The Daughter of Abraham

The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

The Ven. Richard I. Cluett

Isaiah 58:9b-14 + Luke 13:10-17

When I have visited Kajo Keji in South Sudan I have seen this “bent over woman” many times. She lives her life bent over – bent over by poverty, by malnutrition, by disease, by lack of medical care, by life. And when I have been in Israel and Palestine, when I have walked the streets of Europe, when I have been in the supermarket in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and when I sipped tea in a neighbor’s home, I have met this woman. I have met her in all these places and I have even known her name sometimes. The name Jesus gives her is Daughter of Abraham. Others called her by a description of her malady, the “Bent Over Woman”.

If I had the power, if I had the knowledge, if I had the authority, I would have moved heaven and earth to help her stand up right so she could look at us straight in the eyes.

In the gospel today we hear that for 18 years this bent-over woman had to look at those around her out of the corner of her eye, looking up and sideways. It had been so long and she had learned to hope for no other life than this one she had – bent over.

But seeing her, without being asked, Jesus called her and used his power and his knowledge and his authority, and he moved heaven and earth to enable this woman to stand upright, to stand in the midst of the congregation restored to her full stature as a child of God, as a Daughter of Abraham, able to look at each person eye to eye, and then raising her eyes to heaven to look straight into the eyes of God, she gave thanks and praise to God that she had been set free from that terrible condition that had bound her to the ground.

She stood erect and tall before God, in the presence of Jesus and all the people. She had been set free. And except for one misguided synagogue leader who himself was bound up by law and tradition, everyone knew that heaven and earth had been moved to set her free. Thanks be to God.

In the reading from Isaiah we also hear the story of freedom. For 50 years, for more than two generations, the people of Israel had lived in bondage, in slavery in Babylon. And they had finally been set free to return to their homeland, to Jerusalem, to rebuild it and to rebuild their lives.

As they begin to establish their new life in the homeland, the prophet speaks to them about God's promises for renewal, about bringing into the fold those who have been cast out and providing a hopeful vision for what can and will be. He gives them a reminder of God's command to live justly. The prophet proclaims that the Lord will fulfill his promises as the people fulfill their call to live with justice and to honor the Sabbath.

To act justly is to remove the yoke that oppresses others. To act justly is to give of oneself to the hungry and to those who are oppressed. The word our bible has as food is in the original Hebrew the word nephesh . The Hebrew text does not say to give food to the hungry, but to give one's whole being. Then, one's light will rise out of darkness and one's whole being will be satisfied, be nourished, and have a future.

For Isaiah, and we remember that he speaks for God, nothing is to get in the way of living out God’s justice in our day-to-day life. If we attempt to live that way, we will know God’s blessing and God’s world will slowly be healed. Isaiah says, “you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.”

Another rabbi says, “We are to reweave the torn fabric of the world”. It is done by one person at a time, one act at a time, one healing at a time, freeing one person at a time from what binds them up or bows them down.

In the gospel today, one Daughter of Abraham standing up right with Jesus to give praise and thanks to God because she, too, has been freed from her bondage.

Nor are you or I or anyone among us or in our communities meant to be bound up or bowed down by life, or loneliness, or disease, or the malevolent powers of this world. As one writer put it, “The bent over woman is everyone who has ever struggled to rise above the pain of oppression and low self-worth and judgment from others… she is everyone who has struggled with illness, addictions, loss of value, loss of spouse, or self-esteem or innocence… she is anyone who has lived in a situation that is intolerable… anyone who has been told "You Can't" and believed it.... anyone who has lost hope…”

I want to remind us that we, too, are children of God, daughters and sons of Abraham, disciples of Jesus and followers in his way. What these readings tell us today is that we too are meant to be free, to stand tall, and to take our rightful place, standing in the midst of God’s people, and taking our own personal part in the healing of the world, one act at a time, one person at a time as we live out the daily lives God has given us. It’s not done yet and we have a part to play in the reweaving of God’s world and the healing of God’s people.

Fifty years ago this coming Wednesday, on the 28^th of August in 1963, a mighty congregation gathered in Washington, DC on the national mall at the Lincoln Memorial to stand together and before God to bring freedom and healing to more of God’s children, more sons and daughters of Abraham, more people of color and those mired in poverty in this rich nation, any and all who need to be freed from a modern form of bondage.

