Seeing Something New- An Easter Sermon

There is an Easter egg hunt evolution going on here today. Last week, the Sunday school teachers told me to announce that the Easter egg hunt would be only available for kids ages seven and under. So big kids were out. After all, they are so fast that they steal all the eggs. We have tried to have staggered starts, letting the little ones get a few minutes alone before the big kids jump in, but it always seems to result in some kids having tons of eggs and others having only a few. So we just told the older kids that their time was up.

Well, this went over like a lead balloon. Nobody wants to be told that they are too old to hunt Easter eggs. I thought we might have a rebellion on our hands. But then a very gifted teacher came up with something new and unexpected.

She developed a new kind of egg hunt. The old fashioned competitive, find-all-the-eggs-you-can-in-a-short-time-before-everything-is-gone method will still be used on the young ones. But there is something new for the older kids, ages 8-11. They are going to hunt for eggs that contain pieces of a treasure map. They must work together to put the pieces in the right order to form the map that will lead them to the key which unlocks a treasure. And there will be enough chocolate for everybody.

No one likes change. But I think this Easter Egg hunt 2.0 is even better. Instead of being competitive, it is community building. And everybody gets chocolate!

All that Mary Magdalene wanted was for things to go back, back to the way that they were. Jesus had made her well, you know.  Mary had been lost. She had demons, these things that she could not see and did not understand. We don't know what they were: seizures, voices, hurting herself...she was lost and alone. And then Jesus came and he made everything right. He healed her and from that moment on, she would not leave his side. She followed him everywhere. She fed him and helped in any way she could. She did not leave even when they made Jesus carry a cross, even when they hung him up to die. She did not leave even when they took his body down and laid it in a tomb. Where else could she go?

All Mary wanted was to go back to the way things were, when she was with him, when she could cook for him and follow him everywhere, when she was healthy  and well because he was near. She just wanted her life back, her life with Jesus, the way things were.

That's what we want. We all want our lives to be the way they once were, or at least the way that we imagine they were. We want the same in heaven too. We want it to be like our best memories of home, with our loved ones and friends, like the best party we went to, like the best day we had. We want the best things from our past. It's all that we can imagine, the way things once were. Who could ask for anything more than that?

When Mary knew that Jesus was dead, she still couldn't stay away. So in the very early hours of the morning, as soon as the Sabbath was as over, Mary went to the tomb. She just wanted to stay close to him. It was all she knew. She couldn't stay away. And when she saw the dark tomb and his body gone, her grief rushed in on her and she began to weep. Everything had fallen apart. They had even taken his body! There was nothing to hold onto.

And then Jesus comes. Mary looks up and there is this man standing there. She doesn't know who he is. She doesn't recognize her Lord. She doesn't recognize the man that she had served and followed for years. I think that this is very important. Mary wanted things to go back to the way that they were. Her longing for what was prevented her from seeing what was right in front of her. Mary couldn't recognize the new way that Jesus came. Jesus looked different. Jesus was different.

All over the world, Christianity is changing. Christians are dying in the Middle East, being pushed from their homes. Churches are being desecrated. I watched this past week as a Syrian Orthodox Archbishop cried bitterly on 60 Minutes. He had be forced from his town when ISIS invaded. He had just five minutes to leave a church built in the early years of Christianity. The church held hundreds of ancient manuscripts -- some dating from the first century.  He grabbed just five of them and fled, leaving the rest of them, and his beloved church, to be defiled and destroyed. In Europe, churches are falling apart for another reason. Fewer and fewer people are going to church. They are empty, becoming museums, marketplaces, nightclubs, luxury apartments. What is happening to us?

        

All I want is for things to go back to the way they were. I want every Sunday to look like today, full and flowering. Full of bright young faces, worshipping God together. I want things to be the way that they were when churches were full every Sunday and everyone said prayers at night before bed.

And whenever I struggle in life, I think back to the way things were. I want my 20 year old body, my kids being young and so cute. I want my old house that I loved and I want to see my father-in-law again. 

But at the core of what we believe is this mystery called the resurrection. Resurrection does not mean returning to something the way it was. Resurrection is something entirely new. We believe that when we die, we are born into a new life.  And this new life happens when our physical bodies die, but it can also happen in this life. Jesus told his disciples over and over again that the kingdom of God was all around them. It's all around you too. But you have to learn to hunt for it, to seek it out and to find it.

        When Jesus came to Mary in the resurrected form, she could not recognize him. He looked different. He looked so different that later on some of his disciples would spend the entire afternoon with him talking and walking and not realize that it is him. All of his friends wanted things to go back to the way they were before and it made them blind to what God was doing. If you are looking to repeat the past, the resurrection will pass you by.

Now don't get me wrong. I do believe that we will see our loved ones in heaven, that the best of our lives here will be with us there, just as Jesus came back to the people he loved, but our loved ones will be so much more than what we remember them to be. And we will be so much more. Life will be so much more! 

And we are not just talking about heaven. The resurrection is something that we can access now. Jesus is very clear that the kingdom of God is near to you. So we must open our eyes. God is going to do new things in your life, if only you can see them. We are so busy that we don't even know how to see God's work in the world anymore. And yet,  Americans are hungry for meaning. We are running around, busier than we have ever been before, almost frantic with busyness, and we are hungry for meaning. Books on spirituality and meaning are flying off the shelves. We are aware that there is a certain lack of depth in our fast-forward lives. 

So this Easter, I want you to go on an Easter hunt. I don't want you to look for candy. Look for God. Look for ways that God is giving you new life. Look for a new thing. Jesus stands right in front of you, inviting you to see him if you have the courage to slow down and hunt for him. I know that it is scary, this ever-changing world of technology and moving parts. But he is here. All you have to do is look.

The Washing

Jesus washed the disciples feet. He washed Judas' feet and he knew that Judas was going to betray him. He washed the feet of the man who would hand him over to endure the worst pain imaginable and to die. He took Judas' feet in his hands and washed the dirt away.

To forgive someone after they have hurt you is hard enough. What if you were to forgive them for everything that they could do in the future? There is a point in all of our lives when we realize that the ones we love will never be the people that we need them to be. They will always be flawed. They will eventually hurt us, whether they wish to or not. Jesus washed the feet of his betrayer, knowing that he would hand Jesus over to death. Now that is forgiveness!

Ben Clance, our deacon, goes into the prisons and washes the feet of men on death row. These are men that have performed horrific acts of violence. They are about to die and right before they are to be executed, here comes this man, this old deacon, who kneels down and washes their feet. I see your dirt, he says. I am holding the smelliest, dirtiest part of you. And I wipe it clean. Your filth cannot repulse me. I will never stop serving you.

Gods love is not like human love. It does not go away when we betray. God does not need us to love Him back. No, God loves us despite our selves.  God washes our dirty feet. Even before we betray Jesus. Even before we betray one another. Even then.

The Absence of God

My friend Brad was in Seminary when his four-year-old daughter came down with leukemia. They took her to the very best doctors. The Seminary raised money and brought food to their apartment. Brad took a semester off so he could be with her in the hospital every day while his wife worked. But his daughter, Lydia, got weaker and weaker.

He begged God to heal her, to let her stay with them, to be able to watch her grow up. And sometimes, in the hospital, she would look at him with her big blue eyes and say, "Daddy, I'm scared." And he would say, "I'm here, baby. I will always be here."

They talked a lot about Jesus and how much Jesus loved her. And on the day that little Lydia died, she told her dad that she loved him. "I love you, Dadddy," she said.  And then, she just closed her eyes. Brad never saw her beautiful blue eyes again.

After the funeral was over, Brad had to go back to Seminary, but he couldn't. He just couldn't. God was nowhere to be found. All of his life, he had felt the presence of God. All of his life he had believed in the power of prayer. And now, there was nothing. Just nothing. He felt nothing. God was just gone. When his little girls life slipped away, God seemed to slip away with her and, after that, there was just nothing but an empty void. Brad was alone.

