Let us pray: Come Holy Spirit, be present in these words. Through them may we know ourselves, one another, and you, our loving God, better. In the name of the Lover, The Beloved, and Love itself. Amen.

Well, no more bread today! Instead, what we have are some pretty biting words from Jesus about traditions. When the Pharisees and some scribes notice Jesus’ disciple aren’t observing all the rules for cleansing, and purifying, especially around eating and food prep, they ask: “What gives Jesus? Your followers aren’t keeping the rules, they aren’t following the tradition of the elders, why not?”

I wonder, is this an honest question from them, or an attempt to discredit the upstart rabbi from Nazareth who’s rapidly gaining popularity? Based on Jesus’ strong reply, I expect their questions are more like accusations.

“Hey, why don’t your followers follow the rules? What kind of teacher are you?” Jesus calls them out.

“Oh, I see, you’re the ones the prophet Isaiah warned about! You hypocrites!” Ouch! “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.” On the surface they are doing all the right things. Being very diligent in keeping all the traditions of the elders passed on through generations. But why? Are their hearts in it?

Jesus accuses them of abandoning God’s commandments and creating their own human traditions. Ouch again! BUT…I wonder if I’m guilty of the same thing. It’s sure easier to SAY the right things, to GO through the motions, to come to church on Sunday for an hour and then just go on our ways. Much easier to talk about love and justice and racial reconciliation and climate care, than actually DOING IT, right? Do we take refuge in our traditions, talking a good talk, putting our human traditions over what God is really asking us to do to bring about God’s dream for our world?

In our Epistle we heard James’ famous lines: “…Be doers of the word, and not merely hearers.” He goes on to explain what pure religion is: to care for orphans and widows in their distress. To DO something to make our world a better place, whatever, wherever, however we can. To act in love. Love for others, love for the marginalized, the ostracized, the oppressed, those in need, even our enemies! Jesus is saying that we should stop worrying so much about traditions and observations and good words, and we should start DOING something to share God’s love! It’s not about being clean or defiled, or the right or wrong way to worship. What it’s all about is acting from our hearts with love. If we have our hearts set on doing God’s will, God’s good, and loving work for our world, then the question of clean and unclean is moot. We can’t get so wrapped up in just the right way to do this or that in terms of our spirituality. What Jesus tells and shows us, is that it’s all about how we see others and how we interact with them. Are we acting out of compassion? Are we proclaiming by word and example the Good News of God in Christ? Are we seeking and serving Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves? Are we striving for justice and peace? Are we respecting the dignity of every human being? This is pure religion.

How? Start small and go from there. Smile! Be kind! Welcome someone! Where does your heart ache? Is it for the unhoused, for the mentally ill, for those suffering from substance use disorder, for refugees, for immigrants, for the unemployed, for little ones who need stability, who need help to read, who need to know they are seen and loved, for our planet, for our rivers, streams, lakes, and oceans, or, or?

Listen to where God is calling you to act and then go and do your small part to make this world a better place. Show the world the love of God through your actions. Show them that we are Christians by our love, by our love. This is where we should focus our energy and resources. This is pure religion, following the words and examples of Jesus of Nazareth, acting in love and compassion for others. Amen.

A couple of weeks ago we talked about love. I’m not going to rehash that sermon about the centrality of love in Scripture and in our faith, but I do want to revisit a couple of points. I first want to remind you that God loves. God loves you. God loves me. God loves your neighbor. God loves your enemy. God loves everyone, without exceptions. God loves.

The second thing we talked about is that God is love. That is a slight, but important, distinction. God loves is about the doing of God. What does God do? God loves. It is about actions that God takes. God is love is about identity. It is about the being of God. God loves and God is love. They are different and distinct, but related to each other. Because God loves, God is love. God’s identity as love leads to the actions of love. It is important to understand that God’s identity and God’s actions align in this way and are connected to each other. God loves you, not because of what you have done. God loves you for who God is. God loves you because God is love. That means that God’s love for you is not conditional. It is not something you earned. It is not something that you have to be worthy to receive. It is not something that you can lose. It is. God loves you. Why? Because God is love.

The whole idea that God loves you regardless of what you have done, irrespective of your actions, is what we call grace. God’s grace is so enormous that God is going to love you, no matter what. Every once in a while someone will come to me and express concern that they are not worthy enough to receive God’s love. It always breaks my heart. My first reaction is to tell them they are worthy, let me tell you all the wonderful things about you, that God loves you unconditionally. But none of that matters. Because the truth is, even if you were not worthy, God still loves you because of who God is. God loves, not because the object of the affection deserves the love, but because the one offering the love is so full of love that he can do nothing but love you. You cannot earn it, you cannot lose it, you do not deserve it, but that is all beside the point. God loves you already. That is grace.

While we love the idea of love, I think we are challenged by the idea of grace because we do not live in a society that teaches us much about grace. We live in a society that says your worth is in what you achieve, how good you are, maybe even being good isn’t enough, but you need to be great. You need to be perfect. We live in a society that says what goes around comes around, and that people deserve the good things that happen to them, or deserve the bad things that happen to them. And I have to tell you, my friends, that that is not the way of God. That is not the way of our God who is so full of grace that He will love you even if you don’t actually deserve it. And I am not saying there is a person here who doesn’t deserve it, but even if you don’t, God still loves you. That is grace.

For the past month or so we have been reading from the Book of Ephesians as our New Testament reading each Sunday, and this is what Paul has been laying out in his letter. He is talking about the enormous love of God. Paul said the height and breadth and depth and length of God’s love is more than you can imagine. God’s love surpasses knowing. If you close your eyes and imagine the length and breadth and depth and height of God’s love, you will still not imagine the whole thing. It is more than we can imagine. Paul says that the love God has for us is grace. We didn’t deserve it. He says we were still in sin when we received the grace, because grace is an undeserved gift that you are given. Paul tells the Ephesians God loves you, you didn’t do anything to earn it, and you are not going to lose it. God loves you because God has super abundant grace that He showers down upon this earth. That is the essence of Paul’s letter up to this reading.

