Trinity Sunday

What does Jesus mean when He tells his disciples, "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now"? I had one explanation figured out by last night. But this morning, as I read Morning Prayer, I heard another, from Job. First he recalls what God first said to him, "Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?" And then Job responds, "Therefore I have declared that which I did not understand. Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know." Neither God nor Job says that Job declared anything wrong about God. Job didn't declare a false teaching. He didn't misstate any facts about God. But Job's knowledge of God was still puny compared to the understanding that only comes from an experience of God's presence that is beyond any human thought or man-made doctrine, but no less felt in the depths of the human heart.

Another clue to understanding Jesus is found in the word,"bear." Only one other time in John's Gospel do we hear anyone bearing anything. Then it is Jesus who "bears" his cross. Certainly, none of us can bear what Jesus has borne on our behalf. We have a hard enough time bearing the burdens of those closest to us, much less the burdens of all human beings for all time. But Jesus did bear our shame, our anger, our fear. His disciples could not understand just how far true love will go, for us and with us, until they saw it in action on the Cross. They could not understand the power of true love until they saw the crucified and resurrected Jesus in front of them. So one way to interpret what Jesus says here is that his revelation, his declaration of all that the Father has given Him to say is completed in His death, His rising, and His ascension. So everything we need to guide us on our spiritual journey is contained in these words of Holy Scripture.

But can this "Spirit of truth" who will guide us into all the truth, be reduced to a set of doctrines? As useful as teaching is, will it help us "bear" the enormity of what Jesus had to do for us? Doctrines can be useful guides. But how useful are they when we come to a fork in the road, a question for which holy scripture doesn't provide a direct answer. Anyone can say they're being guided by the Spirit of truth. But how do you know if that's really who is guiding them? Oh how we want some assurance that we're headed in the right direction. We want to make plans for every possible contingency. Like good scouts, we want to be prepared for every possible twist and turn in our lifelong journey. We want to figure out a plan. And if we just follow that plan, step by step; and if everyone else will follow our plan, step by step, then everything will be just fine. Of course, it is better to plan for the future, as best we can, rather than be blown about by the crisis of the day. But as one general said, no battle plan ever survives first contact with the enemy.

And so, here we are, reading words that are now some 2,000 years old. Here we are, trying to understand those words as best we can. Here we are trying to live by those words as best we can. Are we any closer to these wonderful words becoming a reality? Are we any closer to seeing the kingdom of God breaking open in our world today, than we were 2,000 years ago? I don't know. But God the Father knows. God the creator is the beginning of all things and all things end in him. Jesus said earlier that in His Father's house are many, many rooms. And in that house is a special place for all of us. What do they look like? None of us knows. But we have Jesus's promise that those special rooms are waiting for us at the end of our journeys. And Jesus has sealed that promise by sharing our human journey. Jesus the divine and human one has passed through every obstacle, every doubt and fear that we pass through. He has even passed through death and come out on the other side. And where the Human One has passed through, so shall we pass through to the other side.

And while we are still passing through, we have the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, who is guiding us into all truth. But that Spirit doesn't guide us by giving us a detailed plan. The Greek word for "guide" is a combination of two Greek words, "lead" and "way." To be guided by the Spirit of truth is not to have a map with every stop laid out, and the destination clearly marked. To be guided by the Spirit of truth is to be led along the way. It is to stop at the unexpected questions, those events we had not anticipated, and to trust that we will have enough answers to continue on the right path. To be guided by this Trinitarian God is to trust in the One God, who knows our beginning and our end, who has gone before us, and who is with us along the way.

Note that I said, "We" and "us." In our English, "you" can mean "you," or it can mean, "You all." It is the plural form of "you" that Jesus uses when He says, "When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth…and he will declare to you the things that are to come." All that the Father has he shares with the Son, and all that the Son has he shares with the Spirit, who shares it with us; not with me or with you but with us. There is no holding back, no behind-the-scenes murmuring. Father, Son and Spirit do nothing but give and receive. And the love they give to each other and receive from each other they share with us, a community called to be one as they are one.

