Just Shine

The Amount

Jesus doesn’t want ten percent. Jesus wants it all: our whole selves dedicated to God. This is the invitation that comes with Christian freedom, and it is a joy, not a burden. The traditional way of saying this is in the Lord’s Prayer: “thy will be done.” Not the pastor’s will, or some list of rules, but an ongoing invitation to bring our lives into alignment with the values Jesus taught, and to collaborate fully with the creative Spirit of God in our daily lives… however that looks like for you. Being faithful means accepting the challenge to give more and more of our lives to God, to accept those invitations God is giving us every day. The details will look different to each of us. But we who follow Jesus can look for things like this:

· Trusting that at the root of the universe and in the heart of each person is good, and beauty and truth, and acting accordingly.

· Learning: engaging sacred scripture and the world, discovering meaning and wisdom for living. Not needing to be right, instead being teachable.

· Mourning injustice, and speaking up for what’s right.

· Going out of our way to show care and respect for the people around us, and not just the likeable ones.

· Forgiving and being forgiven, being freed from the failures and hurts of the past.

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Brea Congregational United Church of Christ

June 16, 2019

The Amount

Isaiah 55:1-3 Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters;

and you that have no money, come, buy and eat!

Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.

2 Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,

and your labor for that which does not satisfy?

Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,

and delight yourselves in rich food.

3 Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live.

I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David.

Mark 12:13-17 Then they sent to him some Pharisees and some Herodians to trap him in what he said. 14 And they came and said to him, “Teacher, we know that you are sincere, and show deference to no one; for you do not regard people with partiality, but teach the way of God in accordance with truth. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not? 15 Should we pay them, or should we not?” But knowing their hypocrisy, he said to them, “Why are you putting me to the test? Bring me a denarius and let me see it.” 16 And they brought one. Then he said to them, “Whose head is this, and whose title?” They answered, “The emperor’s.” 17 Jesus said to them, “Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” And they were utterly amazed at him.

Money is a loaded topic in our culture. We can experience such anxiety and guilt over money, or lack of money. And we are embarrassed to talk about it. At the same time we get judged by the size our income and how we display our wealth. I hope this church is a safe space where it really doesn’t matter how much money you have or don’t have. I hope our spending decisions, should we have more than the basics for survival, are shaped by the teachings of Jesus at least as much as by our culture. That could be disorienting, because what Jesus taught about money and what our culture tells us are polar opposites. Try quoting him in public and see what response you get. “Sell all you have and follow me.” “Blessed are the poor.” That kind of thing.

You’ve heard of the Sermon on the Mount. This is the Sermon on the Amount. Not the amount of money the church needs. I don’t know the amount of money the church needs. People are coming and going, and your money is coming and going. None of us knows exactly what salary and benefit package your next pastor will need. We have an uncertain situation. We have a situation requiring faith, and that’s a good thing. The amount I want you to think about is the amount you are ready to give to God, through the work of this church.

No guilt please. If you are struggling over money, please know that you are in good company. You are not failing; that is a lie our sick economic system uses to blame its victims. Our economic system is failing many of us. If you’re struggling over money, you may need to file this invitation away for another time. But if you’re holding your own financially, I have some things to say to you.

So many good causes are asking for our money. We cannot possibly support all the good causes that are out there. Can we all just take a big breath and let out a collective sigh over all the times we have to say “no” to people and causes that tug at our heartstrings? It hurts, being limited in our ability to help. Among all the worthy causes, I truly believe that church is special. We need to be empowered by the Source, the Source of our to compassion and generosity and call for justice. That is the purpose of the church. That’s why it comes first for me. For you? God meets you where you are. I will warn you: if you keep coming here, you might not stay where you are.

Jesus gave lots of “sermons on the amount:” on money. Today’s reading from the gospel of Mark is one of them. It is during one of those “word wars” Jesus had with people who were trying to discredit him, or worse. Right away we know something strange is going on here because Pharisees and Herod’s men are working together. Pharisees are the ones who are determined to follow every law to the n-th degree. They think following all their rules is going to get them right with God, and they look down on those who don’t follow all their rules. Herod Antipas is Rome’s puppet ruler in Galilee. He’s Jewish by birth; he barely observes his religion. Herod disgusts the Pharisees.

Why are the Pharisees and Herod’s men working together? They are both after Jesus. They are after Jesus because he is teaching things that undermine their authority, and the crowds love him. Jesus has been teasing the Pharisees about some of the silly laws they observe. He teaches that the spirit of the law is more important than the letter. Herod’s men are after Jesus because people are saying he might be the Messiah, the new Jewish king– a direct threat to Herod’s rule.