Today’s reading is answering the question, so what? God loves me, I don’t deserve it, it is a gift, it is grace, so what? Paul says, so then. So then put away all falsehood. Speak with truth. Be angry, it’s OK to be angry, it happens, it’s an emotion, but do not sin. Walk that fine line. Thieves must give up stealing. I love that line because it reminds us that the grace came before the good work. The thief is still stealing but they already have the grace, so Paul says to give up the stealing. Labor honestly with your own hands. Share with the needy. Do not let evil come out of your mouth, but make sure the words coming out of your mouth build others up. Put away from yourself all bitterness, put away all wrath, put away all anger, put away all wrangling, put away all slander, put away all malice. Instead, be kind. Be tenderhearted. Forgive one another. This is a list of concrete ways that we can respond to God’s grace. We do not do all of these good and wonderful things to earn God’s grace, to earn God’s love, because we already have that love through grace. These things are instead our response. It is an order of operations. God loves you, therefore do these good things. Paul’s list is not meant to be exhaustive, it is just a list of suggestions. I imagine Paul talking out loud to his scribe, thinking of ideas. I’m sure he missed some, and I imagine you could come up with some ideas for yourself. What is it in your life that you need to do to respond to God’s love given to you in grace?

In the end, Paul’s letter goes on to say, therefore be imitators of God. All of these ideas that Paul throws out, all the ideas that you can come up with are all meant to help us be imitators of God, the God who is love. It goes on to say, and live in love. Be imitators of God, and live in love. We do that, not to earn God’s love, rather we do it because God has already given the love. The grace of God is so abundant, God has given us so much love that we have some to give away. We have so much love that God gave us that you will never run out of that love yourself. There is more than enough love to go around.

So, my friends, this week take some time to reflect on all we have been learning these past few weeks. Take some time to remember God’s love for you. Try to imagine how enormous God’s love is. Try to imagine the height by imagining the highest thing you can think if, and then go even farther. Imagine the longest thing you can imagine, and then go longer. Imagine the broadest thing you can think of, and then go broader. Imagine the deepest thing you can think of and go deeper. When you have that in your head and think how enormous that is, remember you have not gone far enough. God’s love is even more than that. Try to stretch your brain every day to imagine God’s love as even bigger than you imagined it the day before. Remember that God has given it to you whether or not you earn it, whether or not you deserve it. You are loveable because God loves you, and it is nothing more than that. He does not love you because you do something special. You are loveable because God loves you. Reflect on that, and then ask yourself, what can I do in response. I, who have this enormous amount of love filling me every day, how can I share that same love with someone else? At work, at home, at school, on the street, in the store, wherever you are think of how you can share that love with my neighbors, with my enemies, with all of creation. How can I share that love that God has already given me in grace? Why? Because God loves you.

AMEN.

Let us pray: Come Holy Spirit, speak through these words. Help us dare to believe you have all the food we need. In the name of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, one God. Amen.

In today’s Gospel we pick up right where we left off last Sunday. It’s the next day and the crowd of thousands who had been fed with five loaves and two fish, are looking for Jesus. They know there was only one boat and they didn’t see him get into it. How did he get to the other side? Jesus, in typical fashion, answers their wondering with more food for reflection.

“You’re looking for me because you got your fill of bread? You should be looking for the kind of food that never spoils, the kind of nourishment that’s for eternal life. That’s what the Son of Man will give you. That’s what you should be working towards.”

Umm, ok Jesus. We were just thinking about all that extra bread and kind of wondering how you got all the way across the sea without boat. Perplexed, they ask what they need to do. Isn’t this just like you and me? Don’t we want to know exactly what we need to do? Give me the checklist. Lay it all out. What plan do I have to follow? How many good things do I have to do? Which deeds are worth the most points? Jesus, once again, offers a less than satisfactory answer, exactly what they WEREN’T looking for.

“Here it is. This is it…Just believe. Just put your trust and confidence in the one whom God has sent.”

That’s it? Hmm. How will we know, FOR SURE? What signs will you give so that we can SEE and believe? What works (apparently they’ve already forgotten about t the 12 baskets of leftovers!) As Jews they know well the story of the manna that fed the Israelites in the wilderness, and so they bring this us up to Jesus. What about that? Can you do that? Jesus again, ups the ante, and goes MUCH deeper. First, he reminds them that it was God and NOT Moses who provided, and then he explains that it’s God who give the “true” bread from heaven. It is this bread which comes down from heaven (read incarnation, God taking on human form to live with us as one of us), it is this bread that gives life not just to wandering Israelites, but to the whole world. “For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world” (John 6: 33).

This sounds even better than the manna that our ancestors ate, give us this bread please! And then, BOOM, Jesus drops the bomb. It’s me! I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. Jesus has disclosed to this crowd and the disciples, and to us, his divine identity and his purpose. Jesus is what we need to live. Jesus has come to feed us, to nourish us, to offer us life through relationship.

In John’s Gospel Jesus says it in a slightly different way. “I came that they might have life and have it abundantly (John 10:10). Jesus is here to bring us full and abundant life. Isn’t that what we’re looking for? Isn’t that what we’re hungry and thirsty for? SO many other things are competing for our hunger and desires. SO many other things that we thing will fill us up. But no. They don’t. They won’t. What we need to fill us up is Jesus.

This was definitely mind-blowing for the people of Jesus’ time and it still just as hard, maybe even harder for us to wrap our minds around it today. That’s why we come together to listen, to talk, to ask questions, to remember and experience together. And we try to make sense of these perplexing words of Jesus.

What if Jesus really is the bread of life? What if Jesus really did come to bring us life, to fill us up, so our hunger and thirst would be satisfied? If we embark on this journey to understand these words and their implications, if we dare to hope, to trust and bring who we are to the God of love, it just might be that we’ll find what we have been hungering for. Today, as you come forward to receive communion, the bread and wine, body and blood of Christ, I invite you to ponder these words of Jesus for you and your life today. Whoever, however, wherever you are, you are invited to this journey together with this St. Mary’s community and SO many others who have sought to understand and take in these words of Jesus.

