Sermon – Mark 9.30-37, P20, YB, September 19, 2021

Tags

creative, design thinking, faith, fear, Five Whys, God, innovation, innovative, Jesus, Messiah, Peter, problem, relationship, Savior, seekers, Sermon, solving, stuck, thinking, truth, why

This spring I took a class on Design Thinking.  Technically speaking, “Design thinking is a non-linear, iterative process that teams use to understand users, challenge assumptions, redefine problems and create innovative solutions to prototype and test.”[i]  In layman’s terms, design thinking is a non-traditional way of getting to innovative idea.  Within design thinking are several methods to help people get out of their traditional ways of thinking.  One of my favorites is The Five Whys Method.  You start with a problem, and you ask why the problem is happening.  Then you look at the first “why?” and ask the question again.  Why is that answer happening.  And on and on until you get to the root of the issue[ii] – almost like peeling layers off an onion.  At first, the Five Whys feel a little silly.  But the more you play with the method, the faster you realize the problem you are looking at is not the actual problem.  And when you finally hit the right answer, you may be surprised by how uncomfortably honest the answer is.

 In our gospel lesson today, the disciples clearly have never heard of the Five Whys Method.  In fact, when Jesus, privately teaching the disciples, tells them he will be betrayed, killed, and will rise again on the third day, the disciples say nothing.  The text tells us they do not understand Jesus, and they are “afraid to ask him.”  They are afraid to ask why.  They are afraid to go beyond that first layer of the onion because they do not even like the layer in front of them.  We talked last week about how Peter tried to discourage Jesus from this same fate:  because a Messiah is not supposed to suffer and die – a Messiah is supposed to free them from oppressive power.[iii] 

We can understand their fear.  When taking that class on design thinking I practiced the method using a challenge we were facing at Hickory Neck.  To be honest, I do not even remember the actual presenting problem.  But what I do remember was getting the answer to the third why.  When I answered why to that third question, the answer took my breath away.  I was mortified and ashamed:  surely that was not the answer to the problem.  As I stood stunned at the words that had just come out of my mouth, and after some awkward silence, my partner asked me again, “Okay.  But why?”  As I shook off my paralysis and answered the fourth why, I started getting some more honest clarity.  By the time I got to the fifth why, I was sold on the method.  The method helped me name the thing I could not name just staring at presenting problem.

After the conversation with the disciples, Jesus introduces a child into the teaching with the disciples.  Scholars have many theories about the introduction.  Thousands of years ago, children were not regarded with honor.  As Sharon Ringe explains, “A child did not contribute much if anything to the economic value of a household or community, and a child could not do anything to enhance one’s position in the struggles for prestige or influence.  One would obtain no benefit from according to a child the hospitality or rituals of honor or respect that one might offer to someone of higher status…”[iv]  Most scholars agree Jesus does not introduce children because they are cute and to be loved (even if they are!).  But I wonder if Jesus, having known a few children, knew that children are particularly adept at asking, “why?”  Any of you who has known a preschooler has known the incessant way they can ask the question, “why?”  And as children age, the question does not stop:  the question just gets increasingly uncomfortable.  I think Jesus knew the disciples were stuck on their own conceptions of the Messiah and their role in the divine narrative, and Jesus wanted them to start probing why that narrative mattered to them.  Jesus wanted them to start peeling back the narratives, but saw they were afraid of truth.

That is our invitation today.  Our gospel scene is an invitation for us into deeper, more honest, more probing relationship with Jesus.  Instead of taking our relationship with Jesus at face value, instead of being afraid of hard questions, instead of being afraid of scary answers, our invitation today is to engage in our faith in the same way we engage in innovative thinking:  to keep asking the whys over and over again.  The good news is we have a community of seekers who can ask those whys with us and hold us in the uncomfortable answers until we get clarity.  The good news is we have tools to help overcome our fear and silence, and kids in our community who will keep us honest.  The good news is we have a Savior who is willing to engage with us in a brutally honest, yet radically salvific relationship.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

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[i] Teo Yu Siang, “Design Thinking,” Interaction Design Foundation, as found at https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/design-thinking on September 18, 2021.

[ii] iSixSigma-Editorial, “Determine the Root Cause: 5 Whys,” as found at https://www.isixsigma.com/tools-templates/cause-effect/determine-root-cause-5-whys/ on September 18, 2021. 

[iii] N.T. Wright, Mark for Everyone (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004), 122.

[iv] Sharon H. Ringe, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 97.

Sermon – Job 14.1-14, HS, YB, April 3, 2021

Tags

Christian, church, community, disciples, drama, faith, Holy Saturday, hope, Jesus, Job, liturgy, pandemic, preparation, quiet, redemption, Savior, Sermon, silence, sorrow

Up until last year, I had not remembered that there was a liturgy in our Prayer Book for Holy Saturday.  I had always thought it was Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Vigil on Saturday night (which is basically just Easter), and then Easter Sunday.  But when the pandemic hit last year, we realized doing a virtual Easter Vigil just would not work – there is so much reading, singing, doing things by candlelight, and the drama of being huddled together that we had to let the Liturgy wait until we could gather again.  So instead, we turned to this tiny liturgy, whose entire content is listed on one page of the Book of Prayer Book.

Still in a pandemic a year later, I found myself curious about this liturgy we are entering once again.  The truth is, the earliest accounts of Holy Week observances had no liturgies for Holy Saturday, with the exception of private use of the daily office.[i]  Instead, this day has simply been known as the “quietest day of the Christian year.”[ii]  That the church has not always gathered on Holy Saturday and that Christians might see this day as a day of quiet makes a lot of sense.  The Church says so much this week – from our waving of palms last Sunday, to our gathering around the upper room table to wash feet and share bread, to devastating betrayals of Jesus, to the vivid walk toward the cross, to the finality of the closed tomb.  We almost need a day of quiet to let the drama sink in and wrap our heads around what this week means.

But I suspect if your life is anything like mine or most Americans, we are not sitting quietly in our homes from 3:00 pm on Friday until Easter morning.  Instead, we are filling the time with preparations – tending to all the things we did not do while we were attending church this week:  dying eggs, entertaining children, stuffing Easter baskets, prepping Easter day meals, cleaning the house, or just having fun.  There is nothing inherently wrong about those things, but this year, of all years, I am grateful for a Holy Saturday liturgy.  With this last year of suffering through a pandemic and reflecting on our broken humanity’s inability to eliminate racism or mend civil discourse, even with the rise of vaccines, I find our country is in a Holy Saturday kind of time.  We have been through a tumultuous experience and are not yet healed. 

That is why I like having Job as a companion today.  Job’s words are stark.  As Job sits in the ashes of his sorrows, having lost his children, his livelihood, and his support system, he describes the brutality of life.  He talks about how trees have hope – even when cut down, they can sprout again, and new life can be born out of death.  But not so with humans, he argues.  No, when their bodies lay in the ground, there is nothing but death.  Job captures the essence of this day.  There is a similar finality at the door of Jesus’ tomb this day.  All the hopes and dreams, all the joys and blessings, all the promises of new life are sealed away in a tomb.  And after such a violent death and the threat for those who followed Jesus, there is no wonder why the Church has considered this a quiet day.  Unlike the quiet waiting of Advent, when the church is brimming with expectation and bustling around in preparation for Christ’s birth, today is a day of silence devoid of restorative peacefulness.  As one scholar says, “The waiting of Advent is like having warm bread in the oven.  By contrast, the air of Holy Saturday smells more like stale smoke, as though something essential was burned the day before.”[iii]  As our lives are not yet pandemic free, and as threats of spikes in cases emerge, we know that kind of waiting all too well.

And yet, in the very last verse of today’s reading, the despondent Job says something totally counter to everything else he has said.  “If mortals die, will they live again?” Job asks.  For someone who has boldly proclaimed the finality of human death, his question is a question that only a person of faith can ask – a question that reveals the tiniest bit of hope still left in Job.  Job communicates in this question a truth we people of faith hold dear:  no matter how bad the suffering, no matter how prevalent the experience of dread and doom, no matter how deep the failures of humanity seem to run, there is always hope.  The disciples and community surrounding Jesus Christ do not know that hope yet.  But as followers of Christ 2000 years later, we now stake our entire identity on the risen savior. 

So yes, receive the gift of stale smoke this day.  Sit in ashes with Job and mourn all in your life that feels dead.  Take time in this busyness of life for some uneasy silence.  Name all those who have been lost due to disease and violence.  But keep asking the questions.  Hold on to the hope, however infinitesimally small that God can indeed redeem us – us as individuals, us as country, us as Church.  Holding the two in tension is difficult – we want to rush to Easter and forget all that has happened.  But letting the power of all that has happened speak to us today will allow us to know the astounding power of resurrection much more deeply tomorrow.  Job, Jesus, and this faith community here will pull up a chair and sit with you by the ashes until we can reap with tears of joy tomorrow.  Amen.

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[i] William Joseph Danaher, Jr., “Theological Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, Vol. 2 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 310.

[ii] Christina Braudaway-Bauman, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, Vol. 2 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 312.

[iii] Braudaway-Bauman, 312

The Pilgrim’s Way…Day 6

Tags

Canterbury, Cathedral, disappointment, evensong, experience, God, joy, perfect, pilgrimage, plans, Savior, space, trust

Photo credit:  Jennifer Andrews-Weckerly; reuse with permission only

Sixteen pilgrims from Hickory Neck Church traveled to England for 8 days of pilgrimage.  Our focus was on choral music, hearing Evensong or Choral Mass at a Cathedral, Minster, or college everyday.  This is the sixth entry, initially posted on our church Facebook page.  For those of you who do not follow us on Facebook, I am repeating the journey’s daily entries here.  Enjoy!

Canterbury

When spending over a year planning a pilgrimage for your parish, poring over plans, making amendments to itineraries, and crafting the best spiritual experience you can, you imagine, “There! I have created the perfect pilgrimage experience.” But as soon as you say the words, “I have created,” you have lost. Pilgrimages are not about what I create or even what I plan. Pilgrimages are certainly about working hard – before, during, and after. But pilgrimages are also about making space and then letting God take over.

I was acutely aware of that today. All day I had been internally groaning because we were not going to hear the boys and the men singing at Evensong at Canterbury Cathedral. Instead it would just be the gentlemen. I had really wanted our pilgrims to hear the full sound with the boys, and knowing they would be absent felt like a huge disappointment. But as soon as the men opened their mouths, I was transported to another time – a time when Benedictine monks chanted prayers day after day, hour after hour. The simplicity and beauty of their sound made the enormity of fourteen hundred years of Evensongs unfurl before me, like the wafting of incense before my face, lingering in my hair. Suddenly a multitude of heavenly hosts surrounded me – pilgrims, monks, priests, common Christians, seekers, nonbelievers, the sick, the oppressed – all longing for something, all aching for God. And tonight I remembered, in addition to them, God is right here: always has been and always will be, no matter what plans I have made.

Tonight it is my hope that you can find it in yourself to trust a little less in your own hands and a lot more in the loving embrace of your Savior’s hands. I can’t wait to hear about your disappointment and your overwhelming joy!

Photo credit:  Jennifer Andrews-Weckerly; reuse with permission only

On Jesus, Love, Me, and You…

Tags

Christ, intergenerational, Jesus, Jesus Loves Me, love, meaning, ministry, neighbors, profound, relationship, Savior, simple, song, together, walk

Photo credit:  https://mandjsquared.com/index.php/product/jesus-loves-me-this-i-know/

After welcoming The Kensington School, an independent child development center, on to the Hickory Neck property, the two communities have sought ways to enter into mutual relationship.  One of those efforts has been offering a voluntary Godly Play class for students of the school.  We began the class in the fall, and have had over 18 children registered for the class.  We recently changed the day of the week the class is offered, and so yesterday, I was finally able to join the class.  The children were full of life and wonder, and I loved to watch them engage in the story.  But probably one of my favorite parts was singing Jesus Loves Me with the children.  They clearly knew the words, and it was fun to sing such a familiar childhood song – so simple and, especially in these days, so profound.

My day carried on like any other adventurous day in ministry, and that afternoon, I celebrated Eucharist at a local retirement home.  We usually sing a few songs, and the chaplain always reminds me that familiar songs are important, as they bring up many fond memories for the residents.  So, without thinking, I chose two, and midway through the final song, I realized I had subconsciously chosen the very song I had sung early that morning – Jesus Loves Me.  The same feelings emerged, especially as many of the retirees in that space are in bodies that no longer do all the things they used to do.  But they can sing about the love of a Savior – that they, even in their weakened states, are loved.

I have been thinking about a couple of things since then.  Hickory Neck has been articulating its mission in Upper James City County, and one of the tenets of our mission is to engage in intergenerational ministry.  Knowing our unique setting – a community comprised predominantly of young families and a large retirement community – our parish seeks to minister to both, and in fact, we believe our ministry will be richer as both young and old walk together in Christ.  Yesterday’s convergence of three and four year-olds singing the same words as ninety-three and ninety-four year-olds made me hopeful about the potential of Hickory Neck’s ministry.

But yesterday’s experience also made me think about all of us in the middle – those of us who are twenty-three and twenty-four to sixty-three and sixty-four; those of us who are busily going about life, trying to do our part to make the world a better place, and trying to find meaning and joy in this world.  For those of us in the middle, I wonder if we might hear the words of a song that seems almost childishly simple as instead something profoundly important about ourselves and our neighbors.  Yes, Jesus loves me.  But, Jesus also loves you.  And, from what I know about Jesus, he especially loves those whom we would like to deem “other,” or as unworthy of God’s love.  Jesus loves them too.  Perhaps we in the middle can take a cue from those at the beginning and those near the end and remember the simple, profound words that can hold us together, and help us love better.

The Pilgrimage of Holy Week

Tags

Christ, church, God, Holy Week, Jesus, moments, pilgrimage, sacred, Savior, worship

In Holy Week, I like to offer the parishes I serve a service for each night of the week.  It can be labor intensive, and people can feel overwhelmed by the idea of coming every night of a week for church (even if it is only once a year).  But, if you can make it through every night, you find yourself in the midst of a beautiful pilgrimage – an unfolding story and walk with our Savior, Jesus Christ.  This year, we are only three days in, but each night has given me little “God moments.”

On Holy Monday, my heart was warmed that our community was gathering “virtually” to celebrate compline (evening prayers).  We have been doing it all Lent, but it was a wonderful way to close my evening in my pajamas, knowing that others were on Facebook, praying together with our Curate.  On Holy Tuesday, as I sat in the silence of our Taize service, I was watching the flames of the many lit candles flicker.  Since I knew people had lit the candles with prayer intentions, I imagined each of those flames as a prayer, symbolizing the cares and concerns of each person in the room.  As our silence extended, I imagined the flames represented the prayers and concerns around the world, remembering how our Coptic Christian brothers and sisters must be hurting this week.  It was a powerful, transfixing image.  Then last night, on Holy Wednesday, during our healing prayers, two things happened.  First, my daughter came forward for prayers by me.  Her request was humbling, and the privilege of affirming her and praying with her in that space was incredible.  Second, another local pastor laid hands on me and prayed just the prayer I needed this week.  It was all I could do to hold back the tears.

So, I do not know what the next three days, the Triduum, hold.  But I can promise you there will be many more sacred moments.  If you have a church home, I encourage you to take advantage of their offerings for the rest of the week.  If you do not have a church home, and live in the Williamsburg area, know that you are most welcome.  You can find all our information on our website.  A continued blessed Holy Week for you.  As you ponder your own connection to church, I offer you this video as inspiration for your Holy Week pilgrimage to Lent.  Peace!

On Snow Globes and Other Deceptions…

Tags

blessed, deception, encounter, need, prayer, pretend, protection, reality, Savior, snow globe

Photo credit:  www.balsamhill.com/Christmas-Tree-Musical-Snow-Globe-p/4000824.htm

When I was growing up, we used to have a Christmas snow globe.  If you wound it up, it would play a lovely Christmas carol.  But you could also shake the large globe and snow would delicately swirl around the Christmas tree.  Something about the snow globe was mesmerizing.  I would wind up the music, shake the globe, and just stare into the glass.  There was something so peaceful about that globe – like a perfect world inviting me in to the snowy calm.

Of course, there were no snow blowers, plows, or ice melt in the snow globe.  There were no grumpy people shoveling out sidewalks and cars before the snow gets too heavy or the snow turns to a thick layer of ice.  No one was slipping on ice, sliding into a car accident, or shivering without shelter.  No, the snow globe does not invite that kind of realism.  The snow globe only captures the magical moment of freshly fallen, untouched snow, and dreamy winter.

Too often, we choose to keep gazing at snow globes, or to create our own snow globes.  We stare into snow globes because the destruction, hate, and violence of the world have caused compassion fatigue.  We create our own snow globes to insulate ourselves from the outside world so that we do not have to encounter the other.  Today our church delivered holiday gifts for seven families who live in a large public housing development.  As soon as we parked our car to drop off the gifts, I knew we were not in our snow globe anymore.  As a priest, those in need often come to me.  Today, I stepped onto their territory and it was a helpful reminder of how insulated my world can be if I create a globe around it.

The funny thing is that once I stepped out of snow globe, I did not slip on the ice.  I did not feel a sense of burden or dread.  Instead, people greeted me – making sure that I saw them.  Instead, a resident saw my colleague’s clergy collar and asked him to pray with him.  His friend said, “Well, while you’re at it, can you pray for my daughter too?”  Before I knew it, six of us were holding hands in the middle of this housing development, praying for health, wholeness, and the birth of our Savior.  I don’t know about you, but that’s better than any snow globe I can create.  What snow globes have you been looking into or what snow globes have you inadvertently created?  Join me this week as we pull our gazes away from the world of pretend protection and into the world of blessed encounter.