So these unlikely partners band together and ask Jesus a question. a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t kind of question. “Should we pay our taxes to the Roman emperor?” If Jesus says yes, pay the Roman tax, he is betraying the hopes of the Jewish people for freedom from Roman occupation. If he says no, Herod can throw him in jail, because Herod is a puppet of the Roman overlords.

In response, Jesus throws them a curve ball. Show me a coin, he says. It has the Roman emperor’s head on it (and probably also the words, “Tiberius, son of the Divine Augustus.”) Right away the Pharisees know they have lost this challenge. Pharisees understood the second commandment to mean: don’t display any pictures of people or even animals, just in case you might start worshipping them as gods. Jewish coins, temple money, had palm trees on them. People did worship the Roman emperors as gods. A truly observant Pharisee shouldn’t even touch that Roman coin with Tiberius’ portrait carved on it. And then Jesus hits it home: Give to the emperor the things that are his, and give to God the things that are God’s.

Which begs the question, which things belong to God? What should we be giving to God? Herod’s men didn’t care. They didn’t care about God, only political power. But the Pharisees did care. They were really trying to serve God. What belongs to God? Here was their understanding. God’s covenant people belong to God. Everything they possess is a gift from God. According to Jewish law, God requires in return a tenth of their earnings, know as the tithe. There, I said it. The tithe. Ten percent of all we make. That is the amount, according to Jewish law.

Fortunately, we are not Pharisees. That rule about tithing is not binding on us. We are Christians, free from the old Jewish laws, as the apostle Paul likes to remind us. Paul also says, “All things are lawful, but not all things are good for us. All things are lawful, but not all things build community.” (1 Cor. 10:23) How did Jesus deal with tithing? The only mention of tithe in the gospels is when he made fun of the Pharisees, for giving a tenth of their parsley crop, but not giving their whole lives to God, by practicing compassion and justice. (Matt. 23:23, Luke 11:42).

· Trusting that at the root of the universe and in the heart of each person is good, and beauty and truth, and acting accordingly.

· Learning: engaging sacred scripture and the world, discovering meaning and wisdom for living. Not needing to be right, instead being teachable.

· Mourning injustice, and speaking up for what’s right.

· Going out of our way to show care and respect for the people around us, and not just the likeable ones.

· Forgiving and being forgiven, being freed from the failures and hurts of the past.

Compared to these kinds of daily challenges, tithing is easy, if you are not in financial crisis. I really mean that. Once you start writing that check first every month (or set up that online transfer) it becomes a habit. It’s much easier than remembering to open yourself every morning to God’s wisdom and guidance. Every person I’ve talked to who has made the decision freelyto tithe (not the ones who were coerced or guilted into it) has found it an enriching experience. Commitments to God usually are!

I have a friend, the person who guided me to my faith as an adult. Her family was below the poverty line. I remember worrying about the fact that she tithed. But for her it was just part of her commitment to God. Her commitment to God really meant something, because her tithe wasn’t extra. Yet she was empowered to be able to give in a meaningful way despite her ongoing struggle to make ends meet.

Another friend of mine is a stay-at-home mom whose husband is rather hostile to the church. She was always bugging him for money to donate the church, but one day she realized: she had a little money that she could call her own, from birthday checks, a modest investment, some odd jobs. She could tithe from that! When you commit to tithe, you never need to feel guilty about what you can or can’t afford to give. If your creative partnership with God brings you a larger paycheck, then you can give more.

OK, I’ve given my pitch for tithing. If it sounds lovely to you in theory and impossible in practice, here’s what you can do. Compute the current percentage of your income you are giving and increase it a noticeable amount. Do that for a few years, and you’ll be tithing.

When I started giving money to the church as a young adult, I did not tithe right away. And I was very aware of the fact that my gift did not go in an airmail envelope to the Heavenly Throne. It went to the church budget. Were they spending my money wisely, I wondered. Then I got recruited onto the finance committee of my church, and I had to rephrase that question. Are wespending God’s money wisely? The answer was, certainly more wisely than my home budget. I think the basic issue is not about budget items, but about trust. Do we trust our church? We could keep control, dole out money piecemeal to the projects we approve, or we can give generously to the church’s budget, no strings attached, and then all do our part to make our church effective. I treasure the special calling of this church, to welcome the excluded, to speak for the voiceless. I have not served a church with a clearer mission, a clearer calling that ours. It is our sacred privilege to support that work, and I get teary-eyed thinking about it.

We also support the mission of this church in ways other than money. Thank you for showing up on Sunday morning. For singing and marching and studying and bringing food, and giving rides and lobbying and making art and showing care to one another. And thank God for the generosity and commitment of all the faithful people who have come before us: built this church, and left us the legacy of their gifts. Thank God for the witness this church gives for hurting people, and a hurting earth. In this year’s stewardship drive we are setting a precedent of giving for the future ministry of this church. We will celebrate your generosity next week. Many of you know the joy of giving. Amen.

Jailbreak

Too often lines get drawn, enemies assigned, and we don’t treat people on the other side as people. In the name of freedom, whole nations and nationalities and religions get labeled enemies. In the name of safety, we often shun those who are most in danger themselves: refugees, people without homes. In the name of a just society, we can easily demonize those who don’t agree with our definition of justice. Making enemies is normal, but it is not inevitable. It is possible to recognize and respect the humanity in each person we encounter, whether they are a jailer, a political adversary, a predatory lender, or just a crazy driver. But it isn’t easy. It takes great power, and great love.

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Brea Congregational United Church of Christ

June 2, 2019

Jailbreak

Acts 16:16-32 One day, as we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling. 17 While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, “These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.” 18 She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.

19 But when her owners saw that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities. 20 When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, “These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews 21 and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe.” 22 The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23 After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely. 24 Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.

25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. 26 Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were unfastened. 27 When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul shouted in a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.” 29 The jailer called for lights, and rushing in, he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. 30 Then he brought them outside and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31 They answered, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.” 32 They spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. 33 At the same hour of the night he took them and washed their wounds; then he and his entire family were baptized without delay. 34 He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God.

“Good Omens” is a comedy about the end of the world. It’s in the absurd style of Monty Python. It has been a favorite book in my house for many years. It’s just been released as a miniseries. Good Omens is a ridiculous parody of the kind of literal Christian beliefs that say God has everything planned in advance, and that the world ending in a great battle between good and evil, real soon, is the final page of that plan.

In Good Omens. demons want to have a great battle and end the world. This seems in character. What’s uncomfortable to watch is sterile, corporate-suited angels lining up for battle, savoring the end of the world… and being unmerciful to one poor angel who has been on earth from the beginning, Aziraphale. Aziraphale is soft. When Adam and Eve got kicked out of the garden of Eden, he gave them his flaming sword for protection from wild beasts. Aziraphale can’t imagine killing anything, and he really loves human musicals, and gourmet food, and old books.

Aziraphale has a buddy Crowley, a demon who’s also gone native. Out of love for the earth and all that is on it, the demon talks the angel into breaking free from the normal thinking that they must be enemies, enemies collaborating on destroying the earth. They have no idea how to stop the end of the world, but they are open to possibilities. Good Omens is British comedy, so the possibilities are ridiculous. Babies are switched at birth. This is how you stop the end of the world: instead of being raised by an American politician, the antichrist is raised in the paradise of an English village named Tadfield.

Aziraphale’s efforts to save the world involve trying to decipher the accurate but cryptic prophecies of Agnes Nutter, a 17^thcentury witch. Here is one of Agnes’s predictions. “In December of 1980, an apple will arise that no man can eat.” Agnes’s descendants got very good at deciphering her predictions. They bought stock in the first public offering of Apple Computer and made millions.

Aziraphale does finally speak a word of wisdom that helps avert the apocalypse. But by that time the antichrist has already broken free of the script he’s been given. The antichrist is eleven years old and his name is Adam. Adam doesn’t want to destroy the world. He just wants to be a human kid, love what he loves, be with his friends and family and his English countryside, and his sweet little dog. His sweet little dog was originally a giant hellhound, sent to help the antichrist destroy the world. But when this hellhound overheard Adam saying he wanted a little dog, the kind of dog you can have fun with, it became a little, playful, loving dog, that reminds Adam of his humanity at a crucial moment. Good Omens is a corny overblown romance. People who would normally be destroying one another and the world discover they are rather fond of one another and the world (“rather fond” is an understated British way of expressing love.) So they refuse to fight. And the world is saved. Good Omens is still a very ridiculous show, though. Consider yourself warned.

This is the seventh and last Sunday of the Easter Season. We end the season of Easter as we began it Easter morning, with the story of a jailbreak. Eastern Orthodox Christians picture resurrection as a jailbreak, ours. Jesus breaks open the gates of Hades, rescues Adam and Eve, in other words all of humanity, from death and into life with God. In the Orthodox view of Easter, Jesus went to hell and back to show us that love wins in the end.