Jesus has come to give us life, to feed us, sustain us and restore our relationship of love with ourselves, one another, with our earth, and with the divine dance of love itself, with the parent creator God, the human brother God, and the flowing, inspiring, comforting Spirit God. So come! Come to the table! Join me! Join us! Join with followers of Jesus around the world and throughout time! Come to receive the bread of life! For surely, whoever comes seeking to know Jesus will never be hungry again. And whoever trusts in Jesus’ loving care will never be thirsty again.

Amen.

In St. Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians that we heard today, Paul offers a prayer for the people. He prays that they may be rooted and grounded in love. And he also prays that they may know the height and length and breadth and depth of the love of God. A love that surpasses knowledge, Paul says. When people are filled with this love, he says that God, through us, can do infinitely more than we can ask for or imagine.

Love. Scripture offers a consistent witness and testimony to God’s love. From beginning to end, from the first creation to the new creation and everything in between, time and again we hear of how much God loves us. Sometimes directly, and sometimes through the story we hear of the ways that God loves us. Scripture says not only does God love us, but God is love. Love is not just an action, it is not something that God does, but love is the core of God’s very being. It is God’s identity to be love. So when we say that Jesus is the Incarnation of God in this world, another way you could put it would be that Jesus is the Incarnation of love in this world. Just like the old Christmas hymns puts it:

 Love came down at Christmas.

Love all lovely, love divine.

Love was born at Christmas.

Stars and Angels gave the sign.

Jesus, in his life, shared that love, radiating that love in both word and deed. He would teach about it. Remember when he was asked what is the greatest commandment? He said the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. Not only does he say these two are the greatest of all the commandments, he goes on to say that every other commandment is also grounded and rooted in love. For he says, on these two hang all the law and the prophets. All of it goes back to love. All of it has to be understood through the lens of love. When they push back and ask, and who is my neighbor, he says it is pretty expansive. What is the height and length and breadth and depth of that love? Your neighbor has to include the person who annoys you, and the person who makes your blood boil. It also must include the person you might call your enemy. Jesus says this love has no exceptions. Love encompasses everyone. That is the height and the length and the breadth and the depth of the love of God. It surpasses knowledge, because it is really hard to do. But that is what Jesus asks of us. That is the kind of love he wants us to embody in this world.

Jesus also shares that love through his actions, like when he has compassion. Time and again the Gospel says Jesus had compassion on them, or Jesus had pity on them. He is exuding and radiating that love. He also shares that love when he heals people. Time and again when he heals people, he is sharing that love.

I would also argue he is sharing that love in our Gospel today when he feeds the five thousand. When I was in college, our college chaplain used to start every meal with a blessing: Food, God’s love made edible. I think that is what Jesus is getting at in the Gospel today. He is feeding the people, giving then food, satiating their hunger, but also feeding them with love. He is filling that spiritual hunger to be loved that every single one of us has. It is more than just the food. It is love. Jesus is sharing love in deed, in action.

How does this feeding happen? There are five thousand people, more than six month’s wages would be needed to buy the food, but Jesus does it with five loaves and two fish. There are two theories, but I would like to point out that the Gospel does not tell us how it happened. The first theory is that Jesus makes more, which is a good theory. He is God and he can work a miracle. The second theory is that the kid who offered the five loaves and two fish was not the only person with food that day. What are the odds that only one person in five thousand happened to have food with them and no one else did? It is probable that people brought food with them when they left their house. And when they saw the kid share his food and saw Jesus’s faith that it would be enough, they also shared their food. When the basket came by, some people took and some people put. In the end there was so much food that there were leftovers. Both of these interpretations are miracles. God made more, the people shared more. Both are miracles of God’s love.

The abundance of God’s love is so enormous. Remember the height and length and breadth and depth of God’s love means that there are leftovers. There is so much love to go around that there is more than we need. That is the way of this world, the way that God has made this world. We get so afraid there won’t be enough that we keep it all to ourselves. But Jesus says, no. There is enough of God’s love in this world to be shared, and he wants us to share that love. With Paul’s prayer, to be rooted and grounded in that love, and to understand the height, length, breadth, and depth of that love, God, through us, can do infinitely more than we can ask for or imagine, just as God did with that kid who shared his love by giving his food to feed the people. When we do these acts of love, when we share that love, it creates a ripple effect that keeps radiating out.

So, my friends, take some time this week to think on this love. Spend some time reflecting on how high and how long and how broad and how deep this love is. Every time you think that you have grasped how large it is, remember it is beyond knowledge, so it is even bigger than you imagine. Keep stretching your imagination into this larger and larger vision of love that God has, a love that leaves leftovers. As you spend time reflecting on that, filling your imagination, filling your mind, filling your heart, filling your being with that love, then go and share it. I promise you will not run out of love. There is always more. God will keep filling you up. Go and share that love with your friends, with your family, with strangers, even with your enemy. Share that love, the love that God offers you.

AMEN.

We’ve got some great stories today. All of today’s Scripture is full of such good stuff. We have two miracles, two stories of healing. We have the beginning of a healing, then it is interrupted, and then it gets picked back up again. We have two very different characters, two different people coming before Jesus, and both of them are coming to Him seeking healing.

First we have Jairus. We know his name, we know that he was a leader in the synagogue. So it is safe to assume that he is a man of some authority with power and prestige. He is a leader. And he kneels down before Jesus and begs him to come and see his daughter, who is about to die. He tells Jesus that he knows that if he will come and lay his hands on her that she will be healed. Jesus says, of course, and is getting ready to go with Jairus. But then we have an unknown woman, a woman who is not named, as is unfortunately often the case in Scripture. We don’t know her name. She doesn’t, or can’t approach Jesus. We hear in the story that she sneaks up on him from behind.

