The fruit of the life in Christ is produced by you when God makes you a good tree, a life that naturally bears God’s fruit of love for the healing of the creation.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Seventh Sunday after Epiphany, Lect. 7 C
Text: Luke 6:27-38 (plus 39-49 from Lect. 8 C, hardly ever used)

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

Fruit is a little miraculous to me.

We had a raspberry patch in the back yard of the first house we ever bought. Invariably infested with ravenous mosquitoes, those prickly bushes were intimidating. Until little red bundles of joy showed up. It always seemed a miracle that such beauty and grace would simply appear in that formidable thicket.

And Jesus is absolutely right today. The kind of fruit is completely determined by the plant that makes it. A thorn bush can’t grow figs, or grapes, he says. An apple tree won’t produce lemons. So if you’re looking for a particular kind of fruit – and botanists have known this for centuries, to our great delight and benefit – you need to be working with the plant.

That means there are at least two challenges in Jesus’ words today. First, what kind of fruit do you want to produce in your life? And second, how might you be nurtured, developed, to bear such fruit?

The kind of fruit Jesus calls those who follow to bear has never been a mystery.

The will of the Triune God for those who live in Christ is not hard to discern. Jesus is always crystal clear, including in today’s overview. Those who are in Christ bear this fruit, Jesus says today:

They are loving and kind to those who hate them, hurt them, abuse them. They pray for such people, do good for such people.

They are generous without any expectation of return – whatever anyone asks of them, they give. They even offer to give more.

They do not judge or condemn others.

They forgive freely and fully.

None of this fruit is a surprise to you, if you’ve ever listened to the words of the Son of God, read the Gospels. Those who are in Christ have always known this is the fruit God wants to see in the world from us, from you, the fruit that will bless the whole creation.

The problem has never been knowledge. It’s always been desire.

We don’t necessarily want to bear the kind of fruit Jesus describes today.

We live in a world that despises such fruit. A world that promises revenge and payback. A world that screams that your highest priority is that your rights are cared for, not the rights of others. A world that teaches you to suspect anyone who asks for help, for money. A world that values criticism of others, especially in social media, encouraging personal attacks and hatred. Literally everything Jesus asks of you here is something this world mocks and disdains. If you live as Jesus says, you’ll be seen as weak, cowardly, foolish. You’ll be mocked.

Of course, not everyone in our world thinks this way. Many of us were blessed to be raised or mentored or loved by people who valued what God values. But don’t underestimate the pernicious strength of pressure in this country on making your own needs the highest value, the greatest good, to the exclusion of anyone else you decide to disregard or disdain. Sacrificial, vulnerable love as Christ models and commands is a fool’s game to many in our world.

That pressure makes us reluctant to embrace Jesus’ teachings, even if in our hearts we want to.

That’s why Jesus asks the only relevant question after all these teachings.

Are you in or are you out? “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and don’t do what I tell you?” Jesus asks.

There’s a path of living that is of Christ. Jesus talks about it all the time. Jesus’ only question is: do you want to walk it? Do you want to be in Christ? Do you want to follow God’s Son, whose life, death, and resurrection bring life to you and the world?

Here’s a test. How much do you try to parse any one of Jesus’ teachings, trying to figure out if he really meant it? For example: “Give to everyone who begs from you.” That’s really clear. If you’re trying to explain why Jesus doesn’t understand the socioeconomic realities of 2022, or if you’re spending any time thinking how you won’t have to do this, you’re not ready to follow. Every single one of Jesus’ commands is clear, simple, and unambiguous. If you can’t see that, on any one of them, you’re probably on the fence about this “being Christ” thing.

But if you want to live in Christ, bear God’s fruit, God will make it happen.

Since a good tree can’t produce bad fruit, you just need God to work on your tree, on you, your life. So even if you are on the fence on any of Jesus’ teachings, even if you fail at any of them, the question that matters is “do you want to follow?” Do you want to bear all the fruit Jesus proclaims throughout his teachings? If you do, good news: God will make it happen.

That’s the beauty of Jesus’ imagery. Apple trees bear apples simply because they’re grown to do it. If the Spirit begins to transform your heart and your mind and your body and your strength to bear the fruit of God’s love and grace in the world, you will bear that fruit. It’s as simple as that.

And if you ever doubt whether God is working in you, don’t look at your failures. Look for any time such fruit as Jesus calls for today came from you. If it did, God was there, and you can trust God will still be there to help you grow into a Christ tree bearing God’s healing for all things.

And, please don’t ignore Jesus’ clear warning today about your neighbors.

The only tree you and I need to worry about is our own. Don’t start looking at your neighbor’s fruit, or lack thereof. Jesus says you’ll be looking at a speck and thinking it’s a log, while ignoring the 2×4 sticking out of your eye. Don’t get distracted by how anyone else is doing, Jesus says. You’ve got enough on your plate as it is. Stay in your lane.

The life God pours into the world in the Spirit will produce the fruit God needs to heal and bless all things.

That’s what Jesus promised. That’s what the prophets of Israel promised. That’s what the first disciples filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost promised. God’s life will do what God needs it to do.

You can be a good tree. A blessed tree. A tree bearing God’s fruit of love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and generosity and faithfulness and gentleness and self-control. If you want this, God will grow it in you.

And do look at your life. You’ll see God has already been at work. Fruit has been borne from you as a blessing to many. Let that joy sink into your heart even as you ask God to keep gardening you.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

All are broken, including you, and all need to be healed: when you see this is true about yourself you will be opened to be healing to others.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, Lect. 6 C
Text: Luke 6:17-26

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

Everyone in the crowd today was trying to touch Jesus to be healed. Everyone.

The large crowd of maybe fifty disciples. The twelve of that group who were just named leaders. And the rest of the multitude there who came to see Jesus. Luke says everyone in the vast crowd needed to touch Jesus.

And Jesus said to those multitudes that they were fortunate people. Happy people. Blessed people, as our translation puts it.

You folks who don’t know where you’re going to find food – you are happy, he said. You’ll be filled. You who have nothing to your name – you’re fortunate. You’ll receive God’s whole reign. And you who are weeping, Jesus said, you are blessed. You’ll be able to laugh.

Now, Jesus never deliberately hurt or misled people.

When he says to hundreds, maybe thousands, that their suffering, their pain, their need, is a blessing, is fortunate, it wasn’t to mock them, or patronize them. He promised they would receive what they needed. These are real poor people, and starving people. People in grief. And they are promised relief. Filling. Abundance. Even laughter in their tears.

The reason many came to Jesus, Luke says, is they sought healing from diseases and unclean spirits. Because people saw that God was in this Jesus, and he had power to heal physical and spiritual illness.

But in these blessings Jesus says that God has also come in person to address more universal suffering and pain – poverty, hunger, grief – and offer the same promise. You will receive what you need. In the verses that follow today’s Gospel – which we’ll hear next week – Jesus tells those who wish to follow him that they are part of God’s plan to end people’s hunger, to lift up the poor and lowly, to comfort and help anyone in pain. God embodied in the followers of Christ will directly work on all the suffering Jesus promises to address, will be the blessing to those Jesus blesses with his words.

But go back to the beginning: everyone there that day needed to touch Jesus.

Even beyond the obvious ones with diseases and possessions. They or their family and friends would have made sure they got close to Jesus.

But as far as we know, most of the disciples, the women and men who’d been following Jesus for weeks now – not just the twelve set aside as leaders, but the whole group – didn’t need that kind of healing from Jesus. Mary Magdalene was possessed of demons, but we don’t know of others. Yet these followers also needed Jesus, needed his touch, his kindness, his words. His healing.

Can you see yourself in that same camp? Or do you have a hard time admitting to God or to others that you also need to touch God in Christ for healing and life?

It can be hard to admit.

Many of us want to give the impression that we’ve got it together, that we’re doing just fine. But the secret is, not everyone here is doing as well as you might imagine. We all can hide our own pain or doubt or struggles from others, especially if they’re not physical ones. (Most of us are OK to have physical needs put on the prayer list.) Maybe we’re ashamed of our weakness, afraid no one will understand our inner pain. Maybe someone told us we were supposed to have a strong faith and how can we say that we don’t?

And many of us who live with a privileged status in our society, whether due to the color of our skin or the gender we identify with, or our lack of economic insecurity, or whatever, struggle with naming our own pain. How can someone who doesn’t face what so many of our neighbors face every day, someone for whom this society works and makes sense, how can they complain? How can someone who doesn’t fear the police, someone who’s never been denied housing or help because of who they are, ever say they hurt? If there’s always another who’s worse off, we can feel we shouldn’t name our pain, or doubt, or fear, or struggles with our lives.

But everyone needed to touch Jesus that day, and he blessed them.

He said to those in pain of any kind, you are blessed, happy, fortunate, because God is with you and will help you, heal you. The point of the Incarnation, Jesus showed us, was for the Triune God to be with all God’s children, reach out to all God’s children, love all God’s children, bring healing to all God’s children. Everyone. Whatever their pain.

Everyone means you, too. Pain is pain, no matter who feels it. Anxiety is anxiety to everyone. There’s no need to hide yours because you want to put a good face on your life and not let anyone know you struggle. There’s no need to compare yours to another’s and diminish it or dismiss it because you know that your neighbor is struggling more than you.

If God has come to be with us in Christ, and to bring each of God’s children back into a healing relationship with God, you’re in, too. And that’s a huge promise you don’t want to ignore.

Maybe that’s what Jesus is doing with these woes.

The life in Christ Jesus calls those who follow him to walk is one where those who follow share a life together for the sake of each other and the world. All have enough. All weep when one weeps, all rejoice when one rejoices. No one is hungry or has unmet needs because God’s abundance is shared. That’s the blessing of God in Christ for the whole world. So if you’re laughing while others suffer, or delighting in your wealth while others starve, woe to you, Jesus says. You’re not living in the life of Christ.

But Christ’s healing begins when each of us honors both our own pain and suffering and the pain and suffering of our neighbor. When we don’t neglect our own suffering, because that can harden us to be uncaring and cruel people. And when we also don’t neglect the suffering of our neighbors. When we become Christ ourselves, ready to respond to whatever need God puts in front of us, whatever hand reaches out for help, as Jesus will say next week.

Everyone needs the healing touch of God’s in their lives. You, included.

Let yourself admit your need to God. And maybe to one or two others. Learn to say, “I can’t handle this. I don’t know where to turn. I don’t know what to do. Please help.” Those who reached out to touch Jesus didn’t hold back out of fear. They trusted in this One from God and put their lives in his hands.

When you do that, you will know what it is to be blessed, fortunate, happy. And in your healing you’ll never be able to look at the pain and suffering of another – your family, your neighbors, your world – and not care. You’ll be healed by God’s love and also given the heart of God to be a part of God’s healing touch in Christ that belongs to the whole creation. Blessed are you, indeed.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The Triune God has called you, and given you what you need to be faithful; trust that, and don’t worry so much that you don’t have what Isaiah, Peter, and Paul seem to have. You’ll do just fine, God says.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, Lect. 5 C
Texts: Isaiah 6:1-8; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11; Luke 5:1-11

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

These three can be hard to relate to.

Isaiah – the best known of Israel’s prophets. Paul – author of over half the New Testament, the greatest preacher the Church has known. Simon Peter – a key leader of the disciples, whom our Roman Catholic siblings believe was the first pope.

These amazing servants of God we heard of today had powerful, life-changing, unmistakably divine call stories. Isaiah literally sees God while at worship in the Temple. Paul – who refers back to his call in today’s reading – is knocked down and Christ speaks to him from heaven. Peter sees Jesus cause an impossible catch of fish.

In worship we want to hear what God’s Word has to say in our lives. You look for God’s Word to comfort you, or help you, or even challenge you, for God’s Word to connect with your reality.

What of these three giants of the faith is relatable to you or me?

Like these three, you and I have been called by God.

It’s just that most of us weren’t conscious of it at the time. If you were raised by Lutherans, or Catholics, or Episcopalians (or Methodists or Presbyterians for that matter), God’s call to you to serve probably happened when you were a few weeks old.

You might have been put into a white garment. You were carried into the church, where someone threw water on your head in the name of the Triune God. You might have been anointed with oil, marked with the cross as a sign that you belong to God.

Everything we claim about baptism puts it at the same level as all the calls of these three greats. You are set aside, made holy, for the sake of the Gospel. Someone promised on your behalf that you would be raised in the faith, raised to witness to Christ Jesus in your words and actions, care for others and the world God made, work for justice and peace.

There is no greater call for those who follow Christ than the anointing of baptism. The expectations of God for what you will do with your life in Christ in this world, are the same as for Isaiah, Paul, and Peter.

Why doesn’t it feel the same? Because most of us don’t have comparable experiences to theirs.

Being called to serve as Christ when you’re a month old doesn’t really register as much as a major miracle done before your eyes. So we can unfavorably and unwisely compare our own calls.

My mother had at least two major visions or revelations of God that radically shaped her life going forward. Since my childhood I’ve known these powerful stories. I haven’t had visions like that. I don’t remember a time of wishing I’d had such visions. I have long wondered if it meant anything that I didn’t.

But I was raised by a mother and a father who believed that when they carried me to the baptismal font – 59 years ago this coming Thursday – they were setting me aside as a child of God, a servant of Christ. I was raised to believe that God had a need for me. That I had gifts to discover that God meant to be used to make a difference in the world.

I was raised as if I’d had the same kind of call story as any of the three today. And that’s been enough for me.

Because here’s what Isaiah and Paul and Peter would say to you today.

It’s not the way you are called that makes a difference, it’s that the Triune God calls you. It’s not your gifts or success at the calling that makes a difference, it’s that God’s Spirit works in you.

Truth is, however they began, these three knew failures. Even at his call, Peter admitted his unworthiness. He bumbled through his discipleship, especially before Pentecost, and we love him for it. His mistakes give us hope we might be useful in our incompetence.

Isaiah – who also declared his sinfulness as he was called – struggled with people who didn’t want to hear what God told him to say. Paul was utterly transformed from an opponent of Christ to a brave and visionary preacher of God’s reign. But he struggled with sin, envy, rage, and sometimes even missed his own clear point.

But we still listen to Isaiah 3,000 years later because through Isaiah God still speaks to us. We listen to Paul 2,000 years later, Sunday after Sunday, because, flawed as he is, God uses him to proclaim God’s undying, transforming love in Christ for all God’s children. 2,000 years later, we’re still listening to the story of Peter’s call, and wondering what our own call might be.

It’s not that these three were great. But they let God use them to proclaim God’s goodness and love in the world. And God did, and still does.

God’s Word tells you these calls not so you envy them, but to remind you of yours.

To remind you that, maybe before you could even eat solid food or speak, you were called to be God’s representative in this world, bearing God’s love and grace and life. And also – to invite you to open your eyes to times and places God has spoken to you with clarity.

I haven’t had my mother’s experiences. But I can think of a number of times in my life where God made something clear to me, whether about God’s truth, or my call, or an answer to something in this world. These became watershed moments in my life. Everything changed after them.

But here’s the wonder: if I tried to describe one to you right now, it would be impossible for me to fully explain why that quote in a book, or that thought of a path, or whatever experience I had, changed everything. It did, but it’s not always obvious to others why. Not like my mother’s experiences were, or these three. So yours also might be hard to explain to others but very real to you. Watch for these moments.

And here’s the truth: even after those moments God spoke to me clearly, when God shifted my life and nothing was the same after, I still messed up. I still sometimes forgot what God had shown me. I still struggled to be Christ in my life. Just like Isaiah and Paul and Peter. And my mother.

But the call is always about the Triune God who is calling, who promises to make something happen through you.

God is faithful. You are called to be Christ in this world. And God will work through whatever you bring to the job and make it happen.

Maybe you won’t ever be as famous as Isaiah or Paul or Peter. But then, no one will read about your mistakes 2,000 years from now, either. So that’s a good thing.

Trust this most of all: when God brought you through baptismal waters, God knew you, just like these three. God saw this hope you have that you can share, gave you unique gifts you can use to bring God’s love in Christ into your world. God put you in a place where God knows you can do some good.

It’s not about whether you think you’re up to it, or as good as anyone else. It’s what God thinks and does that matters. And God is delighted to call you and make you exactly what God needs to bring death-defeating love and hope into your world through you.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

We’re halfway through winter, literally and figuratively, and there’s light to be shined, work to be done, with the grace and help of the One we follow, tested as we are so he can help us in our testing.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Presentation of Our Lord
Text: Luke 2:22-40

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

Unlike Simeon and Anna, we’re in the middle of our time of waiting for God.

These ancient saints diligently served and waited, worshipped and prayed, and at the ends of their lives were blessed to witness the coming of God-with-us, Christ in the flesh. Simeon’s beautiful song anticipates his own departure and rest, because God’s light has come.

But we’re not at the end. We’re still in the middle of winter, literally and figuratively. Literally, because it’s been roughly six weeks since the solstice, and about six weeks are left till the equinox. (That’s why our ancient forebears looked in hope to the end of winter on this day.)

But we’re in the middle of a lot of winters. The middle of a COVID pandemic, wondering when this will become an endemic with a less overwhelmed medical system. The middle of a long-overdue awakening in our country to the systemic ways racism and sexism and other evils are embedded into our culture and world, wondering when healing and justice will come for all people. The middle of a tremendous test of our democracy’s existence, wondering if voter suppression and threats of violence and civil war will end this American experiment.

In the very long winter this world now faces, we gather tonight to remember the light we celebrated forty days ago on the darkest of nights. We gather to see fire and eat bread and smell beeswax and taste wine and sing songs and hear God’s words that sustain us in the winter, until the spring comes.

But we can’t take our rest like Simeon and Anna.

We don’t bless our candles for the year today and praise God’s light coming into the world as a sign that our work is done.

We celebrate the coming of God’s light into the world in Christ knowing how much of our world is still covered in the shadows of night and evil. We rejoice in the warmth of God’s love we know in Christ Jesus knowing how cold the world still is to so many of God’s children, crushed by how we’ve built this world. We delight in Christ’s resurrection and the promise of life to come, knowing how pervasive death is for so many – actual death, but also the death of hopes and dreams.

But there is a promise in this day that gives us hope.

This world is not alone in this winter of evil and suffering.

We leave here tonight not just with memory of tonight’s light and warmth. We leave here with the grace and presence of Christ who has already lived through wintry death, who is the risen embodiment of God’s spring.

Hebrews says tonight that Christ can help us as we are tested by the cold and fear, because Christ was also so tested. We go out into the middle of our many winters with Christ our Lord who knows how to hold hope and light in the deepest cold and ice and hatred and fear, even death. Who is our strength, our courage. Who is always with this world, no matter how long winter lasts.

So sing with Anna and Simeon tonight, but with different understanding.

Sing, not at the end, but in the middle of all things. Sing, “now let your servant depart in peace,” as your invitation to Christ to go with you as you depart into the wintry world that desperately needs God’s light and warmth. That you might become that.

Sing, “a light to reveal you to the nations,” to ask for Christ’s light and fuel to keep that light burning in your heart, so others may see. But also so you don’t despair at the depth of the winter.

Sing, “your Word has been fulfilled,” not as the end of all things, but as confident hope that in you and me and all God’s children God’s Word is living into the world bringing light and healing.

As you join Simeon and Anna in song, know you’re not in the middle alone. You, and all God’s children, go with Christ, our Light, our Spring, our Warmth. And nothing can stop that Light, that Spring, that Warmth from healing this wintry world.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen