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Midweek Lent 2020 + Meeting Jesus

March 25, 2020 By Vicar at Mount Olive

Week 4: Thomas learns to follow Jesus

“Faithfulness”

Vicar Bristol Reading
Texts: Romans 8:18-28; John 11:7-16, 14:1-6, 20:26-29

Today, we encounter Jesus through the experience of Thomas, one of Jesus’ disciples. We hear three different conversations from three chapters in John. It’s truly a gift to read these separate passages together because it gives a fuller sense of who Thomas was and what his relationship with Jesus was like.

In the first conversation, Jesus tells the disciples that he wants to go back to Judea because his beloved friend Lazarus has died.

The disciples are concerned about this plan because Jesus had recently been forced to flee from Judea after angry mobs attempted to arrest and stone him. Jesus would be risking his life to go back, so his disciples advise against it.

But not Thomas. Thomas is willing to go with Jesus. He is willing to face danger, even death, to follow his teacher, friend, and Lord. Thomas speaks up and declares that he wants to go where Jesus goes. So Jesus returns to Judea and the disciples go with him. And just as they’d feared, danger and death await Jesus. Powerful people in the region are plotting to kill Jesus.

This is the setting for the second conversation we hear.

In the midst of a tense and fearful time, Jesus speaks calmly and lovingly to his disciples. “Don’t let your hearts be troubled,” he says, “Trust me.” He tells them that soon he will have to go somewhere else, but that someday they can go there, too.

That makes Thomas worried. “How can we know the way?” he asks. He’s afraid that Jesus might go somewhere that he cannot follow. That, too, does come to pass. Jesus is arrested and executed and buried. The disciples, still under threat themselves, huddle together in fear, wondering what to do next, without their leader.

Then, one day, Jesus miraculously shows up – a living, breathing, speaking Jesus who wishes them peace, empowers them with the Holy Spirit, and sends them out to continue ministry. What an incredible moment!

Except Thomas wasn’t there. He happened to be somewhere else that day. When the disciples told him what he’d missed, he must have been devastated.

This is the part of Thomas’ story that most people know: how he insists on seeing Jesus himself before he’ll believe.

But maybe Thomas’ words aren’t defiance but grief. They aren’t doubt but commitment. Thomas – who loved Jesus, who would have faced any danger for Jesus, who would have died for Jesus – Thomas wants to be where Jesus is, to go where Jesus goes. How heartbroken he must have been to hear that the other disciples had somehow managed to be near Jesus, but he had not. He says, “I won’t be close enough to Jesus until I can to touch him with my own hands.”

And this leads to the third conversation.

Thomas may not be able to get close to Jesus, but Jesus comes to him – a living, breathing, speaking Jesus who wishes him peace. And just as he’d hoped, Thomas is near enough to Jesus that he can reach out and touch him. He can finally declare his faith in Jesus, in person: “My Lord and my God!”

In response to Thomas, Jesus offers this promise: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to trust.” Jesus speaks this promise to Thomas and the other disciples, who are trying to understand what his physical absence will mean for them. And Jesus speaks this promise to all future disciples, a reminder that it is faith, trust in God, that matters. This word of comfort is an answer to Thomas’ question: How will we know the way to follow Jesus? The answer is to trust Jesus, who is the way.

Of course, faith doesn’t protect you from danger or death, but it roots you in the peace of Christ, no matter what you face.

When you look to Jesus, who is the way, who is the resurrection and the life, you are reminded that even death does not bring an end to God’s promises.

The apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome: I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not even worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed.

Living as a human, a finite being, entails waiting, longing, pain, and death. But that is not cause for hopelessness, because you can trust in God’s redemption of the whole creation, and that includes you, a beloved creature within that creation. Living with hope means trusting even when you cannot see, when you cannot fully understand, when you do not yet know the way.

You are still called to live for God’s purpose with every day of your life.

That’s what it means to “love God,” Paul writes. To love God is to be called according to God’s purpose, to reveal God through your words and actions, in any and all circumstances.

And when those circumstances involve suffering, even death – you can remember that you are never left to face that alone. God-in-Christ knows those experiences intimately, as we see in Jesus on the cross. And as Paul so eloquently expresses, God’s spirit knows your heart, upholds you when you’re weak, and sighs with your deepest longings.

Whatever your prayer is right now, God hears it. If your prayer is “How will we know the way?” Or “I desperately long to be closer to Jesus!” Or simply, “My Lord and My God!” God hears you, faithful disciple, and loves you right where you are.

Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in the God who loves you and gives you peace.

Amen.

The Olive Branch, 3/25/20

March 25, 2020 By office

Click here for the 3/25/20 issue of The Olive Branch.

The Olive Branch, 3/18/20

March 23, 2020 By office

March 18, 2020 issue

Seen and Sent

March 22, 2020 By Vicar at Mount Olive

When the man born blind receives sight from Jesus, his world is irreversibly changed, but not his isolation from his community. Jesus Christ draws close to him (even when no one else does), transforms him for new life, and sends him into the world to bear light.

Vicar Bristol Reading
The fourth Sunday in Lent, year A
Text: John 9:1-41

Beloved community, wherever you are at this moment, may the peace of Christ be yours.

What a time it is to hear this story from John’s Gospel. To hear about Jesus’ curative touch, when we are being told to stay 6 feet away from one another. To hear about an experience of physical restoration, when we are facing a pervasive virus and rising death tolls.

And yet there is so much in this ancient story that feels so relevant right now. This is a story about a man miraculously receiving sight, but it is also a story about stigma, judgment, fear, and isolation. The unnamed man at the center of this story had been blind since birth. His physical difference had always set him apart from others in his community. His whole life, he had been navigating a society that was set up for sighted people. He had been forced to beg in order to get by. This man already knew what it was to be isolated, and then this whole incident with Jesus happens.

Jesus gives him sight for the first time, but somehow this actually isolates him even more. People had been publicly accusing this man of being sinful because of his blindness, but even after he receives sight, they continue to accuse him of being sinful, because of his association with Jesus. His parents are so afraid of stigma that they won’t stand up for him. His neighbors are so caught up in their own bias that they don’t even recognize him, this person they’ve walked by how many times before. But they’ve only seen him as his blindness; they’ve only seen him as his begging. His community might have the literal, physical ability to see, but they certainly seem to lack the ability to see him as a person. They may have the literal, physical ability to hear, but they lack the ability to really listen to what he tells them. No one seems to hear him when he answers their incessant questions about what has happened to him.

In the end, their fear and judgment get the better of them, and they drive him out of the community. This man was isolated when he was blind. And he’s isolated when he can see.

He’s isolated, but he’s not alone, because Jesus meets him where he is.

While others pontificate about whose sin is responsible for this man’s condition, Jesus outright rejects all this moral condemnation and praises this man’s embodiment of God’s glory, just as he is. While others ignore and reject this man, Jesus reaches out to touch him, to put healing hands on him, even when the Sabbath laws forbid such action. While others distance themselves from this man, Jesus draws close to him. And when Jesus hears that the man has been isolated completely, driven out of the community, he goes out to find him. Everyone else questioned this man’s experience: Why were you blind? Who gave you sight? How did it happen? But Jesus simply asks him: Do you trust me? [The Greek word often translated “to believe” also means “to trust.”]

This man doesn’t have all the answers – actually, he repeatedly admits how much he does not know [see vv 12, 25, and 35.] But what he does know is his own experience. He knows that Jesus has changed him, and he knows that Jesus is trustworthy. When Jesus finds him in isolation, he says simply “Lord, I trust you.”

And that’s no small thing. Consider how significantly his life has been upended since he encountered Jesus.

Imagine what a radical change it would be to suddenly have a new sense that you’d never had before. This man is seeing everything for the very first time. That must have been confusing, overwhelming, and terrifying. The life he knew is gone, and now he is living in a completely different way. This new life will open up possibilities for him, and he seems grateful for his sense of sight. But, still, the loss that this transformation entails for him is unavoidable. He has lost the world he’d lived in since birth. His relationships with his family, his neighbors, his religious community have been damaged, perhaps permanently. And it is clear that declaring his faith in Jesus puts him at odds with both the Jewish officials and the Roman imperial powers.

Stating that he believes in Jesus is an enormous leap of faith. He takes that leap because he has encountered the light of the world – who could not be changed by that?

The pool where Jesus commanded him to wash was called Siloam, which means “sent,” and that is his fate now. He is “sent” into the world as bearer of the same light he has encountered in Christ. He can’t go back to the life he had before; he can only forward into the life God has called him into. Even when the way forward is difficult, grief-filled, or lonely. The God he trusts will go with him every step of the way, and the testimony he bears about how he has been changed will bring glory to God.

Beloved ones, know that this is true for you as well. When you are sent into a world so radically different than the one you have known, know that God goes with you; know that the testimony of your life, just as it is, is a treasure to God. These are times filled with fear, filled with questions, but you don’t have to have answers or explanations. Trust that your experience will be a reminder that Christ will meet you where you are, even in your isolation.

The light of the world shines even in the darkest of times. May it shine within you, around you, and through you.
Amen.

Midweek Lent 2020 + Meeting Jesus

March 18, 2020 By Pr. Joseph Crippen

Week 3: Mary of Bethany pours out her love for Jesus

“Heart”

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
Texts: Romans 12:1-2, 9-13; John 12:1-8

It was easy to criticize Mary.

She took an astonishingly expensive thing and poured it out. If the value really was 300 denarii, that’s worth nearly a year’s wages for a common worker. Whatever you might think of Judas, he has a point. It’s doubtful the disciples’ common purse ever had three hundred denarii in it. Many could have been blessed with that.

It’s easy to criticize Jesus, too. He seems to devalue caring for those who are poor in favor of caring for him. “You always have the poor with you” sounds a little callous.

But the criticism is easy only if we don’t enter Mary’s heart and Jesus’ wisdom. Paul pleads with his Roman churches to live with transformed minds, being completely different people in the life in Christ that the Spirit gave them. Lives filled with genuine love, care for each other, patience, joy, generosity for each other and for strangers.

Mary is living such a transformed mind because her heart was re-made. This pouring out was the only response she could make from her heart. Jesus knows that, sees this new heart. And publicly gives thanks for it.

Mary’s heart and mind were transformed by her life with Jesus.

Transformed by her time sitting at his feet listening, soaking in his grace, the love of God he lived and proclaimed. Transformed by her life with him as his friend, hosting him in the home she shared with her sister Martha and her brother Lazarus. Transformed by her profound experience at her brother’s death, when this beloved Master and Healer wept with her, shared her grief. Opened his heart to her, which she had come to know was the heart of God.

Mary lived in the abundant life Jesus came to bring all. She experienced new life when she was with him, the life in God’s reign Jesus said was now in the world. When she came to this moment, her heart was different and her understanding, her mind, was transformed.

Mary’s new heart gave her deep empathy.

This is a week before Jesus’ death. He’d warned the disciples, and John tells us they feared he’d be killed if he came to Jerusalem. But they seem oblivious to what Jesus is feeling.

Not Mary. Does she know he will die soon? Maybe. But she clearly senses his inner pain, his fear. Her new heart is drawn to his heart, and she feels his grief. She gets this costly perfume and pours out her empathy, her love, her heart, over his feet, and wipes them with her now-fragrant hair.

Living in Christ’s abundant life, with new heart and transformed mind, the only thing she knew to do was to love Jesus in the most abundant and gracious way she could. Little wonder others were confused and even critical. If they didn’t share her heart, how could they share her love?

Mary’s new heart also gave her new math, new values.

Seen logically, pouring nearly a year’s wages on the floor for any reason is criminally wasteful. These were not wealthy people. The math doesn’t work. If you care for those who are poor, and share your wealth with all so that all have enough, whether friend or stranger in need, this gift doesn’t add up.

But Mary’s new heart and transformed mind have a completely different value system, not driven by cost figures or rational argument. When you see differently, understand differently, feel in your heart differently, your priorities and values add up differently.

Far differently than some of her fellow disciples. It’s as if she was speaking a different language, acting according to a different set of cultural expectations. Not just marching to a different drummer, but singing with an entirely different set of musical rules and structures and voices.

This new heart and mind is your gift in the Spirit, too, if you want to live in it.

Meeting the heart of the Triune God in Christ, walking with Christ, transforms your mind, re-makes your heart.

In that new heart and mind, you share Mary’s empathy. Feeling not only God’s pain over the world’s suffering, but the suffering of all God’s children. That’s the wisdom Jesus has in his words about the poor. Mary only had that one week left to care for Jesus. But he made it clear that caring for all those in need, “the least of these,” as he said, from then on was where his followers would care for him. With transformed mind and re-made heart, you have Christ’s empathy, can pour yourself out in love for others whose needs will always be with you. Your Christ heart can feel that pain and offer healing perfume and loving abundant grace.

And in that new heart and mind, you have Mary’s new math and values. We’re learning that in this current health crisis. Suddenly doing things the way we want, the way we like, just isn’t good enough. We sacrifice things that are deeply important to us because we carry Christ’s heart for our neighbors and friends. But we’ve been learning this all along, too. That wealth we share for the sake of others is always a blessing, far beyond tax breaks or investment strategies. That helping someone might not make good business sense but always makes sense in our hearts. That seeing abundance instead of scarcity gives us courage to share in ways others might not understand, might criticize.

I appeal to you, Paul says, be transformed in Christ.

Let the Spirit open your mind to new possibilities, remake your heart into one like the Triune God’s. It’s a whole new world, but it’s life abundant, Mary reveals. And it’s what Christ longs for you to know and pour out into this frightened and broken world.

God’s peace be with you, beloved, in this time we are apart, but still together in God’s love.