And oh, this poor woman. We hear of her suffering. She has been bleeding, she has been hemorrhaging for years and years, and has “endured many physicians” in seek of a cure. Some of us can relate to that. She is still searching for answers as to what is wrong with her, and wants a cure and healing. Not only has she endured this suffering and pain, but she has spent all of her money trying to find out what is wrong with her and to find a cure.

This woman sneaks up to Jesus, coming around behind him and says to herself, I know that if I can just touch the hem of his cloak that I will be healed. She has this amazing faith. Not only was this woman suffering from this bleeding that went on and on for years, but in her society at that time, she would have been completely ostracized. She would have been excluded. In fact, she would have been harshly and unjustly judged. People would have assumed she did something terrible, that she must be a really bad sinner and that God must have it out for her. She was cut off from her community. She was excluded from what is essential to our human lives, and that is relationship and community. Not only was she suffering in her body, but also in her mind and her spirit, emotionally and mentally.

She comes before Jesus and she dares to reach out and touch his garment. Jesus knows right away. He says that power was gone out from him and that is was because a woman of faith had touched him. He asks the question, who touched me? The Disciples probably think, are you crazy? Everybody is touching you. We are in a huge crowd. But Jesus knows he has been touched and the woman who touched him has been healed. The Scripture says that immediately upon teaching the edge of his cloak the woman was healed. She felt it in her body, and she knew she had been healed.

Not only was she healed physically, she was also made whole in other ways. Notice how Jesus addresses her. And this is really important. Jesus calls her daughter. Maybe if you have a daughter or a child or grandchild or adopted child or you serve in that role for someone, then you know the power of that bond and that love between a parent and a child. Jesus says to her, you are my child. He restores her to dignity, and he restores her to community. She was on the outside, but now she is brought in. Jesus says, you are mine. You belong. Welcome. He heals her in her physical body, and restores her to community and to relationship that is so essential.

That is what Jesus does. That is what Jesus invites each and every one of us into. Jesus desires to heal us. Jesus desires to remind us of this essential ingredient to our being. We are God’s children. God claims us by naming us and says you are mine. To name and to claim. James, Sue, Malcolm, Cindy, you are my child. The healing that Jesus brings may not always be a physical healing for us. We pray for healing and restoration of our physical bodies, but it doesn’t always occur. But Jesus does bring to us healing and belonging, and a reminder that God made us out of love, and because God is good, then we are good. Because God is love and loving and we are created out of that love, then we are loved and loveable. How we need to hear that and remind one another of that essential truth. We need to be together in community, and that is what we strive to create as we gather here at St. Mary’s. We come together, we hear Scripture, we pray for one another, we are nourished at the Table, and are reminded of whose we are. We belong to God and God loves us unconditionally. We are God’s children.

Let’s go back to the interrupted second healing. Jesus makes his way toward the house of Jairus, and people come out and say, don’t bother the teacher any more. We’re sorry to tell you this, but your daughter has already died. As is the custom, there is a lot of commotion, wailing and weeping, but Jesus says, she is not dead. She is just asleep, to which I imagine the people scoffing and guffawing at him. But Jesus puts them out of the house, takes his three favorites and the girl’s parents with him, and they go upstairs to where the young daughter is lying. We’re told she is twelve years old. My daughter just turned nineteen, and I can remember when she was twelve, and the love and preciousness of that age. Jesus says to the young girl, Talitha cum, little girl, get up. He raises her from the dead. The power of Jesus’s love and healing transcends death. We know that. At funeral services, Paul’s Letter to the Romans, Chapter 8 is often read. There is a long list of things accompanied by the question, can anything separate us from the love of God? Can any of the powers on this earth, any of the hateful, corrupt, destructive forces of this world, or even a supernatural world, separate us from the love of God? Can death? No, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ. Not even death. We see that in this scripture. Jesus returns this young, precious daughter to the family and restores that community and that loving relationship.

So, children of God, each and every one of us, remember whose you are, and remember that because of it you have inherent dignity and lovability, and that you are loved without limits. Remember that nothing, nothing, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ.

AMEN

Let us pray: Come Holy Spirit, enliven these words and help us to plant the seeds of your kingdom. Amen.

In this section of Mark’s Gospel Jesus is teaching by way of parables, specifically parables about the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is as if…With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like… Parables are designed to get us thinking. They don’t offer straightforward explanations or definitions. They can be shocking, by design, intended to free us from our normal way of thinking about our world and God. They offer us images, similes and metaphors to help us make sense of the divine. Parables can have many different meanings. They speak to deeper messages and understandings about how God relates to humankind. Parables are a part of Jesus’ Jewish culture and a means by which he seeks to engage and relate to those who seek to know him better, and those who are afraid of his popularity and radical ways. The Kingdom of God is one of the things that Jesus talks about the most. The kingdom of God is not the “usual” type of Kingdom. Yes, we can use kingdom words and images to describe God as we attribute human qualities to the Divine. But it’s important to draw a difference between the kind of kingdoms, kings and lords that we know about, and the type of power that God wields, the type of rule that Jesus proclaims. This is where parables come in.

Jesus is saying, you know one way of thinking, the ways things have always been, the way they are, the way you expect them to always be, but wait just a second, what if…how about this type of power and rule? What Jesus has come to proclaim is a new way of interacting with each other and ourselves and with creation. A force that is pervasive, and as our parables would suggest today, even invasive. A type of rule and kingdom that is stronger than all of the terrible, awful, hateful things in our world. The power of love.

“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, one does not know how” (Mark 3: 26-7). How does this dream that God has for humanity and creation come about? How does it unfold? It’s like so many seeds spread all over the ground, tossed here and there, so many different types of seed sown on so many different soils by so many different sowers, and then after a good night’s sleep, we awake to find sprouts pushing their way up in our lives and the lives of others and in our world, here and there, we know not how.

As a kid, did you ever have that little dixie cup of soil and seeds and then you water it and put it in the windowsill and wait, and wait, and then…all of the sudden, overnight, like magic, tiny, tender shoots appear? Wow! New life!

What was once hidden, seemingly nothing, has revealed itself. Little green life just popping up. This is what God’s dream is like for us and for our world. We don’t know quite how or quite where or from whom God’s love, grace, and mercy will push into our lives, but they do! And if you haven’t experienced any tender shoots in your life lately, don’t despair, sleep and keep watch, God’s love WILL push its way into the soil of your life.

We are to be sowers, all of us, scattering the seeds that come from our experience of God’s love for us. I love this image of us just going all around, here and there a seed, a kind word, a smile, a compassionate conversation, a very real help in a time of trouble, a shared experience of the divine, a powerful moment together. Here a seed, there a seed, everywhere a seed. And then we just wait. SO much potential energy. SO many possibilities for planting the loving kindness God intends for us all! Imagine the harvest! Imagine reaping bundles and bundles of care, inclusion and compassion. What an amazing time for humanity. What an amazing place our world will be!

With what can we compare the Kingdom of God? It is like the bright fields of tulips, daffodils, lavender. Beautiful to behold, fragrant, offering joy, color, and life. It’s like everyone, EVERYONE having what they need to prosper.

Affordable housing with wrap around care to meet the physical, mental, and spiritual health needs that we have. A place for everyone to belong, to feel valuable, to know that they are loved unconditionally. Yes, it is a dream, a different kind of kingdom, a different way of seeking, thinking and being. This kind of kingdom, this inbreaking of God’s love spread all over our world, is at the same time already here and not yet here. Already present AND not yet fully realized. With our help, with our work scattering seed, it WILL begin to slowly push up out of the soil, to unfurl, grow and spread. Even though we may plant miniscule mustard seeds, they can and will grow and grow and grow and become giant trees of shelter, welcome, and community, sending forth God’s love into our world, working to bring about God’s dream for us. God’s way of love to rule throughout our lives and our world. Get to work! Start sowing! Amen.

The Book of Genesis has two stories about the creation of the world. These stories are not meant to be science or history, but that doesn’t mean they don’t contain truth. They contain a lot of truth, really important truth that we need to remember: theological truths, moral truths, ontological truths, truth about who we are.

Our first reading today comes from the second creation story. But before we talk about that, we need to talk about the first creation story because these two stories are in dialogue with each other. They are in conversation, and we can’t understand one if we don’t understand the other.

You know how the first creation story begins in the First Chapter of Genesis: In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was Tohu Vavohu, a Hebrew word that only shows up here. Scholars, because they cannot cross reference this word, have some good guesses. It’s something like a formless void, or welter and waste, or primordial chaos. Into that chaos God is making order. God is taking all this stuff and creating objects, creating creatures that have their own being, their own identity, their own separation, their own boundaries. God makes light. God makes water and sky. God makes land. God makes sun, moon, and stars. God makes birds and all the sea creatures and all the land animals. This all takes about six days, according to the story. At the end of each day, God looks over his creation and says, it is good. It is good. It is oh, so very good, God even says on some of those days. And on the sixth day, the last of the land creatures that God made was humanity. You and me. And it says that when God made humanity, he made it in God’s very image. It also says that when God made humanity, God invited, or perhaps we should say God commanded, us to be stewards of the rest of creation, to care for it.

That is the first creation story. In this story there are so many truths for us. I would reckon that we focus on this first creation story more than the second one. I think it is meet and right for us to focus on this story because there are some important truths that we need to remember. We need to remember that in all the chaos of life, God is in the midst of it and God is at work. God is continuing to create, God is continuing to bring things together, God is continuing to bring order out of the chaos.

We need to remember and keep before us the truth that we are made in God’s image. You are made in God’s image. When you look in the mirror in the morning, you are staring at the image of God. That might be a hard truth for some of us to realize and accept. We might not feel so good about that image. There are a few gray hairs, a few age spots are appearing. But we need to be reminded that we are made in God’s image, as is all of humanity. That means your neighbor is made in God’s image. So if you look to your left and look to your right, that is the image of God. That person, the neighbor next to you, is the image of God. We need to hold that truth in front of us. That also means that our enemy is made in the image of God. That is the hardest one of all, isn’t it? The person who makes your blood boil, they, too, are made in the image of God. So we need to treat ourselves, and our neighbors, and our enemies with the respect and dignity that that God-bearer is worthy of. That is truth we need to remember when we read this first creation account.

We also need to remember that we must care for God’s creation. We must be stewards. We are at a point in humanity’s ability and power that we can destroy creation in ways we have never been able to before. We need to remember that is not God’s vision, God’s dream. God’s vision for us is not to consume or destroy creation. God’s vision is for creation to nourish us, and we are to nourish it, to be caretakes and stewards of that creation. These are important truths that we need to hold up in front of us, all the time.

But there is the second creation story. It is saying, I have things I want to add to this conversation. These additions to the conversation are not necessarily in conflict. For instance, the second creation story reinforces the message that we are to be stewards of creation. Both creation stories say that. But the second creation story also says, all right, Mr. First Creation Story, you think that God is making order out of chaos. But what about the chaos I still see all around me? Are you telling me my eyes are lying, that I don’t see all the pain and suffering that still exists in this world? The second creation story is making things a little more complicated.

The second creation story is also saying, OK, you may be made in the image of God, but let me tell you a story about taking that a little bit too far by trying to be like God. The second creation story is saying it is OK to remember that you are made in the image of God, but you are not God. That is an important distinction the second creation story is making. You may be made in God’s image, but you are not God. It is a distinction not unlike having a good healthy self esteem or being a narcissist. You are made in God’s image. Do not forget that fact. But also remember you are not God. Let God be God and you be you. You are the one who carries God’s image, but don’t put yourself in God’s place. The second creation story is offering this corrective by saying if you take this too far, it might go off the rails.

In the first creation story, everything that was made was good. The second creation story confirms that, but it also says there is still bad. While you may be good deep in your core, that doesn’t mean we don’t fall short of the dream, the vision, the mark that God has set. Falling short of the mark, falling short of the dream that God has is called sin. I know we don’t like to use that word all that much, but it is an important one to remember. Every single person is good, and yet sometimes we don’t live up to that. The whole point is not to make you feel shame, but to say, come back to that good. Keep trying, because you are good, and you can do good things.

So, my friends, hold these two stories up before you. Don’t just pick one, but hold both of them up. Remember your goodness. Remember that you are made in God’s image. Remember that God is at work in this world bringing order out of chaos. Remember to be a good steward of God’s creation. But also remember that sometimes we miss the mark, and when we do, try again. For as it says in the Psalm, there is plenteous redemption in the Lord. God’s mercy and God’s grace abound. We may be prone to wander, as a good old hymn writer put it, but remember that grace is amazing, as another hymn writer wrote. Keep trying. Keep coming back, remembering the goodness of the Lord. Remember that you are made in God’s image, as is your neighbor and your enemy. Treat them with the respect worthy of that image, but don’t try and be God. Let God be God, and you be you. Because God loves you without question, without reservation. God made you in love and God loves you more than you can ask for, or begin to imagine.

AMEN.

Ah, Nicodemus. Nicodemus was a leader of the Jews in Jerusalem. He was a teacher, a member of the Sanhedrin. He was also a Pharisee, so as such would have been part of the group who felt so threatened by Jesus’ increasing popularity that some of them set about plotting to have him arrested and executed, thus eliminating once and for all this troublesome rabble rouser from Galilee. But Nicodemus was different. While apparently maintaining appearances among his colleagues around the temple, Nicodemus was intrigued by what Jesus had to say. Sadly, he couldn’t admit that to anyone because unlike Peter and Andrew, James and John, he had something to lose by openly claiming to be a follower of Jesus that they never had to worry about: status. Nicodemus was a well-respected leader, one of the in-crowd at the temple. Admitting that what Jesus was teaching made sense would have cost him his standing among his peers.

So Nicodemus came to Jesus by night, wanting to talk to this remarkable young man who was attracting so much attention, but without any of his fellow Pharisees knowing about it. Unfortunately in the conversation that ensues, Nicodemus comes across a bit like a Biblical literalist talking to an Episcopalian. When Jesus tells him that “no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above,” Nicodemus completely misses the “from above” part, wanting to know instead how someone can be born again after having grown old. You can almost hear Jesus slapping his forehead as he thinks to himself, Geez this guy’s supposed to be one of the smart ones! But Jesus goes on to try to clarify that what is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. He then uses an analogy, comparing being born of the Spirit to the wind. You can hear the wind, he says, you can feel it, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it’s going. That’s how it is with someone born of the Spirit. You may feel their effect on you, they may move you to do all manner of good things, but it won’t be obvious from whence comes their power. Poor, literal Nicodemus is baffled. How can these things be?

How can these things be? We understand the wind. We know what causes it. We know we can’t control it though sailors have known for millennia how to use it to power their vessels large and small. Nowadays more and more places are using it to generate electricity. But the Spirit, what do we really understand about this third person of the Trinity? We believe the Creator God, God the Father in older language, is the force that brought into being all that is. We believe that over time, after life evolved into human form and those humans became less and less what God might have hoped for, God sent Jesus, not to condemn the world, but so that the world might be saved through him. Notice how that’s worded. It doesn’t say that by living among us Jesus saved the world, but rather that by coming into the world Jesus made it possible for the world to be saved. In other words, there is still work to be done, and we, the people who profess to be followers of Jesus, empowered by the Spirit in the same way the wind powers a sailboat, are the ones who have to do it. Which in some respects brings us back to Nicodemus. Do we have the nerve to live our faith in the light of day, or do we feel the need to simply lurk about trying to be faithful Christians in the dark?

 It’s hard these days to be open about much of anything. It seems as though more and more people see the world in terms of us and them, where they, whoever they may be, are seen as the enemy, people to be feared. We tip toe around each other, afraid to say anything that might “set off” someone we suspect, we may not even know for sure, has a perspective different from our own. This is not how Jesus taught us to live. Rather ,Fear not! is what Jesus said over and over again, and he meant it! We simply have to be able to talk with each other. Self-segregating into little pockets of like-minded people only makes everything worse. Back in 1991, following a truly horrible diatribe about homosexuality at a Diocesan Convention, the Diocesan Committee on Human Sexuality was formed. A year later this group presented to the diocese a five part program intended for use during Lent, 1993, entitled Sexuality: God’s Good Gift. I was attending a small church at that time which has since closed, that was located in a very conservative community. It will likely come as no surprise, given how small the church was, that I was asked to facilitate this Lenten program. Okay, so I was comfortable about leading the first three sessions, but the fourth addressed Gay and Lesbian Sexuality. I knew beforehand this entire program would be challenging for many members of that congregation, so I was genuinely nervous about how that particular session would be received. Nonetheless, the vicar asked a lesbian friend to participate that evening, which she agreed to do. People listened and participated - we had very strict rules about engaging in dialogue not debate - and at the end of the evening a man whom I liked and respected greatly though I knew we had different perspectives on many things came up to me and said, “You know, there’s a kind of joke I’ll never tell again.” Wow, I thought to myself as I drove home utterly exhausted, this program actually is making a difference. Conversations around sexuality have continued to evolve over time. Many people’s attitudes have changed. Ten years after I led that program the Episcopal Church ordained our first openly gay bishop in 2003, and twelve years after that at General Convention in Salt Lake City in 2015 we approved rites for blessing same sex marriages within days of the Supreme Court declaring same sex marriage legal. While many of us felt that day that great progress had been made in terms of allowing people to live out their sexuality as is right for them, not everyone shared that perspective. While the vote to approve the marriage rites was by orders and was overwhelmingly in favor of doing so, the vote was not unanimous. There were a few dioceses within the United States as well as most of our off shore dioceses in Central and South America as well as Asia who were opposed. Still, the next morning there was only one deputation who we discovered had left the convention, minus one member who chose to stay. All the other deputations continued to be part of us, even though we had different perspectives on that particular issue. We need to be able to function like that now in society at large with regard to the many challenging issues that confront us.