Theologians have spent centuries trying to come up with analogies to explain the Trinity. But nothing can explain our Trinitarian God better than a community that lives the Trinitarian life. When we can trust that whatever detours come, our special place is still waiting for us, we reveal the Trinity to those around us. When we walk with each other through those detours, we reveal the Trinity to those around us. When we speak openly to each other and listen to each other, we reveal the Trinity to those around us. When we do those things, the Trinity will be much more than an intellectual teaching or doctrine. It will be the warmth in our hearts. It will be the peace in our hearts. It will be the love in our hearts.

The Daily Office, 6th Week of Easter

I want to get back to offering something for your spiritual nourishment. But with the Feast of the Ascension coming this week, there's no weeklong pattern of readings from holy scripture. So this week, I'm making available here daily meditations from Forward Day by Day, an Episcopal organization that supplies most of the pamphlets (or tracts) that you see in the hallway by the office. Just click here and each day you will find a brief meditation on one of the readings for the Daily Office. I pray that you gain some spiritual nourishment from them.

Sermon, 6th Sunday of Easter

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you." (John 14:27)

On this Mother's Day, 2010, my thoughts have turned to leaving. In the Carolinas, at least, the tradition is that men and women wear a carnation in honor of their mothers, red if she is still with us, white if she has gone to that other shore. Since it was Laura who taught me that tradition, as an adult I have always worn white. My mother left too early. And yet, is that not the central mission that mothers, with some assistance from fathers, to teach their children to leave? To become productive citizens, charitable and loving Christians?

In other cultures, children are not taught to leave. They are taught to remain part of the extended family for generation after generation after generation. It would never occur to a Pashtun family in Afghanistan to teach their children that at some point they should leave home. But for whatever reasons, our culture is very different. Our family culture is one of leaving.

We heard last week that even Jesus is leaving. "Where I am going, you cannot come," He told his disciples. And so begins what scholars call the "Farewell Discourse." For four chapters, Jesus tries to help his friends understand two things. First, that He has to die. Second, that He will return to them. Sure He has to leave. But there is a happy ending to this story. Of course, none of that makes the leaving any easier. Mothers and fathers raise their children to leave home. Then they trust that, occasionally but not too often, they will come back. We trust in that coming back, and we hope for that coming back. But it doesn't make the leaving any easier.

But in today's Gospel, Jesus doesn't just say that He is "leaving his disciples. He says that He is leaving them with something. When He "leaves" his disciples, they will inherit something from him. "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you." It is not any peace of this world that Jesus gives. Any peace that the world gives is temporary. Nations make treaties and then break them. Politicians make coalitions and break them. Businessmen make profits, and then see their businesses fall to competitors. Whatever sense of peace you try to construct from whatever material the world gives you is only temporary.

So when Jesus says, "my peace, not as the world gives," what is He talking about? The best description that I can come up with for this kind of peace is freedom from anxiety. Consider when Jesus is giving this peace. It is Thursday night. Judas has already left to go get the Temple guards and bring them to arrest Jesus. His death is less than 24 hours away. Yet he shows not an ounce of anxiety. He trusts that He is doing the will of His Father. He trusts that whatever suffering the world is about to inflict on Him is as temporary as the world's peace. And so He can endure whatever is to come, free from fear, free from bitterness, free from anxiety.

Of course, that's all easy for Jesus to say. What about us? I've had my share of anxious moments these past two weeks. But they have come and gone. They have been temporary. And after those moods pass, what is left is peace, not as the world gives. Shelter is temporary. Books and CDs are temporary. Cars are temporary. Pictures are temporary. Whatever we grasp to give ourselves some "peace" is temporary. What is everlasting is the peace that comes when we focus only on what God wants for us, as individuals and as a community. God wants only the best for us and for Albertville.

Our task now is to pray and talk, to share our perspectives on what it is that God wants for us. When we are honest and respectful, and forgiving of each other, then we will inherit the peace of Jesus Christ that never leaves.

