Southern Virginia.  My work is to support the eight clergy and lay deputies and our bishops, helping them make important decisions, and filling in when breaks are needed.  The official meetings take place July 5-13, but there are already many committee meetings happening.

In talking to a clergy colleague about my participation in General Convention he asked me, “Why in the world did you volunteer?”  I have been thinking (and laughing) about that question, and after reflection, I realized why I was so interested in serving.  One of the things I preach about a lot is about identity – understanding it, naming it, living into it.  In the current climate of the United States, our identity as disciples of Jesus is an anchor.  But just saying we are disciples without critically examining our lives through that lens does little good.  For me, being a part of General Convention is a way of participating in the work of honing our identity as Episcopalians, and where applicable, helping us to better live into that identity.

I look forward to serving the broader church, our Diocese, and ultimately my parish through this work.  This kind of work creates the space for making us all better, and I am hopeful about what the week can bring.  I ask your prayers for the General Convention over the next many days.  Like any family, parish, Diocese, or church who tries to come to consensus across differences, we will need your prayers to listen deeply, speak intentionally, and make decisions thoughtfully and prayerfully.  I look forward to sharing this experience with you!

Sermon – Mark 1.29-39, EP5, YB, February 4, 2018

Tags

#metoo, Bible, disciples, discipleship, gender, interpret, Jesus, men, reassuring, role, scripture, Sermon, together, uncomfortable, women

One of the things I love about the Bible is that the Bible never makes you feel wholly comfortable.  You can always find a comforting passage – a victorious song from Isaiah, soothing words from a psalm, a story of encouragement or inspiration about a beloved character.  But as you read Holy Scripture, you can almost as equally find passages that make you bristle.  This especially happens when you follow the lectionary, because, much to the chagrin of your preachers, you cannot pick and choose what texts you like.  And so, you open up the assigned text and your modern sensibilities say, “Whoa!  Hey now!”

Today’s lesson from Mark hit me that way at first glance.  Jesus has had a pretty full day.  On the Sabbath, Jesus and the disciples go to the synagogue and Jesus teaches with an authority that amazes those gathered.  He rids a man of an unclean spirit, and the people marvel again.  Jesus leaves the temple and goes to Simon Peter’s house.  Before he can even sit down, the disciples tell him that Simon’s mother-in-law has a fever – which, in those days, is a dangerous condition.  Jesus goes to her, offers her his hand, she rises, and is healed.  And this is the part where I bristle.  The text says, “Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.”

The timing of this text could not be worse.  Our country is in the middle of a complete reevaluation of the treatment and role of women.  Just a few weeks ago, women around the country, and even here in Williamsburg, marched to protest the ways in which women are being treated and the ways in which legislation is affirming that treatment.  This year, Time Magazine chose the women of the #metoo movement as their “Person of the Year.”  These Silence Breakers are women who have begun to take a stand against sexual harassment and assault.  The magazine’s selection was timely, as story after story continues to break of prominent men are accused of mistreating and assaulting women.  Even our political elections are seeing more women running for office, including three graduates from the Naval Academy.[i]  In this season of women and men calling our country to examine the role and treatment of women, the last thing I wanted to hear was a story about a woman whose immediate reaction to a miraculous healing and resurrection is to go into the kitchen and serve the men.  She does not join the four disciples as part of Jesus’ entourage; she does not sit with Jesus and learn more from his teachings; she does not become an evangelist of the Good News.  The text simply says, “Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.”

One of the tricky things about reading Holy Scripture is how to interpret scripture in the context of our modern sensibilities.  In my last year of seminary, I decided to write my thesis on the book of Ruth for this same reason.  Here was an entire book on women – a rarity in scripture.  The first three chapters of the book show women of agency and power, who make their way, even in a world where widows have very little power.  Even Ruth is described as a woman of hayil, a Hebrew word reserved almost entirely to describe men of great power and military prowess.  And what happens to this mighty, powerful woman?  In the final chapter of the book, men determine Ruth’s fate, she gets married, has a child, and the child redeems her mother-in-law.  This character who speaks throughout the book is rendered voiceless throughout the last chapter.  It took me a year of wrestling with this book to realize that my modern lens and interpretation of the book of Ruth prevented me from understanding how Ruth’s fate does not mitigate her hayil, her power in the story.  Reading Ruth would never translate the same way to modern ears.  Ruth’s story is still a story of empowerment.  But in order to hear that empowerment, I would need a deeper understanding of the cultural context.  And I would need to be open to other messages from the text – not simply what I wanted to hear and have affirmed to my everyday life.

A similar reality is true in today’s reading from Mark.  This is not a story about a woman’s role or a woman’s expected place with Jesus.  This is not a story about the differences between men and women in the kingdom of God.  This is not a story about gender and discrimination.  This is a story about discipleship.[ii]  The past three weeks we have been talking about discipleship –  how discipleship is discerned within community, how discipleship involves sacrifice and a response to Jesus, how discipleship involves a sense of immediacy.  Today’s lesson reminds us that discipleship is also about service.

Simon’s mother-in-law does not recover from an illness and immediately begin to serve Jesus out of a sense of gendered identity.  She immediately begins to serve Jesus because, through her healing, she understands a key component in discipleship:  service. This is something the disciples will not learn until many chapters later, when Jesus says, “For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve.”[iii]  Two of the same disciples who are there this night of the mother-in-law’s healing, James and John, after ten chapters of following Jesus think discipleship means power and privilege – sitting at Jesus’ left and right hand.  But Jesus, the mother-in-law, and countless others show the disciples that discipleship is about service.  Discipleship is about what we reaffirm in our baptismal covenant – to seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves.

This story is not a story about gender and the role of women and men.  This story is about discipleship.  Now, for those of you who may still feel dissatisfied, what is interesting in this story is that in a room full of men, the woman is the one who actually understands what Jesus is all about.  We see that point even more fully when Simon Peter approaches Jesus later as Jesus is praying.  The text says, “In the morning, while it was still very dark, [Jesus] got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed.  And Simon and his companions hunted for him.”  Scholar’s argue that Simon did not simply “hunt for” or look for Jesus.  The implication of the Greek word here is that Simon vigorously looked for and approached Jesus with the intent of forcing Jesus to get back to work.[iv]  Simon misunderstands Jesus and the work of discipleship; Simon’s mother-in-law does not misunderstand.  But taking this story to be a feminist text of the women getting it and not the men is probably reading too much into the text too.  This is a text about one disciple getting it – getting it to strong degree.  In fact, the word used for “service” here, is the same root of the word for deacon.[v]  The service of the mother-in-law is akin to the work of deacons in the church.

I do not know where you find yourself in this text today.  Maybe the text is reassuring because you have made your life of discipleship about the service of the kingdom.  Maybe this text is reassuring because you understand that sometimes you do not always get the message, and yet you can still be disciples.  Or maybe this text is reassuring because you are grateful to be surrounded by disciples on various points of the spectrum, who are all figuring it out.  The point is – this is a reassuring text.  This passage from Mark is not meant to be a text for bristling, for defensiveness (on either side), or for creating a sense of failure.  This is a text which reassuringly reminds us that we are all on a journey to understanding discipleship and becoming more faithful disciples every day.  This text reminds us that we need each other: men and women, old and young, married and single.  Together we help each other walk with Christ.  Together we teach each other the work of discipleship.  Together we do the work of seeking and serving Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves.  Amen.

[i] Michael Tackett, “From Annapolis to Congress? These Three Women Know Tough Missions,” January 28, 2018, as found at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/29/us/politics/women-annapolis-democrats-congress-trump.html on February 2, 2018.

[ii] Karoline Lewis, “A Call Story,” January 28, 2018, as found at http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5052 on February 1, 2018.

[iii] Mark 10.45a.

[iv] Daniel J. Harrington, ed., The Gospel of Mark, Sacra Pagina Series, vol. 2 (Collegeville, MN:  The Liturgical Press, 2002), 87.

[v] Gary W. Charles, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 335.

Sermon – Mark 1.14-20, Jonah 3.1-3, 10, EP3, YB, January 21, 2018

Tags

adventure, brothers, call, community, disciple, discipleship, faithful, follow, God, gospel, immediately, Jesus, John, Jonah, journey, Mark, moment, Nathaniel, Sermon

What is fun about our lessons from last week and this week is we get two different gospellers’ versions of Jesus’ first call to the disciples.  Last week, in John’s gospel, we got that great story of Philip and Nathaniel.  When Philip is asked to follow Jesus, he runs to find Nathaniel.  They have this great conversation about whether anything good can come from Nazareth.  Nathaniel reluctantly comes, and when he finally speaks with Jesus, he is amazed at what Jesus knows about him.  In the midst of community, conversation, and collaboration, both Philip and Nathaniel are able to say yes to Jesus’ invitation to discipleship.  On the other hand, Mark’s gospel paints a very different picture of the calling of the disciples.  Mark tells us Jesus passes two sets of brothers by the seashore, and instructs them to follow him.  Both sets of brothers drop what they are in the middle of doing.  In fact, the second set of brothers wordlessly abandon their father to follow Jesus.  No conversations or discernment; no collaboration or goodbyes.  In Mark’s gospel, Jesus invites, and disciples drop everything immediately and go.

I do not know about you, but I am actually in the John camp when we are talking about discipleship.  As an extrovert, I tend to process things aloud.  I need to talk through a problem with others to figure out what the best option might be.  I like to get input from others, using them as sounding boards to make sure my decision will have a positive impact.  I like to marinate on the feedback, pray a bit, share my leanings with a confidant or two, and then act.  So the idea of Nathaniel hemming and hawing, expressing his initial doubt with Philip, and then challenging Jesus when he seems to have some insight about Nathaniel seems totally relatable to me.  I need conversation, community, and collaboration, especially if I am going to drop everything important in life and follow someone in a new direction.

In some ways, I may even be closer to Jonah when we are talking about discipleship.  We hear only a small part from Jonah’s riveting story today, but what we might all remember is Jonah is a terrible follower of God.  The first two chapters of Jonah are filled with Jonah saying “yes” to God, and then totally running in the opposite direction.  He even endangers some total strangers when he boards a boat in the opposite direction of Nineveh.  He needs to be swallowed by a large fish, facing death and shame before he is willing to do what God has asked Jonah to do.

Many of you have heard this before, but my own call narrative was neither immediate nor direct.  When I first sensed a call to ministry in college, I avoided it.  I figured, maybe I could just volunteer for a year instead.  I loved working at a Food Bank that year, but figured, maybe I should work at a faith-based non-profit instead.  That would certainly count as serving God, right?!?  And then, when that did not feel totally right, I started to look at going to school – not for a Masters in Divinity, but maybe to study theology.  You know, try to learn about God, but not to be a minister.  Even when my priest suggested ordination it took me another whole year of talking to other people, reading countless books, prayer, and going on retreat before I could say yes.  Clearly, my identification with Nathaniel and Jonah is not unfounded.

But today’s lessons are nothing like my tendencies.  The portion of Jonah that we get today does not highlight any of Jonah’s dramatic avoidance and foibles.  Instead, when Jonah offers the shortest sermon ever, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown,” immediately, the people of Nineveh believe God, proclaim a fast, and everyone – everyone great and small – puts on sackcloth.  To understand the significance of this response by Nineveh, we need to remember that Nineveh is no saint.  They are a great kingdom of people who have been oppressing God’s chosen for ages.  They are tyrants, powermongers, and bullies.  No one scares Nineveh.  And yet, with Jonah’s sermon of judgment, they stop immediately, take on a fast, and repent of their ways.  No debates, no town hall meetings, no consultation with the king.  In fact, in the verses we do not read today, the king even proclaims that the livestock need to be put in sackcloth.  The repentance of Nineveh is total and immediate.

We see the parallels in Mark’s gospel today.  The two sets of brothers we read about, Simon and Andrew and James and John sound very similar.  They are both in the fishing industry, they are both working on nets, and they both respond immediately to Jesus’ invitation to follow him.  But there are some subtle differences that make their stories even more powerful.  You see, Simon Peter and Andrew are fishing from the shore with leaded nets.  They are fishermen, but not very wealthy ones.  Meanwhile James and John are from a higher socioeconomic status.  James and John have a boat and hired workers.  They are fishing by dragnet method, which means they are able to harvest much larger catches.[i]  Their father is also mentioned, which likely means their family has been at this business for generations.  And yet, despite the fact that James are John are in the midst of a long-standing, thriving business, both James and John and Simon Peter and Andrew have the same response to Jesus.  They drop everything immediately and go.

I wonder when you have similarly acted with immediacy to God’s call on you.  The moments do not have to be as dramatic as walking out of the classroom, office, or house without a word to anyone.  Maybe they were moments around giving to the church or a cause.  Maybe they were moments when you offered help to a stranger, knowing full well you were going to be late to your next engagement.  Maybe you called a Congress member or State Representative because your faith could no longer tolerate inaction on an issue.  Maybe you heard the volunteer sexton was retiring, and you said, “Here I am.”  Or maybe your immediacy was in getting out of bed one day and finally stepping in the doors of a church – because you needed a community to help you figure out this voice that was calling you to something new.  At some point all of us hear Jesus say, “Follow me.”

Now you may be sitting there thinking, “I have never said yes to that voice,” or “Most of the time I feel like a failure in following Jesus.”  The good news is that you are not alone.  Despite the fact that Simon Peter, Andrew, John, and James all behave exemplary today, we know as we read more of Mark’s gospel, that these are the same men who will fail time and again in their faith.  These are the same men who will deny Jesus, will argue about feeding five thousand people, will try to hold on to Jesus, and will vie for favor with Jesus.  Yes, today, they say yes immediately and they drop everything they have ever known and step out and follow Jesus.  But tomorrow they stumble, and keep stumbling their entire journey with Christ.

What our texts remind us of today is, as one scholar puts it, “Becoming a faithful Christian disciple takes both a moment and a lifetime.”[ii]  We are not going to feel emboldened to follow Jesus every day.  We are not going to abandon our families and our way of life every day.  There will be moments, hard days when we need courage and reassurance.  On those days, we can remember the moments when we said yes and answered the call.  We can recall with encouragement, on those days when we do not feel very faithful, the days when in fact we were entirely faithful.  And if we are struggling to hold onto those “yes” moments, we remember that we are called in community.[iii]  Whether the entire city of Nineveh was acting together, or disciples were called in pairs, our ability to answer God faithfully is usually done within the context of community – within a group of people who can remind us of our faithful days, and let us go when we need follow.  We are not alone in this adventure of following Jesus.  And that is good news!  Amen.

[i] Daniel J. Harrington, ed., The Gospel of Mark, Sacra Pagina Series, vol. 2 (Collegeville, MN:  The Liturgical Press, 2002), 76.

[ii] Elton W. Brown, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 286.

[iii] Karoline Lewis, “You are Never Alone,” January 14, 2018, as found at http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5044 on January 18, 2017.

Sermon – 1 Samuel 3:1-20, Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17, 1 Corinthians 6:12-20, John 1:43-51, EP2, YB, January 14, 2018

Tags

call, church, discipleship, faithful, Jesus, reaction, relation, relationship, revelation, Sermon

As we celebrate our Annual Meeting and another year of ministry in Jesus Christ through Hickory Neck, we could not have received a better set of lessons.  Today’s lessons are all about discipleship – what being a disciple of Jesus means for us today.  Our lessons tell us discipleship involves relation, revelation, and reaction.

What we first learn about discipleship is relation – that our work as disciples cannot happen without being related to one another.  In Samuel’s almost comical call story, inexperienced Samuel would never have understood that God was trying to speak to him unless he had been in relationship with Eli – his mentor and guide in the life of faith.  Similarly, skeptical Nathaniel would have likely never believed that Jesus could be the Messiah had enthusiastic Philip not said to him, “Come and see.”  Even our lesson from first Corinthians, which perhaps embarrassingly talks about fornication and prositution, shows us that how we relate to others matters – how we use our marvelously made bodies with others matters.

This past year of discipleship at Hickory Neck has similarly and importantly been about relation.  Whether we were talking about race through film, books, or testimony; whether we were sharing a festive meal or taking the holy meal to our homebound members; whether we sharing our stories of giving at Stewardship parties or sharing our faith journeys in confirmation class; whether we were discerning how to modify worship at Hickory Neck or talking with community leaders about how Hickory Neck could address wider needs of our community; whether we were preparing for a quiet day of reflection in Lent or whether we were preparing to welcome a new community onto our property – whatever we did this year, we did so in relation to others.  At Hickory Neck, long-timers and newcomers alike are needed when we are discerning the call of God on our common life.  At Hickory Neck, when changes big and small are being made, we do so with the input of others – both inside and outside of the community – to ensure our discernment is reflective of our related nature through Christ.  At Hickory Neck, we experience God most when we relate to one another through deep, meaningful, vulnerable relationships that rely on trust in one another and on our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  We are Samuels who cannot discern God’s voice without Elis, and we are Nathaniels, who cannot believe what we are hearing without Philips.  Our discipleship is impossible without relation.

After relation, the second thing we learn from our lessons today about discipleship is revelation.  When skeptical Nathaniel responds to Philip’s invitation to come and see, and he meets Jesus, he asks Jesus how Jesus knows him.  Jesus responds, “I saw you.”  Likewise, upon the third interruption of Eli’s sleep, Eli finally realizes that Samuel is not sleepily confused; Eli realizes God is trying to speak to Samuel.  Furthermore, when Eli sees Samuel the next morning, his insistence on knowing what God said to Samuel reveals his own sin and his own coming punishment.  Even Paul’s letter to the Corinthians reveals to them how important their bodies are.  When the psalmist says God created us, knit us together, and we are marvelously made, Paul understands that those wonderful bodies God made are meant to be used for the glory of God.

The more we committed to our relationships at Hickory Neck over this past year, the more we began to experience revelation through those relationships.  When our Tuesday night seekers group invited our brothers and sisters from New Zion Baptist Church to a joint Bible Study, all sorts of beautiful, hard revelations were experienced that night.  When our liturgical task forces worked to define and discern what God was doing at Hickory Neck through worship, we discovered new and beautiful ways we could honor the abundant liturgical variety found in these walls.  When an outstanding mortgage was weighing on our budget or when longtime givers moved on from Hickory Neck, we realized how our giving could impact change at Hickory Neck.  And our budding relationship with the Kensington School has been full of revelation by the Holy Spirit – from sensing within the Vestry that the time had come to think again about a school, to discerning with community leaders that a school was indeed needed, to responding immediately when Charlie got word that Kensington was looking in our neighborhood, to developing a relationship so strong that Kensington would choose to come to Hickory Neck as opposed to another location, God used our relationships to reveal new, different possibilities for ministry.

In some ways, relation and revelation might be the easy parts of discipleship.  The harder part is that third part of discipleship:  reaction.  When Paul writes that letter to the Corinthians, Paul is able to say some hard things about the ways his friends are using their bodies.  The Corinthians could have used that revelation to linger in shame or guilt.  But Paul has a different idea. “Glorify God in your body,” Paul says.  Paul calls the community to change.  When Philip shares his experience with Jesus with Nathaniel, Philip’s story is not an idle tale.  “Come and see,” Philip says.  Philip issues an invitation to action.  And when Eli counsels Samuel what to do about the voice he keeps hearing, Samuel needs to say the words, “Speak for your servant is listening.”  In each of these stories, when something dramatic is revealed through relationship, true discipleship means answering with reaction – doing something in response.

This past year, Hickory Neck has embraced this last part of discipleship with vigor.  When our neighbors needed shelter this past winter, even when our community would have preferred to keep our treasured tradition of a Mardi Gras party, we opened our doors and found new ways to celebrate and care for one another and the wider community.  When we realized that our neighbors were longing for relationship with Christ and our welcome on Sunday mornings was not enough, we developed new ways to invite others to church, and new ways to help newcomers feel more connected once they found their way to Hickory Neck.  When we realized how deep and wide the stain of slavery on our nation was, we welcomed a stranger from Ghana into our home, and found a new friend and a deeper commitment to dealing with our own demons.  When we found new ways to use our property – either through new worship experiences, creating space for community leaders to offer healing yoga to our neighbors in need, or agreeing to step into a rapidly moving process of welcoming a school – we prayed, pondered, and wondered – but eventually said yes.

As I looked back on this year in preparation for our Annual Meeting, I was overwhelmed by the faithful discipleship of Hickory Neck.  We have taken to heart the steps of relation, revelation, and reaction, and said yes time and again.  Being in relation to one another is not easy – look at how hard our country is struggling to stay in relationship with one another.  And yet, the Hickory Neck community takes the uncomfortable and is unwavering.  Welcoming revelation is also not easy – holding up a mirror to our behavior can be scary.  And yet, the Hickory Neck community embraces that vulnerability with boldness.  Being willing to react is not easy either – answering the call to come and see, or saying, “Here I am,” involves strength and commitment.  And yet, the Hickory Neck community trustingly takes on the challenge, and acts with passion and vigor.  I cannot fully express to you how incredibly proud I am of you for all that you have done this year for the sake of the Gospel.  Your discipleship has been an inspiration to me, as I seek each day to faithfully serve Christ as his disciple too.  Of course, the work of discipleship is never done – we will continue to need to commit to the work of relation, revelation, and reaction.  But for today, in this moment of reflection and celebration, know that you are doing good work in the name Christ, glorifying God in your bodies.  Well done, good and faithful servants.  I feel privileged to work alongside you!

