Following Christ, bearing Christ’s heart, is very simple: share Christ’s empathy and kindness in all things.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fifth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 13 A
Text: Matthew 10:40-42

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

A cup of cold water. That’s all you need to know to be a faithful disciple. Or at least it’s a start.

That’s what Jesus says today. And that’s a bit confusing. The past few weeks we’ve heard a lot of challenging things from Jesus from the verses in Matthew leading up to today.

He sent out disciples to heal, to bring life, to drive out demons, to proclaim the reign of God. That seems to need skills and abilities we don’t easily see in ourselves. Jesus himself was overwhelmed at the sheer number of God’s children he needed to reach in person, that’s why he’s sending you and me.

And Jesus warned about opposition that will come to those who bear Christ’s heart into the world, rejection, even worse. Following him might even break up families.

If you’ve been listening carefully, and if you hope to be a faithful disciple, Jesus’ words are daunting. Nothing sounds easy, and the work we can see for ourselves that God needs to be done in this world is overwhelming. Maybe it’s easier not to follow.

But today Jesus says, “don’t overthink it.”

A cup of cold water. That’s all you need to know to be a faithful disciple, he says. Or at least it’s the start. Because it reveals two critical qualities of the heart of Christ that are simple, and easy to understand. They take all the overthinking and anxiety out of following Christ on this path of discipleship.

The first quality is kindness. The heart of Christ you bear is kind.

Kindness is seeing a thirsty “little one,” and offering a cup of cold water. It’s the only action Jesus asks for today. And it’s the simplest of acts. To notice someone, and to be kind to them. To be kind to that one person whom you are with. That family member. That friend. That co-worker. That stranger.

Kindness is the first quality of Christ’s heart. Your heart in your anointing as Christ.

Can you be kind? Jesus asks. Then you’ll do just fine following me. You’ll do wonders when I send you out into the world.

The second quality is empathy. The heart of Christ you bear is empathetic.

Empathy is sharing the suffering of the other one. Empathy is not assuming you know what the other person is going through. Empathy is not putting your experiences on them. It’s listening, intuiting, simply being with another person until you can share in their feelings and needs.

Because a cup of cold water might not be what’s needed. You don’t want to assume you know what another is going through, or what they need. Or assume they respond to the world as you do. You want to be with them, and listen. And if there is something you can be or do, be ready.

Empathy is the second quality of Christ’s heart. Your heart in your anointing as Christ.

Can you find empathy for my children? Jesus asks. Share their pain, listen to them, be with them in love? Then you’ll do just fine following me. You’ll do wonders when I send you out into the world.

Of course, the obvious question needs to be asked: Is this enough?

Can kindness and empathy bring healing to the sickness of this world, life to the death in this world? Can they drive out demons? Proclaim God’s reign? Jesus answers this by modeling it himself.

Yes, he came as God-with-us, incarnate in our human flesh, and bore God’s sacrificial love for the whole creation, for you, on the cross. That’s huge, universe-healing stuff. And yes, he called followers and sent them out, incarnate Christs like him, to be community together and to spread God’s love across the world, so the big changes God needs changed in this world could happen.

But Jesus also had hundreds of one-on-one moments of kindness, hundreds of times he deeply felt the pain of just one person, and was God’s love to them. The vast majority of what Jesus did was kindness and empathy for those he met individually, touching them personally with God’s love.

Now it’s true, the problems of the world won’t necessarily be solved only by your individual kindness and empathy.

If you’re giving out cups of cold water, and everyone is, at some point someone’s got to ask, “why is everyone always so thirsty? What’s going on with our water supply?”

The ills that cause so much pain and suffering, the systems and structures God needs removed, need more than that moment of kindness you’ll show this afternoon, more than that empathy you’ll find tomorrow.

So we gather together as a community. To pool our kindness and empathy and ask God to guide us to make a difference in a bigger way than any single one of us could. Ask God to focus our work on being a part of God’s justice and mercy in this city and world, so we can make a difference on all that ails our world: racism, sexism, classism, oppression, inequality, socially authorized violence, so many things.

And we can’t do it alone as one congregation. So, we partner with other communities, within our city and beyond. For example, we are members of Align, an interfaith group of 17 congregations in Minneapolis working on the severe problems of housing in this city, from rental assistance to low cost housing, and all kinds of things in between, including advocating at the legislature. Other partners we have in this city work with us on issues of food scarcity, and domestic abuse, and mental health counseling.

The kindness and empathy each individual has, multiplied in a community like Mount Olive, then by other communities of faith, across the city, across the nation, across the world: suddenly walls fall, chains are broken, lives are restored, wholeness comes.

But don’t overthink it, Jesus says.

It all starts with a cup of cold water. Your kindness. Your empathy. For all. No exceptions, not even that person that really gets under your skin, or that stranger you fear. No exclusions, not even that one you profoundly disagree with, or just don’t like. That’s the heart of Christ you are called to bear.

You’ve heard from Jesus that you’re needed, you’ve been anointed for this. You’ve heard you are called to proclaim God’s reign, bring healing and life, that you’re sent as Christ. You’ve heard it might be frightening, challenging, risky to bear God’s heart in your world.

But you’re not doing this alone: you have all of us in this community, and we have so many others who partner with us. And you have the Holy Spirit in you, changing your heart into the kindness and empathy of Christ.

It’s pretty simple, Jesus says. Can you handle a cup of cold water? Then you’ll do just fine.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

You are called and anointed to share God’s heart and guts – the deep compassion and love of God – for all God’s children, and to be Christ in your world, for those children.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Third Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 11 A
Texts: Matthew 9:35 – 10:23; Romans 5:1-8

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

Jesus was torn up inside by love.

Gut-wrenching, gut-twisting love, that’s compassion in Greek. That’s what Jesus felt as he saw these huge crowds who showed up everywhere. So many broken people, so many people crushed by the world, and all wanted what Jesus was giving. And he loved them so much. So he healed people everywhere he went. He proclaimed the Good News of God’s reign, God’s love for them. But there were so many. Every day, more and more heard, more and more came.

It was almost more than Jesus could handle. Correct that. It was more than Jesus could handle. Changing the metaphor from sheep to harvest, he told the women and men following him he needed more workers like him to go into these fields, to these flocks. To embody the same gut-wrenching love he had, become Christ as he is, so all could be reached.

Embodied compassion is still the job Christ needs done. Now in your body and mine.

It’s a job that needs human contact, human touch. It’s why the Triune God first came as a human among us. It couldn’t be taught as a lesson. God came to us in person to show this gut-wrenching love in person. To be God’s peace, in person. To be God’s healing, in person. To embrace, to kiss, to love, to touch. It’s the only way anyone knows love is real.

And there are so many sheep without a shepherd, harassed and helpless ones, Christ called you in your baptism to be God’s embodied compassion. So all can be embraced in God’s love.

Look at the job Jesus sends the disciples to do today.

“As you go,” Jesus says, “proclaim the good news, ‘The reign of heaven has come near.’ Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. As you enter people’s homes, greet them with God’s peace.” Jesus doesn’t send them to make sure everyone’s following the rules, everyone’s doctrine is correct. Jesus doesn’t send them out to bash other people’s experiences. He sends them to do something that only can be done in person, in real bodies.

Christ sends them out, sends you out, to be the personal embodiment of God’s love in the world. To proclaim the Good News in your body, your words, your life, that God’s love is for all. To bring healing in a world of sickness. Life in a world of death. To stand against evil and the demonic and drive it out where you can. To speak God’s peace in all you do. There are just too many who need God’s love for one – even God-with-us – to reach personally. Your body, your person, is desperately needed. All ours are.

And this heart you are called to be loves all without judgment.

Jesus looks at the crowds, harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd, and is torn up inside with love for them. For all of them. He doesn’t think, “well, that sheep kind of deserves the mess he’s in. And that one is never kind to others. That one always screws things up. And that one’s just different from the others.”

No. Christ loves the whole crowd to the depths of his guts. It’s the miracle Paul declares today that forever proves God’s love: no matter how sinful, rebellious, stupid, mistake-prone you are, I am, God sees only love. And came as Christ so you could know that.