Martin Luther King, a prophet for our time and place, echoed the words of the prophet Isaiah. I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

He issued a renewed call for God’s justice and God’s healing of the broken people and places of our day and time and place; those bent low by injustice and poverty, so all would someday in God’s time be able to stand tall in the midst of the people and give praise and thanks to God for healing, for release, for freedom.

We don’t know the words used by that Daughter of Abraham standing up with Jesus, but they may well have been akin to the words used 50 years ago on the mall in Washington, in that prophetic vision of God’s justice and healing: when all of God’s people, each of God’s daughter and sons, can say with that Daughter of Abraham standing tall with Jesus, who raised her eyes and her voice to God, to say, “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

Daughters and sons of Abraham, one and all.

Sunday - August 11, 2013

The 12^th Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 14 C
August 11, 2013
The Rev. Kimberly Reinholz
Luke 12:32-40

____________________________

A little girl stands waiting for the bus.  It is her first day of school.  Her back pack is full to the brim with everything that was on the back to school list that the teacher sent home: paper, folders, crayons, magic markers, number 2 pencils, etc.  Her mother packed her lunch- Peanut Butter and Jelly, carrot sticks, a Capri Sun drink and for a special treat, some Tasty Cakes.  A few weeks ago she and her parents rode on the bus on a hot August night to meet the teacher see her classroom and learn where to pick up and get off of the bus.  She is ready.  She is prepared.  She knows what to expect. They are playing tag and catch around her as she shuffles her feet in the road side gravel.    But when the bus slows to a stop at the end of the street she is scared.  Her heart races as she lines up with the rest of the kids on the block.  She looks back Her mother smiles and nods encouraging her from the appropriate distance about 10 feet away where she is huddled with the other parents.    The girl hikes her leg up onto the high step and climbs onto the bus.

18 years later on her first day of college the same girl with her dorm room packed with everything that was on the list at Bed Bath and Beyond: computer, desk, paper, laundry detergent, shower caddy, hot pockets, ramen noodles, etc.   Her parents had packed up the car and drove her across state lines, unpacked the car lugging boxes and bags up 4 flights of stairs, why had she chosen a dorm with no elevator. Afterwards they had taken her out for a nice good bye dinner.  A few months ago this had all be a dream when they had visited and taken a tour of campus, when she interviewed with the dean of admissions.  She finished her senior year.  She had the support of friends, family, and faculty from her high school.  She is ready.  She is prepared.  She knows what to expect.  But when her parents drop her off at the dorm after dinner for that long drive back home, she is scared.  Her heart races as she reaches in her pocket for her lanyard and ID.  She is leaving everything she knows behind, her friends her family and her support system, all for this dream of something better, but still something unknown. For just a moment, she looks back considering what would happen if she went home.  Her mother waves to her from the car she waves back and cautiously opens the door to the dorm and her new young adult life.

On some level we can all relate to this girl, whether as ourselves, as a parent, or both.  We all have been in these kinds of situations ones that feel like no matter how much you are prepared for what is coming around the corner there is still a sense of anxiety, a sense of fear of the unknown, which can be overwhelming when we start a new part of our lives. 

I stand in front of you living this kind of fear.  Despite being as prepared as I possibly could be to stand in this pulpit today.  Despite knowing that I have the support of Dean Pompa and the personnel committee who hired me, Bishop Paul who ordained me, the Standing Committee who recommended me for Ordination and the Commission on Ministry who guided me through discernment, and countless other people who have supported me with prayer and sacrifice through the years.  Even though you have welcomed me graciously into this community, the hugs and kisses and warm handshakes I received last week went a long way to making this congregation my new spiritual home.  Alas, I still stand before you today prepared and scared.

But, I don’t think that the kind of fear that I am experiencing right now is the kind of fear which Jesus warns us against. I think this fear is healthy normal fear, even for a Christian.

The fear that Jesus warns against in Luke’s gospel is fear that leads to incapacitation in our physical or spiritual lives. It’s okay to be afraid so long as you keep living. The little girl at the bus stop got on the bus, the young woman at the college walked through the door, and I got into this pulpit today, not because we were unafraid, but because we had faith in something beyond ourselves which made it possible to overcome that fear.  The little girl got on the bus with the support of her mom, the young co-ed with the support of her family, friends and teachers, and me with all those who believed in my call along the way.    

For those of us who believe that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior, it would seem like this balance of scared preparedness would be easy to accomplish.  We believe God loves us and sent his Son to die for us and gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit to sustain us we can therefore live in faith and fearlessness.

If only it were that simple.  In reality our Christianity is not the antithesis of our humanity we actually have two very distinct natures a human mortal nature and a Christian immortal nature which are constantly fighting for dominance.  Day to day, we live in a culture which fear-bashings us into believing that everything we eat, drink, do or don’t eat, drink, or do is going to cause us some kind of irreparable harm.  In our faith life, we struggle because even though we believe that the world is no more threatening than the boogey monster, there are times that the devil bends our ear and our heart and makes it impossible to maintain our assuredness in the security which the Lord God provides. 

Society teaches us to be fearful and that fearfulness seeps into our spiritual lives as well.   So much so that even though we try to put aside our fears when we stand before God this is when we find ourselves the most afraid because we are at this point the most vulnerable the most trusting in that great “something beyond ourselves”- God.

We strive to be in the world and not of it, to not let anxiety and fear over power our sense of faith, reason, and love from the Almighty God, but sometimes it is hard to remember that when we are facing the unanticipated times which come along in life.  This is what Jesus is trying to teach us in the gospel message today, teaching us to prepare as much as we can for the changes and chances of life but rely on God to give us the push to get on the bus, to get through the door or to get into the pulpit. 

What Jesus warns us about in Luke today is that we do not know when crisis will strike nor when opportunity will present itself; we have no way to tell the future.  But we can be prepared to the best of our ability.  We cannot prepare by stock piling items,  Jesus doesn’t want us to become doomsday preppers totally focused on the future calamity which may or may not come.  Rather, we as Christians prepare through support systems which are not financial or structural but instead prayerful and intentionally based in relationships.  We prepare for crisis or opportunity through being part of a community of faith by celebrating the Eucharist together, by holding one another in prayer, by offering to love one another unconditionally as God has loved us.

Jesus’ parable of the alert slaves reminds us that we must always be on the lookout for both the master whose arrival is expected and desired as well as the presence of the thief who is unexpected and unwanted.  We must wait patiently and prepare ourselves for whichever guest comes our way.

Together we are waiting patiently and preparing ourselves for those moments when we will face unexpected circumstances.  For us today we know about the cracks in the roof, our search for an organist choir master, discerning the call of the diocese for a new bishop.  But in our future we will have many other adventures the birth of children, new employment opportunities, pilgrimages, mission trips, and the illness and deaths of beloved members of our community.  All of this is par for the course for our journey of faith.  Luckily on this journey we do not travel alone and we do not wait alone.  We wait with one another and we wait with the Holy Spirit, our ultimate guide.  With guidance and companionship when we are afraid, we are not overcome by fear and doubt and the tendency to rely on objects which rust and moth will destroy.  Instead in community we are assured in the love of God by our brothers and sisters in Christ will be lifted up and helped through our times of trepidation. 

We need not be fearful, but when fear surfaces we have companions who have been with us waiting for this day anticipating the desired outcome and preparing for the crisis we face.  Our family in Christ Jesus stands with us holds us up when we fall and occasionally when we are unable to stand will offer to take our place.  This is what it means to be a servant to Christ – to be prepared for whatever comes our way, good, bad, night or day, and helping one another get through it.  Amen.

Sunday, August 4, 2013

The Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost

The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

“Therefore let us concern ourselves with heavenly things, not human ones, and like peregrini (pilgrims) always sigh for our homeland, long for our homeland, which is the resurrection.”  St. Columbanus of Bangor, 5^th century

Well, hello! If you are visiting with us today, please know that today is a day when we both welcome The Rev. Kim Rowles, as our new associate for family formation ministry, and my own return from a three month sabbatical time. We are delighted that Kim is among us and look forward to her sharing her considerable gifts for ministry.

I return to you from a sabbatical time to share with you an overwhelming sense of gratitude. If I had to boil down in one simple statement the heart of my discovery on this sabbatical time, it would be gratitude. I am overwhelmed by God’s goodness and grace in my life, in my relationships, and in this vocation of witnessing to Christ that I share with you! I am most grateful to you for your prayers and for your continued witness to Christ while I was away.

The week before I returned to the Cathedral, I asked those closest to me (my family) what they thought folks at the Cathedral would like to hear from me upon my first opportunity to preach. I asked if folks would want to hear a sermon or just stories about my sabbatical time. They replied rather quickly, “stories about your sabbatical time, who wants to hear another sermon?” Well, today I hope to share a few stories about my sabbatical time and as I do perhaps you will also have a sermon worthy of holy reception.

The scriptures today have a solid theme. It can be summed up by saying that we human beings consistently struggle and strive to find truth and meaning about our lives through our labors, our relationships, and those things we seek to put our trust in. We human beings consistently do so by placing our trust in those things the world has to offer. We labor hard seeking security, possessions, the safety of shelter, food, recognition, and achievement of successes. We sometimes acquire material things, money, possessions, in the hope of security and comfort and with an authentic desire to provide for those we love best in the generations that follow us. We sometimes see our relationships and behave in them in ways that also bring definition to who we are, or value to who we are. All of this at face value, authentic, and part of the human experience. The scriptures however remind us of the deeper, sometimes mysterious and hidden truths about meaning, authenticity, trust, and value that can only be found in the spiritual realm, a much larger picture. The scriptures today warn and remind us that we too often will place our trust in worldly things to bring this meaning and security, missing the bigger picture of eternal truths that might lead us to life beyond our understanding. The writer of Ecclesiastes for example tells us that “everything under the Sun” is actually vanity of all vanities. That is those gathering material things for definitions of safety and success, those believing the end game is pass such things on to a generation that may have no appreciation of such things, and hoping to find eternal security and truth in such acts is in VAIN. 

Jesus in the parable he tells of the man who has fallen into the trap of reaping more and more as if it would guarantee happiness, meaning, and truth for his life, builds bigger barns that are at the end of the day, just bigger barns, when God Himself is hoping for so much more of this man’s life.

The scriptures of course provoke us to look beyond our earthly needs and strive for deeper heavenly treasures that open pathways to spiritual riches by “seeing the world” a different way, a way that is far less concerned about our looking to the world to satisfy our needs, but rather looking to “heavenly things” to open our hearts to meet the world’s needs on a spiritual level.

A story now if you will from my sabbatical time that I hope will invite your own reflection as you think about what is at play in the scriptures today. Some of you know that I was fortunate to be a guest and spiritual companion with Dr. Esther DeWaal, author and speaker on the topic of Celtic Spirituality. My time with Esther reminded me of the great Celtic pilgrims whose spiritual yearnings gave birth to the monastic movement in Scotland, Wales, England, and Europe, bringing a spirit of revival and the spread of Christian principles throughout these lands.

These pilgrims, like the authors of our scriptures today, too considered the endeavor of human beings seeking truth, to be found not in worldly gratification and discovery, but on a spiritual realm. These pilgrims influenced by the monastic lives of the dessert Fathers in the first century after Jesus death and resurrection, left all they knew of worldly comforts and securities. They hopped in rickety boats and began a journey across an unknown sea from Ireland to the coastlands of Wales, Scotland, and England. They departed on what they called “Peregrinatio”, that is holy pilgrimage with a mission of discovering spiritual truths they knew they would not find in worldly things. St. Columbanus of Bangor, one of these early “peregrini” and founder of the monastic order in Bangor Wales, invited fellow pilgrims with these words,

  “Let us depart as peregrini (Pilgrims) in a spirit of hospitas mundi, that is as guests of the world, in search of One’s resurrection, the peregrini to heaven, the true home and let us not get entangled with earthly things but fill our minds with heavenly and spiritual things- making our song, “when shall I come and appear before the face of my God”.

It was in this spirit of “peregrini” that I perhaps discovered a bit of insight about my own struggles with the themes we find in our scriptures today of missing perhaps some heavenly opportunity by looking to the world to satisfy my human needs. I will explain.

My routine with Esther was to study and read in the morning, reflect aloud over coffee mid-morning, and being sent in the afternoon by Esther to discover holy places, pray, and reflect. One afternoon, Esther fitted me in a pair of boots and sent me into the three streams that run and join on her property. She sent me with the reminder that in Celtic spirituality, water is a powerful symbol. Streams are symbols of purity and eternity. In ancient Celtic spirituality, holy shrines were created in places where streams and springs flowed from the earth. Where streams join together, two forces of eternity coming together, this would be exceptional, but where three streams flowed together, this was a holy of holy place. I was instructed to put my feet in the streams, in each stream, to “pay attention” to all that around me, the feel and flow of the waters, and to follow the streams to the places of their joinings and in this case of their branching off again, and to “follow” where I felt led.