 The question of course is how? There's no doubt the world has changed dramatically since 2015. The ability to have a calm discussion during which differing perspectives are shared seems to be a dying art. Conversations, be they public or private, seem to devolve much more quickly these days into arguments where each side is determined to prove the other side wrong, rather than opportunities to share differing perspectives that over time might lead if not to agreement, as least to understanding and acceptance of each other as good people with different views. While human sexuality is certainly still a topic that garners plenty of attention, racism, which is linked closely to immigration, the use of vaccines that was thrust into the limelight during the pandemic, the nightmarish situation in Gaza are just some of the issues that seem to divide us into opposing camps in 2024. As it did with human sexuality, the Church has tried to make a difference where it can. I’m currently participating in Sacred Ground, a program produced by the Episcopal Church in an effort to get white people to understand just how pervasive racism is in our country and to recognize our often unwitting participation in it. It’s an excellent program, one that has prompted me to examine how I was raised, what I was taught, and how all of that influences how I live my life today. It is very much designed to get me and others to step out of the dark into the glaring light of today’s conflict-ridden world, to find the courage to move from being spectators of what’s happening in the world to people willing to speak and act in an effort to make a difference. While this course is addressing racism, I would like to think that what I’m learning in that context will carry over into other areas of my life as well.

 On the dreadful day of Jesus’ crucifixion Nicodemus joined Joseph of Arimathea in burying Jesus’ body, bringing over a hundred pounds of spices to include when they wrapped the body in the burial shroud. Beyond that very compassionate act, which was done in secret out of fear of how the Jewish authorities might respond, we don’t how Nicodemus lived out the rest of his life. Did he believe and acknowledge that Jesus rose from the dead, or did he go along with the party line that clearly some of Jesus’ followers must have stolen the body? Did he try to walk a sort of existential tightrope, doing his best to follow the teachings of Jesus as far as he could while at the same time keeping up appearances around the temple, or did he at some point openly identify himself as a follower of Jesus? There’s no way we can ever know. What we do know is that enough people have openly followed Jesus teachings down through time to keep them alive over 2000 years after Jesus walked the earth. Will the principles that we hold dear, that we reaffirm every time we recite the baptismal covenant, still be important to anyone ten, twenty, a hundred years from now? That depends on whether we, and the young people learning from us how to follow Jesus, have the courage not merely to live out our faith in the light of day, but to actually be the Light of Christ in a world full of people fearfully hiding from each other in the dark. Amen.

Let us pray: Come Holy Spirit, dance in these words that we may know you better. In the name of our Mother/Father, our Brother Jesus, and the mystery of the Spirit who guides and encourages us. Amen.

Happy Pentecost! Pentekoste or 50th in Greek. Fifty days after Easter when we remember, celebrate, and renew the coming of the Holy Spirit on the first followers of Jesus. The spirit that empowered and emboldened them to share the good news of Jesus’ life, death, ascension, and resurrection. Today we wear our red or other “flamey” colors and we have our amazing streamers, bringing to life for us the Spirit’s flow. Fifty days ago we celebrated the ultimate triumph of love over evil. Jesus, God incarnate, came down to live as one of us and to give himself as an offering, the ultimate example of sacrificial love, showing us that love always has the last word, that love, ALWAYS wins. And that nothing, nothing, can separate us from the love of God demonstrated by the resurrections of Jesus. And so, our Easter acclamation from Easter Sunday and throughout this season including today is: Alleluia, Christ is risen! (The Lord is risen indeed, alleluia!).

And so, today, after the glorious resurrection, and the ascension, we now celebrate that coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. The description of this awesome event we heard about in the lesson from Acts today.

There was a sound like the rush of a violent wind and divided tongues, as of fire, appeared and rested on each of them. And all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking in other languages. And pretty soon a crowd gathered to see what was going on they were bewildered because each person heard the disciples speaking in their native language proclaiming the Good News.

What an amazing picture! These followers of Jesus, men and women, were filled with the Holy Spirit. They each got their own flame hat, and that’s not all, they could also speak whatever language the person they were talking to spoke! So they just went off sharing the good news of God’s love demonstrated in Jesus to every person gathered there from whatever place, ethnicity or language. SO COOL! The Holy Spirit gave them what they needed for that moment to share the message of God’s healing, inclusive love.

And today, the Holy Spirit continues that bewildering, inspiring work in our world and in our time in moments and contexts with specific people in our lives who need to hear how much God loves them. Who need to hear how they are forgiven, how they are valued, how they belong.

Did you know that you were baptized with the Holy Spirit just like these first disciples?

 “Holy Baptism is full initiation by water and the Holy Spirit into Christ's Body the Church” (BCP. p. 298)

During the baptism service we pray: “Fill them with your holy and life-giving Spirit” (BCP, p. 305). And: “We thank you, Father, for the water of Baptism. In it we are buried with Christ in his death. By it we share in his resurrection. Through it we are reborn by the Holy Spirit.”

And: “Heavenly Father, we thank you that by water and the Holy

Spirit you have bestowed upon these your servants the

forgiveness of sin, and have raised them to the new life of

grace. Sustain them, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit” (BCP, p. 308)

And one of my favorite things is to mark the sign of the cross on peoples’ forehead with chrism and pronounce: “You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism and marked as Christ’s own forever” (ibid).

In our baptism we receive this amazing power of the Holy Spirit to guide, strengthen, and comfort us on this earth. Just like these first followers of Jesus on that first Pentecost, God and has sent us the gift of the Holy Spirit.

This gift that Jesus calls the Advocate, the Spirit who speaks for us and who champions our cause. The Spirit watches over, protects and comforts us.

And the gift of the Spirit testifies to the truth of God’s goodness in Jesus, in creation from the beginning of time, and revealed in our lives whenever and wherever love shines forth. The catechism tells us that “we recognize the presence of the Holy Spirit when we…are brought into love and harmony with God, with ourselves, with our neighbors, and with all creation (BCP. p. 852).