So as your heart beats with God’s heart, as your guts twist in love alongside God’s guts, this is the love you’re bearing: a love that will not stop, will not rest, until all God’s children are found, healed, brought home. Until all are safe and fed and cared for. No exceptions. No exclusions.

This call is risky, and Jesus warns you of that, too.

Maybe you and I will never stand trial for our faith, but Jesus knew some of these women and men would. It’s likely that anyone who bears God into the world will face setbacks and rejection.

Not everyone will be receptive to your God-beating heart and what it leads you to do. If driving out demons leads you to political actions, you most certainly will face pushback. If reaching out to the sheep God shows you leads you to changing things about your life that make other people uncomfortable, you’ll hear about it. And so many who need God’s love are vulnerable ones who are being targeted today for hate and even death. Standing in love with them will put a target on you. Even the ones you greet in God’s peace might reject that peace.

So be prepared for that. But if someone throws your peace onto the ground, Christ says, it will return to you. You still get to have God’s peace, that can’t be taken away. And shaking the dust off your feet isn’t answering rejection with rejection. It’s just a reminder that you don’t need to carry your rejections with you as you go forward as Christ. Shake them off and move on.

 Christ sends out these twelve, and later 70, and after Pentecost more than 120, and now millions, knowing his gut-wrenching love got him killed. So if you bear the kind of love God has in your own body, all kinds of sacrifices are going to be asked of you, too.

But you’re embodying God, which means God is in you.

Which means you are not alone. Jesus says, “don’t worry what you’ll say – the Spirit will give you all the words you need.” When you wonder, “what will this mean for me today and tomorrow? What am I supposed to do?”, the Spirit will give you all the help and guidance you need to figure that out.

Paul proclaims today that God’s love has been poured into your hearts by the Holy Spirit! Poured into your heart to join your heart, your guts, your hands, your voice, your life, your love, to God’s. To change you. So that healing can transform sickness in this world, life can change death, demons can be driven out.

There’s one more thing: you don’t have to do everything.

These first twelve were only sent to their Jewish siblings for now. Christ’s mission was to the whole world. But this first time, Jesus said, “don’t go to the Gentiles or Samaritans yet.” They weren’t ready to do that.

So, you get baby steps, too. Until you get better and better at bearing God. Until your heart and guts more instinctively react to the world as the Triune God’s do, and you more and more sense the Spirit.

Maybe you’ll never feel you’re good at this. But God’s Spirit is going to do this, and you’ve been called to be this. You were anointed for this. And you are loved with the same gut-wrenching love of God that God is hoping you’ll have for the other sheep, the ripe fields.

So that all will know that love of God now and always.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

Go and learn your need for God’s steadfast love and mercy, and you will find it.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Second Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 10 A
Texts: Matthew 9:9-26 (incl. vv. 14-17 not appointed for today); Hosea 5:15 – 6:6; Psalm 50:7-15

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

“Go and learn what this means,” Jesus says: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice”

Jesus is crossing all kinds of barriers the Pharisees believe God has in place. He’s called an undesirable to be a follower, this tax collector Matthew, and he eats with undesirables. They don’t know yet, but he’s not finished – he’ll soon allow a bleeding woman to touch him and even heal her, even though the law says that he becomes unclean if an unclean person touches him. He does it once more when he touches the dead child and raises her, again becoming unclean by touching what is unclean.

But Jesus says two powerful things to them. First, only sick people need a doctor, and seek a doctor, not healthy ones. And second, they need to do their homework, go back to Hosea, our first reading, and understand what Jesus quoted from it, that God desires steadfast love, mercy, not sacrifice.

Go to those Scriptures you say you know, he says, and learn what God really wants. Then we can talk.

Today’s readings all reveal what God desires most.

Both the northern and southern kingdoms have sinned against God, and Hosea declares God’s anger. They’ve worshipped other gods, permitted perjury, committed murder and theft and adultery. And the people think if they just return to their sacrifices, their burnt offerings, God will be happy with them again.

