Sunday - September 22, 2013

The 18^th Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 21C
Luke 16: 19-31

September 22, 2013
Cathedral Church of the Nativity
The Rev. Kimberly Reinholz

________________________________

Between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.

Today’s gospel unfolds uniquely when compared to the other parables of Jesus.  It would seem that those to whom Jesus was speaking new Lazarus, they may have seen him sitting outside of the rich man’s home, sores oozing and dogs licking his wounds.  They themselves might be the rich man.  I say this because it is out of the ordinary that Jesus mentions anyone in his parables by name, we do not know the name of the prodigal son, or the Samaritan, or the wounded traveler, but we do know the name Lazarus.  Some biblical scholars argue that the name Lazarus is derived from the Hebrew name Eliezar which means “God helps” and this is why the name is used, but I don’t think this is the case.  If it was,  shouldn’t the rich man be named as well.  I am sure there is a Hebrew name which corresponds with the notion that “God punishes” perhaps a derivative of the word Nephilim which is associated with fallen angels, would be appropriate.  However Jesus doesn’t use this literary device leaving the rich man anonymous.

This anonymity could also be a way of protecting those who have wronged Lazarus because if Lazarus’ circumstances were as bad as what Jesus describes you can imagine that many people had to have ignored him, not just the rich man in order for him to suffer so terribly.  What I think happened is that Jesus saw Lazarus mistreated in the streets of Jerusalem and he used Lazarus circumstances to demonstrate what one of his followers ought not to do.

In some ways not much has changed since Jesus told his story.  I could walk across our parking lot and around the corner and find a soul similar to Lazarus suffering from illness and hunger in the New Bethany Residence.  The chasm between the New Bethany client and myself would be seem to be similarly insurmountable to that distance between the rich man with his fancy robes and daily feasts and Lazarus who longed to eat the scraps that fell from the table, the 500 feet from this cathedral’s doors to New Bethany’s doors can be conquered not by feats of daring and engineering but by simple acts of love.

We live in an era of transcontinental, transoceanic and extraterrestrial travel so the concept of an unbridgeable distance seems to us completely foreign.  Even images of such great chasms like the Grand Canyon and the Mariana’s Trench have been conquered by the likes of Nik Wallenda and his high wire, or James Cameron and his submersible, Deep Sea Challenger.  With all of our advances in technology and travel the distance between Lazarus and the rich man might seem equally surmountable.  But the truth is, without Jesus, we are no closer to traversing that chasm today than the people who first heard this parable nearly 2000 years ago. 

We neglect to notice that the chasm described is not a physical distance but spiritual one.  And like Abraham explains to the rich man without the teachings of Moses and the prophets even a resurrection won’t bridge that spiritual emptiness.  Without studying scripture, without engaging with the almighty, without caring for our neighbor the chasm between us and them remains impenetrable.

This is not a new lesson that Jesus is trying to teach.  He told his disciples, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and by anyone who followed in the footsteps of the apostles the same thing in many parables.  In simple terms – Love God and Love one another.  It isn’t rocket science.  It’s compassion. 

In this world, we can bridge what seems unbridgeable physically and we can do so spiritually if we are willing.  Just like it takes fortitude and ingenuity to walk across the grand canyon or dive to the deepest depths of the ocean so too does it take fortitude and ingenuity to lessen the gap between ourselves and our Lazarus.  This is what it means to follow Jesus, to do the work he has given us to do, to care for those who have less than you, and let’s be honest most people have less than you. 

If we talk dollars and cents for a second, here in Bethlehem, the average household income was $45,000 in 2011.  In relation to the rest of the world according to Global Rich List.com with this income the average household in Bethlehem falls in the top 0.37% which means that 99.63% of people in the world live on less than us.  This statistic is sobering as just recently we marked the second anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street Movement which proclaimed we are the 99%.  As a 20 something living in New York at the time many of my classmates and colleagues in ministry proclaimed this position loudly and I had begun to believe it.  But when I looked up the world-wide statistics this week I was forced to realize that despite my debts, I am indeed rich.  That was enough to stop me in my tracks.  I found myself struggling to know what to do with my “new found wealth” and wondered if our neighbors look at our cars and stained glass windows and think of us as Lazarus did longing for a scrap from our table when we can afford so much more. 

