Tabernacle Church, UCC

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God Bless You ~ May 9, 2010

God bless you. Do any of you say this to friends or family? After someone tells you something good, or something bad - do you say God bless you!? Sometimes, we sign letters of sympathy with these words. I say "God Bless You" often in my day-to-day interactions with people. It’s one of the percs of being a minister; it’s acceptable for me to bless people.

When we say it, what do we mean? What is meant by the word “bless”?
It has been variously translated as happy, fortunate or comforted. One is blessed when life is going great. A blessing from God is like a God kiss. Today’s psalmist uses the word "gracious" with his blessing: "May God be gracious to us and bless us, and make his face shine upon us. That God’s way might be known upon the earth, God’s saving power among all nations. May God continue to bless us; let all the ends of the earth revere him."

Both Jesus and our psalmist today call us to a gracious relationship with God through which we receive God’s kiss. And by revering God to the ends of the earth, God will continue to bless us...So, this relationship is a two-way street. We revere God and God blesses us.

This week I have worried that God’s kisses might be with held from our planet. The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has made it difficult to imagine God being gracious with people who barter with life to profit from oil. It’s been heart wrenching to watch innocent sea turtles and sea lions float onto shore, smothered by oil. News that the oyster beds and coral reefs are forever damaged makes me want to curse someone instead of call on God’s blessings. This environmental disaster is a sign that we have definitely not revered God to all the ends of the earth.

Fortunately, Jesus takes a very different tact from cursing people.
He does not threaten punishment if we make enormous mistakes. He looked out upon the world, the same world that we are talking about and looking at, and he struggled again and again with how to help us help one another to be God’s advocates here on earth. He tried to help us live
under the influence of God at all times.

"Those who love me will keep my word and God will love them. The word you hear is not mine but is from God who sent me. And now that I must leave you, God is sending the Advocate or Holy Spirit, who will continue to teach you."

In the face of this week’s news, we want answers from the Advocate: How can we help one another practice our faith in the shadows of a river of oil that is destroying lives? We want to know from this Holy Advocate, what spiritual practice will right this wrong, restore life, recover innocence and save the earth? We come to church on a Sunday after a tragedy like this, and we want answers. Tell us Advocate, what can we do?

Jesus sits with his disciples, with hopes that they are willing to continue to grow after he is gone. He testifies, by his very life, to God’s power in the world and urges his followers to stop searching for answers from THIS world. Decide instead to be in constant relationship with God; to trust God’s word among you; and to praise God in all things.

Frankly, I think this is an almost impossible spiritual practice.  Praising God in the middle of hard times seems counter-intuitive. We want to get mad at God in hard times. 

Jesus is fully aware of how easy it is to get to that place in life where things seem bleak: the place where we can’t praise God or imagine God’s blessings. And he promised that if we trust God, God will teach us everything we need to know. He promised God’s blessing.

He promised that whatever God’s people go through, God will always be there. Whatever the nations of the world go through, God will be there. Whatever the creatures on the earth go through, God will be there.
 
I suppose this is a good enough response to our questions today. I picture the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, seeping into the hearts and minds of the owners and profiteers of BP Oil and giving them courage to do what’s right for the world. I imagine the Holy Spirit breathing with the sea lions and turtles, even on their last breath, and soothing away any fears they may have held, while chanting: "Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid....And now I have told you this before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe."
AMEN

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Ordinary Resurrections
Sermon Preachon on April 18, 2010
John 21:1-19

For the disciples, life as they knew it had come to an end. The reason for their existence, the center piece of their daily lives, had vanished. The tomb was empty, and in an instant, everything had changed. Grief invaded their psyches. They felt like they were moving in slow motion, while the rest of the world was speeding by. They couldn’t find anything to do to soothe their pain or bring a sense of hope to their lives. And memories of their beloved Jesus were triggered by the slightest sound or scent. Life as they knew it had come to an end.

The disciples were grieving. They were at that cusp where one wonders whether to live or not. The cusp where sadness over shadows joy, and we can’t imagine feeling light-hearted again. So, they returned to what they knew. The re-turned to their ordinary lives. They returned to the Sea of Galilee where the smells were familiar and the rhythms were routine. They returned to what they knew best. "I’m going fishing" says Peter. There is no escape from this reality of our lives. Jesus is gone; we are here. Let’s return to the life we had before. Maybe from our fishing boats, we will be able to assimilate all that has happened. Maybe in the ordinary, we will find some kind of meaning for our lives once again.

In her book "The Wisdom of No Escape" Pema Chodrin talks about allowing the emotions of grief to bring us to a place where we feel there is no escape. Because in that place, we are present to ourselves. In that place of grief, where we cannot bear to watch the world spinning, where we cannot bear to see other people smiling, or acting as if nothing has happened, in that place of no escape, we touch the wisdom within, we touch Christ in us.

Recently, some of you attended Julia Gauthier’s memorial service. Julia grew up in Salem and was a joyful and popular student at Salem High School. About a month ago, she was in a fatal car crash. At her service, many young people some of whom had never been to church or to a funeral for a friend, sat in the pews and remembered Julia.A few brave souls spoke and told stories about her life. The stories brought a sense of her presence to the remembrance. Story-telling is a way we create ordinary resurrections. Stories help us grieve.

Not all grieving is a result of death. Recently, I met with a family of four, two highschool boys and their mother and father. The Mom is living with terminal cancer. She has been receiving chemo-therapy for five months and has lost all her hair. So, the illness is blatantly visible and her death is in front of them constantly. The grief that the family has been feeling is as potent as the grief people feel when someone dies in a caraccident. But no one wants to admit their sorrow for fear that sadness will escalate the disease and death will come faster. So, they avoid their feelings and avoid each other.

The problem with avoiding the feeling of sadness is that we then can’t access any feelings of joy. There is no Easter without Good Friday. Sadness and joy keep the human spirit in balance. Without one, the other is void. When we met, I asked each member of the family to tell me a story about what was happening in their lives. When the story-telling began, everyone engaged and everyone cried. And when everyone cried, there was enormous relief. And when there was relief, when the wisdom of no escaping the truth was allowed, everyone felt a sense of joy. This was an ordinary resurrection.

In our scriptures, the disciples have returned to their ordinary lives. They return to their boat to fish through the night. For the grieving disciples, the night out on the sea of Galilee was a time when darkness allowed them no escape from the loss of their beloved friend and teacher. And it was just what they needed. As the light dawned, as the sun rose, as the darkness was overcome in the most ordinary of ways, Christ called to them from the beach.

"Children, you have caught nothing. You have no fish."
That’s right brother, we have no fish. We don’t really care one way or the other. We are just sitting in the dark, in familiar surroundings, minding our own business. Leave us alone. "Put your net on the other side of the boat and you will find some fish."

When the net was full, one of the disciples recognized the man on the beach. IT IS THE LORD! Another disciple naked and vulnerable in the throws of his grief, put on some clothes and swam with vigor directly towards Jesus.

When they are gathered once again on this familiar beach, Jesus feeds them. Not many words are spoken. Just a quiet appreciation of his re-turn. And then Jesus begins to help them make meaning of his death for their lives. In a brilliant classic titled "Mans Search for Meaning" by Victor Frankl, readers are brought into the world of meaning-making by a man who survived a concentration camp but lost his family. Frankl is known as an existentialist. He makes meaning out of everything that happens; especially trauma and loss. He is in my estimation the quintessential ordinary resurrectionist. His work focuses on turning suffering and loss into human salvation.

He wrote: "A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth, that love is the ultimate and highest goal to which humans can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: the salvation of humanity is through love and in love. I understood how someone who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when one cannot express themself in positive action, in such a position one can, through loving contemplation, achieve fulfillment."

In the second half of today’s scripture, Jesus having returned to a place and time when he was present and alive with the disciples, invites them to achieve fulfillment. He invites them to remember a time when they were in their boats, frustrated and depressed by their mundane lives and their lack of fish, when he called them to follow him and fish for people. In today’s final episode at the end of John’s Gospel, he transformsthe former story into an ordinary resurrection. He invites them to remember the stories that have drawn them together. He commissions them to love one another as he has loved them. Feed my followers. Tend to the human spirit. Feed each other. Be healers in your ordinary lives. Spend your time moving towards the light, not away. Be vulnerable, not guarded. Touch people who need to be healed, with your tender kindness.

For us, the purpose of today’s story is Jesus. Today we remember that Jesus is the risen Christ. Today we re-turn to Jesus in faith that no matter who has died, or what we have lost; love lives beyond our comprehension.
Love lives forever.
AMEN

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God Bumps
Easter Sermon 2010 by Rev. Laura Biddle
There is an old story about a group of rabbis who gathered together one day to prove that God does not exist. Fed up by long and painful experiences of divine neglect, they were convinced that humanity is completely alone in the universe. Just then, one of them interrupted to say, “We will have to finish this conversation later. It is time for our prayers.”

Easter is about remembering that God exists - even when we feel God’s absence, or God’s silence, Easter says GOD EXISTS.

In our Easter story today, the spices and oils were prepared by the women, but not really for Jesus. They were prepared because even though Jesus had suffered and died in such a frightening manner, even though their beloved teacher, healer, minister and friend had been executed in such a cruel and violent way...they believed they could restore their connection with Jesus through a touch, a kiss, the anointing of skin to skin, heart to heart, soul to soul. Even though God seemed to be absent, they trusted that God was in their hands; that God was always present.

How is this concept about God relevant to our lives? Some of us come to church every week and still we suffer loss in our lives, and we wonder if God disappears. People we care about die suddenly or we are betrayed by someone and our faith is completely derailed by grief. How can we trust that God is always present, when life gets so hard?

Mary and the rest of the women watched Jesus die. They were at a distance, and they watched him die on the cross. Perhaps you have watched someone as they die. This year, I was invited into several hospital and hospice rooms to be present while someone died. Watching can feel helpless. But if you trust God’s presence, watching can become a prayer, for peace, for relief, for new life, for God’s unconditional connection.

One woman invited me into her hospital room at a time when she knew her family would be there. She had only learned about her cancer nine months earlier. There was no illness or even symptom to prepare her or her family. Watching their mother, wife and grandmother die was excruciatingly painful. Helplessness and sorrow were masked by the veil of pretending. We pretend each other because we think that by pretending that there is no death, we might actually stop it, or slow it down. By pretending we might spare one another the agony of loss.

But, this dying woman did not want to pretend any longer. She wanted to have the hard conversation about her death with her family around her bed. And so I was invited to be the conduit for this Holy conversation. I asked her whether she was afraid. And she said not any more. Once I let go and allowed myself to accept this truth, I felt God’s presence completely. I am not afraid anymore. We talked about a bunch of things, including her favorite animal. Why you might ask. Sometimes, resurrection comes in the form of a creature on earth. People have told me that they feel the presence of the one they love in an eagle flying overhead. Or in a pet who was the beloved follower of the one who died. Or in a deer in the woods. In this woman’s case, her favorite creature was fish.

We talked about fish being a religious type of creature on earth. Jesus called his disciples from their fishing boats; served fish to thousands of followers; and cooked fish on the beach after his resurrection.

After her death, the family of this woman went out and got a fish tank and now they have beautiful fish at home. Fish that will be a constant reminder of God’s presence here on earth.

The women who watched Jesus die, who trusted God enough to know that touching his body with spices and oils would heal their grieving hearts and restore their connection to him...came to the tomb with great expectations. Through touch they were going to have a Holy Conversation. But there was an unexpected situation. When they went in to the tomb, they did not find his body. Imagine the moment...

Being denied this intimate ritual of goodbye, left them perplexed. Perplexity, a moment or more when we really don’t understand. A time when we pause in pure and utter confusion. Perplexity is a God Bumbs moment; like goose bumbs but God Bumbs. Perplexity is a God Bumbs moment. A moment when we are absolutely in GOD’S HANDS. When God touch US and anoints US with divine spices and oils and infects US with hope. The women were perplexed.

And then two men dressed in dazzling clothes, stood beside them. Not behind or in front. They stood side by side. The women were terrified - maybe of the power of these two men; maybe of their mystical appearance. And the men were reassuring: Don’t worry. There is nothing to be afraid of. His body is gone, but he lives on forever.....

This was the beginning of their new understanding of how God works in the world. God is always present to turn suffering into human achievement. God is always present to turn death into a new understanding of life. God is always present to turn emptiness into an expression of hope; perplexity into God Bumps; and fear into love.

We are an Easter People. We trust that God is always present. Alleluia, Christ is Risen Today! Christ is risen indeed.
AMEN