Ten Words

Know this, my dear brothers and sisters: everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to grow angry. This is because an angry person doesn’t produce God’s righteousness. Therefore, with humility, set aside all moral filth and the growth of wickedness, and welcome the word planted deep inside you—the very word that is able to save you.

You must be doers of the word and not only hearers who mislead themselves.Those who hear but don’t do the word are like those who look at their faces in a mirror. They look at themselves, walk away, and immediately forget what they were like. But there are those who study the perfect law, the law of freedom, and continue to do it. They don’t listen and then forget, but they put it into practice in their lives. They will be blessed in whatever they do.
If those who claim devotion to God don’t control what they say, they mislead themselves. Their devotion is worthless. True devotion, the kind that is pure and faultless before God the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their difficulties and to keep the world from contaminating us. James 1:19-27 (CEB). 

Words.

That’s what we’re going to talk about tonight.  Words.

Words are pretty powerful, aren’t they?  

They have the power to build people up. 

They have the power to tear people down. 

Words can create.  Words can destroy. 

Words have power. Words have the power to transform.  

God’s Word has the power to transform.  

We know of the power of God’s Word in creation.  With simple words, God transformed chaos into an ordered world.  With simple words, God created humankind in God’s very own image.

In the Hebrew scriptures, God’s spoken word calls Israel to live as his holy people.  God’s Word promises blessing and judgment.  Through God’s Word, God reaches out to his people and expresses his emotion toward them.  God teaches Israel, through the Word, about who God is and how to live in relationship--both with God and with each other.

This is the basic premise of the Ten Commandments--which in the time of Israel was known as God’s Ten Words.  It is in these Ten Words that God teaches Israel and us about what it means to live in a full and loving relationship with God and in relationship with one another.  The Ten Words aren’t about shaming us or tearing us down.  Instead, they lift us up, they encourage us to live into our relationship with God and with each other in the way God intends for us.  

But, mostly, the Ten Commandments--God’s Ten Words-- teach us about love.  
Remember the words of Jesus in Matthew as he summed them up: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

I am a regular listener of a weekly program on NPR called “On Being.” Krista Tippett is the host of this program and she regularly brings on guests who talk about many of the central questions of human life.  What does it mean to be human?  How do we want to live?

About a year ago, she had a guest on her program--Dr. James Doty.  Dr. Doty is a brain surgeon who teaches neurosurgery at Stanford University.  He’s also a researcher and is the founding director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education.  

During the interview, Dr. Doty spoke at length about his research, which studies the physical connection between the brain and the heart, how each organ affects the other, and how powerful this connection is.  It’s amazing work.  

One thing they’ve discovered, for example, is what happens to the brain when one practices compassion, when one speaks and responds to others in a way that builds people up rather than tears them down.   

Each of our brains contains the amygdala, which is the very primitive, basic part of our brain that houses our tribal “fight or flight” instinct.  When we are threatened, this part of our brain sends a message--either to stay and fight or to flee.  

In their research, Dr. Doty and his colleagues have discovered that, when someone practices compassion with others, there is a physiological change in the brain.  The amygdala--this primitive part of our brain--begins to shrink.  And, as a result, we begin to see ourselves and the world with greater clarity.  And we begin to approach others and the world with a more open heart.  The more one practices compassion, the more the physical body changes and inclines one toward practicing even more compassion.  

What is even more amazing, though, is the work he has done with gang members--work of compassion and love that not only seems to transform these gang members, but, in the process, has transformed Dr. Doty as well.  

That is the gift of living into the Ten Commandments, God’s Ten Word. The more we love God and one another, the more we are all transformed. 

In the animated movie Despicable Me, Gru is a world class villain. But, his reputation has come under attack. And so, to maintain his reputation, Gru devises this elaborate scheme to steal the moon. In the process, he kidnaps and uses three young, orphan girls as pawns in his outrageous plan to steal the moon and assure his reputation as the biggest, baddest villain in the entire world.
  
As he carries out his plan, however, Gru unknowingly becomes affected by these three little girls and by the love they show him. In the process he is transformed.  In the process, they are all transformed.  

Let’s watch.