In the gospel of Mark, the Passion narrative takes up a full third of the gospel. Jesus does so much in the first two thirds of the gospel. He moves from place to place, he heals, he teaches. He is surrounded by crowds. But once Jesus rides into Jerusalem, it is as if everything slows way down. The gospel writer goes into slow motion. Every step is described, every place, every word. And Jesus just gets quieter and quieter as his life draws to a close.

 Have you ever noticed that the story of what happens to Jesus in the last week of his life is one big process of abandonment? Jesus starts off surrounded by well-wishers. Everyone hopes that he will be the new King. Everyone is cheering for him, waving palms, shouting Hosanna. And then, slowly, inch by inch, he is left alone. The crowds disperse and his friends and disciples remain for a last meal together. Then Judas leaves to betray him. After dinner, just a few of the disciples go with him to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. And they cannot stay awake with him. Jesus is left alone. He is afraid. He talks to God but God does not answer or speak as God has spoken earlier in the gospel. And then, Jesus is captured and his friends all desert him. He is punished alone, whipped alone, interrogated alone. And he speaks less and less. Finally, even his clothing is stripped away and Jesus hangs on the cross naked and completely alone. In his final words, Jesus cries out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" 

Jesus felt abandoned by God. He thought that God had left him. He was in pain and totally alone. Or was he?

When we go through our darkest moments, it is easy to think that God has abandoned us, or that God simply doesn't exist. It is easy to despair. We don't understand why we have to suffer and perhaps we never will. But God never leaves us. That is what the cross is all about. Even when things seem beyond repair and we are totally alone in the darkness, God is there. In the very pit of despair, the cross is there.

And the truth is that our feelings of God's presence are just that, feelings. God does not come and go from us so much as we are open at times to God while at other times we cannot see or sense God's presence. Jesus thought that God had abandoned him. Jesus was afraid and he thought he was alone, but that was just when God was doing His best work.

Sometimes our greatest struggles, the times when we suffer the most and can't figure out why, those are the times when our growth is greatest, when God is even more present, where something incredible and eternal happens. Those are our times of the cross.

I don't think that God willed for Jesus to die and I don't think God wants us to suffer. After all, God made us for Eden. But I do think that God is with us , even in our darkest hour, and that God never left His Son. God never leaves you, no matter how you feel.

Brad no longer wanted to become a priest. God had taken his daughter. God had left when she died. And the worst part was that she never got to go to her prom, fall in love, wear her wedding dress. These thoughts tormented him. He could not get out of bed. 

Then one night, Brad had a dream. Jesus came and took his daughters hand and together they flew through life, and she got to experience everything, her first dance, her first kiss, having children, everything. And Brad knew that Christ was with her now and had never left her. Brad knew that God would do even greater things with her new life.

Why does God abandon us? Why do we feel so alone? The pain of this world can slice you right open, cause you to stumble, cause even Jesus to wonder why God was gone, but God never leaves us. Never. No matter what we feel.

And when you feel alone, remember that Jesus once felt that way too. Remember, and wait for the dawn.

The Happiness Illness

Did you know that March 20th is International Happiness Day? I don't know who invented the holiday, maybe Hallmark card? It's certainly not on the list of holy days in any Christian calendar that I've ever seen. But how perfect for us Americans. Another day in the pursuit of happiness. How about buy-more-stuff day? Or Feel-good day? Or stuff-yourself-silly day? Here is a day dedicated not to any role model or meaningful issue but simply to the idea that you should be happy. Oh, and by the way, what do you do on international happiness day if you are grieving or sad or just in a bad mood? I guess that you should just crawl back in bed and pray for tomorrow?