On Needing Each Other…

Tags

community, discipleship, each other, equal, gifts, God, housing, need, others, value

Photo credit:  https://www.gcurley.info/news/2015/01/

This morning I attending a symposium about housing in the greater Williamsburg area.  The theme of the symposium was the effect of housing on health, both for individuals and the community.  One of the ideas that stuck with me was about the consequence of a lack of affordable housing.  What the researchers found was that a lack of affordable housing had a negative impact on the entire community – not just those struggling to make ends meet, but also on those in upper-income brackets.  When communities do not have affordable housing, service industry workers can eventually opt out of living and working in the community altogether, creating a void of laborers, and an increase in the cost-of-living for all.  Whereas many wealthy community members may not be concerned about affordable housing, in fact, a lack of affordable housing hurts the property values and economy for all.

The idea of affordable housing being a problem for everyone reminded me of an idea I have been pondering lately:  we need each other.  In the United States, we have long-held ideals about individualism, independence, and industriousness.  We value an “every man for himself” ethic.  But that kind of ethic only gets us so far.  Sooner or later, we eventually discover that every man (or woman!) cannot do everything for himself or herself.  In fact, we need each other.  I suspect that our need for one another is not a surprise when we are really honest.  But many of us have a hard time being honest about our mutual need because it means admitting vulnerability, dependency, and incompleteness.  Whether we like it or not, we need one another.

This Sunday at Hickory Neck Church, we are finishing a series on discipleship, using Rowan Williams’ book Being Disciples.  Williams argues that there are two principles of Christian faith and discipleship that we need to form the basis of a moral society:  we are each of equal value to God, and we are all dependent on each other.  His second point is what connected with me today.  Williams argues, “The community that most perfectly represents what God wants to see in the human world is one where the resources of each person are offered for every other, whether those resources are financial or spiritual or intellectual or administrative.”[i]  When we allow each person to be needed, to play a role in each other’s lives, we begin to be able to see that we are not just being kind – we actually need each other.

I invite you to take a look around this week, and try to imagine what each person you meet has to offer the world.  From infants to wise elders; from wealthy to homeless; from male to female; from convict to free – imagine what gift each person has for the world, and how you can honor and respect the dignity of each person you meet.  Even when someone is rude, unkind, or on the other side of the political aisle, I encourage you to find what you need in each other.  God will help you find the answers, and I hope you will share them here!!

[i] Rowan Williams, Being Disciples:  Essentials of the Christian Life (Grand Rapids:  William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2016), 69.

On Remembering Roots…

Tags

Campus Ministry, Christ, church, college, community, disciple, discipleship, faithful, formation, fun, Jesus, leadership, love

Photo credit:  https://wels.net/serving-you/christian-life/campus-ministry/

Last night, as a member of our Diocesan College Ministry Commission, I visited Canterbury at William & Mary.  We had some time with both the students involved in the Episcopal Campus ministry and with the Campus Minister.  It is a vibrant ministry, with a lot of passion and enthusiasm around service, worship, and discipleship.  Canterbury is a place where they can ask questions of their faith, become leaders, serve their community, and forge deep friendships.  They are doing the work began in their baptism, continued in their confirmation, and now affirmed as adults.

As I listened to the students and Campus Minister, I was flooded with a host of memories from my own experience in Campus Ministry at Duke.  Although I was involved in the Wesley Fellowship, the models are quite similar.  Wesley was the place where I came into my own faith, where I engaged my intellect in partnership with professors at the Divinity School, where I first discovered the power of mission trips, and ultimately, where I began to feel a sense of call to ordained ministry.  Wesley created disciples – encouraging us to find a local church community, fostering a personal spirituality, developing deep Christian friendships, and exploring the implications of my faith.  Most of my friends from Wesley took a year or more to volunteer or live in intentional Christian community.  Today, most of the alumni I know are clergy, lay leaders, non-profit workers, social services providers, and are raising up a new generation of faithful disciples.

When I was in college, I thought Wesley was doing something revolutionary.  The community certainly articulated its faith a little differently than my home churches had.  But more than that, we created an intimate, trusting, challenging space that fed me and informed my life path.  As I thought about that experience and the experience of the Canterbury students at Williams & Mary, campus ministry does exactly what Church does – or should do.  We are forming people into faithful disciples, who want to learn and grow in their faith, who want to find ways to serve God and live out their baptismal covenant, who want to develop the deep bonds of Christian community, and who want to have some fun while they are at it!