Sermon, 5th Sunday of Easter

"By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (John 13:35)

Why? That is the question that all of us have asked and pondered in our hearts and minds since last Saturday night. Why did the tornado explode on some streets and leave others untouched? Why was no one killed in Albertville, but ten people were killed in Yazoo City, Mississippi? Why did I drag myself out of bed after yet another tornado siren? Why did Laura instinctively go to the interior bathroom after the lights went out? Why did we happen to make it to the bathroom seconds before the tornado went through the front of our apartment like a freight train? Why were some churches spared and others not? And the most truthful answer I can give you is: I. don't. know.

Well, that may be overstating it a little bit. But the standard answer – "God's will" – makes God into an arbitrary tyrant who destroys some and spares others for no discernible reason. If we thank God for not killing anyone in Albertville, does God also get the credit for those in Yazoo City? You say that of course God doesn't kill people, he spares people. So why did God intervene to save the people of Albertville and not intervene in Yazoo City? Does God only take the sinners and spare the righteous? Would anyone like to take a moral inventory of all the people affected by the storms and decide which ones deserved to suffer? I'm sorry but aren't we all sinners in need of God's unmerited grace?

All people naturally want to feel secure. Many want to have some control of their lives. No one really wants to face the truth of how fragile our lives really are. And so, they project their fear of losing control onto a God of their creation. And that, my brothers and sisters, is idolatry every bit as much as witchcraft, or anything that people substitute for God as the object of their worship. Even the illusion of a God as puppet master, pulling all our strings, is preferable to saying, "I don't know."

Okay then, where was God in the tornado? What good is such a God in a crisis? What do you know, Reverend, about the ways of almighty God in this world? What I and many other believers know is that God is not to be found in the sky pulling our strings. As a blogger put it this week:

"God was the father who could think of nothing but his family while he tried to protect them, hunkered down in the hallway…God was the child looking to his parents for comfort. God was the man or woman that kept a cool head in the midst of total chaos…God was the family who had no damage that generously took in another family until they can get back on their feet…God was the faithful few that took communion and gave thanks in their church courtyard, though the church building had a gash in the ceiling and the walls were leaning off the foundation.

"We are not God's playthings. He is not some grand puppet master, and we are not his puppets. I hope that people will stop believing that God caused this destruction. I hope people will stop thinking that God was merciful to some and merciless to others. I hope people will stop asking, 'What did God do to me?' and ask instead, 'What does God want for me?'

God is the love that has passed between us all in the days since last Saturday. In God's Son Jesus Christ, God is the love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. In that love we need not fear any disaster. For in the cross and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, God has truly endured all things.

So, what will happen to Christ Episcopal Church in Albertville, Alabama? I don't know. Will we be able to recover our historic church, or will we have to find some way of replacing it? I don't know. There are still facts to be gathered. However the church looks to any of us, none of us in this room have the expertise to say what is and isn't possible for that lovely gray church on Main Street. Your Senior Warden and I will be consulting with the Church Insurance company and their experts in the week, or weeks ahead. Your Vestry will be praying and discussing all the possible options. And those options will be presented to you at the appropriate time, with all the information necessary to make an informed decision about the future of the church.

What is the future of Christ Episcopal Church? I don't know. But I do know this from the Good News we hear today. We are to love each other as Jesus loves each and every one of his disciples, then and now. We are to listen to one another. We are to respect each other. We are to seek the truth with each other, knowing that none of us has an exclusive claim on the truth, and that we will not find the truth, except we look for it together. We all should know that.

I also know that we are blessed with a parish hall and office space that was untouched, and will allow us to continue our ministry to bridge Christ and community. I know that we have been blessed with $10,000 from Bishop Parsley, half of which must go to Outreach. Know that in the days ahead, even as we care for each other, we must not stop caring for Albertville. We have already begun caring for the community through our beans and rice ministry. On Saturday morning, before the tornado, we gave away beans and rice to 40 families. Many more families are in need and we must take the gifts that God has given us and give them back to God through the people of Albertville.

That, my brothers and sisters, is what makes us the Church, our love for each other and our neighbors. My brothers and sisters, the Church is the people not the building. What will happen to the beautiful building we call our church? I don't know. What will happen to the Church, the people of God and the Body of Christ? As long as we love one another, and our neighbors, with the same selflessness as Christ loves us, we will endure all things. And we will triumph in all things.