The truth is that we have become a bit ill in our consumerist world. We have fallen prey to the myth that to be happy is the greatest goal in life. And even more than that, we have come to believe that you can buy happiness, or exercise it onto you somehow, or vacation into it. By golly, if you look good and you're beautiful then you will be happy! And worst of all, if by some reason all of this self-absorption and feelings-centered reasoning still leaves you moody, the implication is that there is something wrong with you. You should be happy! Our ads scream. MAKE YOURSELF HAPPY!! We have become plagued by The Happiness Illness.

Jesus said these words two thousand years ago. Up until this week, I ran away from these words because I didn't really understand them. He said, "those who love their life lose it and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life." 

We are supposed to hate our lives? That just never sounded right to me. Our lives can be frustrating and sad and full of pain but to HATE them? Could that really be what Jesus meant when God created us and gave us life? Why would God want us to hate what he had made? It made no sense to me.

So I spent some time studying the Ancient Greek of the gospels. The word Jesus used is m-i-s-e-o. It is a word whose meaning is to hate in the sense of renouncing, to give up, to hand over.

Renounce. Let go. Reject...We are supposed to renounce our lives.  And then Jesus is very specific by including three key words IN THIS WORLD. You are supposed to renounce or give up your life IN THIS WORLD and live for heaven, live for God, live for the life eternal...live for the real deal.

Have you ever thought about the symbol of our faith? A cross. They are everywhere in our world, on top of buildings and on graveyard stones, engraved in rings or suspended on a chain around a persons neck. The cross is the ultimate symbol of Christianty. How strange that a symbol of torture would embody a faith...the symbols of other religions are all more upbeat- a six-pointed Star of David, the crescent moon of Islam, a lotus blossom for Buddhism. And for us--an instrument of execution.

Would you put a firing squad on your business card? Wear a tiny electric chair around your neck? Suspend a gold hangman noose on your wall?  Don't forget what a cross really is. It is a symbol of death.

The cross reminds us of what Jesus is talking about here. That we must be willing to die to ourselves, that our lives are not first and foremost about making ourselves happy.

My son Luke got his drivers license on Friday. And I am a nervous wreck. I want to hold onto him. I don't want him hurtling down the highway at 60 miles an hour. I don't want him to risk his life. I want him home. But he is going to drive. And I have to let go.

And if I don't let go and give him the freedom, he will not grow into the man that God wants him to be. I will crush him. I cannot hold onto his life any more than I can hold onto mine. I want him safe, I want him happy. But I must let him go and renounce all my motherly instincts, send him him out onto the highway of life.

When you wonder what to do with your life, most of us ask first and foremost if this thing will make us happy. Luke is already thinking about college about a career and people ask him all the time, "what do you want to do?" Not "what is God asking of you" but "what would make you happy?" No wonder our young people don't know what to do with their lives. We are asking them to pursue happiness and no one can make themselves happy. 

What if we asked, first off, how can I serve God? How can I renounce my own pleasure and give it away instead? What does God ask of me? Where does the world need me?

Brad Dowling, neurofibromatosis...

Kimberly Ham, a reporter, did all kinds of research on how to make yourself happy. And guess what she found? It had nothing to do with your looks, your health, your money, or even your family situation. The number one thing that makes you happy is...giving.

GIVING. Do you mean doing something for someone else? Yes. The best way to make yourself happy is to try to make someone else happy. How ironic. How paradoxical.

In other words, you have to give up your life if you want to really live. You have to let go of making yourself happy and give your life away to be happy. Give your money. Give your time. Give yourself to things not because they will make you happy but because God needs you.  The goal of your life cannot be your own gratification, that is a recipe for disaster. No, you must lose your life for God, give it all to God. 

God really wants your help in this crazy, broken world. And it is the forces of darkness that distract us into thinking we can't do anything unless it makes us happy. Was Jesus always happy? Most of the time he was totally exhausted, actually. He fell asleep on boats and climbed mountains to get some peace. And I'm darned sure that he was not happy on the cross but that was the best thing that he ever did!

Things are changing. People are going to church now when it is convenient, just enough to make themselves not feel guilty, when they are not doing something like vacations and hobbies and sports and eating out. One lady came up to me on Christmas Eve in the receiving line and proudly announced, "I come here every year!" 

It is easy to go to church for the purpose of making yourself happy. Did the sermon feed me? Did I feel moved? Was the music good? But none of these are the reasons to come to church. Christians have been going to church on the morning of the first day of the week for thousands of years because it is a concrete way of saying to God, "My life belongs to you. I put you first. I will worship you in the first hours of the first day of the week. I DIE to self and LIVE for you!"

I want you to combat The Happiness Illness. Don't buy into the myth. Your happiness is not the most important thing in the word. There is something so much more important and so much more meaningful and that is your salvation, your heart's growth, the journey of your soul.

The crowds have poured downtown for these basketball games. It is awesome. I wish people would pour into church that way. I wish our problems had to do with crowding and people screaming and lack of parking. What if we came to church with the same enthusiasm that we come to a game? Cheering for GOD!

You know, the evangelicals have something with that altar call. It gives people the invitation to hand themselves over to Christ, again and again and again. To hand your life over, hand over your happiness. You don't need to worry about your mood anymore. It is just not that important.

I told my evangelical friend something recently that I truly believe. We at the cathedral, we do an altar call every week. And everyone comes up. Everyone!

So when you walk forward to receive Christ's body and blood, hand over your very self. No more worry about the mindless chasing of happiness. No more cheering for the wrong team. Fight the Happiness Illness. Your first priority is no longer your own pleasure. Give yourself over to the mystery of the cross.  

Are We Ashamed?

It took a long time to tell others my story of how I came to church.  Some of you have heard it but I want to make sure that all of you know how it happened.

When I was a little girl my dad was very depressed.  He couldn't get out of bed sometimes.  During one period, he stayed in bed for three months.  He would weep and cry.  I used to pray by sending letters to God in my head.  "Dear God," I would write, "Please help my dad.  Thank you for life, love, Kate." 

My first memory of church was of two things, beauty and safety.  The people seemed so solid, it was as if that they loved me already.  And I just felt that I could relax.  It was beyond words, a presence of God that I felt deep inside and it was so beautiful.  When my mother, who was a concert pianist, would practice in the church, I would take off my shoes and run and slide down the aisles in my socks.  There was no place I would rather be.  Church was where there was love and laughter and church was where I found God.  It was the single most important aspect of my life, the fact that I went to church.  I don't know where I would be, who I would be, without it.

When I meet with parents to get ready for their baby’s baptism, I ask them what qualities they most want to see in their child as he or she grows into adulthood.  Most parents say similar things.  They want their child to grow to be good and honest.  They want them to give something back to the world.  But when the parents look deep in their hearts, they realize that there is nothing more important to them than the fact that their child have faith in God and love Jesus.  And one of the most important places that can lead them to develop that faith and love is right here in church.  In fact, there is nothing more important than coming to church – not going to school or soccer practice or violin.  There is nothing more important than developing our relationship with God, and so much of that happens here in this place.

My son Luke is at a boarding school up north, just outside of Princeton, New Jersey.  It was his idea to go and I have missed him like mad, but he has learned a lot.  You see, it is a different world up north.  The winds of secularism blow there with a force.  When people ask Luke about himself and he says that he is a Christian, they assume he is male chauvinist, racist, and judgmental.  They think he is backward and some kind of redneck from the south, out of touch with reality.  They have a chaplain at the school who is an Episcopal priest.  He has been instructed by the school administration not to say “The Lord” or “Jesus.”  At the end of the service, he says, "Go in peace to love and serve."  People at Luke’s school talk freely about the Buddha or Islam or Hinduism, but not Jesus.  It is taboo to say Jesus.  They mock the name of Jesus.  And those who are Christians are, for the most part, afraid to acknowledge it.

Luke is one of only two students in the whole school who go to church on Sunday.  He has found a small Methodist church near his dorm.  They love him there.  I think that he finds the same kind of love and acceptance that I found so long ago – the presence of God in community.

What is happening?  The church that I found as a child saved my life.  It taught me about the grace and love of Jesus.  But up north, people are staying home.  As at Luke’s school, many are ashamed to admit if they have a Christian background.  The churches are small and struggling.  It looks like the end of Christendom.  It is no longer normal to go to church – it is counter-cultural and can get you labeled and branded as a bigot or worse.  But don’t kid yourselves.  These winds of secularism are not just blowing up north.  These winds are blowing here, too.  As I have said before, my friends, there is a storm brewing, and so many people are living in a pup tent while the hurricane is bearing down on them.

What is happening to our world?  Christians are being slaughtered in the Middle East every week.  And even at home, we are slowly becoming reviled, considered out of date and out of touch.

And you know what?  All of this is a great blessing.  Let me say that again.  The fact that the world reviles us is a great blessing.

When Jesus spoke to his disciples, he told them that he was going to have to suffer.  Peter could not handle that thought, and argued, "No, Lord," you are the Son of God, you should not suffer!"  To which Jesus responded with these harsh words, "Get behind me, Satan! You are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things." 

Where is your mind set?  Is it set on money, power, prestige, friends, comfort?  If so, your mind is set on human things.  God wants us to not be ashamed of Him.  God is calling us back – back to the time of the early Christians when it was not popular or even safe to go to church.

Jesus said that those who are ashamed of him, well, he will be ashamed of them when the time comes.  And, for me, the thought of Christ being ashamed of me is a truly scary thought.

If I asked you, I don’t think any of you would say that you are ashamed of Jesus.  But do your actions speak otherwise?  Are you willing to speak the name of Jesus at work, at play, at any place you find yourself?  Or do you find yourself hesitant, holding back, afraid you might offend, afraid that others might treat you differently? If that’s the case, then you have made a strong statement to the world.  And believe me, it’s NOT the statement that Jesus wants you to make.

We Episcopalians are a funny breed.  We don't want to offend.  We don't want to sound pompous.  We want others to like us.  So we are subtle in our evangelism, IF we even evangelize at all.  But Jesus is calling us to speak aloud about what the church means to us and to not be ashamed.  Remember, if we are ashamed of him, he will be ashamed of us.

My friends, RIGHT NOW we have the opportunity to really stake our claim for God.  RIGHT NOW, when you come here to church, you are choosing to come despite having all kinds of other options – TV and coffee shops, extra sleep and shopping, reading the paper or travel.  RIGHT NOW, you are giving up many things to come here.  When you start your week with church, you are saying, I give my PRIME TIME to Jesus.  I am NOT ashamed.  He is the most important one in my life.  I would give my life for him. 

Now is the time.  We must begin to speak about our faith to people out on the streets because they are hungry for the love of God and don't even know it yet.  

In London, there is an old historic church called the Steeple Church.  They have a big lawn outside their building.  The church was aging and small but young at-risk youth would gather on the lawn to talk, bask in the sun, or play music.  One day, some of the members of the church came outside with hot chocolate.  They did not invite the kids inside immediately, but gave out the hot chocolate and listened to them.  And week after week, they would bring hot chocolate and listen.  The kids began to call their time together “hot chocolate.”  And then, after a few months, one of the members of the church asked them, "If we gave you some rooms in the church, what would you use them for? What would you like to do?"  They mentioned just hanging out, playing music. And so the church gave them space during the week.  And often, if you walked into the old sanctuary, you could hear heavy metal music being played or teenagers talking and laughing.  And soon those teenagers were wandering into worship.  They wanted to know more about this place that had opened its arms to them without question. 

I don't think any of us would say we were ashamed of church or of Jesus.  But if that is true, why are we afraid to admit who we are?  Why are we not inviting people inside?  Why are we not listening carefully to people's lives and offering Jesus to them when they seem lonely or afraid?  Why are we so hesitant?

There is a storm brewing.  In fact, it is almost upon us.  It is time for us to speak the truth about who we are as Christians.  It is time for us to speak the name of Jesus without hesitation.  Are you ashamed?