How Blessed – A Policy Statement

    We read it in our good book and so we do our best to obey:

    How blessed are those who are poor – so the American Evangelical embraces a leader who will ensure a greater poverty. How can the spiritual kingdom grow if people rely on material things like food and housing, and medicine for dignity? Let wages shrink and rents rise – and they will pray harder.

    How blessed are those who hunger – so the church celebrates cutting food stamps and foreign aid. Call it stewardship. Call it discipline. Call it love. Hunger sharpens the soul.

    How blessed are those who are weeping – make the world harder, colder, crueler to increase the kingdom. Their tears are proof of our righteousness.

    How blessed are we when the world hates us, denounces us as criminals on account of our faith – the louder they object and the more they rail against us the holier we must be. Their criticism is our martyrdom.

Luke 6:20-23

from Doctor Luke’s Personal Notes (Ananias and Sapphira)

    Though I was not present to witness the deaths of Ananias (“Yahweh is gracious”) or Sapphira (“Beautiful”) and neither did I perform an autopsy on their bodies following, I have been asked by members of the community to address as a doctor and member of the Royal College of Surgeons the peculiarities of their sudden demise and to, if possible, describe the cause (other than the supernatural obvious). The community wants to retain a record of these events, as discreditable as it may be, so that Ananias and Sapphira and their legacy will not be forgotten.

    Ananias: 42-year-old, male with no previous history of heart disease or cardiovascular difficulties and his wife, Sapphira: 30-year-old female with sparkling blue eyes and a clean health history were both suddenly and inexplicably struck dead on the same day, within a few hours of each other.

    The couple had voluntarily sold a piece of property and brought the cash to the apostles as part of the voluntary communalism being put into practice by the Followers of the Way. Ananias reportedly told Peter that the amount he brought in was the full amount of the sale. But when challenged on this, Ananias began to sweat profusely. The apostle Peter described this as a lie not to men, but a lie to the Holy Spirit and asked him, “Wasn’t the property yours to use as you wished? And once sold, wasn’t the money yours to give as you desired? What put this scheme into your head? Your philargyry will not save you. Keep your money. Keep your mammon. Keep your mummery.”

    And with that Ananias fell down dead; he ‘breathed out his soul,’ as one witness described it. A group of young men wrapped the body in a sheet and took it out for burial.

    A few hours later Sapphira came too and was challenged in the same way by Peter. “Listen! You can hear the footsteps of the men who just finished burying your husband returning. They’ll carry you out next.” Immediately she fell down dead like her husband. The group of young men who had just buried her husband, wrapped her in a sheet and buried her body next to that of her husband.

    There are a variety of physical conditions that could have resulted in this sort of sudden death. The sudden onset of excessive sweating could be indicative of a Heart Attack. This “cold sweat” would probably have been accompanied by other symptoms including chest pains and a racing or skipping heartbeat. If their deaths were caused by a Stroke they would have felt a numbness or a prickling sensation in various parts of their body, along with a headache and blurred vision. This is not an uncommon occurrence; deaths caused by strokes are fairly common. Emperor Valentinian died as the result of a stroke precipitated by yelling angrily at a group of foreign envoys. I might have suspected a Pulmonary Embolism but there is no indication that either of them were coughing or that they experienced a bloody or frothy mucus with the coughing. Shigellosis (a bacterial intestinal infection) might be considered except there was not an accompanying diarrhea, fever, abdominal pain, or bloody stool. Neither does an Aortic Rupture seem likely as this would have been accompanied by a sudden loss of blood pressure and a blue tinge to the skin. It may have been a case of Exhaustion as the result of diseased blood vessels in the lungs – but this seems unlikely. There was no trace of either Strychnine, or Prussic Acid, or Opium.

    More exotic diagnoses have been suggested including: Being Struck by Lightning – I read an article in one of the Latin medical journals about an entire football team from The Democratic Republic of the Congo that was simultaneously killed by a bolt of lightning. The old adage, “Lightning never strikes the same place twice” is veritably untrue. It is possible that the couple in question were both killed in the same place by separate lightning strikes. This is strange, but not outside of the realm of fortean possibilities. Or they could have been killed by other articles falling from the sky. A villager in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq was killed by a falling Meteorite, and the Greek playwright Aeschylus was killed by Tortoise dropped by an eagle flying overhead which mistook the author’s bald head for a stone on which to drop and break the tortoise’s shell. It’s true that none of the witnesses mention lightening, meteorites, or tortoises, but these possibilities cannot be completely discounted.

    My sometimes traveling companion, Paul, has often suggested that members of the church who violate the standards and expectations of the community should be Turned Over to Satan for the “destruction of the flesh.” I am not sure what he means by that but it sounds like death to me.

    Psychosomatic or Psychogenic Death (sometimes referred to as “Voodoo Death,” is a parasympathetic backlash of the mind against the strong emotions of fear and terror that is powerful enough to shut down the body. It is possible that the couple were, quite literally, scared to death.

    A skillful physician could, from the color and cast of the skin, make an inferential diagnosis of an illness, but it is impossible at this far removal in both space and time to make any authoritative diagnosis, but it would seem that something incredible and fearful happened here. More than that I would not hazard to say.

Crickets, Fireworks, and Christian Perfection - An Ascension Day Sermon

    Tiff and I weren’t here last week – some of you noticed. Joyce sent us a copy of the bulletin to make sure that we knew we were missed. Thank you, Joyce. I was doing what I’m doing today, filling in for an absent pastor, across town. But here I am today and here you are. So as we celebrate Mother’s Day

    Well, you didn’t hear it last week. I thought I could get away with reusing the same sermon.

    Actually, today is Ascension Sunday. One of my favorites in the church calendar – though it doesn’t get the pomp and splendor of Easter, or the emotional saturation of Christmas. It doesn’t get page after page of psalms and hymns and spiritual songs like the other High Holy Days. In fact, if you check the index in the back of The United Methodist Hymnal, under the Christian Year heading, there are only six listings – and two of those are All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name, under two different melodies.

    In some denominations the clergy may switch to white or gold vestments. Whoa… way to really party it up… I recently learned that in Florence, Italy they celebrate the Festa del Grillo - the Cricket Festival - on Ascension Day. Crickets are sold in tiny little cages and then the children release them into the streets. Loki – who wants to be an entomologist – will appreciate that one. And in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, people often hike up into the mountains on Ascension Day – like the disciples following Jesus up the Mount of Olives to witness his ascension.

    But I think we need something like fireworks for Ascension Day. Shooting up into the sky in a blaze of brilliant glory, cascading colors, the sky ablaze with sparkles and spangles. It’s a joyful, brilliant day to be celebrated with song and explosion. Loud songs and small explosions…

    For forty days he continued to show himself alive to his disciples after his Passion – that is to say, after his pain. For passion is pain. And pain is death. He showed himself to them after his death. For forty days he showed signs, and wonders, he showed them many demonstrations, evidences, and proofs. He spoke to them of many things: of shoes, and ships, and sealing-wax, of cabbages, and of carpenter kings. He spoke to them of the coming the Kingdom and of God¹.

    “And don’t leave Jerusalem,” he told them while he was sitting down to eat with them, “until you receive what was promised.” They were sitting around eating and drinking, sharing a communion of fellowship with the risen Lord. I like to think that his favorite post resurrection meal was broiled fish and honeycomb.²Those privileged to share that meal with him would remember it always. “John baptized with water,” he reminded them. But not too many days from now you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit – and this is a baptism by fire - and this is where the sprinkling versus full immersion debate gets interesting…

    And the disciples asked him, “Lord, has the time come for you to restore the Kingdom to Israel?” They were thinking perhaps of the Maccabean glories, and Solomonic marvels, and Davidic victories of the past. “Are you going to, in this hour, make Israel great again?”

    But Jesus said “No,” or rather, “It’s not really for you to know.” He commissioned them instead to be his witnesses in ever-expanding circles – in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria – and to the remotest parts of the earth. And the commission is given with another promise of the Holy Spirit.

    Meanwhile the disciples were still trying to figure out when the Kingdom would be restored even as Jesus was lifted up from the ground. A glorious sight - he rises up and up and up through endless ranks of invisible angels, until he is disappeared in a cloud. Up through obscuring clouds. Gone. Vanished. Disappeared from their eyes. Two men in white step into view and announce that this same Jesus will come back in the same way he went.

    And here we are - celebrating the ascension of the risen Lord. Let’s sing another hymn and where are the fireworks and the crickets? Today is a day to celebrate.

    The risen and ascended Christ is the promise of something extraordinary and it rarely gets discussed – at least on this side of the Eastern Orthodox / Roman Catholic / Protestant divide. It is the promise of theosis or divinization or even deification– to use some of those heavyweight theological words.

    And this might sound a bit alarming – as if the substitute pastor were saying that we all get to be God, or little g gods. But he’s not. You don’t have to send Pastor Mark a concerned email.

    The word Theosis is a two-part Greek word: theo being God and the suffix -osis which means a process. Think of a white cloth being saturated with red dye by the process of osmosis. In the same way we are filled and saturated with the presence of God by theosis.³ Theosis is the end goal of our salvation. It is what we were created for. It is what we are redeemed for.

    We were created in the image and likeness of God – and this isn’t just our physical, fleshy bodies. We were created to be good, as all of creation was called good. Very good.

    Since we’re good Methodists here, lets quote John Wesley:

“In the image of God was man made, holy as he that created him is holy, merciful as the author of all is merciful, perfect as his Father in heaven is perfect. As God is love, so man dwelling in love dwelt in God, and God in him. God made him to be ‘an image of his own eternity’ an incorruptible picture of the God of glory. He was accordingly pure, as God is pure. … He ‘loved the Lord his God with all his heart, and with all his mind, and soul, and strength.’ … Such then was the state of man in paradise. By the free, unmerited love of God he was holy and happy, he knew, loved, enjoyed God, which is (in substance) life everlasting. And in this life of love he was to continue forever if he continued to obey God in all things.”⁴

    But sin broke that goodness and death destroyed that life. We were enslaved by fear and lust and shame and wrath and hate. Christ came to restore what had been destroyed, to return what we’d traded away, to revive what was dead.

    The second century Bishop, Irenaeus of Lyons wrote, “The only true and steadfast Teacher, the Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, through his transcendent love, became what we are, that he might bring us to be what he is himself”⁵

    Saint Augustine of Hippo said: “We carry mortality about with us, we endure infirmity, we look forward to divinity. For God wishes not only to vivify, but also to deify us.”⁶

    In the second letter of Peter we read: By his divine power he has lavished on us all the things we need for life and true devotion, through the knowledge of him who has called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these, the greatest and priceless promises have been lavished on us, that through them we should share the divine nature and escape the corruption rife in the world through disordered passion.”⁷

    Paul said it over and over again in his letters: If anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation… For me to live is Christ… It is no longer I that lives, but Christ that lives in me… Christ in you, the hope of glory… And we all, with unveiled faces like mirrors reflecting the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the image that we reflect in brighter and brighter glory.⁸

    Ascension Sunday is not some weird appendix to Easter. Ascension Day is not an afterthought. The Ascension is not just Jesus going away with a promise to return. It is Jesus enthroning a redeemed and restored humanity in the presence of God the Father through the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.

    This is the entire sanctification, the Christian perfection that John Wesley described. That we are so filled with the love of God and a love for God that “no wrong temper, none contrary to love, remains in the soul; and that all the thoughts, words, and actions are governed by pure love.”⁹

    The disciples, having watched the risen Lord, rising into the sky, went back to Jerusalem worshiping and full of joy, continually praising God.¹⁰ When we leave from this chapel, we should go out into the world like bottle rockets, shooting up into the sky in a blaze of brilliant glory, cascading colors, the sky ablaze with sparkles and spangles of holy joy. We go out, transformed in brighter and brighter glory. We should explode in love for each other, for our neighbors, for our enemies, for the world. We should be brilliant bursting bodies of love for God.

1Lewis Carrol - The Walrus and the Carpenter

2Luke 24: 42 (not all of the early manuscripts include the honeycomb. It’s probably rightfully omitted from our translations, but I still like it.)

3Frederica Mathews-Green, Welcome to the Orthodox Church, Paraclete Press, pg. 68

4John Wesley - Sermon 5, “Justification by Faith,” I.1.4, Works, 1:184-85.

5Against Heresies, Book 5,

6Sermo 23B

72 Peter 1:4

82 Corinthians 5:17, Philippians 1:21, Galatians 2:20, Colossians 1:27, 2 Corinthians 3:18

9Thoughts on Christian Perfection (1760), Q. 1, Works, 13:57.

10Luke 24: 52-53

Emmaus

    Come risen Christ to the confused
    from light to shadow and return

    Come uncanny Christ seen unseen
    unrecognized and with us all the while

    Break bread and he is gone.
    Break mystery and he is here
    within our burning and broken hearts

    Come hidden disappearing Christ
    live and live again

Ha ha! And Oh Lord!

    “There were an estimated eight to nine million at the No Kings rally …”

    “Ha ha! You’re so dumb. We don’t have kings. We took care of that in 1776. We’re democracy, dumbass.”

    “Right. You understand, of course, that what we’re doing is trying to protect that democracy from authoritarians who would subvert our rule of law…”

    “Ha ha! You’re so dumb We’re not a democracy. We’re a constitutional republic.”

    “Yes, but a republic is a form of democra…”

    “Try reading Alexis de Tocqueville, moron!”

    Test the professions to reveal the confessions – or the lack thereof – in our global warming, resource plundering disaster. It’s a moment of crisis for anyone with half an eye or even a detuned ear. But seeing they might see and hearing they might hear. And no one wants that sense. Bandaged and broken. Limping along with sick vandalism.

    “O Lord! There’s never been such a violent, lawless, decadent generation,” says the pearl clutching Evangelical who’s never looked at history. “I’ve seen things I never dreamed possible. World wide corruption. Debauchery in the western world…”

    “Our God is a God of war. A God of battle. And our Christ is the Christ of Conquest. Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to burn them up?”

    “It’s the same maniacal purpose. The same evil system collapsing. You’ve seen the suicide attempts and people indicted. The law is finally being enforced. At home and abroad. On a global scale. Now why not make it personal?”

    You cannot reason with them. Logic and reason are destroyed. The science fiction writers and prophets were right: the authorities have become as psychotic as the people they hunted. The authorities are filled with hate.

    “Do you want us to call down fire from heaven to burn them up or not, goddamn it:?!”

How to Celebrate this Christmas

 It certainly feels like Mary’s Magnificat is becoming more and more relevant. 

Burn It Down

    Jesus and his companions watched the news with horror – the rioting, the buildings on fire, people shouting in the streets, broken glass, shattered skulls, horse mounted police trampling protesters carrying nothing more dangerous than cardboard signs, riot squad officers firing pepper balls at reporters and cameramen, firing tear gas and flash grenades into the crowds to provoke them to violence.

    “Jesus,” said Matthew. “I’m so sick of the division and the strife. Can’t people just get along?”

    Jesus turned off the television and scolded them, “You think I’ve come to bring peace? Do you think that’s why I’m here? Shit no. I came to start a fire, and I wish to God it were already burning.”

    “Burn it down!” whispered Andrew beneath the keffiyeh he already had wrapped around his face, and shook his tightly clenched fist in the air.

    “But,” Matthew objected. “Destruction of property isn’t a valid form of protest.” 

    Jesus laughed. “Just wait a few chapters.” He laughed again.

     “It’s going to be divided houses from here on out – three against two, two on three. This is the uprising, the struggle, the intifada. It’s the end of traumatized truth and tortured dreams, but the end falls hard. Fathers and mothers against their children. Children against their parents. The world upside down until all is made right. Till one can walk on through without feeling like they’re in hell anymore. The roof is on fire, but we don’t need no water. Let the motherfucker burn.”

Why I Hate America

A friend of mine recently shared on Facebook the purported results of a CNN news poll asking the question: Will you fly the American flag on July 4th?  63% of the respondents said Yes. 33% said No and the response of the other 4% is not described. (I have not investigated the accuracy or veracity of this meme – for the purposes of this post I will accept it as valid.)

In the comments his post gathered, it was suggested that the 33% not planning to fly the Stars and Stripes on July 4th must be Democrats who actually hate America, and want to see it destroyed, and that they should find someplace else to live – preferably somewhere behind President Trump’s yet unbuilt wall.

As it turns out, I am not a Democrat, and neither do I wish to see America destroyed, but I do hate America – or more specifically, I hate the United States of America.

Please allow me to explain.

I could list examples of our nation’s history of slavery and genocide. I could describe or ever expansive, militaristic imperialism. I could cite our racism and class warfare,  but none of the things, as potent as they are, are the real root of my hatred. I hate the USA because Jesus told me I should.

“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.”  Luke 14:26-27 -  NRSV

I am aware that these verses do not mention the USA specifically, or any nation-state in general. But the principle underlying these words certainly applies. And it’s not really that much of a stretch. We speak of Fatherland. We speak of Motherland. We speak of Homeland. And I am told by Jesus that I should hate my home.

It will be objected that Jesus didn’t actually mean hate. And it’s true; you can find any number of commentaries to explain that the Aramaic root of the word hate that Jesus uses here actually means, “love less.”  And this understanding is reflected in Matthew’s version of this instruction.

Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.  Matthew 10:37-38  NRSV

But Jesus’ words ,as recorded by Luke, were intended to be coarse, shocking, vulgar even. These instructions cut across the fabric of society, tear a hole in social constructs, then and now. We are supposed to be offended by them and provoked by them. It does us no good to dismiss them as merely examples of Jesus’ sometimes fiery, hyperbolic rhetoric. It is rhetoric, yes,  but we dare not dismiss it.

Those who love their home – their homeland – more than him are not worthy of him. Those who do not hate their homes – their homelands- cannot be his disciples. And so, yes: I hate the USA.

Does this mean that I want to see it destroyed? No. No more than I want my parents, or brothers, or my wife, and children to be killed. The persistently belligerent will demand, “if you hate America, then why don’t you leave?”  But where could I go that I wouldn’t say the same thing?  No nation-state is the kingdom of heaven. No nation-state has my allegiance. Only the kingdom of God – on earth as it is I heaven. .

Jesus Might Call President Trump a Mother%*@#er

  

Incoming freshman Representative, Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) set Christian tongues a clucking last Thursday with her stated intent to “go in and impeach the motherfucker”  - referring with that vulgarity to to President Donald Trump. Many Christians shake their heads and wag their fingers, lamenting the decrease in decency, and the collapse of civility, and et centers

But me… I just wonder if Jesus himself might not have called President Trump a “motherfucker” or something similar.

Hear me out.

I know, of course, that Jesus’ admonition to love our enemies (Matthew 5:44) and the apostle Paul’s advice to “…let no unwholesome talk come out of your mouth,” (Ephesians 4:29) would seem to negate any chance that Jesus might use such an uncouth epithet, but I still think there is a case to be made.

Look for instance at the fiery invective that Jesus used against his enemies, the Pharisees, in Matthew 23 – particularly verse 33:  “"You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?” (NIV).  We’ve probably read this verse enough time to buff away the jagged edge of these words. So we need to remind ourselves just how uncivil Jesus was sometimes.

Here Jesus is describing his enemies as snakes, as the children of vipers. In the context of that culture and that time, Jesus was condemning them as disgusting and defiling children of the devil (that ancient serpent – Revelation 20:2). This is no polite ecumenical discourse. This is bitter polemic. This is nasty partisanship. This is abusive, ad hominem attack. It may not have been “motherfucker,” but it was just as nasty.

We like to keep our Jesus clean. We like to keep him out of the gutter – and to keep the gutter out of his mouth, but Jesus’ interaction with the Pharisees was, at times, quite ugly. we tend to forget (willful, perhaps) that “[p]olite ecumenical dialogue among different religious groups is a happy modern invention (Meier 338).” And since the division between the two is often indistinguishable, it’s true of political discourse as well.

Would Jesus have called President Trump a Motherfucker? I don’t know. In Luke 13:23 he called Herod Antipas a “fox” (more specifically a “vixen”) – and it wasn’t because Jesus thought Herod was handsome or clever. It was a pointed, and insulting criticism on par with calling him a poser, jackass. 

Would Jesus call President Trump a Motherfucker? I don’t know – but I think a case can be made that he might.

See also: Jesus, Be Civil! 

Meier, John P. A Marginal Jew Vol. III: Companions and Competitors.  Doubleday. New York, New York. 2001.

Jesus for President

The powerful ones were there that afternoon in the lakeside home of the Missouri millionaire - a couple of bankers, a senator, a rancher from Wyoming. Powerful men. Wealthy men. They declined, however, to think of themselves as “movers and shakers” of society. They preferred Stability and Status Quo to progress and change, unless it was happing in one of those socialist countries in South America or someplace in the Middle East. Shaking there could be turned to profit. No, these men (all men, of course) were assembled to plan for the future. They’d come to discuss their candidate for the next presidential election.

A silver haired and silver tongued Senator welcomed their specially invited guest: “Jesus, we want to thank you for sharing your time with us this afternoon. We know that you’re busy, and we appreciate you willingness to be here as we plan how we can return our country to its Christian heritage. Before we begin, can we offer you something to drink? Some water, perhaps, if you’d like a glass of wine…”

There was polite laughter around the table. Jesus smiled. “No thank you. But I’m glad to be here among you,” he said and made the sign of blessing over them.

“Well, let’s get right down to it, shall we?  We’d like to put your name forward to the nominating committee of God’s Own Party as the presidential candidate with our backing and support, but first we’d like to discuss your platform, your stance on a number of important issues.”

“Wonderful,” Jesus said.

“Let’s start with domestic policy.” The men around the table nodded for Jesus to describe his plans.

“Excellent. One of my first steps would be to announce the cancellation of debts…”

The nodding ceased; a low grumbling ensued. “Excuse me for interrupting, Jesus, what are you talking about?”

“Well, you know. The obvious - student loans, mortgages…”

“Jesus, Jesus!” the silver tongued Senator exclaimed. “You can’t be serious! Why, several of the men in this room own banks that hold those loans, Jesus. Why would you want to do something like that?”

“At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts.” Jesus explained. “This is how it is to be done: Every creditor shall cancel any loan they have made to their fellow countryman. There need be no poor people among you…”

“I’m sorry to interrupt again, Jesus,” said the Senator, who did not look at all sorry to be interrupting, “but where are you getting this policy?”

“The scriptures; that’s in the Law of Moses. Deuteronomy 15.”

“I see. I see. Obviously that’s where the confusion is, Jesus. Deuteronomy? That’s in the Old Testament, right? We thought you’d be guided by the more relevant portions of the New Testament. The gospels perhaps…”

“Sure. Sure,” said Jesus. “How about “…forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors…?”

The murmuring around the table became a low grumbling. “Alright. Alright. Let’s change topics for a while; we can revisit this issue later. Let’s discuss military spending.”

“Excellent,” Jesus said.

“And Jesus,” said the rancher from Wyoming at the back of the room, “don’t be bringing up that whole ‘turn the other cheek’ thing. We ain’t pacifist peaceniks here. This is serious business.”

“Right,” said Jesus. “Serious business.”

“Okay then, Jesus.  We think we can get you another 10 to 12 percent, but we need to hear your plans. How much do you plan to increase military spending?”

“Actually, I’d like to reduce our spending to one-sixth of its current level.”

The grumbling exploded into vexed vocalizations. “For the love of God, Jesus!”

“Exactly" Jesus said. "I’d prefer to reduce it further, but this seemed like a decent compromise for the first term. We can discuss further cuts in my second term.”

“And just where did you pull this one-sixth figure?” the exasperated Senator inquired.

“It’s an arbitrary number, yes. But it is grounded in the same kind of policy I gave to my disciples.”

“What the hell are you talking about, Jesus?”

“After the last supper, the disciples said to me, “Lord, here are two swords,” and I said to them, “That is enough…”

The silver haired Senator threw up his hands in frustration. “I told you this would be a bad idea,” he said to the men around the table in a low, curt voice. Then he turned to Jesus and said, “I’m sorry to have wasted your time, Jesus. Security will be here shortly to escort you from the premises.”

Hail Thou Lady of Air and Night, The Lord is With Thee

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to Nazareth in Galilee, to a young woman betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the House of David; and the young woman’s name was Lilith. The angel went in and said to her, “Hail, thou Lady of Air and Night. Rejoice, the Lord is with thee.” And she was deeply pleased by these words.

The angel said to her, “You have won God’s favor. Look, you are to conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great and will be the Son of the Most High.”

But Lilith said to the angel, “How can this be? I fear and hate children and will kill him them as they sleep. And I will be no one’s servant. Let it happen to someone else.”  Then the angel left her to find someone else.

***

In later Jewish legends, Adam had another wife prior to Eve, Lilith – created from the same dust as he. But she refused to submit to him and fled into the desert to become the Night Hag, a killer of children.

White Dives and Poor Old Lazarus

There was a rich white man named Dives who used to dress in fine linen suits and who feasted every day on tasty victuals and wines. At his gate there used to be a poor black man named Lazarus, covered with sores (he did not have health insurance, of course). He longed to fill his belly with even the scraps that fell from the rich man’s table. And dogs came to lick at Lazarus’ sores. (Did we mention that he had no health insurance?)

Now it happened that the two men died on the same day. Lazarus was carried away by the angels into the Bosom of Abraham, the rich white man was buried in the family plot and descended into the underworld.

Tormented in Hades, he looked up and saw Father Abraham a long way off with old Lazarus in his embrace. He cried out, “Father Abraham, have pity on me. Send Lazarus to dip the tip of his littlest pinky finger in water to cool my parched tongue. I am in agony here in these flames.”

And Father Abraham said, “My son, remember that during your life you had your fill of good things – you lived a life of privilege, white privilege But Lazarus lived a difficult life; now he is being comforted while you are in agony.”

So Dives said, “Father Abraham, send someone, I beg you. Send someone to speak to my five brothers. Send someone to warn them about this white privilege so they won’t end up here in torment.”

But Father Abraham said again, “They have James H. Cone, Howard Thurman, and Cornel West; let your brothers listen to them.” The rich white man said, “No, Father Abraham. But perhaps if someone came back from the dead they’d listen…”

Father Abraham said, “If they will not listen to Cone, Thurman, and West, they will not be convinced even if Martin Luther King Jr. came back from the dead.”

The First Shall Be Last

Mr. President, please re-read (or read for the first time, perhaps) Luke 13: 22 - 30. You need it.

A Resurrection of Justice - A Sermon (Luke 24: 13 - 35)

The world around us has already moved on. They celebrated Easter with chocolates, and bunnies and then moved on to other things – but in the church we are still in Easter. The world outside is already gearing up for graduations and summer vacations – but in the church we are still in Easter. Our scriptural reading for today (Luke 24: 13 – 35), like last week’s reading (John 20: 19 – 31) takes place “that very same day” (Luke 24: 13 New Jerusalem Bible) Easter Sunday. We take our time here; we linger in this, the “Lord’s Day.” The world may have already moved on to the next shopping holiday – but in the church we are abiding for a while in this resurrection day.

“Now that very same day, two of them were on their way to a village called Emmaus, seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking together about all that had happened. And it happened that as they were talking together and discussing it, Jesus himself came up and walked by their side.” (Luke 24: 13 – 15)

These two disciples – Cleopas and another unnamed disciple (in later tradition, named Simon) (Maclean 422) – may not have recognized Jesus as their risen Lord and master, their eyes may have been supernaturally blinded against seeing him for who he was, but the risen Jesus did not want them to remain in the darkness of ignorance. As they walked those seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus he walked them through the scriptures, “starting with Moses and going through all the prophets, he explained to them the passages throughout the scriptures that were about himself.” (Luke 24: 27)

We cannot know what passages Jesus explained to them on that dusty road, but let’s take our own little trip through the scriptures, through Moses and the prophets, and try to understand the resurrection a little better.

The first thing that we should understand – and this may help us to understand why the Cleopas and ‘Simon’ were so disappointed that day – in the Hebrew Bible / Old testament, especially the earliest parts of it, there is little that speaks about a resurrection.

The idea of a resurrection of the dead “does not appear except in texts that are rare, obscure with regard to their precise meaning, and late” (Martin-Achard 680). In the Old Testament there is no concept of resurrection, life after death, or rewards or punishments in the afterlife. In the Old Testament, the dead, all of them –the good, the bad, and the ugly- go to the grave, the pit, to sheol. And that’s it. Sheol, the place of the dead, was a place of no return. No one came back from there. No one gets out alive.

“A cloud dissolves and is gone,
so no one who goes down to Sheol ever comes up again,
ever comes home again,
and his house knows that person no more.” (Job 7: 9 – 10)

The road to Sheol was a “road of no return. (Job 16: 22). For the Jewish people, the grave was an inescapable prison.

But this thought caused a sort of crisis of faith for them. IF God is good, and IF the world belongs to him and is under his sovereign control – then why, they asked, do the righteous sometimes die horrible, painful deaths at the hands of powerful and wicked men? IF God is good, and IF the world belongs to him, then there must be justice for the righteous – if not in this life, then … perhaps in the next.

And so, slowly, over time, an idea developed among them that in the later days, in the time of the end, everything would be made right; the righteous dead would be rewarded and wicked, powerful men would receive the punishment due to them. And there would be, they began to understand, a resurrection of the dead.

In the book of Daniel (written during a time of intense persecution and struggle, during the Maccabean wars against the tyrannical Antiochus Epiphanes) we find this newly developing hope expressed: “Of those who are sleeping in the Land of Dust, many will awaken, some to everlasting life, some to shame and everlasting disgrace. Those who are wise will shine as brightly as the expanse of the heavens, and those who have instructed many in uprightness, as bright as stars for all eternity.” (Daniel 12: 2 – 3)

The origins of Jewish belief in a resurrection after death are unclear (Nickelsburg 685). But by the time of Jesus, many (but not all) Jews accepted the idea of a life after death; the Sadducees did not accept this new and still developing theological point, and they argued with Jesus (and presumably with others who believed in the coming resurrection).

But the idea of resurrection was, at its foundation, about justice.

So, while Cleopas and ‘Simon’ may have believed in, and hoped for the resurrection of the dead, they still grieved the great injustice that had been done to their Teacher, their master, Jesus – the one that they had hoped would be the one to set Israel free (Luke 24: 21) And, while Cleopas and ‘Simon’ may have believed in, and hoped for the resurrection of the dead, they did not expect Jesus to be raised from the dead.

They thought of the resurrection of the dead as a great and general event all at once, at the time of the end. They did not expect a dying Messiah, and they did not expect his singular resurrection. As the New Testament scholar, N.T. Wright has said, “Nobody expected the Messiah to be raised from the dead, for the simple reason that nobody in Judaism at the time expected a Messiah who would die, especially one who would die shamefully and violently” (Wright 19). And no one expected the Messiah (or anyone else for that matter) to be raised up in resurrection before the general resurrection at the end.

But as they walked those seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus, with their eyes still blinded and their understanding still darkened, Jesus walked them through the scriptures again, explaining how Moses and all the prophets pointed to him and to the justice that his resurrection promised.

And this is what the resurrection is really about; this is what we must understand. The resurrection is about Justice. “The resurrection stories in the Gospels do not say Jesus is raised, therefore we’re all going to heaven, or therefore we’re going to be raised.” The resurrection stories in the Gospels are not there to give us a rosy hope for justice someday. The resurrection stories are there to say that the Kingdom of God – which is the kingdom of life, the kingdom of the living, the kingdom of the resurrected – has broken into this world of death and is bringing life and justice with it. The stories of Jesus’ resurrection in the Gospels say that “Jesus is raised, therefore God’s new creation has begun and we’ve got a job to do” (Wright 21).

The hope and promise of our resurrection is not (not merely) the hope of life after death someday – but life after life, and of renewed life and full life in this world now.

We cannot begin to answer the question of how did the resurrection happen – the resurrection of Jesus is a supernatural event, outside the realm of observation and quantification. But we can answer the question of why. Why is there a resurrection? Why is Jesus resurrected? Why does he promise this resurrection to us, his followers? For Justice. For Righteousness. For the renewal of all creation. Jesus is resurrected and we’ve got a job to do.

I’m always disappointed when I hear people say - and when I hear Christians especially say with a sigh and resignation, “well… that’s just the way things are.” Or “that’s just the way the world is.” No. I do not accept that. If we do not believe in change, the possibility and the necessity of making change for the good in this world, then why do we bother to speak of the resurrection of Jesus? Look again at the scriptures that Jesus opened for Cleopas and ‘Simon’ – the Law and the Prophets – passages of Holy Scripture concerning justice for the poor and the oppressed. The resurrection of Jesus may not be about our politics – but it doesn’t change our political belief, why bother to believe in the resurrection at all? “A deeply orthodox theology about the resurrection… is the proper seedbed of radical politics” (Wright 23).

Further, I may not agree with the conclusions of John Dominic Crossan, a New Testament Scholar who believes that the resurrection of Jesus was not a ‘real’ event[i], but I fully embrace his conclusion that while we might disagree over whether or not Jesus’s resurrection was a real event, a literal, physical, bodily et cetera… resurrection, what really matters is what we do as the result of our belief in Jesus’ resurrection; “I want really to know how we are going to take back God’s world from the thugs” (Crossan 29).

This is what the resurrection means. This is why we linger here in Resurrection Sunday two weeks after Easter. In his letter to the church at Corinth, the apostle Paul wrote at length about the nature Jesus’ resurrection and concluded by saying, “Thank God, then, for giving us the victory [over sin and death] through Jesus Christ our Lord. So, my dear brothers, keep firm and immovable, always abounding in energy for the Lord's work, being sure that in the Lord none of your labors is wasted.” (1 Corinthians 15: 57 – 58). 

The resurrection of Jesus (and the promise of our resurrection) does not mean we sit back and hope for that ‘pie in the sky, by and by’ – but that we are to be at work in this world, in the here and now, creating the justice and righteousness that is the character of the Kingdom of God. Jesus’ victory over sin and death does not mean we kick back and relax until we are raptured away, but that we get to work, that we make things better for our neighbors, for the immigrant, for the sick, and the poor. He arose a victor from the dark domain, and he lives forever with his saints to reign” (Lowry). And this is what is to believe in his victory over the dark domain of death, to believe in the resurrection – to reign with him in this world by working for justice.We have a hope and a mission in this world because Jesus’ resurrection (and the promise of our own) is about Justice.

***

Lowry, Robert. “Up from the Grave He Arose (Low in the Grave He Lay)” 

MacLean, Gilmour S. “The Gospel According to Luke: Exegesis” The Interpreter’s Bible Volume 8. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press. 1952. Print.

Martin-Achard, Robert. “Resurrection (OT)” The Anchor Bible Dictionary Volume 5. New York. NY: Doubleday. 1992. Print.

Nickelsburg, George W. E. “Resurrection (Early Judaism and Christianity)” The Anchor Bible Dictionary Volume 5. New York, NY: Doubleday. 1992. Print.

Wright, N.T. and John Dominic Crossan, “The Resurrection: Historical Event or Theological Explanation? – A Dialogue.” The Resurrection of Jesus: John Dominic Crossan and N. T. Wright in Dialogue. Ed. Robert. B. Stewart. Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Fortress Press. 2006. Print.

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[i]  …though we do have to be careful about that word “real.” “The word real is one of the slipperiest ones in modern English…” (Wright 32)

Biblical Limericks: Ignoramus

The stranger en route to Emmaus
must be a complete ignoramus -
he hasn’t heard a word
of all that has occurred
to the one we had hoped would save us.

Luke 24: 13 - 21

A Time Machine in the Church Basement

Let us suppose that I have constructed a time machine in the church basement. Why not? The church basement is as good as any other place. A time machine right down between the shelf of old hymnals, blue AA books, and battered copies of the KJV with Jesus’ words in red and the dissonant old piano with cracked and yellowing ivory keys would not seem so strange.

And let us suppose that we could use this time machine, this fully functional and not at all dangerous time machine in the church basement to visit (or re-visit) the stories recorded in scripture – supposing, of course, that we could locate them along the flow of the historical time line.  Why not? The stories of the bible are endlessly fascinating. Using a time machine to visit Moses, or Jehu, or Deborah, or Manasseh of Judah, or Peter seems perfectly reasonable even if I don’t have a robot named Gizmo or a Flying House.

So. With the Bible as our travel guide, where would we go?

Suppose we wished to visit the man after God’s own heart, King David, the son of Jesse himself. Why not? Perhaps he would teach us one of his psalms. After fastening our safety harasses and putting on the protective eyewear, the switches are thrown and the levers pulled. With a zzzap of static electricity and a whiff of ozone the church basement disappears and we find ourselves in Jerusalem on the roof of David’s palace on a cool evening in the spring.

It happens towards evening as the king gets up from his nap, and strolls along the palace roof. He sees from the roof a woman, a beautiful woman, bathing. “Who is she?” the king inquires and the report comes to him that she is “Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam and wife of Uriah the Hittite who serves in the army of the king.”

Now we’ve read the book and we know that this story does not end well for any of those involved, so let us suppose that we step into the story, suppose that we constrain the king (may he live forever) from making such a rash and unwise decision, that we persuade him to resist the temptation to take Bathsheba for his own. And suppose that the king (who usually had all those who opposed him killed) thanks us for our timely intervention. The king does not sin. Uriah does not die and the shadow of the sword does not hang ominously forever over the house of David.

With another zzzap of static electricity and whiff of ozone we attempt to return to the church basement, but… It is gone. The church basement is gone. The church is gone. In fact the Church with a Capital C is gone.

We consult our travel guide, one of those battered KJV bibles with Jesus’ words in red – the book falls open to Luke chapter 3, to the genealogy of Jesus traced through Mary… he was the son (as it was thought) of Joseph, son of Heli, son of Matthat, … yadda, yadda, yadda… son of Nathan, son of David.

This strikes us as important, though we’ve never paid too much attention to the genealogical lists. We check again, this time the lists of the sons of David. “…He reigned for thirty-three years in Jerusalem. These are the sons born to him in Jerusalem, Shimea, Shobab, Nathan, Solomon – the four of them children of Bathsheba.”

In our supposing, David never seduced and stole the wife of Uriah, never had Uriah killed, never fathered any sons with Bathsheba, and the unborn or not-born Nathan never had sons and grandsons and greatgreatgreatgreatgereatgreatgreatgreatgreatgreatgreatgreat grandsons who would have become the ancestors of Mary who would give birth to Jesus if only we hadn’t interfered.

But the church basement is still there, and the old hymnals and blue AA books and battered KJV bibles with Jesus’ words in red are there, and the tuneless old piano as well. This supposition of ours falters because Luke’s genealogy of Jesus isn’t traced through Mary, and because time doesn’t work like that, and neither does God.

Even so. Perhaps a time machine in the church basement isn’t such a good idea.

Biblical Limericks: Capitalist Fool

Jesus said to call no one a fool
and we follow this general rule -
applied to everyone
with one small exception
for the wealthy capitalist tool.

Matthew 5: 22 / Luke 12: 16 - 21

El Caganer - My Favorite Character in the Nativity Set

It's still Christmas - and don't you forget it.  Christmas until Epiphany (at least.  Some hold out till the Feast of the Presentation...) And since it's still Christmas I'm going to tell you about my favorite character in the nativity scene. (I’ve written about him before. This post is an update of that previous writing.)

So what if he's not mentioned in the nativity stories (either Matthew or Luke).  Most of the characters we put into our nativity scenes weren't in the nativity stories. (If you want your nativity set to be biblically accurate, follow these instructions: )

My favorite nativity character is El Caganer. El Caganer comes to us from Catalan and its neighboring areas, and he's been around since the 17th or 18th century.  His name literally means: "the shitter.”

And already I've offended someone, I'm sure. Yes: He's irreverent. And that is a good thing.

El Caganer reminds us of a couple of things. First – that our God is one that pulls the proud and mighty down from their thrones (Luke 1: 52 – 53). Kings are used to being treated with reverence. Kings don't have shit all over them them  El Caganer is often portrayed in contemporary works as celebrities and political figures. In this way El Caganer is a leveler, humbling the proud and the lofty.

El Caganer also reminds us that we have a different kind of king, one who's come to lift us up from the dunghill, one who gets down off his high horse and gets dirt on his hands.

The Angel and the Dinosaur (Luke 2 Re-imagined)

Biblical Limericks: This Is Why the Christmas Story Needs an Oxford Comma

The shepherds said, “Now let us go see
what the angels said to you and me.
We will look for that sign
in a stable for kine:
a manger with room enough to sleep three.”

Luke 2: 16