Financially we can find ways to support ministries that feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, comfort the sick, and rehabilitate the incarcerated.  We’ve all heard stewardship ideas like if you give up one cup of coffee per week at Starbucks you save over $250.00 in the year and that will provide clean water for a year to a family through Episcopal Relief and Development. But in reality it is spiritually that we cannot afford not to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, comfort the sick, and rehabilitate the incarcerated. It is not a question of what luxury we can afford to give up, rather it is a question of what part of our Christian mission can we ill afford to ignore.

This is what Jesus is trying to teach us today.  When we ignore the needs of others to pursue our own comforts we are the rich man who ignored Lazarus.  In the earthly world wealth is scarce, there is only so much money to go around, so it stands to reason that without giving up something we cannot bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots.  If what we do in this life determines how we will be treated in the next.  

We cannot expect to have the chasm bridged between the haves and the have-nots in the next life because it is cemented by what action we take to lessen the gap now when it is surmountable now.  The only thing that is keeping us from caring for one another in our daily lives is our own greed, and blindness.  Even though it has begun to sound like the same old refrain, Love your neighbor as yourself, we like the disciples and the Pharisees don’t get it. There is always more that we can do, and should do.  It is great that we have pledged to raise $25,000 for the Habitat for Humanity project, we have been active in the New Hope Campaign, we have supported various ministries over the course of our life as a parish but there is still so much more to be done. 

There are still needs to be met and we can help to meet them, but we hesitate.  We hesitate just as the rich man did despite having the teachings of Moses and the prophets and all the learned Rabbis who interpreted the law.  He fell victim to eternal suffering,  because the gap between himself and Lazarus which on earth could have been overcome through compassion and mercy, remained and became unbreechable in the afterlife. 

We likewise have the teachings of Moses, prophets, rabbis, priests and more scholars who interpret scripture telling us the same thing, and we also have a resurrected son of God, telling us exactly what to do Love God, and love our neighbor. But like Abraham told the rich man, when he pleaded that Lazarus be sent to warn his brothers, what good are Moses, and all the prophets or even a resurrected man if no one listens to them?

I pray today that you will see your neighbor, and not just see them but help them and in so doing fulfill the calling that has come to us through scripture from Moses, the prophets and Christ himself our resurrected Lord, to love our neighbors who are in need.  Amen 

Sunday - September 15, 2013

The 17^th Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 19 C
Cathedral Church of the Nativity
The Rev. Kimberly Reinholz
Luke 15:1-10

____________________________

                I love the game “Hide and Seek”.  I often play it with my nieces and nephews and look forward to playing it with my own children, but whenever I play I am reminded of a story I heard once of how quickly an innocent game of “Hide and Seek” escalated into something more serious, because not everyone involved knew there was a game being played. 

A little boy about 5 years old and his baby sitter went to a local department store.  The babysitter gets distracted for a moment and turns around to find the boy missing.  She is hysterical she starts tearing around the store looking for him.  She gets the manager and all the store employees looking for him.  The police are called.  In the mean-time the little boy has started his own game of hide and seek and is climbing in the clothing racks, sneaking from rack to rack whenever someone gets close.  Eventually he gets tired of running around and falls asleep on a pile of clothes in the fitting room, which is where they eventually find him.  All’s well that ends well right? Thank God this story has a happy ending. 

                Imagine what it must have felt like to be that baby sitter frantically missing the child for whom she was responsible.  It must have been horrible!

                Imagine what it felt like to be the boy who thought he was playing the best game of hide and seek ever.  It must have been awesome!

In the Gospel today Jesus tells about how valuable each and every one of us is.  When the Pharisees are disturbed by Jesus fraternizing with sinners and tax collectors, those who liked to ignore the laws which the Pharisees held sacred Jesus reminds them that people are more sacred than the law. 

                Jesus shares a pair of parables: the lost sheep and the lost coin which both end with rejoicing because what had been lost is now found. As Christians it is this rejoicing which we hope everyone has the opportunity to experience.  This exuberant welcoming home, this embrace, this celebration at being reunited with God, is like the little boy being swept up into the arms of the baby sitter when he is found resting in the fitting room, the lamb which is flung across the shoulders of the shepherd when it had wandered off, or the coin safely stored in the woman’s purse after it had been misplaced. 

It is wonderful to think that there will be rejoicing when the lost person or the lost item is returned to its rightful place, but how often are we ignorant of the fact that we are lost, how often do we think instead that we are playing a game of spiritual hide and seek from God the creator of us all?  How often do we fool ourselves into thinking that we don’t need to come to church , or join that small group, or participate in that ministry because God is everywhere not just in this building?  I know that many of my friends, family and colleagues in and outside of the church feel this way.  It is impossible to explain to those who have never been part of a congregation why it is important to come to church, because can’t you worship God in your garden or in your living room, why do you have to go to some stuffy old building to experience community?  I will admit that sometimes I am envious of people who sleep in, have brunch and do the crossword puzzle on most Sunday mornings.  That doesn’t sound like being lost to me, it sounds like a nice relaxing morning where I know exactly where I am, happily relaxing in my fluffy robe and bunny slippers and it sounds better than running around editing my sermon or looking for my clerical collar. 

I know that not everyone who isn’t here is enjoying a mimosa and scone.  I know that there are people who have to work elsewhere on Sundays.  I know that there are people who have other responsibilities which divert their attention from worship. Sometimes in our busy lives coming to church feels like it just one more thing to do, and we just can’t do anymore.   

I recognize that we are part of a culture which has moved away from the observation of a Sabbath.   But the truth is that observing the Sabbath, by coming to church, is exactly the opposite of having something else to do.  Yes we do a lot when we come to church we worship the Lord our God, celebrate the Eucharist, read scripture, recite prayers, seek intercession for our own needs and those of others, and come together in this holy space so that we can go out refreshed and renewed into a world that doesn’t understand us and feels like what we do here is a waste of valuable “down time”.  But in reality what we do when come here is we refocus on God- our gaze does not fall on ourselves, our children, our friends, or co-workers but in worship we turn our eyes, our hearts and our minds towards God. We stop and take stock of where we are, what we are doing and where we will be going next. 

This is orienteering essential. Only if we look towards Christ Jesus can we find our true north, can we find our true value, and we can discern who we are and what God expects us to be.  If we do not take this time regularly to focus on our creator, redeemer and sustainer we are deluding ourselves into thinking we are playing a game of Hide and Seek when in fact we are truly Lost. 

Like the shepherd seeks out the sheep, the woman scours for her coin, and the sitter panics as the loss of her charge so too Jesus searches for each and every soul of each and every person in creation.  In his searching Jesus rejoices exponentially more than the shepherd or the woman or the babysitter whenever a person, stops and takes a breath, looks up, focuses on God, and remembers that there is more to life than their calendar. In those moments when Jesus rejoices and all the company of heaven rejoices with Him, all of us who were playing at knowing what we are doing, realize that we were in reality lost are now are truly found. 

I think that the next time I feel like I might be wasting my time on Sunday morning by going to church, I might just ask myself am I really playing an intricate game of hide and seek with God?  If that is the case I know that I won’t be wasting my time in going to worship, I will just be reaffirming what has been sung time and time again in that beautiful hymn Amazing Grace- I once was lost but now am found was blind but now I see. 

Sunday, September 8, 2013

The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa

Deuteronomy 30:15-30; Luke 14:25-33

John Arthur Nunes, newly appointed to a professorship of Christian values and Public life at Valparaiso University, recently wrote about the beginnings of his new adventure moving from his role as an executive director of a non-profit religious group providing a ministry of relief and care to those in need around the world to a new beginning as a teacher of Christian values in an academic setting.