It is this work, the work of coming alongside other people, people who, just like us, are created in the image of God...it is this work that, through Christ’s saving act on the cross, God has freed us to do.  

You see, being a believer isn't just about hearing God’s words. It is about doing God's word, about doing God’s Ten Words.

Have you ever noticed in scripture that with God’s Word there is always action connected to it?  God speaks and the world is created.  God pledges to deliver his people and rescues Israel from Egypt.  God promises through the prophets that he will send a Messiah and Mary gives birth to Jesus.  God’s Word is always connected to action.

It is to be the same with us.  With God’s Word and with the simple elements of the earth--the water, the bread and the wine--through these simple elements God acts to work faith in our hearts, through the power of the Holy Spirit.  And, through this gift of faith, God acts to transform us.  To free us.  To free us, then, to act. To become the righteous people that God already sees us to be. To free us to be transformed into vessels--the vessels of clay that Paul writes about in 2nd Corinthians. Vessels of God’s love. 

Now our clay may be weak and our vessel may be a little broken, yet God, through Christ, uses that brokenness and our weakness and turns us into doers of God’s Ten Words. Doers of love. Doers of God’s transforming love.  

“You must be doers of the word and not hearers only...”

May we all begin to see the Ten Commandments as that guide to our relationships--to our relationship with God and with all others. And to be more than simply hearers of those Ten Words, but doers also. God grant it. Amen. 

Preached March 8, 2017, at Grace and Glory Lutheran Church
First in a series of five sermons on Luther's Small Catechism, Midweek Lenten Service 1
Readings: Exodus 34:27-28, James 1:19-27

Step Back and See the Possibilities

The Son is the image of the invisible God,
        the one who is first over all creation,
Because all things were created by him:
        both in the heavens and on the earth,
        the things that are visible and the things that are invisible.
            Whether they are thrones or powers,
            or rulers or authorities,
        all things were created through him and for him.
He existed before all things,
        and all things are held together in him.
He is the head of the body, the church,
who is the beginning,
        the one who is firstborn from among the dead
        so that he might occupy the first place in everything.
Because all the fullness of God was pleased to live in him,
        whether things on earth or in the heavens.
            He brought peace through the blood of his cross.

Once you were alienated from God and you were enemies with him in your minds, which was shown by your evil actions. But now he has reconciled you by his physical body through death, to present you before God as a people who are holy, faultless, and without blame. But you need to remain well established and rooted in faith and not shift away from the hope given in the good news that you heard. This message has been preached throughout all creation under heaven. And I, Paul, became a servant of this good news.
Now I’m happy to be suffering for you. I’m completing what is missing from Christ’s sufferings with my own body. I’m doing this for the sake of his body, which is the church. I became a servant of the church by God’s commission, which was given to me for you, in order to complete God’s word. I’m completing it with a secret plan that has been hidden for ages and generations but which has now been revealed to his holy people. God wanted to make the glorious riches of this secret plan known among the Gentiles, which is Christ living in you, the hope of glory. This is what we preach as we warn and teach every person with all wisdom so that we might present each one mature in Christ. I work hard and struggle for this goal with his energy, which works in me powerfully.  Colossians 1:15-29 (CEB)

Grace and peace to you God our Father. Amen.

This past week I was on vacation in Colorado. In fact, I was at a family reunion. My father had thirteen brothers and sisters. Every three years, our family, which is now into its fourth and fifth generations and numbers over 300, gathers together at some place in the U.S. to remember who we are and where we are from. It’s an amazing and moving time as we sit together and listen to the stories of our lives, of the lives of our parents and children, and of the lives of our grandparents and grandchildren.  This year we met for our reunion in the mountains of Colorado for five days. 

While we were there, I had the opportunity to see my niece, who I haven’t seen in a few years. She’s been busy with finishing college and starting work. I’ve been busy with school and internship and moving across country a few times. So, here in Colorado, we had a chance to catch up.

She’s quite a young woman. A mechanical engineer who graduated with honors from Cal-Poly. She has a great job with a start-up biomedical company in Southern California. She loves to hike and camp. And, she loves to tinker with machines. She has three motorcycles that she loves to mess with along with numerous other mechanical and electronic devices.