But God says, “I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” Echoed in today’s psalm and throughout the prophets, God desires a changed heart, not empty words and rituals and practices.

The Pharisees think they have this all figured out. Both kingdoms ended up destroyed and exiled. So when only Judah returns, groups like the Pharisees emerge, with a system of laws and purity standards intended to make sure the people never stray again. Lesson learned. Keep the rules and God’ll be happy.

But Jesus says they haven’t learned anything. They still don’t understand what it truly means that God desires steadfast love and mercy, not burnt offerings.

Now, the Pharisees are trusting in their rules, not their burnt offerings.

Temple sacrifices are still happening at this time, but what they’re angry about is Jesus breaking the purity laws and codes they’ve set to keep the people in line with God. And yet Jesus says they still have the same problem as Hosea’s people.

We don’t sacrifice animals to please God. So here’s the first piece of our homework: do Jesus’ words apply to us? What are we clinging to that prevents us from understanding God’s heart is about steadfast love and mercy for all? If not burnt offerings, what?

Is it our belief that we’re the right kind of Christians in a world where many Christians seem to be the anti-Christ? Christian fascism and Christian nationalism are on the rise in our country, and many who bear the name Christian promote death and destruction and oppression and exclusion and hatred, all in Christ’s name. They seek political power to do what they want without restriction, and cover it with Christianity’s label. We are right to decry that abuse of the name of Christ, that betrayal of the love of Christ. We need to work against it as hard as we can.

But is our judgment of these Christians also our trap? Our self-justification? Do we think, “we’re right, we’re loving like Christ, and God knows that and is happy with us, not like those evil ones?” Maybe our self-righteousness is our burnt offerings.

The true answer for us is hidden in Jesus’ words and actions today.

Jesus says “those who are well don’t need a physician, only those who are sick.” He spends time with so-called “sinners,” the undesirables, the unclean, folks the Pharisees reject and cast out, because God’s mercy is for them.

And there’s the hidden secret: Jesus can only give God’s steadfast love and mercy to those who need it. Those who know they’re broken, sinful, those who have no ground to stand on before God. No offerings. No self-righteousness. These are the ones Jesus spends time with and loves because they’re the only ones who realize what he’s offering and their own need.

This is your real homework assignment, learning this: do you need God’s mercy? Do you have nothing to stand on before God except your hope that Jesus, God-with-us, came to seek and to heal the lost?

Go and learn what this means, Jesus says.

Ask yourself, what mercy do I need and want from God that I have a hard time admitting? It’s easier to compare ourselves to others who seem to be a lot worse. But it risks missing the mercy we need for life.

How are you handling those deeply rooted habits and ways you cling to that hurt those you love and others? How are you doing with those inner prejudices that keep cropping up even though you’ve tried to get beyond them? How are you handling the racism and sexism and classism that lurk under the surface of our hearts? It’s hard to imagine what it would be to let go of our privilege we have, and yet, how is that keeping us, keeping you, from being a part of God’s abundance and grace for all God’s children?

Do you see? Once you take Jesus’ assignment seriously, you pretty quickly long for a God who has a heart of mercy and steadfast love for you.

And do you see? That’s exactly where you need to be to receive and know God’s mercy in Christ.

I didn’t come for people who think they’re well, Jesus said. Just for sick folks.

And I came, Jesus said, to give them abundant life, and a healed heart, and a hope for a healed world. Look at this dinner party Jesus attends: it’s full of people who only know two things, their need of God’s love, and the truth that they’ve found that love in Jesus.

The sooner you do our homework and learn your need of God’s steadfast love and mercy, the sooner you’ll rejoice in it. And the sooner we can all become part of the Triune God’s persistent plan to spread steadfast love and mercy to every child of God on this planet.

Go and learn what this means.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

The nature of the mystery of the Trinity is not ours to grasp; living into the image of God we were created to be is what will heal us and the world.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Holy Trinity, year A
Texts: Genesis 1:1 – 2:4a; Matthew 28:16-20; plus John 13-15, 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

There’s a strange and beautiful phrase in our first reading.