In our bible reading, we are traveling with the author Luke himself. We know this because the story says, “we were going to the place of prayer.” Luke shows us the casual injustices of the Roman world, injustices that probably seemed normal to him. On the road to prayer each day they encounter a woman, a slave—that much is normal, in Paul’s time. This slave woman yells at them every time they pass. She is possessed by a spirit that sees the future, like Agnes Nutter. Unlike Agnes, this slave has no control over how she deals with the information. We might dismiss her visions. But her affliction was real. We might call it mental illness. Paul doesn’t free her from slavery, but he does free her of her illness, from possession by a spirit that annoys him and robs her of her humanity. That spirit had been making her masters a lot of money, so those ‘businessmen cheated of their property and livelihood’ get Paul and his sidekick Silas put into the town jail. This injustice is also normal: nobody is surprised. This is the kind of inhumanity people have always inflicted on each other.

Then comes an act of God, as they say. An earthquake breaks open jail cells and all the shackles of all the prisoners. But it’s the miracle that happens next that interests me. Instead of escaping and leaving the jailer to his plan of suicide to escape some awful punishment, the prisoners promise not to run away. This is not normal. It is normal to regard your jailer as your enemy; his fate is not your problem. Paul and Silas see their jailer’s humanity, and sacrifice their freedom out of compassion for that man.

The earthquake convinced their jailer that the God they were worshipping was powerful. But their willingness to give up their own freedom to protect the life of a man who should have been their enemy? That is what made that jailer want to be a part of their community, to pledge to follow Jesus. We watch the impossible happening: the jailer washing the wounds of his prisoners, and then the prisoners washing the jailer in the waters of baptism. Bodies and souls receive tender care. Then the jailer, instead of locking the prisoners away, invites them to dinner at his own home. These first Christians have broken free of the narrative of “us and them,” good guys and bad guys. They treat their supposed enemy as they would a friend, and he becomes a friend and co-worker for the gospel. That is the miracle that hits home to me.

When Paul and Silas were in jail, they were singing and praying. They were immersed in the love and power of God. That immersion made it possible for them to show compassion to their jailer. I have seen the power of God, not breaking metal locks, but breaking down human barriers. Whether it goes by the name of Christian or not, this power transforms. I have seen restorative justice that brings a perpetrator of violence to true repentance. I have seen people divorcing, and treating their ex with kindness and consideration. I have seen people working for social justice by building relationships with people on the other side of the issue. May we be so filled with prayer, and song, and the love and power of God, that we break free of what binds us, to see new possibilities for caring, to make an enemy a friend. Amen.

Open to Possibilities

It’s hard work staying open to possibilities. It’s heart work. To do it, we must live with the tension between what is, and what could be. To be able to name what is when it’s ugly. That gap is painful to witness. It’s easier to say, “Oh, well, too bad, nothing can be done.” To shut that door and move on, with certainty and low expectations. If we have low expectations, we won’t be disappointed.

When we speak about a possibility, long for it, strive for it, we remind ourselves what we value. We serve as witnesses to other people about what may be possible. Then maybe they can take the risk and open themselves to possibilities they hadn’t been able to hope for. We challenge business as usual, and sometimes we get in trouble for it. As we take actions that are out of our comfort zone, we embody those possibilities. We make those ideas into visible signs. Like the idea of publicly welcoming gay people to our church with that little flag out front. It’s an adventure! And we discover community with open-hearted people who see the possibilities and believe they’re worth striving for, even if they’re long shots.

Living with possibilities will lead us to disappointments. What we long for may be a long shot. But when we’re open, we may notice some other possibility we never even imagined. In this this strange way we often create something different than what we intended, but maybe just as valuable. We can’t know in advance the possibilities God and we may be able to unfold.

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Brea Congregational United Church of Christ

May 26, 2019

Open to the Possibilities

John 5:1-9 After this there was a festival of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

2 Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. 3 In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. 5 One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be made well?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” 9 At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk. Now that day was a sabbath.

If you were reading along in your pew bible, you may have noticed that verse four is missing. Verse four was apparently not in the oldest manuscripts of the gospel of John, but you can understand why some scribe added it. It fills in the blanks nicely… “for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool and stirred up the water; whoever then first, after the stirring up of the water, stepped in was made well from whatever disease with which he was afflicted.” Talk about rationed health care!

However you take this story, as actual history or as a teaching story, let’s unpack it a little, and use our imaginations. The pool in this story is a source of hope, of miracles. But the miracles are rare, so there is a big crowd of people whose disabilities bring them here every day for a glimmer of hope, or at the least a way to pass the time. They sit around the pool all day, waiting for something to happen. In those long hours they talk; they’ve learned each other’s histories. One fellow takes the award for longest time disabled: thirty-eight years. His name is not given, which means he probably never became a follower of Jesus. We’ll call him Horace. Perhaps Horace’s family carries him out to the pool every morning and fetches him back home every night. Perhaps he very slowly makes his way there himself, settles in, and regales the new people with stories of long ago. Horace was the pool patriarch. He had his place, and his business as usual. To the newcomers he would say, “Better act fast, when the time comes.”

And who’s this Jesus character? Horace has never heard of the man in his life. Asking an outrageous question like, “Do you want to be made well?” Horace is annoyed. “Don’t you get it? I can’t. Here’s why.” At the same time, the Powers That Be have been telling Jesus, “Don’t you get it? You can’t.Here’s why.” But apparently Jesus can, and in front of everyone, he does. He tells Horace to pickup his mat and walk, and no one is more surprised than Horace when he does just that. Horace is stunned. Disoriented. And scared, because the Powers that Be, instead of celebrating his healing, are hassling him about breaking the Sabbath by carrying a mat. That could lead to his being excluded from the community, and Horace has been excluded enough, thank you very much. All the time he’s wondering: can this be real? Can this last? And if I am not the pool patriarch, who am I?

All the other people ringing the pool, each with their own stories, each with their own wounds, witnessing this transformation, what was their experience?

Shock and disruption… This healing wasn’t business as usual. What new order is afoot?

Jealousy… Why Horace and not me?

Hope… Why not me? Maybe there are possibilities for my life that I didn’t know existed. Why am I sitting here day after day waiting for something to happen? Say, can I see more of that Jesus guy? At least something new might happen.

Whether or not you understand Jesus as a miracle worker, he is a revealer of new possibilities. Psychologists tell us that two things can help us overcome the wounds of trauma. First, being able to tell a coherent story of what happened. Horace had that one down. Second, having agency, the power to act, a purpose for living, and something to live for. I hope Horace got that.

In the story Jesus did not cure everybody. He still doesn’t. He revealed new possibilities to everybody. He still does. New possibilities that disrupt old patterns of who belongs and who doesn’t, who matters and who doesn’t, who has power and who doesn’t. New possibilities for abundant life despite disability or hardship or oppression.

As the story continues beyond what we read, the religious authorities don’t like Jesus healing on a Sabbath. That’s a pretext. The religious authorities don’t like Jesus messing with business as usual, opening new possibilities for encountering sacred power outside of their control. I hope you know better than to make this story about Christian religion versus Jewish religion. The Powers That Be, then and now, are interested in power and control. Sabbath observance was just an excuse for power and control in this case. By now Powers claiming to be Christian have oppressed far more people than Powers claiming to be Jewish ever have.

The Powers that Be control the stories we live by. They define right and wrong. Powerful people who are invested (literally) in business as usual are by definition right. Who dares question them? and those who offer new possibilities are wrong, foolish, crazy... The Powers define what is possible: that is, what we believe to be possible. Their power depends on us not seeing new possibilities.

When I first read about HR 763, the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act of 2019, I thought, “That’ll never work. Big oil will never allow it.” And if we all think that, it’s guaranteed to be true. But I caught myself. I opened myself to the possibilities. This legislation is a long shot. It’s only one possibility for reducing our carbon emissions. But it’s a possibility. And the only way we will begin to free ourselves from our fossil fuel addiction that is killing the planet is to challenge business as usual, to see that a different world is possible. It is possible.

Here is how bible scholar Walter Bruggeman describes the work of a prophet. “To maintain a destabilizing presence, so that the system is not equated with reality, so that alternatives are thinkable, so that the absolute claims of the system can be critiqued.” We in this church have become prophets, because we see a new way. We are open to the possibility of letting go of fossil fuels, for the saving of the earth.

I am also open to the possibility of cost-effective low-income housing that offers dignity to its residents. I know UCC minister Vern Joseph. I know his work as the head of Retirement Housing Foundation, RHF is a UCC-affiliated nationwide non-profit corporation based in Long Beach. RHF builds and manages retirement and family housing. Their elderly residents are hospitalized at strangely low rates. Someone did a study to try to figure out how they manage to stay so healthy. Vigilant staff help, but that’s not all. It is intentional caring community. Dignity and purpose. It’s not that hard. Can you think of about twenty people you know personally that should live in such a place? Vern will be happy to build some for you if you have the money and zoning permits to make this possibility a reality. National money for affordable housing is gone. But there is plenty of money in California at the moment, and our neighbors have formed a YIMBY group, People for Housing. Yes in my backyard. Because loving your neighbor means helping them find a home. It is possible to house low-income people in health and in dignity. Now you know. Together we are open to this possibility.