So, it seemed natural that, when she showed up at the reunion, she brought her new drone along with her. Now, I’ve only read about drones and watched them online. I’d never seen one in person or watched on in action. So, it was fascinating for me to see her operate this and to watch what it could do. 

Here’s an example of what it was able to do. Here, in this video, she was able to take a video of the members of our family who came to the reunion (by the way, this is only about half of my family!) and then to raise it up further into the sky and pan over the entire area where we were able to stay. We were able to see the setting first from a very small perspective and then to see it from a much larger, fuller perspective of the entire place. 

It is this video, taken by my niece from her new drone, that was helpful for me this week in thinking about our texts. 

Let’s first look at our Gospel lesson. I really don’t care for this story. Because it just seems to pit Martha against Mary and vice versa. It also seems to say to me that we have to choose one way of life over another--that a contemplative life is better than an active life of service. That Mary’s attention to Jesus’ teaching is better and more important than Martha’s work to be hospitable. 

But if, like the drone, I pull back and look at the bigger picture, I’m wondering if something different isn’t going on here, something I’ve never stepped back far enough to see from a fuller perspective. What Martha was doing was what was expected of her. She knew that guests were coming and so she got busy to make sure everyone had everything they needed. This is what was--and often still is--expected of women. It was work that was not just expected, but also valued. 

What wasn’t expected, though, is that Mary would take the position of a disciple, seated at the feet of Jesus, listening to him teach. If hospitality was considered women’s work, well, discipleship was considered men’s work. So, perhaps, the intent of this story is to push us out, to see a broader perspective, to see the possibility of something different, to see someone actually acting differently from what would have been expected or even allowed a woman to consider. Perhaps as Jesus repeats Martha’s name, he isn’t expressing frustration with her, but deep affection: “Martha, Martha, it is exactly because I love you that I don’t want you to be distracted or trapped by your work or your expected role, but instead to step back and see all that is possible for you, just as Mary has.” 

To step back and to see the possibilities. 

Perhaps we can take a lesson not only from Mary, but also from my niece’s drone.

To step back and to see the possibilities.

What if, for example, we were to step back and see the possibilities in the recent protests over the shootings in St. Anthony and Baton Rouge?  To not view them only from a close perspective, where they might seem out of control or disruptive or wrong. But to back up and take a broader view. To gain a bigger perspective. To see the possibility of these protests as transformative. That they might be the first step in an upsetting of societal structures that protect and elevate those of us with white skin over those of us who are people of color.  

Or what about the ways in which we deal with young Muslim men and women who go to Syria to fight with ISIS. What if we were to step back and look at the bigger picture? 

This is what crime prevention officers did in a small town in Denmark. On receiving reports of two young Muslim teenagers missing from an immigrant neighborhood outside their town, they, too, stepped back to gain a bigger perspective. After an investigation, they found out that these young men had gone to Syria. They had been drawn to the call put out by ISIS for Muslims worldwide to help build a new Islamic state. 

The police officers didn’t stop with this information, though. They stepped back and began to ask why this might be happening and what they might do to prevent radicalization.

Now most of the rest of the European countries came down hard on citizens who traveled to Syria. France shut down mosques it suspected of harboring radicals. The UK declared citizens who had gone to help ISIS enemies of the state. Several other countries threatened to take away their passports--a move previously reserved for convicted traitors.

But Danish police took a different approach. They made it clear that any citizens of Denmark who had traveled to Syria were welcome to come home and that, if they did, they would receive help with going back to school, finding an apartment, meeting with a psychiatrist or mentor, or whatever they needed to fully integrate back into society. In the process, they ended up creating an unusual--and unusually successful--approach to combating radicalization.

This program came to called the “hug a terrorist” program in the media, but this description doesn’t sit well with the cops. They see themselves as making an entirely practical decision designed to keep their city safe. From their perspective, coming down hard on young, radicalized Muslims will only make them angrier and more of a danger to society. 

To step back and see the possibilities. 

You see, that’s also the point of our Colossians text today. From a close-in perspective, it would seem impossible for an infinite, eternal God who exists outside of time to indwell in one human being who is mortal, finite and who dwells inside of time. 

Unless, of course, it isn’t. 

Unless, of course, we step back and see the possibilities.  See a new way that God was and is at work. As we read in verses 19-20...For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven.

To step back and see the possibilities. To step back and see that, through the event of Christ, God has reconciled himself to all things--on earth and on heaven. That God is at work making a new reality. A new social system. A new creative order marked by peace and reconciliation. Salvation is not about the transformation of our existing reality--the defeat of enemy powers. Salvation is about a radical reconciliation of the entirety of the created order. Salvation here is not about God making an offer and waiting to see who takes it. Here, it is about God just doing it. About God turning all creation on its head and reconciling himself to it through Him in whom all of the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.

To step back and see the possibilities. And to imagine God in a way that we have never imagined God before.

May that be our lesson today.


Amen.

Preached Sunday, July 17, 2016, at Chatfield Lutheran Church.
Ninth Sunday after Pentecost (Year C)
Texts: Psalm 15, Colossians 1:15-29, Luke 10:38-42

Setting Our Face

1 For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. 2 Listen! I, Paul, am telling you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you. 3 Once again I testify to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obliged to obey the entire law. 4 You who want to be justified by the law have cut yourselves off from Christ; you have fallen away from grace.5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness.6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that counts is faith working through love.

13 For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another. 14 For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 15 If, however, you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another.

16 Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For what the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to the flesh; for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, 21 envy,drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit. (Galatians 5:1-6, 13-25 NRSV)

Grace and peace to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. He gave himself for our sins, so he could deliver us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father. To God be the glory forever and always! Amen.

“When the days drew near for him to be taken up," we read in our Gospel today, “[Jesus] set his face to go to Jerusalem.” 

Jesus set his face to Jerusalem. There is a single-mindedness of purpose here in the ninth chapter of Luke’s Gospel, a chapter that begins what is often called the “traveling texts.” Ten full chapters. Nearly half of Luke’s Gospel.  Why so much space to get to Jerusalem?

If one reads through these chapters as we will in the coming weeks, it is immediately apparent that these are teachings texts.  Texts for intensive disciple-training. Jesus knows his time with the disciples is limited. He knows that soon they will arrive in Jerusalem and he will be arrested, crucified and die at the hands of the people. And so, he has turned not only his body, but his entire being towards Jerusalem, focused both on what is to come and on what he must do in preparing the disciples for once they arrive. There is a single-mindedness of purpose shown here by Jesus. Forward-looking to Jerusalem and even beyond Jerusalem, to the very ends of the earth. 

Jesus set his face forward.

Have you set your face forward, too, with the same single-mindedness of purpose as Christ?

Over these past five weeks, we’ve been immersed in our Galatians readings, texts that tell us how we have been freed from the law. That we have been freed from the law for freedom. In verse 1 of chapter 5: “For freedom Christ has set us free.” The law no longer matters. The law no longer counts. 

And what does count? Well, we read in verse 6: “...the only thing that counts is faith working through love.”

This is, in a way, the irony of Paul’s letter to the Galatians. It is the irony of their freedom--the irony of ours, as well.  We have been freed from the law to do the work of faith which is, in fact, the work of the law. No, it’s not works such as circumcision, food laws, or the like. But, it is the work of living out the ethical core and central command of the law: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” In freeing us, Christ has released us from our own bondage to sin, not so that we might be self-indulgent, but that through love we might become slaves to our neighbors, slaves to one another. 

The Tree is Life is an epic film by producer Terence Malik that centers around a Texas family in the 1950s. It follows the life journey of the oldest son, Jack, through the innocence of childhood to his disillusioned adult years as he tries to reconcile an internal emotional conflict caused by the two completely different ways of living taught by his parents--the way of nature or the way of grace. Let’s watch the opening scene. 

This struggle of the oldest son is our struggle. It is a struggle laid out in this beginning scene--between the way of nature, or as Paul names it, the way of the flesh, versus the way of grace, or the way of the Spirit.

The way of nature, or the way of the flesh, is the way of self-indulgence. It is a way of living produced by selfish motives, where “I” comes before “we.” It is exemplified by behaviors that Paul lists in verses 19-21 of our text: things like, doing whatever feels good, hate, fighting, losing your temper, group rivalry, jealousy, and the like.

Living in the way of the flesh cheapens the gift of grace given to us by God in Christ.

The other way, the way of grace, or of the Spirit, stands in complete opposition to the way of the flesh. It is a way of living that is exemplified by selflessness, where “we” comes before “I.” It is a way of love that is characterized by service to others, where one’s selfishness has been crucified and replaced with the fruits of the Spirit in verses 22:23: love, joy, peace, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control--the fruits of living in the way of the Spirit. 

The way of the Spirit is the way of discipleship.

Have you set your face forward? Or, better yet, how have you set your face forward? 

Is your face set forward with the single-mindedness of purpose that comes out of living in the Spirit? Or is it set forward with a focus on living out the selfish desires of your flesh? 

In verse 16 of the NRSV translation of our text, we read that we should live by the Spirit and not gratify the desires of the flesh. It’s a both/and proposition. Do one and don’t do the other.

A better translation of this verse, though, is this: “I say be guided by the Spirit and you won’t carry out your selfish desires.” Here’s it’s a cause-and-effect proposition. If we are guided by the Spirit, if we live in the way of the Spirit, then we won’t carry out our selfish desires. We will become less and less guided by the flesh and more and more guided by the Spirit.  

Is this easy? To follow in the way of Jesus? No, it isn’t. It isn’t easy to love when the world says hate. It isn’t easy to show self-control when the world says do whatever feels good. To speak peace when the world screams fight. To be faithful when the world throws idol after idol our way.

But, this way--the way of grace, the way of the Spirit--is the way of the kingdom of God. It is the way of Christ and the way to which Christ calls us: to deny ourselves, to take up his cross daily, and to follow him. 

It is the way of freedom. A way where we are, as Luther wrote, a servant to none and a servant to all. It is the way to life.

So, set your face forward. Set your face in freedom toward Jerusalem and to the ends of the earth, walking in the way of the Spirit--the way of life, the way of the kingdom of God.

Amen.

Preached at Chatfield Lutheran Church - 6th Sunday after Pentecost (June 26, 2016)

Texts: Galatians 5:1-6, 13-25; Luke 9:51-62.

Choose Love

When Judas was gone, Jesus said, "Now the Human One has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify the Human One in himself and will glorify him immediately. Little children, I'm with you for a little while longer. You will look for me--but, just as I told the Jewish leaders, I also tell you now--'Where I'm going, you can't come.'

I give you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, so you also must love each other. This is how everyone will know that you are my disciples, when you love each other. (John 13:31-35 CEB)

Love. That's our main topic today. Love.

Isn't love what the resurrection is all about? It seems so simple, doesn't it? Resurrection is love. Love is resurrection. No matter how you slice it, when you are talking Christ's resurrection, you are talking love.

And, today, in our lessons for this fifth Sunday of Easter, we are not only talking love. We are being told to "choose love."

If I were to go around this room today and ask you whether or not you choose love, I would dare say that everyone of you would answer, "Yes."  "Absolutely, positively, yes!" This is a warm, loving congregation. It is who we are. Besides, after all, who wouldn't choose love?

But, do we? Choosing love can be really hard. Choosing love can make us vulnerable. It can feel like we're taking too much of a chance sometimes, can't it? It can expose us to the possibility that our love might not be reciprocated. It might be a waste of our time, especially if we give it expecting something in return and don't get anything back. Choosing love can hurt, especially if the person we want to love doesn't see us as worthy of their love.

Yet, if we are truly the resurrection people we claim to be...if we, as the church, truly seek to be a partner with the Spirit at work in our world making all things new, then the only right choice for us is love. Our only choice is to be on the side of God and to be part of God's new creation and to choose love.

And, if we truly choose love, then our only other choice is to turn toward God and away from the influence of the world. To be in the world, but not of the world. To work toward a new way of living, a "new heaven and a new earth." Toward a place where God will come down and dwell with us.  A place transformed by God into something fully beyond our wildest imagination. To work toward the new Jerusalem instead of the global empire in which we currently life.

This new Jerusalem spoken of in our Revelation text today isn't some eternal place up in the heavens paved with golden streets. Unlike most of what we've heard in contemporary culture, this isn't a rapture; this new Jerusalem isn't a place for us to escape to from our current world--a place away from this messed up world to which God will rescue us.

No.  This new Jerusalem that God is creating is right here, right now. It's happening in our presence. In this very moment. Here and now the Spirit is at work in our world, creating a new world where every human being and all of creation might experience the joy and goodness and fullness of God's love.

And our job, as the church, is to walk alongside the Spirit--to partner with God in ways that allow God's power and Christ's love to be experienced in the world. Our job is to be involved in making God's dream come true in this world. Our job is to choose love.

But, once again, it's not easy to choose love, is it? To treat all people with love? To treat people as if they are no different from us, regardless of race or religion or class or gender or age or sexual orientation or political persuasion. It's not always easy to set aside the biases and prejudices that are so deeply ingrained in us, is it? Or to even recognize that we have bias and prejudice in the first place.

It's hard for us today. It was hard for the early church, too.  Look at our Acts reading. Hear the Jerusalem council grilling Peter as to why he was baptizing those Gentiles--those unclean Gentiles. It is hard for all of us, past and present to choose love.

This past week, as I drove home from my vacation in Texas, I listened to an audiobook. The name of the book was "Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking." I've wanted to read it for a long time, so I decided I would use my driving time efficiently and listen to it instead.

In it, the author Malcolm Gladwell, presents research on what is called the "adaptive unconscious." Our adaptive unconscious is our ability to use limited information from a very brief experience to come to a rapid conclusion--like when you reach a quick, gut-level decision about something or someone. He argues that a decision like this--one reached quickly and with limited data--is often better than one that is reached with much more information or a longer period of time.

Yet, there is also a dark side to our adaptive unconscious. Prejudices and biases operate at this same level, even in someone who doesn't consciously exhibit such behavior. To test whether or not one has unconscious bias, readers of his book are invited to take a test on a Harvard University website.

So, when I got home on Tuesday, I took one of several possible tests--a test to measure any implicit bias I might have toward African-Americans.

Now keep in mind that, although I grew up in very white South Dakota, our ranch was situated between two reservations--the Cheyenne and the Sioux. In Los Angeles, I lived in a very diverse area. Within 10-12 blocks from my house lived immigrants from Korea, El Salvador, the Philippines, Mexico, as well as African-Americans. There was a large Muslim mosque only a few blocks from my house and a Jewish temple within a quarter of a mile.

For ten years, I worked for an organization with a leadership that was predominantly African-American. For many years, I worked with undocumented workers, primarily from Mexico and Central America. I worked for three years along the Texas-Mexico border. I have many close friends who are Hispanic and Filipino and African American.

So, although I knew I might have some unconscious bias, I thought my test results might be okay.

Well, I was stunned!  The data compiled from my test suggested a "strong automatic preference for European American compared to African American." It was the highest level of unconscious bias possible on the test.

You see, it is hard to "choose love." Even when we consciously do choose it, trying to treat others with dignity and respect and as no different from us, our unconscious biases and prejudices creep in.  "Them." "Those people." "They." Not "us" or "we."

The only way for us to begin to put an end to making "us and them" distinctions is to begin to recognize and admit our biases and their impact on our relationships with those who are different from us. Racism, sexism, classism, ageism, heterosexism, and other biased behaviors and thinking are not godly. They are motivated by fear of the other and not by a love of humanity. They are not the result of choosing love.

And, yet, in spite of us...in spite of even our unconscious bias and prejudice, God continues to work in our world. God, who created this world and all living and life-giving things in it, continues to disrupt and overturn the walls and the barriers we create between each other or any bias and prejudice we may have.

"See, I am making all things new." This is our promise. It is a promise that is trustworthy and true. It is a promise for a new world--a world where God will dwell among us, where God will wipe every tear away, where there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain. And where those who are thirsty will receive water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.

Let us working alongside the Holy Spirit, then. Let us seek to overcome our unconscious biases and prejudices.  Let us choose love.

Amen.

Preached April 24, 2016, at Chatfield Lutheran Church.

Chaos and Darkness

John 20:1-18 (NRSV). Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes.

But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus.Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

Chaos.  That early morning in the darkness, it must have felt like chaos.  For three years, Jesus and his followers had walked the roads and streets of the countryside and the cities, teaching, learning, ministering.  From the north to the south, they lived together as families do, arguing, forgiving, loving.  The disciples, men and women, had developed a deep bond with each other and had been fully yoked to their rabbi, Jesus. 

And, then, in just a few short days, everything had fallen apart.  In just a few short days, everything had disintegrated.  Disintegrated into chaos.  Chaos and darkness.

But when chaos and darkness happen, well, that’s when God seems to be at his best. 

We just heard this.  In the stories we just listened to, we heard God at work in chaos and darkness.  Out of chaos and darkness, God forming all of creation.  Out of chaos and darkness, God delivering his chosen people from slavery and abuse at the hands of the Egyptians.  And on and on and on in the stories of our faith.

Chaos and darkness.  It is in chaos and darkness that God seems to be at his best.

It was no different that early Easter morning.  In the midst of the chaos and darkness of the past three days, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb, preparing to anoint the dead body of her beloved Jesus. And there, she found the large stone covering the entrance removed.  Grave robbers.  As if there wasn’t enough chaos. 

We know the story so well.  She ran to get Peter and John.  The three of them returned to the tomb and discovered that the body of Jesus was, in fact, gone.  Peter and John returned home, beginning to believe, but yet not fully understanding. 

After they returned home, well, Mary remained. And, as the day began to dawn, Jesus called her by name.  Mary.  And she knew who he was.   Out of chaos and darkness and into the light.

In the decades and centuries to come, this why the early Christians, as they celebrated the passover of Jesus from death to life.  As they celebrated what we now know as Easter, they began at sundown, which, for them as Jewish Christians, was the beginning of their day.  These early believers would wait in vigil in the darkness.  And as they waited, they would tell the stories.  The stories of their faith.  The stories of God at work in chaos and darkness.  The stories of God delivering his people out of it and into the light.  The stories of God’s faithfulness. 

And, then, at the crack of dawn, as the light was just beginning to break into the darkness, the baptisms would begin.  All those who had been fasting and learning for the 40 days of Lent, in intense spiritual preparation for this very moment, they would be fully immersed in pools of water, drowning their past lives and emerging into new lives as claimed children of God.  Members of God’s family.  Members of the body of Christ.  Out of chaos and darkness and into the light. 

Four years ago I was deeply engaged in my work in labor and social justice along the border in south Texas.  I had been doing this work for over twenty years and had relocated from Southern California to Texas to continue it in an area where there was little justice for people of color.  After two years of working nearly 7 days a week, we were just beginning to see progress.  And, then, everything fell apart.  And I was laid off. Chaos and darkness.

But, in the midst of it, well, God was at work.  Although, at the time, surrounded by it, I was no different than Mary.  I couldn’t see God at work. 

Yet, because of that layoff, I was pushed, literally pushed, by the Holy Spirit back to seminary to finish my studies.  And, two years later, to end up right here in this very place, preparing to enter into full-time ministry in the church.  In looking back now, I CAN see God at work in the midst of it.  God’s hand moving me out of chaos and darkness into the light. 

Where in your life has God been at work in the midst of chaos and darkness?  Perhaps you can’t see it now.  Perhaps you may never see it.  Yet, somewhere, in the midst of it, you can trust that God is present there.  Working. Faithfully.

Tonight, as we now move into reaffirming our baptism and as we receive communion, we can trust that God is at work in our midst.  At work forming and shaping us so that we, like Mary and those early Christians, might go into the world and proclaim Christ in our words and our actions of love.  Supporting the Holy Spirit in transforming our world into a new world.  Not one of chaos and darkness.  But a world of light.  A world transformed by the light of the resurrected Christ.

Amen.  That is, yeah, yeah, so shall it be!

(Preached for Easter Vigil, March 26, 2016.)