He wrote, “A life transition—like any effort to follow Jesus—is stressful.  Packing, unpacking, moving from one set of commitments to another, focusing on a new future. It might be best summarized by the ancient North African Bishop Tertullian’s interpretation of Luke’s Gospel  (Take up your cross and follow me)  “Take up your Stress and Tortures”

Once again our scriptures bring us in a forceful way to the drama of what it was, and what it is, and what it might be to be a disciple, that is a follower of Jesus. Once again we are given the narrative that is ours to discern and discover of what speaks to our own “being”, our own experiences, our own narrative of patterns in life where we like Dr. Nunes, experience the “cost of discipleship”. That is the experience of that stress or conflict as we find ourselves in our own lives either literally or figuratively packing or unpacking, moving from one set of commitments to another, focusing on a new future.

For those literally following Jesus in that countryside where today’s Gospel lesson takes place, Jesus captures that sense of the dramatic (as he does in Luke’s Gospel), upping the ante for those who might not yet quite understand just how deep and broad the commitment to a new future of following him may be. To follow Jesus on his journey to Jerusalem, one will be entering a new focused circle of family, literally leaving behind relationships and yes even possessions. (Because you can’t take your mother or your herd with you on this journey to Jerusalem.) If you are following on this journey it is going to cost you some, so “do the math” as it were, consider the “price of admission” to this journey, and if you choose, pick up your cross, and follow me.

Imagine the “Packing and Unpacking” literal and figurative for those deciding in those moments to set their eyes and hearts on this new future and commitment.

But surely you do and have had the experience of your own, “packing and unpacking” as you yourself follow Jesus. You yourselves have known by the nature of being alive and the nature of your lives of faith, those times when you may have literally or figuratively “left home” to be in the company of others who would lead you to a new future. You yourselves in time and in place surely have at times done the “accounting” and have made decisions in life that have cost you something when following a path that you know has been informed by your relationship with Christ. Perhaps spend a bit of time this day or this week pondering these things.

Recently in my prayer time I have re-discovered the power of walking the labyrinth. If you don’t know the labyrinth, it is a patterned walk with one entrance and one exit that leads you on a journey to a defined center, then leads you back out again from the pattern. The labyrinth pattern is an ancient one, pre-dating Christianity, though adopted by Christians and non-Christians as a tool for meditation or prayer.

The walking of the labyrinth for me gives me a pattern of journey that allows me to shed those things that distract me from centering my heart on the presence of the holy, leading me to a center where I can leave those things and lift my eyes to see what the holy might bring. The journey then back out of the labyrinth reminding me that I take that unity of the sacred center back to the margins of life, where surely the “stressors and tortures” of following Christ are felt as they conflict the uncertain and unsteady forces of the world in which we live.

I share with you my journal from my walk in the labyrinth this week, pondering our Gospel lesson today.

“I have prayed again the labyrinth and there I was greeted again and again, as I pondered in my heart the faith of generations and the demands placed on that faith. And there I imagined their and my own struggle to find reconciliation of the conflict that exists between my own need and desire for a deep pool of peace, Grace, and Joy — that place I find in a sacred Center — where life is full, congruent, authentic, and at peace.

And the demands that this Jesus seems to place on us — Where we know that when we do the accounting of following Jesus’ way, it’s going to cost us something, the cost typically showing up in the “conflict” or “stress” of “carrying a cross” emboldened with an ethic Jesus has taught us.

Then I realize again as I walked the labyrinth, at least today, that the journey to the sacred center is that place of becoming aware of our “true selves”, that is the self as God sees it.

It is that place where all the fear, mistrust, doubts, desires, and distractions of life that impede the joining of souls and beings, are peeled away on this journey, and offered on the cold stone Altar, and there in that sacred center is the opportunity to join with beauty, love, hope, joy, awe.

I began the pathway back out of the labyrinth, now making my way back out to the edges, a distance growing from the “sacred center” now aware that this is exactly what is taken to the edges, the margins of life, the sacred center. Back to the complexities and challenges of life and the decisions that are to be made in it.

The accounting I have this day, the cost of the journey, a few shekels of doubt, fear, mistrust, uncertainty. The real cost I realize in following Christ to that “Sacred Center” of course is the offering of the true Self to the edges and margins of life/the world.  Full of joy, and awe, of peace, and of Quiet, of certitude and grounding. Back out here now on the edges, I do the “accounting”.  This is worth the price of admission.

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.