As a pastor, I often get caught up in the programmatic and administrative work of Church.  I want to create a community that offers the things necessary to produce faithful disciples.  What last night reminded me of is that I need to remember to look around and enjoy what we are creating too.  If you have been looking for a community that can help you find meaning and purpose, can help you grow in unexpected ways, can help you connect with others on the spiritual journey, and can embolden you to live a life full of the love of Christ, come join us at Hickory Neck.  And if you are already a member, invite a friend into this rich experience.  There is good news to share!

Sermon – Matthew 5.1-12, All Saints Sunday, YA, November 2, 2014

Tags

Beatitudes, blessed, discipleship, God, Jesus, journey, money, path, road, Sermon, stewardship, walking the way

Courtesy of http://firecatching.blogspot.com/2011_04_01_archive.html

Today we hear one of the most beloved pieces of scripture.  The Beatitudes from Matthew’s gospel have been the source of inspiration for Christians for centuries, for artists and musicians, for entire ministries, and even for comedians like Monty Python.  As soon as we hear that phrase, “Blessed are…” our eyes close and we let the words flow over us.  We nod in assent, and maybe even whisper, “Yes!”  And as the preacher for In-Gathering Sunday, getting the Beatitudes in the lectionary is like being handed a silver platter.  What other inspiration can we need on a Sunday like this than to think about blessings?  That is what our Stewardship Committee has been encouraging us to do for weeks: to think about the ways that we are blessed and to return that blessing to this community through the gift of our financial resources.  That message could not be better captured than in the Beatitudes from our gospel lesson today.

Or at least that is what I thought before I started really working with the Beatitudes this week.  The more I poured over the text, the more I became confused.  Then the questions came pouring in:  What does it mean to be poor in spirit?  How do we know if we are pure in heart?  I might prefer peace, but could any of us in our everyday lives be considered peacemakers?  And those are just the surface level questions.  When we read at a deeper level, ethical questions begin to emerge.  Our news outlets have been flooded lately with people who are reviled, persecuted, and having evil uttered against them.  All we have to remember are Christians in Iraq, Palestine, or Burma whose very faith means a life of oppression and sometimes death.  Is the word for them today, “You are blessed”?  Many a liberation theologian has balked at the idea of Holy Scripture being used to keep down oppressed peoples.

Luckily, I stumbled on two things this week that opened up the Beatitudes for me in a fresh way.  First I began to look at what the word translated as “blessed” really means.  There are a couple of words in scripture that are translated in English as “blessed,” but they do not necessarily have the same meaning.  In our Beatitudes today, one scholar argues that the phrase translated as “blessed are you when…” is more rightly translated as “You are on the right road when…”  For example, “You are on the right road when you are poor in spirit.”[i]  So blessed does not really mean, “Happy are you when people persecute you,” but instead, “You are on the right road when people persecute you.”  Somehow this translation makes for a much more sober, honest rendering of Jesus’ words.  Jesus is not saying that these things are cause for happiness in a superficial way.  Jesus is saying that we are fortunate in those experiences because they point us to a deeper truth:  that we are heading in the right direction, making the right decisions, and living a meaningful life.

The other source of insight I found this week was from The Message’s translation of this text.  If you are not familiar with The Message, The Message is a paraphrase of the Bible:  not a literal translation of the Biblical language, but a modern rephrasing of the text to make the text more accessible.  Of course, biblical scholars often cringe when they hear certain paraphrases of key texts, but in the case of the Beatitudes, I found this paraphrase quite useful.

I have taken the two ideas – The Message’s paraphrase and the new introduction of “You are on the right road when…” and want to read for you my hybrid rephrasing of the Beatitudes.  Our text now goes like this:

You are on the right path when you’re at the end of your rope.  With less of you there is more of God and God’s rule.  You are on the right path when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you.  Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.  You’re on the right path when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less.  That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.  You’re on the right path when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God.  God’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.  You’re on the right path when you care.  At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.  You’re on the right path when you get your inside world—your mind and heart—put right.  Then you can see God in the outside world.  You’re on the right path when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight.  That’s when you discover who you really are, and your place in God’s family.  You’re on the right path when your commitment to God provokes persecution.  The persecution drives you even deeper into God’s kingdom.  Not only that— You’re on the right path every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit God.  What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable.  You can be glad when that happens—give a cheer, even!—for though they don’t like it, God does!  And all heaven applauds.  And know that you are in good company.  God’s prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble.