This gift of the Spirit is our guide, helping us discern what is good and right and worthy of our time, energy, and care. And just like those first Spirit-filled disciples at the first Pentecost, the Holy Spirit is MOST definitely still at work here and now in our lives. May we, this Pentecost, recognize and receive the power of the Holy Spirit that flows within, around, and through each one of us, and so empowered, may we share the good news of a loving, liberating, life-giving God. Come Holy Spirit, come, fill our lives with an abiding sense of your presence and courage to share your love with our hurting world. Amen.

This past Thursday was the Feast of the Ascension. On Ascension we commemorate that moment when Jesus took the Disciples, 40 days after his Resurrection, out to the Mount of Olives and gave them some final words, some last wisdom, and then ascended up into heaven.

This moment was a second death for the Disciples. The first death was on Good Friday, and they had begun the process of grieving when their grief was interrupted by the Resurrection. In the following 40 days they had encounters with Jesus, wild and wonderful experiences of the Risen Lord with them in person, in the flesh. We heard many of those stories at the beginning of the Easter season. Like Easter Sunday when Mary Magdalene had the experience of encountering Jesus by the empty tomb. We heard both John and Luke’s versions of the Disciples gathered together in a locked room in their fear, and Jesus appeared among them and showed them his wounds. There are other stories, like the road to Emmaus when two Disciples were walking and Jesus appeared to them. They did not know it was him, but in the breaking of the bread they realized that Jesus had been with them that entire time. Stories like the Disciples going back to work on the Sea of Galilee, and Jesus calling them from the shore in the early morning and feeding them some freshly cooked fish. There are other stories that we don’t have. They were not recorded in the Gospels, but we do hear tell of them.

And we have this final Resurrection experience where Jesus meets the Disciples at the Mount of Olives. He says this is it. I am going back. You are not going to see me again like that. This is the second death, and the Disciples start that grieving process again. Like so many of us in grief, their first response is just to be stuck. They just stand there, looking up. It takes awhile, but finally some angels come along and say, what are you looking at? Jesus is gone. You need to get out of here.

The next thing the Disciples do is something normal as we process grief, and try to go back to the way it was before. We pretend the loss didn’t happen. We try to recreate the past, as if we could. What do the Disciples do? They say there used to be twelve of us. We lost one, that Judas guy, so let’s pick a new Judas. So they create a criteria for the next Disciple. The person had to be with them from the beginning, which I find a fascinating detail. The way I had always imagined this as a kid, was that Jesus called his twelve Disciples, and then went out and started preaching and other folks came along for the ride. But that’s not what the Acts of the Apostles says. It says there are a whole bunch of other people there from the very beginning, and one of them is going to be one of the twelve. There are so many people that there are options they can pick from. The Disciples are trying to go back. They are trying to imagine as if they could go back in time and be they way they were.

But here is the problem: you can never go back. You cannot recreate the past. What the Disciples are in is not a new beginning, but rather a liminal in-between time between the Ascension and Pentecost. Even though it is ten days, they have no idea what is going to happen. Next week we will hear the story of how the Holy Spirit came down and lit a fire underneath them to go out into the world and do all kinds of wonderful and amazing works. But they are not there yet. Right now they are in this moment of deep grief, trying to recreate what once was.

What is true for them is true for us. We do the same thing. When we have loss, we so often try to grasp at the world as it once was, whether it is the loss of a loved one, or the loss of some part of our life. We do it as a community, as a country and long for the past. We do it as a church. We long for a church that once was, the booming church of the 1950s that I have heard great things about. Or perhaps the church of the 80s or 90s, which was fantastic. The church before the pandemic, the church of February 2020 was great. I loved it. But it is gone. That ship has sailed. We can’t recreate the past. Instead, what we do is move forward

It's not that the past is completely gone, there is no discontinuity. We bring forth elements of the past, but we can’t recreate it. So what we do is build upon it. The Disciples cannot recreate what their life was like when Jesus was with them, but what they can do is move forward in faith, pulling forward the best of that life. They can keep grounded as the Holy Spirit leads them, stay grounded in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Stay grounded in the way of love that Jesus taught them and Jesus showed them through his kindness, compassion, and healing. They can pull all of that forward, but it will not look the same, it will not be the same. It will be something new and something wonderful, guided by the Holy Spirit.

You already know the ways it is going to shift because you have been hearing that story throughout this Easter season. The Lectionary does this weird thing by messing up the chronology. During the early Easter season we were hearing stories about what the early Church was like in the Acts of the Apostles, but all of those stories are after Pentecost. Now we have gone back. Thursday we heard about the Ascension, today we hear about the in-between time, and next Sunday we will hear about Pentecost. But you know what is going to happen, and that is that the Disciples will find out about the power of the Holy Spirit that will lead them in new ways. Not ways that are discontinuous from Jesus, but ways that build on what Jesus was doing. Last week we heard the story of the way Peter finally comes to realize that Jesus’s message of love, peace, justice, mercy, forgiveness, kindness, and compassion is not just for him and people like him. It is for the Gentiles also. So Peter realizes that they, too, can be baptized. God’s message of love is for all people and all creation. That is different from what they had experienced when it was just the twelve of them with Jesus. But it builds on it in ways that makes so much sense from everything that Jesus showed us.

That is the model for us as we move forward, individually, as a country, as a church. Whatever loss we have experienced, we cannot rebuild it the way it was. It is not possible. But what we can do instead is move forward in faith, continuing to follow the way of love, not as it was, but as it is. What we can do is follow the Holy Spirit and all the wonderful and wild ways the Spirit is moving in this world, lighting a fire under us to go out and bring the message of love and peace and kindness and compassion and forgiveness to a world that so desperately needs it.

The reason we try to go back and rebuild the past is because there is comfort in doing so. We are trying to fill some kind of need in our lives, but the real way to feel that need is through love. We can share that love, we can bring that love to this world that so desperately needs it. We can look for the ways the Holy Spirit is blowing, and we can follow along. Keep doing what Jesus did. Keep loving this world. Keep caring for this world, and we can join in on that good work.

AMEN.