We are nourished through Christ to be nourishment for others as we journey together. 

Vicar Andrea Bonneville
The Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 19 B
Text: 1 Kings 19:4-8 

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

Don’t grieve over who the Holy Spirit has created you to be.

Listening to voices that say that you are too young or too old, or don’t have enough skills or experience or training to engage in the tasks ahead. Being so overwhelmed or filled with fear and anxiety that it stuns you. Having a sense that no matter what you do, it is not going to be good enough or have a big enough impact.

Perhaps these are the voices and messages that got into Elijah’s head.  The voices that drove him restlessly into the wilderness and that caused him to have no choice but to lay down and rest, suggesting that continuing the journey was going to be too much for him.

Elijah has a justifiable reason for his overwhelming exhaustion and yet it is easy to look at his situation and think that he is just being a little over dramatic.

But Elijah gets to a point in his life that resembles what we call burn out. Feeling so exhausted that he’d rather give up than continue to do what he has been called to do.  It’s incredible he went a day’s journey into the wilderness to begin with.

The way I see it is that Elijah had two options. He could run away from the call the Triune God had placed on his life and go live a more comfortable life someplace else or he could run into the wilderness of the sin and suffering of the world and learn how to find rest there.

One instinct is to look at Elijah and just say, come on, get up, we have work to do. That’s what our society would tell us to do. To ignore our need to care for ourselves so we can produce more and do more.

But another instinct is to have compassion and empathy for Elijah and just say, it’s okay to rest, here have some nourishment. The angel in the story today does the opposite of what the pressures of world teach. The angel sees Elijah under the tree and tells him to eat and rest.

The need to rest and find nourishment in the midst of chaos in the middle of the wilderness is what the prophet Elijah teaches us today.

Elijah figures out how to go into the wilderness and find rest, not through what he does, but through what he finds on the journey. Not because he alone has all the strength that he needs but because he realized that he can’t go on the journey alone.

We are the people called by God to go into the wilderness to proclaim a message of hope, a message that Christ is the bread of life and light of the world. A message that we proclaim to each other and to our community.  It is a lifelong task and if we don’t find places to rest and nourish ourselves on the journey, we are going to burn out.

So if today you are feeling tired, or overwhelmed, or lonely, or anxious, or afraid. Worn down from the sin and suffering of the world. There is a place for you to rest, even in the midst of chaos, even on this wilderness journey.

Following God’s call will lead us to find places where we can release the burdens the world has forced us to carry.  Release the anger, fear, all the things that hold us back.

We may not always know what rest will look like for us and so we are challenged to find places to rest even as the world challenges us to keep moving and to keep doing.  Finding a way to even rest in the unknown of what is next.

God isn’t going to lead us to places where we are going to fail. God isn’t going to leave us alone in the wilderness. This is the purpose of the angel and the tree and it is the purpose of each of us.

To be the presence of God, filled with love, forgiveness, and passion for caring for all of God’s creation. Peeling back layers of exhaustion so that the light of Christ continues to shine from our hearts and nourishes all around us.

But we can only be nourishment if we are nourished.

Nourished by being in community with each other and seeing and being with people embodying God’s love and forgiveness.

Nourished from having a sense of routine and enjoying spiritual practices, such as meditation, music, gardening, whatever helps us to express who God calls us to be. Finding ways to use our bodies, our voices, and our minds to care for and advocate for our neighbors and all of God’s creation.

Nourished by being who the Holy Spirit has called us to be. Living out our vocations at work, or in school, or during retirement. Joyfully loving who we love. And finding meaning and happiness in all of the unique things that make each of us who we are as God’s beloved.

Nourished by believing that our worth is not assessed by our performances and our work, but solely for being who we are and trusting that we are worthy of the love and the calling the Holy Spirit has placed in our hearts and sealed on our forehead.

It is simple and profoundly complex at the same time. But the more we know and trust that we are loved and the embodiment of Christ’s love in the world. The more beauty, and life, and love, and nourishment we will give and receive.

When we continually lean into the person the Holy Spirit created us to be, we find rest and find nourishment that can only come from God who truly is our bread of life.

At the very least my hope is that this place, this community is a place where you find rest. Taking what you learn about yourself, about God, about love, grace, and justice here. Taking in the nourishment you receive from Christ’s table and finding places in which this table extends into our daily lives.

Where all can find love and forgiveness.
Where all can find rest and nourishment for the journey

Get up and eat, feast on the bread of life, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.

Amen.

Through the love and grace of Christ, we are sent out into the world to look toward and listen to cries for justice and peace and proclaim the Triune God’s love and healing. 

Vicar Andrea Bonneville
The Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 15 B
Text: Amos 7:7-15; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6:14-29

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

It leaves an unsettling feeling. The image of John’s head on a platter.

Reminding us about situations in our lives that leave us unsettled.

A fire burning in the ocean.
A drought and record-breaking temperatures.
A pipeline threatening our watershed.

Homelessness and poverty.
Racial injustice.
Gun violence across our city.

The headlines of today show us that today’s Gospel reading could easily have been a headline in this morning’s paper: “Man executed after speaking out against the King’s relationship.”

We absorb so much information daily that we have been trained to keep it from touching us, likely a way to cope with all the brokenness around us.

We hear our Gospel lesson for today and we may unknowingly numb the emotions and the message.

Questioning what is wrong with the characters in the story.
Distancing their situation from ours.
Laughing about a birthday party we would never want to attend.
Hearing it and thinking, can a story like this really be the Word of God?

Our emotions and our bodies can only hold so much pain and brokenness happening in society, let alone the pain and grief that we experience in our lives, families, and communities. 

 The shock of John’s head on a platter leads us to be filled with fear of danger. And perhaps a gut reaction to not want to have anything to do with the message that John is proclaiming.

The challenge then, is to not be swayed by violence and displays of power, but to see what is really going on in the story. John is in jail and he speaks up about injustice and about people in power taking advantage of the law.

Like John, we have inherited the grace and love and courage to see the injustice and oppression happening all around us. And we have been anointed by the Holy Spirit to speak and act against unjust power and oppression.

We see situations in our lives every day and ask ourselves what role we have in it.  If we’re following God’s call like John, and like the prophet Amos who we heard from today, we know that we have a part in sharing the love, grace, and hope of the Triune God.

We do this by being who God has created us to be, finding avenues where our skills and talents match with the needs around us as we boldly step in directions that help us to proclaim justice and peace.

We do this by looking around in our community and listening to our neighbors. We do this by transforming our church community and our church building to be a place of hospitality.

So that when we look at the headlines about climate change, we know that we are continuing to strive to do our part and commit to environmental justice. And when we look at the headlines about houselessness and poverty, we know that we are impacting our community by being in relationship with and caring for our neighbors.

To look at the brokenness of the world and listen to the cries for justice around us is going to lead us down a path of discipleship where we continue to be and become people who: 

speak truth to power.
speak healing to brokenness.
speak love to hatred.

Speaking not only through our mouths by through our actions that at times are even more powerful than words.

Doing so will lead us down paths that will change us and ask us to step outside our comfort zones. It will cause us to have many unsettling feelings and emotions and we try to discern where we are being called and sent.

But we know that we do not do this alone, we do it in community. Caring for each other and caring for ourselves.

Like the disciples at the end of our Gospel reading who find ways to hold space and grieve, we find ways to lay to rest the brokenness in our lives and hold onto hope and believe with our hearts that God can resurrect and heal the world.

And then we go out to look and listen to the pain and brokenness around us and listen to where God is calling us to be agents of healing and love.

Like the prophets and people called throughout scripture and time, we too are called by God out of who God has created us to be. Perhaps this is the message that Paul is speaking to the Ephesians: Reminding them and reminding us of the love and grace that we have in Christ.

And that this love that we’ve been transformed by is going to send us into places where we see deep brokenness and are called to proclaim love—Love that will always transform. 

It leaves an unsettling feeling. The Holy Spirit stirring in our lives.

Reminding us of who we are created to be.
Calling us out into the world to proclaim justice, healing, and love.

Amen

Created in God’s image, we grow to be people who produce shade for all of God’s creation. A place where all can rest and experience the sheltering and protecting love of the Triune God.

Vicar Andrea Bonneville
The Third Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 11 B
Text: Mark 4:26-34

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

We have an apple tree in our front yard.

It was planted in a less than ideal location and now its roots are running out of room to spread and its branches are becoming heavy. Half of its branches are no longer bearing leaves while the other half is growing apples. It’s lopsided, its leaves are few and its branches are bent in uneven directions. It’s not a typical beautifully pruned tree and its apples are quite small, even though they’re delicious.  

We inherited this apple tree when we moved into our home, but it is clear that its time is coming to an end. At the beginning of spring, I figured I would leave it to bear fruit for one more season, so that way we could enjoy its apples again.

Bearing fruit is good. We as humans are created to bear fruit through our love and service to our neighbor. We give our resources and extend ourselves. We know that part of our purpose is to bear fruit, fruit that will last. And we also know that bearing fruit takes a significant amount of energy and can be overwhelming at times. So much of who we are is assessed by what we produce, how much we produce, and the quality of what we produce.

In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus shares two parables to help us glimpse into what the reign of God looks like in the here and now.  The first parable focuses on the mystery of planting, growing, and producing a harvest.  A miracle and mystery that continues to amaze so many.

Yet the second parable doesn’t focus on what the seed will produce, the focus is on what the seed will become. Jesus says, “[the reign of God] is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”  

This is who we strive to be, a community of people living out the identity of who God has created us to be, not solely focusing on what we can produce, but focusing on how our very presence can be an invitation for someone to experience the sheltering and protecting love of the Triune God.

We become a living shade that provides comfort, shelter, and rest so that people, like every winged creature, can build their nests and find a home within us. Opening ourselves to how God is working through us and holding within ourselves the capacity to be a shelter for any one of God’s beloved, not knowing who is going to build a nest in our shade.

We are a living shade as we provide and create a listening presence to neighbors as they share stories of their lived experience, as we provide hospitality so that someone feels they have a place to belong, as we see each other for who we are and not solely for what we can produce.

How can we, not only bear fruit, but also be shade for all to feel safe, secure AND nourished under our branches?

We don’t exactly know how and perhaps there is comfort in that. But what we do know is that there is going to be growing involved and that God is going to do it.

And if we are being honest with ourselves there is probably going to have to be some trimming as we unlearn patterns and messages that kept people from making their home in our branches. Replacing them with new patterns of inclusivity and radical hospitality in which we are invited to change and grow by that impact others have on us.  Only making our branches stronger and roots deeper.

We know that there are going to be growing pains. At times, we may feel like a small, uneven apple tree. The one with little fruit to share and a small patch of shade. But with God’s love and grace, we are sharing what we have with the rest of creation.

As small as it is, birds’ dwell in our apple tree all day long and while it was blooming bees were buzzing at every flower. Yet as often as we do, I only saw what the apple tree could produce for me and not the impact it has on all the other creatures that find a home within it.

Even when we’re tired and we’ve bore all the fruit we can in one season of our life, we know that the structure, the presence, of who we are will be a place where people can find shade, a place where people experience God’s love and see the ways that God dwells within us.

We are this presence because we have been created out of and rooted in the nutritious soil of God’s love and grace, watered with the waters of baptism, fed at Christ’s table, and sent out in community to grow branches and be who God has created us to be.

For we never know who will build a nest in our shade.

Amen.

Through the love that we receive through Christ, we become an embodiment of God’s love in the world by living in love and sharing God’s love with all of creation. 

Vicar Andrea Bonneville
Sixth Sunday after Easter, Year B 
Text: John 15:9-17

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

Do you know how loved you are?  Created. Claimed. Called. Chosen.
To be an embodiment of God’s steadfast love in this world.

Do you know how worthy you are? Created. Claimed. Called. Chosen.
To proclaim God’s steadfast love to all of creation.

The love that the Triune God has for each and every one of us is at the heart of our Gospel message for today. Abide in my love, Jesus tells us. Rest in the love that has been poured out for you for I have Created. Claimed. Called. Chosen. you to continue in my loving service and care for all.

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”

Jesus’ command to love comes out of the assumption that we have known and experienced what the Triune God’s love can do and continues to do in our very own life.

Love that was present when we were created.Love that was present when we were claimed and called by the Holy Spirt in the waters of our baptism.
Love that is present as we are chosen to bear the lasting fruit of love.

The command to love isn’t as easy as it sounds, and the invitation to abide in God’s love is almost more difficult. Social pressures, shame and guilt, compassion fatigue, you name it.. All make us think that God’s love isn’t enough.

It’s one thing know about God’s love for us, but it’s another thing to live out of the conviction that God’s love is within us. We are all God’s beloved and embodying the image of God’s love is what we are created to do.

Because God incarnate laid down his life for us, his beloved friends, we live through our experience of being transformed by God’s steadfast love for as we become an embodiment of God’s love for all. Love that leads us to lay down our lives for not only our friends, but for all that God has created.

It sounds intimidating, laying down our lives, but we have to remember that Christ laid down his life for the salvation and reconciliation of all creation and we lay down our lives so that people may see the love and grace that has been given to us through Christ.

What if laying down our lives means opening up so that God’s grace can transform us to live out of the love that God has for us, and no longer be held captive to lies that tell us we lack talent, ability, money, or confidence to be an embodied proclamation of God’s love.

What if laying down our lives means challenging the culture of white supremacy and letting go of some of space that we take up and the privilege that we have so that all of God’s creation has the opportunity to flourish in our communities.

What if laying down our lives means stepping out of our comfort zones to hear and authentically listen to perspectives other than ones like our own to help expand our empathy and build more unity and collaboration.

We are capable of laying down our lives because of the love that has been shown to us through Christ, love that casts out fear, so that fear doesn’t have the final say as we live out Jesus’ command to love one another. Laying down our lives in love, care, and service to each other is how we embody Jesus’ command to love. It is how others will see the radiance of God’s love that reflects into our world.

We know that laying down our lives in love is possible because we have witnessed this in community. We have experienced the love of Christ embodied in each other and have experienced this love from being in relationship with each other.

Love that checks in and prays for a friend. Love that tends the gardens for pollinators. Love that cares for their family. Love that shows up when we need it the most and when we least expect it.

We have a first-hand account of being in community and witnessing to the ways that each of us embodies the love of Christ, for each other and for the sake of our communities that we participate in daily.

Of course, this has been challenging as we have been separated for over a year, but even apart we have been the embodiment of God’s love to each other through screens, telephones, emails, cards, and small gatherings.  And we’ve had the opportunity to look into our local community and see the ways that people have embodied love in advocating for justice and social change. 

And we know that following the command to love should come with the caution label: follow at your own risk, because we know the Holy Spirit will lead us to people and places that challenge us to embody love. At other times our heart will grow weary as we look at the brokenness of the world and wonder if our love is enough to bring healing. We will look and ask, do we really need to love that person?

But this is the beauty of God’s love for if we live out of the transformation that God’s love has in our lives and abide in God’s love, the Holy Spirit will led us and guide us into the places where we can radiate the of the image of God, even when we know what we are doing and even when we don’t know how God is working through us.

Our baptismal identity roots us in the nutritious soil of God’s love so that we can extend our branches as far as they can reach so that we can bear fruit that will last, fruit that will regenerate and share the sweetness of God’s everlasting love.

Do you know how love you are? Created. Claimed. Called. Chosen.
To be an embodiment of God’s love and to live out the love that God has for you.

Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jesus appears to the disciples and asks them if they have anything to eat. They give him broiled fish and recall their ministry of the past and are called to be a witness to Christ’s peace.

Vicar Andrea Bonneville
Third Sunday after Easter, Year B 
Text: Luke 24:36b-48

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

They saw their beloved publicly executed for a crime he did not commit as they watched, even at a distance, all the things that had happened (Luke 23). Mourning the death of their beloved who died at the hands of people who enforced the law, they gathered on that day, terrified and doubting, attempting to put together their fragmented pieces of hope to make sense of the reality of the past and piece together their future.

And then their beloved appeared. Again.

Fully embodied in a human body with flesh and bones and wounds. And they didn’t know if what they were seeing was real. Because why would they? The fresh and raw experience of death and injustice consumed their thoughts. Wondering what they should have done differently. Asking how they had been complacent.  Seeking answers for why and challenging how something like this could happen again and again.  It led them to believe that resurrection wasn’t possible; they needed evidence to hope and reassurance to be filled with joy.

So Jesus asked if they had something to eat.

The embodiment of the Triune God goes to the disciples who gathered in that room. The risen Christ shows up to people who are grieving, looks them in the eyes, says peace be with you, and then asks them if they have anything to eat.

And they gave him broiled fish.

Fish that they probably went out and caught early that morning because even in their mourning fishing was what they knew how to do. When Jesus asks them for food they look around and they see that fish and it is the ah ha moment.

And like how the smell of bread reminds me of my grandmother’s kitchen and her love for me, the disciples see Jesus eat the fish and they see an embodiment of love that took on everything that was broken and unjust and rose bringing peace and reconciliation to all of creation.

The fish reminds them of when they were by their fishing boats, exhausted from a long day of fishing without a catch, and Jesus boarded the boat and suddenly their nets were filled till they broke. Remembering what it felt like to trust in the Word of God and live into their vocation.

Or maybe their minds wandered to when they only had the two fish and a few loaves of bread and Jesus told them to feed the people. They watched as the little resource they had turned into an abundance and all the people where filled. Reminding them of what it felt like to provide food and love to the people in their community.  

Or maybe their minds went back to the last time they were all gathered around the table, breaking bread and drinking wine together, being reminded of what it felt like to be in community together and feel love. And then be told to go out and share that love (Luke 22).

The broiled fish was the food they ate the most of; it was so common in their everyday lives that they forgot it had significance to their identity of who God had called them to be and their identity of what it meant to be a follower of Jesus.  

So what is our broiled fish today?  What helps us when we are filled with fear and doubt see the risen Christ in our communities in our lives?

I don’t know what the broiled fish is for you because my assumption is that the broiled fish is different in all of our lives. But what I can say is this: the tangible thing that helps us to see the resurrected Christ in our community is as much a part of our identity as followers of Christ as fish was to the identity of the disciples who gathered in that room on that day. 

We know there are things in our everyday lives that make us look back to the bad things that have happened in our past and if we are being honest with ourselves there are times and places when that is what is needed and necessary, especially when we have to ask hard questions about our privilege in this society.

But we also need the tangible things; a tune of a song, the sound of children laughing, a Bible story, the smell of a home cooked meal, feeding and caring for our neighbors, that help us look back and see the goodness and love of the risen Christ.

Who on that day and on this day is coming to us and our community looking us in the eyes and saying peace be with you and then calling us to witness to these things.

So we bear witness in our community as we mourn the death and cry out for justice for Duante Wright, George Floyd, Adam Toledo, and countless other who have died at the hands of the broken system of violent policing.  Wondering what we can differently. Asking how we have been complacent.  Seeking answers for why and challenging how something like this could happen again and again. 

We have the evidence and we have the reassurance in the hope and joy that the risen Christ in our community and in our lives. Find where you can touch it, feel it, eat it, and see it.

Because we are the witnesses of hope and the embodiment of Christ’s peace.

Amen.