In our personal lives and our relationships as well, the sacred may be inviting us to step out of a narrow and life-denying story that we have told ourselves. You can call it resurrection. You can call it Creative Transformation. But God is in it. What it isn’t is the same old sad story, business as usual, nothing can be done. The sacred invites to reach for new possibilities. Maybe we are stuck and can’t see a way out. Maybe we think, well, that is just the way things go, that is just the way I am. Can’t change it. But how do we know what is and isn’t possible?

Our low expectations and our attachment to business as usual can be habit-forming. We may not want to get our hopes up. We may not want to give up the misery we know for unknown possibilities. Or we may simply be trapped and not have any idea how to imagine a new possibility.

I wonder how many of you are familiar with the work of Alcoholics Anonymous and other twelve-step groups that use the same principles for various addictions. I don’t know because it’s anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous was created in the mid-twentieth century by a couple of drunks who crashed a small group program at a Methodist church called the Oxford Movement. The church folks got tired of the drunks so the drunks went and started their own meetings. They were looking for a remedy for a condition doctors did not know how to treat. To broaden their welcome, they took the overtly Christian trappings out it, called God their higher power. But make no mistake, they were looking for a spiritual transformation. You can’t make transformation happen, but you can seek the possibility of transformation, and it’s a possibility worth striving for. They say it works if you work it, and it’s a lot of work. And that’s a paradox, because how is a person who has made a wreck of their life supposed to work anything properly?

Total immersion is often recommended: daily meetings for 30 or 60 or 90 days, and doing whatever a sponsor tells you. You can fire your sponsor. But if you’re serious about the program, you have to get another sponsor, and do what they tell you. At meetings people learn the AA principles, but mostly they share their stories of recovery, so others can come to believe that a transformation might be possible for them. Your story of what is possible can change, especially in the presence of people who believe in you. Don’t want to do the work? The AAs have a remedy for that: Pray for the willingness. I like that. I can’t do this, God. I’m not sure it’s even possible. I’ll pray for the willingness to do the right thing, to show up for what I value. In this way, step by step, maybe millions of alcoholics over the years have found sobriety. Another thing AA say is, “Act as if.” To new members they say, act as if you’re sane and responsible and sober and considerate. If you act as if, repeatedly, you will be.

A young friend of mine recently celebrated seven years of sobriety. When she came into AA, she had lost everything: her driver’s license and her job, and all self-respect. I met her about five years ago and I have had the privilege of watching her grow from a bundle of raw nerves who was acting as if every day by the skin of her teeth, to become a responsible employee and wife and soon-to-be mother. It was a lot of hard work on her part, one day at a time, with a lot of support from friends and mentors, and a higher power. She has shown me it is possible, in supportive community, to rebuild a life.

So when we find ourselves saying, “I can’t,” or “That’s just not possible,” let’s catch ourselves and ask, “Is the sacred inviting me to be open to new possibilities that I can’t yet see?” Can we pray for the willingness to do things differently? Can I live in the tension between what is now and what might be? Are we willing to act as if the old story that has imprisoned us no longer applies, and a new story of life and hope is starting on our watch? May it start on our watch. May we be open to new possibilities for life and love and hope. Amen

Here are some other bits from last Sunday's worship...

Unison Prayer (Paraphrase of Psalm 67 by Christine Robinson)

Bless us, O God— whisper in our hearts and light our times.
Help us to understand your love and your law and bring them to bear on the world’s ills. Let all the people of the earth praise you with all their diverse voices.
Let them call out the ten thousand names. Let all nations praise you with the best of their ways. Let us all enjoy each other’s wisdom. Let the peoples of the earth bless the earth and heal her together. Bless us, O God, with your presence in our hearts,
And in the soul of our nation.

Creed

a poem by Laura Martin, Associate Pastor, Rock Spring UCC, Arlington VA

I believe in the held (musical) note,
And in the space of silence after.
I believe in the slow rise of creation,
In the light of late May.
I believe in the weight of peonies,
In the fragile,
In the imperishable.
I believe in the shark’s tooth found on the beach,
In the sweep of constellations,
In the history of my own muscles.
I believe in the conversations of shadows
And the dust shaken from courage.
I believe in the first and the forever,
In the you and the Us,
In the already and the still coming.

Love in Action

Yesterday I went on a hike hosted by “Southern California Botanists.” Botany hikes are not good exercise. We get about five feet down the path and somebody says, “Hey look at this plant!” We all gather round, ooh and ah, take pictures. We go another five feet down the path. “Oh wow, look at that plant!” Some of these plants are tiny grey mats of fluff that only a botanist could love. But a few were gorgeous. I had never heard of Turkish Rugging before. A whole bluff covered with little purple balls. I got to learn about these plants from the guy who wrote the book on Orange County native plants. Literally. Tucked under his arm, Fred Roberts had “the book” listing the 22,000 Orange County wild plants. Fred also co-wrote the book on OC native wildflowers. It was funny to watch him reel off the Latin name of a plant and then say, “But let me check!” Then he pulls out his own book, and spells it correctly for us.

This kind of field trip is not for everybody. Scott was relieved when he heard about it that he hadn’t tagged along. But what a gift it was for we who love this land and want to know it better, and for some reason enjoy knowing Latin names of things. Fred shared with us his passion, his love for these gifts of God, and he was also equipping another generation of volunteers to pass that love on.

Fred has been doing a botanical survey of rare plants at Crystal Cove State Park, right near the beach. Several varieties were thought extinct, because the botanists hired to do surveys before Fred didn’t bother climbing the bluffs to look for them. That he cares enough to look for them matters. If you identify a colony of rare plants, you can protect them, and that helps protect the land they’re on. Love in action.

We heard a piece of good news from Fred’s friend Dave, who is retired now, but used to manage Orange County’s coastal state parks. The bluffs we saw were not wildlands before the 1980’s. They were horse corrals and vegetable gardens. The soil was almost entirely bare sand, and what few plants were there were almost all invasive weeds. The bare cliffs were crumbling into the sea. Crystal Cove State Park was formed in 1978, and Dave’s crew began replanting a few native plants. With the cows and horses and plows gone and a little priming the pump, the seed bank hiding in the soil woke up. Many more varieties of natives than they’d planted began to appear. Now the bluffs are topped with deeply rooted native bushes that help prevent erosion into the sea. As Dave told us this, you could see the pride in his face.

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Brea Congregational United Church of Christ

May 12, 2019

Love in Action

Acts 9:36-42 Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas. She was devoted to good works and acts of charity. At that time she became ill and died. When they had washed her, they laid her in a room upstairs. Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, who heard that Peter was there, sent two men to him with the request, “Please come to us without delay.” So Peter got up and went with them; and when he arrived, they took him to the room upstairs. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them. Peter put all of them outside, and then he knelt down and prayed. He turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, get up.” Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up. He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he showed her to be alive. This became known throughout Joppa, and many believed in the Lord.

It has been my pleasure to participate in a Breaking Bread Group over the last two months. A half dozen of us gathered at each others homes. When it was my turn, we went to happy hour at Taps so people didn’t have to drive to Irvine. We took turns telling about our lives, and our faith, and our take on our church. It does me good to listen to participants of our church, as well as talk to you. One member of our group said this: “We are a conservative church. We believe Jesus.” That took me a while to process. What he meant was that we believe what Jesus taught. And at the center of what he taught was not right belief, but love in action. The most important commandment Jesus gave us: Love God, with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength. And the second: Love your neighbor as yourself. We gather here to remember what love looks like.

Love sometimes looks like simple respect. That is no small thing these days. Love sometimes looks like sharing, caring, offering but not forcing. Love can look like setting respectful limits instead of resenting. It sometimes looks like commitment when it would be easier to walk away. At its simplest, love looks like sharing a gift or a kindness with another, regardless of whether that other looks like us, or belongs with us, or is respectable.

Sometimes we get caught up in abstract ideas about what our religion is or isn’t. I enjoy talking theology, but that is not the heart of what Jesus taught us. Love is not a feeling. Love is a verb, a doing. We will not always succeed in loving like we think we should. We will do it imperfectly, and we will risk being hypocrites. That’s what happens when you have worthy goals.

Love does not require any miracles. Thank God. Peter worked a miracle, raising Tabitha from the dead. Whether or not you take the bible story at face value, consider. Peter has just created impossible expectations. The next time someone dies, call Peter! He’ll raise them from the dead, right? What do you mean you can’t do it this time, Peter? Don’t you love us? Aren’t you right with God? Poor Peter.

There are some things love cannot mend. But maybe it is just as well that most of us do not know how to do big heroic acts of love like Peter. Just little stitches like Tabitha’s that, over time, knit together lives of sacred worth and care.

Tabitha’s simple acts of love, in making clothing for others, are ordinary, and have inspired people for thousands of years. Tabitha’s love wasn’t abstract. It was clothing people well who would otherwise have had rags. She gave what gifts and time and talents she had to serve others. It seems from the story that she gathered others to serve with her, and that is a pretty good way to keep a church thriving. Love in action.

Churches through the ages have had Tabitha circles, sewing or quilting or knitting in community. Often the products of those circles go to people needing warmth or comfort. A friend of this church described knitting a prayer shawl for her friend who is facing cancer. She discovered a whole system of praying as she knit, so that loads of prayer and love went into that shawl. Her friend took a picture of herself wrapped in the shawl, waiting in the doctor’s office. But love in action can take different forms.

Another example of love in action. Last year I went to the Iftar meal at the mosque in Anaheim. People came together on a rooftop on a spring evening to share with each other the struggle and celebration of Ramadan. They had fasted all their daylight hours. The people from Brea Congregational had not fasted; it was actually First Food Sunday, complete with potluck! Nevertheless we were welcomed to accompany them as they prayed and broke their fast with a delicious feast. Reaching out across barriers that some would make hateful and violent, to invite strangers to celebrate a holy feast with them. Our Muslim friends showed us love in action.

Sometimes love is remembering. Each second Tuesday of the month, an interfaith memorial service is held at St. Philip Benizi church in Fullerton for the people of Orange County who have died “without fixed abode” in the previous month. All the names are read aloud. The souls of the homeless are not forgotten. Love in action.

Sometimes love is taking public stands on issues, because justice is what love looks like in public. My friend Sarah Halverson brought her baby to the Costa Mesa City Council meeting last week, She was there to speak for flying a rainbow flag at city hall each year from May 22, Harvey Milk Day, through June, Pride Month. Sarah didn’t need to stay with her baby for three hours till 9:30 pm and speak in favor of the flag. The Council already had the votes. But she wantedto speak for her church’s values, to support her friends, and to remind people how important it is to make a safe space for LGBTQ people these days. Love in action.

Another example of love in action. Many of you have asked, “How can we help,” when you heard of Mike Flynn’s accident. It sounds like our help is not needed right now, but Lauren knows we offered, and I hope she knows how much love and prayers are there for Mike. Our love can’t fix him, but we hope it brings their family a little comfort and encouragement. There will be a card for you to sign in the Hall after the service.

A final example of love in action. Edith died last week at the age of 91. I never met Edith. I learned about her from my friend, who had to tell me about Edith. Every year for twenty-five years Edith called up my friend and asked her who could she drive to Idyllwild for their annual retreat. Edith would drive from Orange to Newport Beach to pick someone up to take to Idyllwild. And back again at the end of the weekend. Never mind that she was older than the person she was driving. You all know that driving someone distances in Southern California traffic is an act of love. My friend was walking down the street with Edith one time when she fished a Kleenex out of her purse, bent over, and scooped up a piece of gum. Because then it wouldn’t get caught on the bottom of someone’s shoe. Love can be that simple. That was how Edith operated, apparently all the time.

Edith clearly loved what she did, as did Tabitha, and she loved others through what she did. As do Fred and Dave. Love in action. No miracles required. No perfection required. Special skills can help, but thoughtfulness or enthusiasm work almost as well. What are your personal ways to put love in action?

I thank you, members and friends of Brea Congregational, for being love in action over and over again, in large ways and small. You bring food for the food shelf. You support Citizens Climate Lobby, including hosting that amazing Sustainable Living Faire. You marched in the OC Pride parade. You welcome visitors of all description. I see love in action as we do the small and ordinary tasks that keep us celebrating on Sunday morning and sharing this church’s message of inclusive welcome and love for all, including care for the earth. Thank you.

There is a risk in claiming an ethic of love. We will not always do it well. We may never think we are doing enough. And others may judge us as lacking. Occasionally we may do the opposite of love. (Speaking for myself, anyway.) This is the risk we take, being human, and trying to live up to high principles. Loving ourselves means accepting our limitations, forgiving our failures, and practicing kindness for ourselves as well as others.

So put your love into action, whether it’s babysitting or fixing a car, saying a prayer or writing a card, calling your congressperson or driving someone to the doctor. Do it with a friend, make it a habit, do it for the fun of it. Celebrate the people who show you love in action, like Tabitha. Watch what they do, learn, help. And if you can’t do what they do, just enjoy what they do, and figure out your special stitch in the fabric that is our love for one another and for God. And rely on God’s all-encompassing love to weave our little stitches together into a beautiful tapestry of sacred worth and care. Amen.

Pages

The Amount

Jailbreak

Open to Possibilities

Love in Action