This Stewardship Season, we have been talking about “Walking the Way.”  Certainly Walking the Way is a metaphor for our journey into a time of reflection about the value our money holds for us and how our relationship with that money is connected to our relationship with God.  But the Walking the Way metaphor is one that goes beyond just our money too.  Walking the Way is a metaphor for our entire journey with God – a path that is ever winding, has steep slopes at times, is sometimes full of potholes and rocks, and at other times is as smooth as a freshly paved road.  Our entire life is a journey – one in which we mature in faith from the time of our birth and baptism to the time of our old age and death.  We are constantly Walking the Way with Christ, growing, learning, messing up, and returning to a loving God.

What I like about this reworded rendition of the Beatitudes is the affirmation in them.  When we are on a journey, Walking the Way, we sometimes struggle to know whether we are on the right path.  We wonder if we are where we should be and whether God is really with us.  This rendition of the Beatitudes gives us a tiny glimpse into that affirmation:  You are on the right path when…  Of course, the description is not all roses.  Mourning, persecution, and making peace are not easy roads.  But a sign of true discipleship, of Walking the Way, are those times when the path is in fact quite rocky.  Then we know that we are on the right path, and Jesus is walking right beside us.  Amen.

[i] Earl F. Palmer, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), 238.

Homily – Romans 10.8b-18, Feast of St. Andrew the Apostle, November 29, 2012

Tags

discipleship, evangelism, proclamation, relationship with God, Sermon, St. Andrew

I lead a weekly Eucharist on Thursdays at St. Margaret’s.  The service is a short, spoken service, and my homilies are brief reflections on the saint or feast appointed for the day.  I do not usually write out these homilies, but instead outline my thoughts.  Last week a parishioner felt like it was a “waste of gems,” for me not to publish them on the blog too.  So, she is helping me type up my outlines, and I will try to start posting them here.  They are obviously less formulated than my sermons and will read a bit like an outline, but perhaps they will feed your spiritual journey.  Enjoy this first installment from the Feast of St. Andrew the Apostle.

**********************

But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed?  And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard?  And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him?  And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent?

When we lament the shrinking church, we often forget one or more of these four steps.  In reverse order, the steps are a little clearer:  People have to be sent in order to proclaim;   Others cannot hear without proclamation; If others don’t hear, they can’t believe; and unless they believe, they cannot call on God.  Sending.  Proclaiming.  Belief.  Relationship with God.

Some of us stop at sending.  Church sends us out every Sunday, but we quickly move on to the next thing.  Some of us stop at proclaiming – we might invite others to church, but proclaiming sounds way too scary.  Others stop at belief.  We might be able to talk about our faith, but we can’t imagine being responsible for someone else’s belief.  Finally, we might convince someone to believe, but we can’t force them to have a relationship with God.

Today we celebrate Andrew the Apostle.  Andrew had every reason to avoid these steps, too.  Often he is simply known as Peter’s brother.  Andrew is not a part of the inner circle, which included Peter, James, and John.  Andrew could easily have left the work of going, proclaiming, and creating disciples to the others, just keeping his faith to himself.

What Andrew shows us is that everyone can be a disciple and evangelist.  We simply need:

1. A willingness to respond.  Matthew says Andrew immediately leaves his nets and follows Jesus when he calls;
2. A willingness to hear.  John says that Andrew had been John the Baptist’s disciple, and when John the Baptist proclaimed Jesus the Lamb of God, Andrew switched camps;
3. A willingness to share the Good News.  John says Andrew’s first act after following Jesus is to go get his brother and bring him to Jesus.

Andrew is just a regular guy doing the work of proclamation!

Andrew teaches us today that we can all be evangelists.  Now I know how we hate that word and even the concept of evangelism, but Andrew makes it simple.  Go into the world, proclaim (tell your God story), encourage belief (you believe – it must be important enough to share), and foster a relationship with God (don’t stop talking – all your life is a witness to others that can foster others’ relationships with Christ).

Being an evangelist is all of this work, and the work really isn’t all that scary.  As Paul says, “The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart.”