It was standing in these streams in full communion with the power, majesty, and beauty of my surroundings, literally “in conversation” with all of creation that I came in communion with a voice for reflection, particularly as in regards to the themes in our scriptures today.

Again, I hope as I share this you might resonate and reflect on your own lives where such themes might be at play. First, the voice, “why do I labor so hard?” Why do I spend my mornings into nights laboring at trying to get things “right”, get things done. Of course we are supposed to work hard, but “why?” What was I expecting, needing, hoping for, and to what or whom was I looking to get these things from?

Then I realized much of my labor, my need to work so hard, “get things” right (whether they are “right” or not is a whole other conversation) to do them well, with expectations that those around me would do the same, perhaps was coming from a place of “worldly” resolve. To be honest, I realize that I had come to a place where I didn’t want the “world” to believe that I could fail! What if the world would decide that professionally, I wasn’t all that effective, all that good at what I do? What would that mean for who I am, what I am about?  This response on “earthly or worldly” terms of course has no reward that lives in eternal things, eternal like the streams I was standing in. My behavior and the internal script that comes with this is distant from the spiritual heart of peregrini, which is to discover the truth of my being and the home of resurrection. The truth that God knew me before I was born, that a fear of failure is woven in earthly definitions of success and leads to behaviors and beliefs that are life-threatening not just to me but to those around me, as opposed to life-giving.

The second insight I had those days standing in those streams that have been flowing for generations and generations. I am one of those folks who is approaching 50. I know some of you have been there, for some its far away, and some are there with me now. It may not seem old, but for me on some level it’s a big deal. My kids are at that age, entering teenage years and adulthood, where my role as lover and parent is shifting. I am keenly aware at least that their physical presence in my household is coming near its natural end. Somehow standing in that stream I became aware again that internally and probably behaviorally, I was looking at my relationship with my children through worldly eyes. That script goes like this. I have a very short amount of time left with my children! I must give them everything they need, provide everything they need. I must love them well and deeply so that they will always know of that love, right now! I must share all the wisdom I have right now, so that I can fill them up forever.

Then the voice came again. “Tony, don’t you believe in the promises that have been made? Don’t you believe what you have been preaching half your life, really, that love is eternal! Forever, and ever! You have an eternity to love your children and to be loved by them, an eternity!”

Like a trip to Target with a list of things I feared would not be in stock, I realized I was carrying anxiety and fear defined by worldly things that was interfering with the way I was enjoying the richness of loving those closest to me! The Celtic pilgrims journey begs me, begs us to “not get entangled in earthly things”, but to “set our eyes upon “heavenly things” seeking our homeland, which is resurrection, that is eternal things! To live with our eyes set upon “heavenly things” and not hoping to find our meaning, reward, comfort, trust from a world which cannot deliver, means we can be free of the despairing and love in ways that flows as powerfully as the streams my feet were set upon that day.

I said to my son a few days before returning from my sabbatical, “perhaps I should return to work!”  He said to me, “good idea Dad, after all you are the bread maker”. He meant of course to say bread winner, which by the way his mother can rightly argue with as she joins me so faithfully in “winning the bread” in our home. But I think I like what he said better, yes, bread maker.

I found a slice of heavenly bread- standing in the streams of eternity- where my ancestors both blood and spiritual stood-generations of faith, wisdom, labor, Love, Truth descending upon me in the flow of these gentle eternal streams!  My children will know of this toil, this love, this care, and find meaning in eternal things promised by God and handed down for generations,- and their children will know it EVEN when they are not aware of it! 

So people of Bethlehem, of this Cathedral, House of Bread, shall we make some bread together? Bread from heaven, life-giving bread, where we hand over our fears and anxieties and set our eyes on “heavenly things”?

Shall we set ourselves upon a vocation of “peregrinatio”, asking God to show us who we are and who we are to be?

Let’s make some bread, life-giving bread, and set ourselves upon a vocation of peregrini- setting our eyes on heavenly things and asking God to show us who we are and who we are to be?

“Therefore let us concern ourselves with heavenly things, not human ones, and like peregrini always sigh for our homeland, long for our homeland.”  St. Columbanus