Proper 5, Year B 2018

Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston
Gospel:  Mark 3:20-35
10 June 2018

Unless you had insanely overprotective parents, you probably learned early on that actions have consequences.  Some of you, like me, can recall childhood experiences when you did something that “put you in a pickle,” so to speak.  


One such memory, for me, was about this time of year when I was 10 or 11 years old.  School was just out, and I was worried about being bored.  “Back in the day,” grocery stores ubiquitously handed out a little something extra with your change at the check-out.  I’m talking about stamps, “S&H Green Stamps” at some stores and “Top Value Yellow Stamps” at others.  The grocery near our neighborhood gave out the yellow ones.  My parents had saved these stamps in a large paper grocery sack which by summer’s start was brimming full of the colorful, glue-backed tickets.  I had the idea that a good project for me would be to go about the work of pasting the stamps into the booklets provided by the grocery.  The stamps had to be moistened, one-by-one, and affixed to each page in the prescribed way.  The completed books could then be taken to a (now, here’s religious language for you) “redemption center” and exchanged for valuable prizes.  I figured that, in exchange for this constructive behavior, I should be allowed to redeem the stamps for something I wanted.  My mother jumped on the idea.  My parents both worked long hours 7 days a week at the nearby pharmacy they owned, leaving me with a lot of unsupervised time.  With this project I could be constructively occupied for a few days and be rewarded for some tedious work.  (I still remember the nasty taste of the glue.  It took me a book or 2 to realize that wetting the stamps with a damp sponge was the way to go.)  Of course, my mother was thinking that I would, in the end, exchange the stamps for something wholesomely age appropriate.  As it turned out, she was wrong about that.

Being a resourceful chap, I scored my own ride to the redemption center with my stack of stamp books. I perused the in-store catalog with wonder.  In the end what called out to me from the shelves to be released from bondage was a butane blow torch.  The torch came in a blue metal box with a latch.  I think I was attracted to the power of the idea of a tight metal flame.  Perhaps I would start by cutting a small hole in some corner of our driveway.  The unit came with instructions….but as I said at the beginning, I was 10 or 11; the way to make this thing work seemed obvious enough to me.  Anyhoo, I took the brass nozzle with knob and screwed it onto the blue butane tank.  Then I turned the knob which produced a slight hissing sound.  Conveniently a striker was included in the box, so I made it spark over the nozzle.

That’s when it all went downhill.  Instead of the tight flame in my imagination, there was a billowing flame.  It scared me so, that I dropped the torch in the grass and ran to hide behind the corner of the house.  I watched for a moment as flame billowed from the torch.  I began to wonder that, if the thing exploded, it might take out some of the house with it.  I imagined that I would be in a great deal of trouble with my parents.  In the moment that fear of my parents’ wrath outweighed fear of injury, I ran to the torch, kicked it with my foot so the knob was up and turned the thing off.  Somehow, the knob was not too hot...otherwise, the story might have had a very different ending.  I confessed to my parents that evening.  As I recall, my father started taking me with him to the drug store in the mornings.  I never saw the blowtorch again. So, learn the lesson of the blowtorch: it is possible for anyone (young or old) to suffer from the consequences of his or her own dumb decisions.

Both the story from Genesis and the story from the Gospel According to Mark are about consequences.  In Genesis, we hear how, from the beginning, human beings misused free will.  We chose to be disobedient to God’s will.  The result was alienation from God, from each other, and from self.

In Mark, we start seeing that Jesus has a difficult relationship with his own family.  They think something is wrong with him.  He’s “one taco short of a combo,” so to speak.  They seek to restrain him because he’s crazy.  As far as Mark knows, the consequence for this is that Jesus took leave of his family focussing instead on the greater family of God...a new family, now related by faith, who could be restored to wholeness and forgiven for Adam’s sin.  Thankfully, we know from tradition that Jesus’ human family members were part of the early Jesus movement too.  In John, Mary the mother of Jesus follows Jesus to the foot of the cross where Jesus places her in the care of the Beloved Disciple.  In the Acts of the Apostles, we see that James, the brother of Jesus, becomes one of the early leaders in the Church at Jerusalem.  A fruit of the Spirit is reconciliation among believers...even among those who at first thought Jesus was a “nutcase.”

We also see that Jesus’ relations were strained with religious intellectuals from Jerusalem.  The scribes thought Jesus was a liar.  Instead of manifesting the power of the God of history, he was, in their thinking, wielding the power of the Adversary of Scripture.  Jesus used a parable to show that believing he was using the power of the Adversary to defeat the Adversary was illogical.

I end this sermon with advice I was always sure to give the kiddos who took my Bible classes.  This advice is from C.S. Lewis’ book, Mere Christianity (Chapter 3).  Lewis states that, logically speaking, Jesus words and actions leave us only 3 choices that make sense regarding the truth of who Jesus is.  As someone who claimed to forgive sins, for example, Jesus was either 1) a liar (he deliberately misled others), 2) a lunatic (he might as well have announced himself to be a poached egg), or 3) the Lord of Life.  I advised my students to remember these choices, because one day (perhaps when they would be in college) someone would tempt them into bypassing these 3 choices.  The argument would be that Jesus was a good man who had great advice for living our lives but certainly not the manifestation of God.  The problem is that Jesus forgave sins...his actions and words repeatedly presented himself as God.  In all of life, including (and especially) religion, wholeness requires that we not check our brains at the door.  Logic does not allow us to pick and choose from Jesus’ words and actions to construct our own private “sanitized” Jesus with no pesky stuff that might lead to questions of his sanity or his character.  Our view of Jesus must take the “whole enchilada” if we want to maintain intellectual integrity.

There we are; the choice before us is "Lord, Liar, or Lunatic."  May our Savior mercifully guide us to choose wisely and accept the love of God into our lives anew each day!  And most importantly, may the Spirit grant us the humility to trust that our salvation is ultimately not a function of our own doing like some kind of reward for good behavior.  It is so easy to stop at the idea of behavior and consequence because life in this world teaches us that lesson.  In that scenario, we are all toast.  The Good News is God's love.  To roughly quote William Langland, as I often do, our misdeeds are to the Love of God, nothing more than a live coal thrown into the sea. Being in the family of God is pure gift...what's that word that we all know so well.....ah, God's love is simply Grace!  AMEN.

Proper 4, Year B 2018

Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston
Gospel:  Mark 2:23 - 3:6
3 June 2018

One of the Seraphim with face
uncovered from the Hagia Sophia
(Holy Wisdom) Basilica, Istanbul

The most awe inspiring building I have ever entered is the Hagia Sophia in the historic Old Quarter of Istanbul.  Translated Holy Wisdom, this great basilica church was built in the Byzantine capital of Constantinople in the 6th Century during the reign of Justinian.  After the city was captured by the Ottoman Turks in the 15th Century, the building was re-purposed as a mosque and all signs of Christianity, including works of art, were removed or covered-over.  Islam was rather high on the iconoclast spectrum, so religious art in the mosque was limited to geometric patterns and calligraphic writing. The building was eventually secularized and opened as a museum in 1931.  Today, some of the art from its Christian past has been uncovered and restored including one of the faces of the seraphim which had adorned each of four main arches.  I would be remiss in failing to mention that Christianity has had iconoclastic periods too.  The original Hagia Sophia was built during a time when representational art was considered suspect by the Church.  After all, one of the 10 Commandments prohibited the making of such images.  But, the thinking of the Church changed and the building was eventually adorned with images of Christ and with creatures from heaven and earth.

Representational art became suspect again in the 16th Century Protestant Reformation.  The Bible, literally translated, forbids the making of images of living things in heaven or earth.  But, for many Christians, including Anglicans, the Council of Nicaea in 787 had settled the issue in favor of religious art.  If God became incarnate in Jesus, a real human figure, then representations of human beings in worship spaces were from that time onwards surely acceptable to God.

The main theme in our appointed readings is another of the 10 Commandments, the direction to “Observe the Sabbath day and keep it holy.”  Like the prohibition regarding images, this commandment seems to be largely bypassed by modern Christians.  But, let us remember that authority in our church rests on Scripture, Tradition, and Reason...the so-called “three-legged stool” of Anglican theology.  If something is stated in Scripture, which we hold to be divinely inspired, we must not simply bypass what we disagree with or find inconvenient, but should look at it through the lens of tradition (i.e., ask how have those who have come before us wrestled with this?) and through the lens of reason (i.e., ask what makes sense as I try to apply this scripture to my everyday life?).

Taken literally, the ancient Sabbath Commandment means a restriction from work on Saturday, the day when God rested from the work of Creation. Some Christians, as do Orthodox Jews, do their best to follow this restriction literally.  The very conscientious, just to give 2 examples, do not start cars or switch-on lights during the Sabbath.  In the Gospel reading for today, Jesus encountered some Pharisees who objected to healing on the Sabbath because that was considered work.  In case you’ve wondered if Jesus ever became angry, now you know.  He was quite off-put by the Pharisees’ choice of rules over compassion.  I am reminded of a story told by Holly, an Episcopalian friend, about a date she had in her college days.  She and her date went to see a movie.  This was not a problem for her date, whose tradition strictly adhered to the Sabbath, because they opted for a Friday matinee.  On the way home, they were delayed by traffic, and as luck would have it, the car suffered a flat tire.  She managed to pull over.  Holly looked at him and there was silence.  Then, he said to Holly that the sun had gone down...he would not be able to help with changing the tire.  She managed to get the lug nuts loosened and the jack placed.  She wrestled the spare tire out of the trunk covering her blouse in grime.  She was fit to be tied.  They did not go out again after that.  

Most Episcopalians do not observe the Sabbath in a strict literal sense.  But, since we take the Bible seriously, we must still wrestle with how to apply this commandment in our lives. Jesus said that the Sabbath was made for human beings.  It is something that is supposed to be life-giving and helpful.  The idea that our spiritual ancestors were directed to take one day of the week to refrain from all work reminds me of the importance of life-balance.  A fully-lived life is more than our work, it is more than how productive we can be, it is more than how much money we can make.  A fully-lived life is about wholeness.  

If we take seriously both the Sabbath and Jesus’ willingness to break that law in service to others, then we must use reason to figure out how to apply Sabbath.  In order to be a disciple, there is no getting around having to think about what we’re doing.  If we mindlessly devote every moment of our lives to some form of survival, then we will squeeze-out all down time, all fun, all reflection, all worship, all thanksgiving, all compassion.  In short, we become something less than whole.

In this long Season After Pentecost, the themes will be about the Christian Life.  We are reminded today that Jesus intends for us to take some time for worship, for prayer, and for being still before God...something that you can’t do when you’re on the clock, checking Facebook, or otherwise engaged in non-stop busy-ness.  We are also reminded today that Jesus intends for us to devote time to self-care.  The idea of Sabbath was something that was given to help with our wholeness.  Think about the things we might do for self-care: drinking enough water, watching what we eat, getting enough exercise, staying mindful, having enough rest, being creative and playful, keeping a list for that which we are thankful ...I could go on, but you get the idea.  Such is the stuff that brings us Sabbath wholeness.

The emergency instructions given on every air flight remind people of the drill when cabin pressure is lost and the oxygen masks deploy.  If you are travelling with children, put on your own mask first!  If you don’t do that you run the risk of not being able to help those you love.  This is a good analogy for figuring out how to have Sabbath in your life.  The Jesus of the Gospels modeled self-care.  He attended worship in synagogues, he encouraged his disciples to take some time just for themselves to talk and pray, he showed that there would be times when rules conflicted with compassion...and in such times, he showed them to choose compassion.  Sabbath is about showing compassion for yourself in order to enjoy life, to find wholeness, and in so doing, to become equipped to be compassionate toward others.  So, today’s take home question is…. “What’s in your Sabbath?” AMEN.

The Day of Pentecost 2018

Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston
Gospel:  John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

20 May 2018

I worked on my sermon on Friday, and like you I was and still am in shock over the news of yet another mass shooting in a school. Only, this time it was in our own backyard, just up the road in Santa Fe. This time many of us know people directly impacted in one way or another.  I know a retired teacher who had the assailant in his math class last year.  At least three of the wounded were taken to the Level 1 trauma center at UTMB.  When the dust cleared on this thing, 10 persons, two teachers and 8 students were dead. This is heartbreaking, and we are left wondering how we will respond in the days to come. Even while the news was breaking your senior warden, Ellie Hanley, was vetting ways that Grace Episcopal Church might respond. Marti Pittsenbarger suggested that the church be opened Friday evening for those who wished to gather in prayer, and a small group did just that. When I heard that idea I was struck by how much it was in sync with a theme I was seeing in the readings for the Day of Pentecost.  More on this in a moment.

Pentecost comes from a Greek word meaning fiftieth referring to this celebration being on the Sunday fifty days after Easter.  Pentecost is the day set aside to recognize the gift of God’s Holy Spirit to empower and sustain the early Church. We think of this day as the birthday of the Church because the Holy Spirit made it possible for the Church to begin to carry out its ministry in the world. The Holy Spirit, the 3rd Person of the Trinity, is traditionally and often symbolized by fire and water (not to mention the other images). I’m using these two symbols to structure my thoughts. 

First there is fire. We have in our reading from the Book of the Acts of the Apostles the story of the powerful outpouring of the Holy Spirit to believers gathered in Jerusalem. The Spirit was manifested in divided tongues of flame that rested on the heads of those who participated. It is the memory of this sight that inspired the design of the mitres worn by our bishops...the ecclesiastical accessory known to the uninitiated as those “funny pointed hats.” 

What is so striking to me in this story is what continues to this day whenever the Spirit is present. What happens when the very life of God has a place among us is that people are drawn together. In the reading from Acts, people were able to understand one another even though they were from various places with different languages. The presence of the Spirit broke down barriers and helped folks hear one another and hear particularly the good news preached by Peter. Christians who learn of tragedy tend to feel a “tug,” so to speak to come together as a community to pray for peace, healing, and a way forward. I sensed this movement of the Spirit as many churches prepared to open their doors in an unscheduled way on Friday evening. (We would not be surprised if the faithful are drawn in numbers greater than usual this morning in all houses of worship.)

So, when I think of the flame, I think of the Bishop’s mitre, and how the Church was formed as people were drawn together and barriers between them were taken down. 

Second, there is the theme of water. Our reading from Romans speaks of how the whole creation is waiting for a promised hope. In the beginning the Spirit of God hovered over the waters. The gift of God’s Spirit is symbolized with water in our baptism so our spiritual journey of transformation begins as a kind of new creation. The Spirit endows us with Spiritual gifts and the gift highlighted in our reading from Romans is that of hope. Hope is not something seen; otherwise hope would not be necessary. Hope is something we trust will be. Life is such that circumstances so often threaten our hope. Do we have the strength to do what we need to do? When we feel overwhelmed, are we going to be able to keep going? How do we figure out going forward when tragedy is constant and seems to be never ending?

Sometimes, a strong sense of hope is all that we need to stay in the game and see things through. I am reminded of a dream I had in my first year as a priest when I was serving as curate at the parish and chaplain at the parish day school. The dream went like this: I was teaching a religion class and everything seemed normal except that the classroom was on a 747 jet airplane. Suddenly there was trouble, and the plane was headed down. After the plane crashed into a lake, I managed to open a door and lead the students through the water and into an opening in the side of the lake. Once into the opening there was a spiral staircase which I climbed with my class to the top. Upon opening the hatch at the top, we were greeted by archaeologists who were jumping up and down for joy that we had helped them find the opening for which they had been looking. I pondered this over a few days wondering what my Dream Maker was telling me.  

Many dreams are gossamer-like, and you forget them quickly. This one stayed with me. At some point, I remembered something that Carl Jung had written about the importance of the context of the dreamer’s life when trying to figure out a dream’s meaning…. suddenly, the meaning hit me. I was in my first year of ministry, preaching 4 or 5 times a week and teaching classes. I was going through seminary notes to figure out what I needed to cover and I was worried I was going to run out of things to say...that the well would run dry, so to speak. It was like I was drawing cards from a deck and worried that any day I was going to draw the last card. In the midst of this anxiety, I came to believe that God was telling me that there was much more to me than what I was consciously aware of at any moment. I was given hope that the ideas would keep coming, that I could leave the lecture notes and depend on God to inspire me. Well, here it is after almost 31 years and I keep having ideas every day. 

Finally, by way of review...let us notice the color red used liturgically today and so remember that day when the Spirit manifested as tongues of flame and brought people together.  Let us also note that the Spirit still brings people together today even in the face of tragedy. Regard the water in the font as we come and go from this church and so remember that the Spirit was present at Creation and is also present with us as the one Jesus called the Advocate. We do not face life without hope but have One called alongside of us who will give us strength, ideas, creativity, and wisdom to meet the challenges ahead. AMEN

7 Easter, Baptisms, & Mothers' Day

Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston
Gospel: John 17:6-19
13 May 2018

I was blessed to hear Bishop Doyle preach at Christ Church Cathedral on a Mother's Day some years ago.  He included in his sermon a simple but poignant poem by Billy Collins entitled "The Lanyard."  I'm beginning my sermon today by referencing this poem.  (It may be found in Collins' collection The Trouble With Poetry first published by Random House in 2005.)  

You can listen to Collins read the poem himself at this link:

Billy Collins Reading "The Lanyard"

Collins' poem addresses a profound subject: the timeless idea that the sacrifices a mother makes for her children are such that no son or daughter could ever repay them.  You know...it's similar to the concept that the best from this life, things like friendship, sunsets, and a parent's love, cannot be bought for any price... a poignant lesson in our contractual-based, everything-is-for-sale world.  Collins points toward this huge concept with the boy’s “rueful admission” that he once thought his lanyard gift had somehow repaid his mother in full.

I should acknowledge that our experiences of our own mothers will differ.  The range of actual experience, I suppose, goes from warm and nurturing all the way to cold and distant or even absent.  As a young adult,  I would get stuck on my experience as a teenager and how I was embarrassed to the core by my mother’s eccentricities.  (Perhaps you will hear a sermon on that later.) As the years go by, I have more compassion for her and have come to appreciate the sacrifices and life that she gave to me….so much so that, like the boy in Collins’ poem, I know I am completely without the ability to repay what she gave to me.

Now, we move on to the Gospel. This section of John has (from the 16th Century) been known as the “High Priestly Prayer of Jesus.”  Jesus closes his sort-of after-dinner speech to his friends with a prayer for them going forward.  We also are Jesus’ disciples, so he is praying for us too, for those who have come before us and for those yet to come...in other words, Jesus prays for the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church...that mystery that defies human attempts to draw boundaries around it.  In his prayer, Jesus acknowledges that we are in the world because he sent us….the Greek for sent is ’αποστελέω, this is why in our Creed we describe the Church as apostolic….it means simply that we are set apart by Jesus and “sent” back into the world with a mission.  Our mission, like yeast hidden in dough, is nothing short of transformation.  We are called to make a difference by letting God’s love shine through us while we are in the world.

The final part of Jesus' prayer has a theme that we can connect with Mother’s Day.  On our behalf, Jesus sanctified himself.  This word “sanctify,” ἁγιάζω in Greek, is a word that has a place in the theology of our altar (or table).  It means to consecrate or make holy...that is to take and set aside to be used for God’s holy purpose.  Thus, in the Eucharist, we set aside ordinary bread and wine.  God’s holy purpose for this bread and wine is accomplished in giving these elements back to us now transformed into the body and blood of Jesus.

In the Gospel According to John, when Jesus sanctifies himself, this is his code language for submitting himself to the cross….it is his sacrifice that sets him apart for God’s holy purpose.  He does this not only to set himself apart, but in so doing he also sets us apart, consecrates us, makes us apostolic with a mission to serve God’s purpose.

Sacrifice and consecrate are words that describe what Jesus did for us; they describe what happens at the altar; and they have some intersection with what mothers are called to do too.  Being a mom certainly involves sacrifice.  Could it be that a mother’s love can, in its own way, consecrate a child?  Does a mother’s selfless love in some way impact the child, confer upon him or her the basic ability to trust.  Set the child apart as one capable of loving others.  Does her love help to give a child a developing sense that he or she has something to contribute in the world?  These thoughts are apropos for today.

Now, I turn these thoughts toward today’s baptisms.  In Baptism, we recognize that these children not only have a human family but that they also have a Godly family.  By now you know the word consecrate means to set apart for God’s holy purpose. So, today we consecrate these two children as Christians and then return them to their families and sponsors to raise and nurture them in faith...and we pledge to help them too.  Jesus’ prayer is also for them.  Today, we claim the promise and hope implicit in Baptism that Jesus will send Walten and Annabella into the world when their time comes that they too may be like yeast in the dough. AMEN.

6 Easter

Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston
Gospel:  John 15:9-17
6 May 2018

5th Grade Maypole Dance 2015

We are having a beautiful spring in southeast Texas.  New life is evident all around.  On our evening walks, Layne and I have been noticing the change: new blooms on the magnolia trees, numerous rabbits, as well as the occasional yellow-crested night heron, to name a few examples.  Galveston definitely has visible changes in the seasons; you just have to know what to look for. I’m delighted that a plumbago in our yard, almost killed during this year’s earlier freeze, has come back smaller but vibrant with flower buds...itself a testament to the tenacity and resilience of life. 

Given my 15 years as headmaster of Trinity Episcopal School, I suppose I’m programed this time of year to think of the May Fête celebration.  In this time-honored tradition, parents, grandparents, and alumni gather on the grounds to watch students present dances matched to a theme.  The event always concludes with the 5th graders presenting the iconic Maypole dance.  In springtime, nature itself seems to exude joy, and this end-of-year event is a mirror of this joy.  The students know that the celebration marks the beginning of the end of a year of hard work, an anticipation of summer fun and freedom.  The joy is palpable.

Joy is a clear theme in today’s Gospel.  Over the course of the last several Sundays, the readings from John have been snippets from a kind-of after-dinner speech that Jesus gave to his closest disciples.  Jesus describes his words telling the apostles, “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.” (John 15:11)  The reading reminds us that Easter is itself a season of Joy.

Let us take care to realize that sometimes we can get into a funk and lose sight of the joy we are intended to have.  I know that May Fête came for our school community at a time when energy often was running low...the excitement and promise with which the year began had faded and many (teachers, students, and parents) were ready for a break from the routine.  The end-of-year celebrations helped give us all a boost of energy.  Tradition was as comfortable as it was tonic.  Spirits were lifted as we focused on all the closing activities.

I think we all know that when we lose sight of joy we can get into a kind of funk.  There is a story that’s so old, I bet most of you have heard it before, so I’ll apologize in advance: It was a Sunday morning.  A mother was trying to get her son out of bed, so he would get ready for church.  This particular Sunday, he was adamant that he did not want to go.  He looked intently at his mother and said, “I’m not going to church, and I’ll give you two reasons I’m not going.  1) Those people don’t like me, and 2) I don’t like them.”  Unfazed, she responded, “You are going and I’ll give you two reasons that you are. 1) You are a 50 year-old man, and 2) You are the rector.”  The surprise ending makes the joke, but it also serves as a lesson.  Any, and I underscore, any person or institution as a whole can lose sight of joy and get into a funk.  We may not have a choice over how we feel, but we can choose what to make room in our hearts for.  May God give us the grace to always choose joy.

As Jesus continues his after-dinner speech he makes two startling, never-been-said statements.  Firstly, he boils all of the commandments that we have been asked to keep into a single, simple rule: “love one another as I have loved you.”  In what seems like another lifetime, I served as the Dean of Students at an Episcopal Boarding school.  One of my duties was to keep track of the Student Handbook.  That was the reference that contained all of the rules by which the community lived.  Over my six years as an administrator there, the number of rules grew every year, and the handbook just got thicker and thicker.  Just off the top of my head, I remember adding rules to restrict smoking and to forbid gambling in the dorms...those two added half a page.  I suppose, a potential list of rules in response to human misbehavior is limited only by the human imagination.  Teenagers thrive with boundaries, so I knew the list needed to exist, but sometimes I wondered how it would play out if we just had one rule, the rule of love.  

To be an adult and to be morally mature means moving from what Piaget called heteronomous or (outside directed) morality to autonomous (self-directed) morality.  Observing traffic laws on I-45 only because you don’t want a ticket is heteronomous, while doing the same because you believe it is the right thing to do is autonomous. Perhaps, when we open our hearts so that Jesus can abide with us, this is another way of saying that we internalize Jesus’ love and base our decisions in the light of the love command.  In other words, love becomes self-directed.

Secondly, in his after-dinner speech, Jesus claimed his disciples as his friends.  I’ve often wondered how much pain people would avoid if we had been created without the free will to be selfish.  No one would lie, cheat, or steal. No one would ever make fun of another at the other’s expense.  All people on I-45 would obey the traffic laws!

But that is not how we were created.  Human beings were made in the image of God complete with free will.  If we instead had been made in a way that our choices were determined, none of us would have the ability to be a friend.  A world of automatons is no perfect world as far as what God desires. You see, a friend is just not a friend if he or she is paid, coerced, or required.  I think that a lot can be explained by the idea that in the Big Bang, God set in motion a process that would eventually include sentient life in God’s image… life that would have the ability to reciprocate God’s love, or not.  In the end, Love is not a warm fuzzy feeling.  Love is a choice, and one that bears fruit.  This Easter season, may we all reconnect with the Spirit of joy, internalize the Father's love, and find a friend in Jesus.  AMEN. 

Homily for the Wedding of Cameron Davis & Megan Zionts

Wedding of Cameron Davis and Megan Zionts
28 April 2018
Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston

Today we celebrate the marriage of Cameron and Megan.  This is a first for me in that it marks the first time that I have had the honor to preside at the marriage of a former student of Trinity Episcopal School.  I remember Gena and Gary Davis from those days...but you know, I don’t see the scrawny 6th grader. I’m just going to take his mother’s word that this burly, disciplined man who marries Megan today is actually the Cameron that I remember from 2006!

I’ve got 3 brief pointers to mention about marriage.  I hope these pointers will be a solid guide for this couple’s future and I also hope they will resonated with the married folks who are here today to witness.

First, think with me about a definition of success in marriage.  Cameron and Megan, I hope you will be careful when defining what success might be for you.  No doubt you will work together to make all kinds of goals happen.  Years from now you may find yourself with a beautiful, low maintenance house, two cars in the driveway, and 2.5 low maintenance children who are good looking and above average.  Your Facebook page might show that the two of you just get more and more good looking and your news feed might show how well connected you are.  Everyone on social media, including Cambridge Analytica, would see that you are a couple to be envied! My advice is that you be careful not to go too shallow when thinking about what success in marriage looks like to you.  Try not to think about success in terms of what others think.  The important opinions are those of the two of you.  There is no one right answer but true success will more than likely be something that is non-tangible.  Take curiosity for example.  Another person is always a mystery.  A young couple engages in a journey on which they are learning about one another...What are the places he would like to visit?  What is her favorite memory from childhood?  The list of things to find out about is endless...and even after spending a lifetime together, there is still more to know.  In the end, all people are mysteries to one another.  So my advice is “Stay curious my friends!”  If even after growing old together as a couple, you are still curious about each other….well, that might be one way of describing a successful marriage.

Second, let me say a word about mistakes and disappointments.  Go ahead and accept that these are going to happen.  What matters is not so much that you make a mistake as it does how you recover from them.  Marriage is not about perfection.  Using Brené Brown’s definition, perfection is all about what others think.  Remember, the important opinions are those of the two of you.  Be humble enough to admit your errors to one another and be prepared to amend your ways.  I’m kind of embarrassed to tell you about the first argument between my wife, Layne, and me.  We had recently moved into married student housing at Sewanee.  I was thirsty and was looking in the refrigerator for something to drink when I knocked over an open can of Sprite.  The contents poured through multiple metal racks onto glass shelving, proceeding into a drawer of lettuce and other produce, before pooling under the lower drawers at the bottom.  What a gross, sticky mess.  I was angry. I knew whose fault it was….Layne’s of course.  She left an open can on the shelf where I was reaching...that was “booby trapping” in my book.  I do not remember the back and forth of the argument, but I saw in the end, that my anger was displaced.  I was really mad at myself.  I know now that whenever I start to blame someone else for some mishap, the most important thing is to hold my tongue until the cerebral cortex is back in charge.  I think that the best school we have for learning not to be selfish is the institution of marriage.  It takes work, but over time marriage can be transformational.  The key is to be humble in front of one another.  To be big enough to admit mistakes and to learn from one another.

Finally, let me say a word about joy.  In the theology of the Church, mutual joy is the primary purpose of marriage.  Don’t be a sourpuss couple.  Make plans to do things that are fun.  If you are blessed to have teenagers one day...do not be afraid to smooch in public sometimes just to embarrass them!  Have fun figuring out what makes your spouse laugh.  Beware of becoming much too serious about everything.  Sometimes, you just have to stop and perceive that what life has thrown at you is totally ridiculous.  In the end, you are responsible for your own happiness.  In a way, being joyful is a choice...and the way to choose this path is to be thankful.  Count your blessings.  Revisit why you fell in love in the first place, and be grateful for those qualities in one another.  There is a time for everything under heaven, and sometimes it is the time to grieve.  When this is the case, grieve together.  Help bear one another’s burdens.  Pray and worship together.  Share each day something for which you are thankful.  Sometimes, it is good just to be silly.  Never forget that God’s wish for you is mutual joy. AMEN.

5 Easter 2018

Grace Episcopal Church, Galveston
Gospel:  John 15:1-8

29 April 2018

I’m an amateur photographer and an image aficionado. The best photos for me are everyday images that also carry a timeless meaning.  For example, I was learning photography at Sewanee when I made an image of a boy climbing a tree. I underexposed the negative and overexposed the print to create a black and white silhouette...you could tell that it was a boy climbing a tree, but the silhouette effect helped underscore that the particulars were not what was important.  For me, the image was about growing up. It begged the question, “How is climbing a tree like the journey from child to adult?”

I suppose nowadays children are not encouraged to climb trees.  There are much safer climbing structures at schools and parks. My childhood experience scaling an old oak tree was during summer visits with my cousins who lived on a dairy farm.  My same-aged cousin and I were practically turned loose to entertain ourselves on long summer days...and the big oak tree beside the dairy “called” to us in good weather. We figured out how to climb to a spot among the branches, where we could sit and drink Nehi “belly wash.”  Getting to that point was tough, at one point the main branch lacked limbs but bent just enough that the climber could bear-hug the tree and shimmy up until a handhold was available. We learned the hard way that short-sleeved shirts and pants offered no protection from the rough bark.

Now that I’m “high mileage,” so to speak, the image speaks to me of the journey of life, as a whole, as much as to that small part we associate with “growing up.”  Life has periods that are easy and periods that are difficult. Sometimes, we suffer scrapes, other times we find places to stop for a time and reflect on where we’ve been.  Eventually, we find that we’ve gone as far as we can go. One picture can surely evoke more than a thousand words on such a timeless subject. One picture can evoke greater understanding.

Jesus did not take photographs but he certainly used images in his teaching.  He taught with parables which compared situations of everyday life to the Kingdom of Heaven.  He used what people already knew to help them gain insight on the new thing that God was doing in their midst.  I can imagine the written discourse in today’s Gospel reading going all the way back to Jesus and his disciples having discussions about how the new community, known by its love, was like the branches of a grapevine.

Last Sunday the ordinary image of a shepherd was transformed into Jesus, the good shepherd. This Sunday the ordinary image of a grapevine becomes Jesus, the true vine. In each case, a mental picture was used to evoke a greater understanding of Jesus.

The image of the grapevine would not have been lost on Jesus’ Jewish listeners.  In both the Psalms and the Prophets, Israel is represented as a vine planted by God. While Israel was disobedient to God, Jesus, by contrast, was faithful even to the point of laying down his life. Thus, the true vine is Jesus. The Church is made up of many branches...we are the branches. And without the vine the branches are dying twigs.  People like you and me become the Church, the community of faith, by abiding in Jesus and bearing fruit.

This grapevine image is ripe with meaning, but I’ll limit myself to just noting a few points...just three ideas on how this one image can evoke greater understanding.

1) Jesus notes the presence of the Father as the vine-grower.  The image of a working vineyard includes one who tends to the plants.  This image-metaphor evokes the understanding of God as one who walks with us and who is intricately involved in our lives.  Our God did not create us and leave for some distant place, abandoning us to our own devices. Our God abides in us; we call this companion-God the Holy Spirit.  

2) Branches that begin to bear some fruit will later produce more and more fruit under the vine-grower’s supervision.  The description of branches responding to the vine-grower’s pruning evokes an understanding of the Christian life as being one of transformation.  God is with us, and God is not done with us yet. With God abiding in us, we have power to grow toward the perfection for which we were created….although, not reaching it completely in this life and knowing there will be stumbles and setbacks for which we will have the vine-grower’s loving attention.  

3) Finally, a branch can only live if it abides in the vine.  Disconnected from the water and nutrients in the vine, a branch becomes unproductive, withers, and dies.  Just as our bodies need physical food to live, our bodies also need spiritual food for strength to obey God’s commandments.  Abiding in Jesus evokes an understanding of a worshipping community where we are fed with the study of scripture, with the fellowship of other pilgrims, and with the very life of Jesus made known to us in the breaking of the bread. AMEN.