Christ Jesus goes away on this day so that we can be filled with the Spirit and continue the ministry of self-giving, wounded love that is the only way the world will be healed.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Ascension of Our Lord
Texts: Acts 1:1-11; Luke 24:44-53

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

Having Jesus around was great for the disciples.

Whenever there was a crisis, Jesus handled it. If decisions needed to be made, Jesus made them. If someone needed help, they brought them to Jesus.

It was good. These folks spent their time being taught by God’s Messiah, embraced by God’s grace and love. They didn’t have to worry about much if they stayed close to Jesus.

The crucifixion was a horrible blow to this peace of mind. But then Jesus was alive, raised from the dead. They had him back. Jesus in charge again, and it’s good.

That is to say, it makes sense that after Christ ascended into heaven, the disciples, women and men alike, stood on the Mount of Olives gaping at the sky. “He’s leaving? What are we supposed to do now? What will happen when things get challenging?”

And that’s precisely the point.

In times of crisis, we often look to the skies for God.

We get angry with God for not intervening in human suffering, and we’ve seen a lot of it this year. We want to neatly hand all our problems and the world’s problems to God and say, “here you go.”

Except the point of God taking on human life and living among us was to show us in person God’s way, the way of love of neighbor, so that we would do it. To teach us in person how we could love as God loves, so that we would do it. The Son had to return into the full life of the Trinity so we could be left in charge.

This doesn’t mean we can’t ever look up at the sky and yell at God.

We don’t need to defend God or God’s choices to anyone, even to ourselves, and God’s big enough to handle any criticism. Sometimes God seems to intervene, and miracles happen, and sometimes God doesn’t. It’s legitimate to shout our frustration to God when we have it. If Jesus, the Son of God, could do it, as he did on the cross, it’s fair game for us.

Even so, there’s always that angel from God standing next to us who, at some point, will say, “Why are you just looking up to heaven? Go back to the city and wait, and God will give you what you need to change this. To begin the healing of the world.”

This has always been the plan. Good Friday and Easter revealed it, but Ascension gave it to us.

In Jesus, the Triune God said, “I will show you in my very life and death that this is how all of you will also end human suffering and pain, and I will transform your hearts as you join in my resurrection life. So when you are doing this yourselves, you can take on human suffering and pain. Stand with those who suffer. Love those who hate. Get in the way of evil to keep it from someone else. Be my loving presence to those who are in pain. In this way I will heal the whole creation through you.”

The world needs God’s healing love, and will receive it when we carry God’s vulnerability, God’s willingness to be wounded, into the world to bring life to our siblings in pain. When we share God’s strange way of using power by setting it aside.

Christ trusts us a lot in leaving us in charge. We’re going to mess up some of these crises. We’re going to find wrong answers to problems sometimes. We’re not always going to know what to do to help someone who comes to us, or change massive systems of evil. But Christ trusts us with this ministry.

And gives us one more grace.

Those women and men were sent back to the city and told to wait, because the Holy Spirit was going to fill them with the power from God they needed to do this work their beloved Jesus had begun.

We have ten days until our celebration of Pentecost. We’ve already experienced the coming of the Spirit, all our lives, so it isn’t exactly the same for us. But these ten days are a good reminder that sometimes you have to wait before you receive all you need from God. And they’re a reminder that you’re not in this ministry alone, ever.

The Triune God’s answer when you look to the skies is to send you the Spirit so you can have the strength and grace you need to carry on as God’s love in the world. It’s always been the plan, and God has you covered. Just look around you and see.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

You were created to bear God’s love, complete God’s love, in the world, and Jesus invites you to rejoice in the pruning God needs to do to help you become your purpose and meaning.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fifth Sunday of Easter, year B
Texts: John 15:1-8; 1 John 4:7-21

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

I discovered the importance of pruning in my first call.

Mary had planted spirea in front of the parsonage, and I learned that in late fall you need to cut the bushes back to only about 6 inches. It all looked wrong – these beautiful shrubs reduced to short stick bundles. But the next spring, the spirea came back rich and full and flowering. Without the pruning, the bushes would grow long and leggy and look terrible.

That’s the sum total of my plant lore. Mary is definitely our plant specialist. But I’ve never forgotten the wonder of both the painful-looking cutting back in late autumn and the lush beauty that came from it in the spring.

Sometimes you have to have things trimmed away to produce the true blessing that the plant can be.

It’s the same with you folks, Jesus says today.

To bear the fruit you were created to bear, Jesus says, you might need occasional trimming back, cutting away. There are two important truths here.

First, this means you’re meant to bear fruit. It’s your purpose, your reason for being. The elder in 1 John says that fruit is love: abiding in God’s love (like a branch joined to a vine) means you also love with God’s self-giving, sacrificial love 1 John proclaims today. In fact, the elder says that God’s love is only made complete when it is lived out in your love and in my love. Without our fruit, God’s love isn’t fully what God needs it to be.

The second thing is that Jesus does speak of cutting away, removing things that draw away from what makes fruit in you. And that might be painful. I don’t know if bushes and trees feel pain, but you and I should be prepared for some pain in being pruned.

You also can’t prune yourself, God does it.

That’s because pruning requires someone with the right knowledge, vision, and skill. I’ve been told that lilac bushes need pruning so they can blossom even more fully the next year. You can’t just cut them back whenever you like, though. Lilacs begin to set buds for the next year’s flowers not long after this year’s flowers are done. So you have to prune them right after the spring flowers are finished, or you might be sacrificing next year’s flowers. And you have to know what to cut.

Point is, we need someone who knows us better than we ourselves to see and cut away the things that keep us from loving as God made us to love.

So this could be your prayer, to ask the Spirit to open your eyes to what needs changing in you and also to do that pruning. To bring you healing for when it hurts, courage to face what needs facing.

And wisdom to still see yourself as God’s beloved, even as God works on you to become more like Christ.

But what does Jesus think needs pruning?

Jesus gives a huge hint today: “You have already been pruned by the word that I have spoken to you.” He says this pruning has already begun in the word he brought the disciples. So listen to Jesus’ teaching, his words that give life. That’s where we’ll see what he means.

One of the things Jesus hopes to prune away is fear. Fear shuts down your ability to bear love in the world. What happens if you risk? What if someone takes advantage? What if you are rejected or harmed? But Jesus’ word is constant: “don’t be afraid.” You are beloved of God, always. God can trim that fear away from you and open the way to love’s fruit.

Jesus also wants to prune away bias and prejudice. People didn’t use those specific words 2,000 years ago, but Jesus constantly called followers to see with God’s eyes and love with God’s heart. He called them to let go of their preconceived notions of outsiders and aliens, of people who struggle with obvious sins, their views of gender and patriarchy and legalism and privilege, and even race. God can trim away any bias or prejudice in you, remove any blindness to privilege or status you might have, and open the way to love’s fruit, which will lead to justice and peace in this world.

Jesus also wants to prune away hatred and enmity.

Those who hurt you, those who cause you pain, even those that others teach you to call “enemies,” Jesus knows that if you allow yourself to hate them, wish them ill, hope for their harm, you won’t be able to love as you were made to love. This is a hard pruning God needs to do; we far too easily relegate people to this place outside our hearts. But God can trim even your hatred and dislike away and open the way to love’s fruit. Even for that now-former enemy.

If you listen to Jesus, there are many more things that need pruning away for God’s love to emerge and be visible in our lives. Stick with Jesus’ word and you’ll see what needs cutting and also learn to trust God to do it for the love God knows is ready to flow from you.

There’s one more joy: your fruit and my fruit might not all look alike.

1 John is clear, all the fruit you and I bear is love, love like God’s. But just as there are Honeycrisp and Granny Smith apples and they’re both the same and different, so God loves diversity in what you and I bear in the world. What needs pruning in me or in you will sometimes be the same, but sometimes not. Likewise, you and I will both produce the fruit of God’s self-giving love, but how it works, and looks might be very different. God’s love has to address all the things that need it in the world, in whatever way needed. God will make sure the right fruit gets to the right place.

Just remember this: it’s pruning time, and that’s going to be a blessing to you and the world. You don’t need to be afraid. This is what you were made to be. To be God’s love. To complete God’s love. God just needs to do some things to help that happen.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen