dream day

this colorado girl's dream day!!  today was one of my monthly reading days (scheduled about a month ago with no knowledge of "winter storm q"'s plans to come visit--what does the q stand for, anyway??).  the snow just kept piling up and after a visit from jesus (or was she just a homeless woman in need of shelter?), i headed outside.

this is my rain meter - something i didn't know about until coming to kansas city. 
yes, it is full of snow with snow piled all around it.

my car, approximately five minutes (or less) after i had brushed it clean - as in, black like it's painted. 
when i was getting my snow gear on, it wasn't even snowing!

the snow would not pack together for a snowbaby on my porch, so i had to at least make a snow angel!

this is my happy (and maybe a little cold and tired) face!

for a girl who was beginning to give up on winter here in kansas city, this snow was a dream come true!!

may you be covered in the dust of jesus: ash wednesday

the psalm with which we began the service was psalm 51.
the first reading was joel 2:1-2, 12-17.

the holy gospel according to matthew, the 6th chapter.  glory to you, o lord.

“Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven. ²“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. ³But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, ⁴so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

⁵“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.⁶But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

¹⁶“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. ¹⁷But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, ¹⁸so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

¹⁹“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; ²⁰but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. ²¹For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

the gospel of the lord.  praise to you, o christ.

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remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

just as joel sounds the trumpets for a solemn assembly, much of our lives are marked by funerals and loss.  sometimes i find myself keeping track of the events of my life in relationship to those who have died.  it’s not necessarily every year that someone close to me dies, but it’s often enough that they can be time markers.  my uncle in third grade, my grandfather at the end of eighth grade, my high school classmate my second year of college, and my grandmother this past year.

you are dust and to dust you shall return.

death is all around us and yet the world that surrounds us does not like death or mortality.  it does not want to be reminded that we will all die in the end—you can see it in commercials most clearly.  denying mortality, the underlying message is that you will be more alive, more immortal, further from death—or, at least, that is how you will appear.  you will look younger, more alive, vibrant if you would just by this one product.

but we were created out of the dust to be a dusty people.  god formed the first human from the dust of the ground.  it’s even in the hebrew of the words.  adam from adamah.  we are dusty people,    from dust,    and when we die, we will return to the dust of the earth. 

as god has provided us with nourishment from creation for our living, so, in our dying do we respond with nourishment for creation.  returning to the earth at the end of our lives, continuing the cycle for generation after generation.

you are dust and to dust you shall return.

we come today to put ashes on our foreheads, to proclaim the good news of our mortality to the world.  we come today to stare death in the face,   to face our mortality    in the grace of god because even as we embrace mortality, we know that in jesus christ, death does not have the final word. so we can come to join the solemn assembly of joel to honor that life is precious and short—even when it lasts for over a century.  we come to say that yes, we will die, we will get sick, we will be sad and lonely and angry, we will mess up and sin and hurt, and,   even in all of that,   we have a god who loves us.

a god who loves us in all our messiness and a god who knows not only our shadow sides, our sinfulness, but also our original goodness.  this is the god who creates us, the god who comes to dwell with us, to be the Dusty One among the dusty many.  a god who comes to us, even knowing the path ahead.

you are dust and to dust you shall return.

that is what these long 40 days are about.  we begin our lenten journey marked by dust—the dust of the cross.  we know this road.  we have traveled it before.  this is the road to jerusalem.  the disciples walked it so many years ago, not knowing how it would end.  we know where the road leads, to the top of the hill, to the cross.  yet our call is to discipleship.

in high school sunday school, we talked about discipleship in jesus’ time and learned that in jesus’ day, disciples were the people who tried to be just like their rabbi.  they would try to follow the rabbi so closely that the saying for disciples was, “may you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.”

you are dust and to dust you shall return.

we are covered in the dust of our rabbi, marked with the cross of christ.  looking forward to these 40 days as a time to deepen our discipleship—to be covered in the dust of jesus not just today, but every day.

it is in light of our dusty situations that we hear jesus’ words to us that in our alms giving, in our praying, and in our fasting we are to do it not for the recognition that the world gives, but for our own growth.  we do it as a way of helping our hearts to get to the right place.  jesus says, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

my heart does not always go where i want it to.  psalm 51 makes it clear, requesting, “create in me a clean heart, o god, and renew a right spirit within me.  cast me not away from your presence, and take not your holy spirit from me.  restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain me with your bountiful spirit.”

jesus’ promise that where we decide to store up treasure will help our heart to go where we choose gives me hope that even when i am struggling in my heart, my mind and intentionality matter and they can guide my heart in the long run.  it is a promise that says i have agency and i get to choose where i lead my heart. 

my heart, though very much influenced by it, is not bound to evil or consumerism, spite or fear.  i get to help my heart live into its original goodness, which came before and is stronger than any original sin, and part of how i get to do that is in how i respond to what god has provided.  i get to store up my treasures where i choose.

and lest i get too full of myself, believing my salvation might depend on me rather than on god, i am reminded:

you are dust and to dust you shall return.

even as i get to choose where to store up my treasure, where i want to lead my heart.  here on ash wednesday it is clear.  i am not dependent on my own heart or my will or my actions.  even as i seek to be covered in the dust of jesus, i am not jesus and i am not the one with all the grace. 

even as i store up my treasure, as i come for repentance, for forgiveness, for comfort, i am reminded of my favorite definition of grace: there is nothing you can do to make god love you any more and there is nothing you can do to make god love you any less. 

because although we are dust and to dust we shall return, that is not all we are.  in our baptisms we are claimed as god’s beloved children.  so when we come seeking clean hearts and right spirits, we know that god will cleanse us as with hyssop and make us clean because god has already cleansed us with the waters of baptism, where we were joined to jesus in his death so that we might be raised with him in the resurrection.

so i come to be covered in the dust of jesus, trusting that god’s grace, poured down at baptism and made known in jesus christ, covers me long after the dust of ashes has been washed away.

you are dust and to dust you shall return.

jesus chooses his disciples: narrative lectionary

the holy gospel according to luke, the 5th chapter, glory to you, o lord.

Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, ²he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. ³He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. ⁴When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” ⁵Simon answered, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” ⁶When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. ⁷So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. ⁸But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” ⁹For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken; ¹⁰and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” ¹¹When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.

the gospel of the lord, praise to you, o christ.

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in high school sunday school, we’ve been watching a video series by rob bell.  a couple weeks ago when i taught sunday school the theme was discipleship.  we learned a couple things about those who were disciples to a rabbi that really stuck out to me.

1-disciples were the best of the best of the best as all others were filtered off into their family business and being a disciple was the dream job, such that a rabbi would go to a potential disciple—who had memorized the torah (the first 5 books of the bible), the talmud (the rest of the books that make up what we call the hebrew bible or old testament genesis through malachi), and the midrash, or commentary from the rabbi (referred to as the rabbi’s yoke)—and say “come, follow me” and a disciple would do it in a heartbeat.

2-the goal of discipleship was to be like your rabbi—to the extent that you walked right behind them and walked in what they walked in and the saying was “may you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.”

so, when jesus as a rabbi comes to simon and james and john to call them as disciples, he is not calling the best of the best—they’re already well into the family business, after all—but it’s no wonder they say yes!

it’s the dream job of the day!  the catch with jesus is that try as anyone might, they cannot follow him as they would another rabbi.  jesus is god incarnate—grace made real—and so while we can try to be like him, we will never be him.  we will never fully succeed.  his love and grace is so overflowing that it breaks the nets we cast and nearly submerges our boats!

this is the part of the sermon where i invited people to make use of the crayons, pens, and paper in their pews to reflect individually and then with someone next to them on the following two sets of questions:

1- what is your dream job?  if you could do anything and get paid for it, what would it be?            

what would you say if somebody came by out of the blue and offered you that job?                       

2-when has someone chosen you for something?  how/for what do you wish god would choose you?

as we move through lent this year, i invite you to reflect on how you might deepen your discipleship.  what would it take and what would it look like for you to be covered in the dust of jesus?  what would it mean to you?

jesus is ready to jump: 4th sunday after epiphany

jeremiah 1:4-10 was also a reading assigned for today.

the holy gospel according to luke, the 4^th chapter, glory to you, o lord.

²¹Then Jesus began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

²²All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” ²³He said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Doctor, cure yourself!’ And you will say,

‘Do here also in your hometown

the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.’”

²⁴And he said, “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown. ²⁵But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a severe famine over all the land; ²⁶yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. ²⁷There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.”

²⁸When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage.

²⁹They got up,

drove him out of the town,

and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built,

so that they might hurl him off the cliff.

³⁰But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.

the gospel of the lord, praise to you, o christ.

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last week pastor jennifer read the passage just before this where jesus outlines his vocation, saying, “the spirit of the lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. he has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free,                        to proclaim the year of the lord’s favor.”(luke 4:18-19)  jesus then makes clear that this is what he is about.  as in most of luke’s gospel, salvation comes here and now.  “today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 

now.

this first glimpse in the gospel of luke of god’s glory being revealed in jesus gets the hometown crowd pretty excited.  their reaction is positive, if slightly patronizing: “this is joseph’s kid!”  “we know him!”  “he sure is getting his money’s worth at school!”  but then jesus drops the figurative bombshell:

not here.

this is not “good ol’ boy” salvation that comes, as the hometown crowd expects, to family and hometown first.  just like jeremiah, jesus has good news of building and planting: freedom from oppression—release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, but for them both first comes reality: for jeremiah that reality is destruction—plucking up and pulling down, destroying and overthrowing—babylonian captivity—for jesus it’s that god doesn’t play by our rules—the way we’ve always done things.

jesus has come for all nations and all people;            there sure are a lot of those other nations.  and, the hometown crowd are no more deserving than the gentile widow at zarephath or the gentile leper, namaan.

nor, is the hometown crowd any less deserving, but until they can realize that first part, that they are not more entitled to the first and best from god, they won’t be able to appreciate the second, that because of god’s love and grace, they are just as deserving as everyone else.

this realization—that they are not automatically entitled to all the miracles they want as the hometown crowd—leads             to             rage.          in typical mob mentality, the crowd switches from praise and hope    to rage    in a heartbeat.

…and they’re off. 

filling with rage, driving jesus out of town, and preparing to hurl jesus off the cliff. …  that’s the plan, anyway.  but in all their rush to hurl jesus off the cliff,      somehow,   he manages   to pass   through   the midst of them, begging the question: if he could just walk away, why did he let it go so far in the first place?

as he is pushed and shoved to the hilltop,    is jesus holding onto a glimmer of hope that the crowd will ask to be a part of what he is up to?  to join jesus’ mission instead of getting riled up that he won’t join theirs?

i wonder what would happen if, instead of trying to throw him off, the crowd had tried    to fly with him.  what if jesus let them shuttle him up to the hilltop to see if anyone would have the courage to ask to fly?                         the courage to leap with him into his ministry and vocation.

so, jesus keeps waiting and hoping that our questions and requests of “what will you do for me?”  and “please bless what i am doing.”  will change to “what can i do for you?” and “how can i get involved in what you’re up to in the world?”

if jesus is always waiting for us, pursuing us, what does it mean that he tells the crowd—his hometown crowd, who expects his utmost allegiance:      it’s not happening here.

it’s not that what the hometown crowd does is awful, they clearly care enough for jesus that they listen to him and praise what he says—at first.    the tough part,     the part where emotions turn on a dime,    is when his hometown realizes that while jesus is for everybody, their privileged position as the hometown crowd doesn’t entitle them to anything. 

jesus holds out hope as long as he can.  perhaps out of love for this very hometown crowd that is running him out of town.  i can just imagine jesus, being pushed and shoved along the way to the top of the hill, waiting and hoping for a voice to speak against the mob.

and finally, as they make it to the top of the hill, jesus looks around at everyone, and, with a deep sigh, lets his head hang down and passes gently through the midst of them to go on his way, always waiting and hoping, glancing back, to hear one voice, one person, break with the crowd and ask to join jesus.

but it’s hard.  it takes courage and tough deliberation to leap.                       

at seminary, it was a big deal, for me, to lead a student organization as we worked to become a reconciling in christ seminary, to make our welcome official, and to engage in the tough conversations about welcome, but i was not alone in it—it was jesus who was ready to jump, and i was just trying to join in and that happened to be the role i was given.

at immanuel, we have plenty of chances to jump, to be brave and courageous and ask jesus how we can join what he’s doing. 

sometimes the chance to jump with jesus is clear, easy, or straightforward:

            saying yes to serving at bessie’s house

            bringing extra food for mlm or the souper bowl on sundays

            increasing your giving

            attending a worshipping opportunity you don’t regularly attend

            becoming a faith mentor

sometimes it’s a harder question:

            how do we express god’s welcome, love, and acceptance to those who come here?

do we want to adopt a new welcoming statement?

how do we want to spend money as a church?

how much do we want our benevolence to be?

how do we use this building?

how might we use this building?

what is jesus up to in westport?  in kansas city?  in the country?  the world?

sometimes, like jesus’ hometown crowd, i do not want to join jesus in what he’s doing.  i would much rather hurl him off the cliff because this different way of being or this new idea is too much for me and i’d rather stick to the way things have always been.  

lucky for me, jesus always seems to pass through and go on his way before i get the chance to actually hurl him off the cliff, and i am left to ponder what i could have possibly been thinking.

other times, though, i am ready to be that voice in the crowd that says, “wait!  i want in.  i want to fly with you, jesus.  take me where you’re going!”  it’s both scary and exciting.  i want it and i fear it, and much of the time it is our vocation—it is where our desires and joys meet the world’s needs—it is a dream that seems far off, but might    actually    be    as close as jesus    passing    through    the midst of us.

what is it for you?  

what makes you scared?  

what makes you want to hurl jesus off the cliff?  

what makes you excited?  

what is jesus up to that makes you want to jump?  

how do you?  —how will you—jump with jesus?