On the sixth day of creation, God says, “Let us make humankind in our own image, according to our likeness.” Our image? Our likeness? The Hebrew people didn’t have a conception of the Trinity, but they did have a complex, plural understanding of God. The Hebrew word for God is Elohim, a plural noun, not singular as in English. So every time they said “God,” they meant One, but it sounded like more than one. Their word for Lord is Adonai, also a plural. There’s mystery here. God can’t be described in singular terms.

But this little pronoun “our” is the trap on this feast day of the Holy Trinity. We take off from there on a path of speculation as to God’s make-up, how God is Triune, how God works as One yet Three. It’s a trap that produces the Nicene Creed, a worthy credo, but one which completely omits the teachings and commands and way of Christ, the life in Christ that animates and fills the entire New Testament.

Jesus never tried to explain the true reality of God. He cared much more about the life in God to which he called people, and which shapes the whole New Testament.

Rather than focus on “our,” Jesus would prefer you focus on “image.” Because Jesus came as God-with-us to invite us to live into the image of God we were created to be.

Jesus invited this with the idea of “abiding.”

Jesus in John consistently proclaims that he somehow “abides,” lives, in the One he calls Father, and, in fact, he and the Father are one. If you’ve seen him, you’ve seen the Father, he says. It’s the blasphemy that got him killed. And then he speaks of the Spirit, who also abides in Jesus and in the Father, and now abides in God’s people. There is a oneness of God in Son and Father and Spirit that the Church wanted to express in a way that honored the oneness and the threeness. It’s just not the path Jesus needs us on.

The thing Jesus wants you and me to learn is what it is to abide in God. Jesus said you and I could have an intimate knowledge of God, Father, Son, and Spirit, within us. That the Trinity is found in you and in me. And in that abiding, we are transformed into God’s image.

And God’s image, Jesus says, is self-giving love.

Jesus commands us to love as he has loved, giving of himself for the creation. It is, Jesus says, the highest form of love, to give of yourself for the other. And it is the true nature of the Triune God.

So, Jesus says, when we abide in the life of God, God’s sacrificial love comes to us and flows out of us. You and I are like the stretching branches of a vine, connected to each other and into the life of God through that vine. God’s love flows like sap into our branches.

And when the love God has given you shapes your life, your words, your actions, your habits, your planning, into the self-giving love of God that now is your fruit to bear in the world, you are living as the image of God you were always meant to be.

This is what Jesus urges on those who would follow him after his resurrection.

On the beach in Galilee, the risen Jesus sends his followers out to care for his sheep. Three times he asks Peter if Peter loves him, and three times Peter says he does. Each time Jesus responds, “feed my lambs; tend my sheep; feed my sheep.”

This is your call to follow: if you love the Triune God you know in Christ Jesus, then this Good Shepherd needs you to feed the other sheep, care for the flock of God’s children. To be in this world the image of God’s love seen in Christ’s death and resurrection so all are blessed by it.

Jesus gives the same commission in our Gospel today. Jesus sends out the disciples – including you and me – to invite others to discipleship, to follow Christ. To invite others into the mystery of the Spirit of God living in them and changing them. To share the Good News that all are created in God’s image and can live in that image for the healing of all.

To do this, Jesus says to teach others to obey all that he commanded us. And what did he command? Love one another as he has loved. Love God with all you have and love your neighbor. Even love your enemy. Basically: learn to feed and care for my sheep and teach others the same.

So for today, leave the Trinity to the Trinity.

The mystery of the Triune God, how Father, Son, and Spirit are related and dance together, how God works, all that, leave to the holy mystery it is. God knows who God is. That’s enough.

But let us fervently pray that you and I and all God’s children grow ever more deeply into the image of the Triune God who created us in that image, sacrificed all to bring us back into relationship, and now lives in us to bring love and mercy and healing to this world. And as you become more and more visibly the image of God, the image of love, you will also more and more see God’s image in everyone you encounter.

You are the very image and likeness of the Triune God, the love and mercy that is God’s heart. What a difference you will make in this world!

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen