Monthly Archives: December 2014

New Year’s Goals

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It seems to me that so much “success” in our lives is based on setting goals. We set goals in our business ventures; we set goals for our personal self-care — exercise, diet and relationships; we set goals for acquiring the toys and things we want in life. Setting goals motivates us to act!

A person who does not have any goals, we believe, is a person without backbone, floating untethered through life, unprincipled, and usually lazy and poor. A person without any goals, we believe, is rudderless and not making the most of what life can offer. A person without any goals, we believe, are the very people who end up in therapy, counselling, or on the street. They just need to get their life back on track by setting some goals, we believe.

There are some traditions of this time of year that stand out for me. Making New Year’s resolutions is one of them. And I like to ponder what this means, because I need to get back on track with so many things — year after year! And since I do a lot of driving, I like what blogger Jeff Boss has to say about New Year’s resolutions:

“New Year’s resolutions are like traffic. As the driver, your focus is intent while trying to ‘get there;’ you see others pass you by; you get held up at a red light that slows down progress. Distractions such as the radio, crazy drivers, cellphones, preclude you from focusing on the one thing you should: the road ahead. In other words, New Year’s resolutions come and go, ebb and flow, only to be revisited the following year …

“It has been said that the only certainty in life is uncertainty; change is the one ‘thing’ we can all count on to always be there—and that guy Murphy always seems to be leading the charge.” (Jeff Boss, contributor, “4 Simple Goal-Setting Ideas for 2015”, Forbes http://buff.ly/1A6rx47)

As important as goal-setting is, we also have somehow to account for the unexpected, on-the-ground realities that come our way on the journey towards that goal.

What will we do when we encounter those who ‘pass us by’ on the road? What will we do when we have to ‘stop at a red light’? And, what will we do when we are distracted from our goals?

First, what do you do when you see others pass you by on the road of life and faith? Our culture is based on the value of competition — whether we’re talking about sibling rivalry, sports or our economy. Competition can be a motivator.

But it can also deflate one’s spirit, creativity and passion. Because competition can discourage you from focusing on the grace in your unique life, the gifts of your own life, family, job, and the blessing you are to others. You are beloved by God, created in the image of the Divine, endowed with a special gift to share with the world.

And it doesn’t matter that someone is passing you on the road; it doesn’t matter what other people are doing. It only matters what you are doing. How has our cultural obsession with competition and comparison stifled your growth and held you back?

Second, what do you do when you get held up at a red light that slows down progress? The red lights in our lives are usually those unfortunate events that are unexpected, stressful and require the loving support of others. No amount of goal setting can turn this around: a family member suddenly turns ill, you receive a discouraging diagnosis, a friend dies, tragedy strikes, the bottom falls out on your personal life, you lose your job. If you’ve set some lofty goals before any of this happens, you’re into a major reset on life. After all, “Life happens,” they say.

Finally, what do you do when you are distracted by the radio, crazy drivers, or your cellphone? These are issues we probably have the most control over, whether we like it or not, whether we take responsibility for them or not.

Most of the ‘distractions’ of life are self-imposed. We do it unto ourselves — lifestyle choices that are really counter-productive, habits that immediately gratify but are ultimately self-destructive. We enter here the realm of addictive behaviours that can de-rail any idealistic goals for self-improvement. So, they say, instead of watching that show, go for a walk; instead of staying up late on social media or surfing the net, get some sleep; instead of indulging in that second helping, pack away leftovers for lunch the next day.

This inner struggle can drive us over the curb and into the ditch! The passers-by, the red lights and the distractions on the road of life throughout the year often cause us to abandon those goals altogether.

I wonder what some of those first desert wanderers did to cope with the reality of the terrain over which they travelled. I wonder how the Magi (Matthew 2:1-12) following a star in the sky, coped with seeing others pass them by on the caravan routes whenever the star appeared to stop in the sky? I wonder how the Magi, following that star over what must have been a long period of time, dealt with the red lights of set backs that surely must have occurred on the trail? I wonder how the Magi kept their spirits up when the desert creatures, sand storms and bandits threatened their safety and resolve on the journey? I wonder what would have happened if they said, “Let’s just give this until January 11th, or December 21, or December 31 at midnight — and if that star hasn’t brought us to the Christ-child by then, let’s go home!”?

Perhaps the wisdom of the ancient story of the Epiphany has something to say to us about how we traverse the terrain of our lives today. As we set goals and resolve to do certain things in 2015, perhaps it would be wise to pay attention to how we travel over the long haul of our lives, and not just fixate on the specific goals themselves.

Will we pause regularly on the side of the road — not just at Christmas and Easter — to worship, pray and give thanks? Will we pause regularly on the side of the road — not just when times are good, but especially when they are bad — to reflect on the Word and the meaning of our faith in Jesus? Will we pause regularly on the side of the road — regardless of our ‘goals’ — to remember the One who walks with us, who is always by our side, who is ever faithful to us and steadfast in love for the whole world?

And thank God, that we always have a second chance to press the ‘reset button’ on our lives, reflect again, and start anew! Year after year! It is a miracle and grace that we even consider a fresh brand of New Year’s resolutions every January 1st. Despite the failures, we still go back to the drawing board every New Year.

In 2015, perhaps our goals need to be a little more open-ended and less prescriptive. The magi had a goal, to be sure: to follow the star to where the newborn king was born. But that goal could lead them anywhere! They didn’t presume it had to be Jerusalem. They didn’t presume it had to be in a palace. They didn’t presume it had to be in their own home country.

When the goals are set with this kind of openness, Murphy may still lead the charge, uncertainty can still be the only certain thing, and change be the only constant on the journey of life. But we still trust that God’s promises are true and that eventually our yearning and longings are resolved somewhere in God’s unconditional, and never-ending love.

Happy New Year!

Jesus is here

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On Christmas Eve we come to see, and to pay attention to, the places where Jesus comes to us: Jesus is born into all the places of our lives. Jesus comes to us, wherever we are and go. The fact that Jesus — the King of Kings — was born in an animal stable (not a palace), to teenagers (not the rich and powerful) and whose first visitors were the ruddy shepherds (not the highly educated) — should tip us off to this truth: Jesus comes into the least expected places of our lives — not just here at church, or at the altar.
But in our homes, in our places of work, in the marketplaces, in our schools.
Merry Christmas!

Jesus is here

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On Christmas Eve we come to see, and to pay attention to, the places where Jesus comes to us: Jesus is born into all the places of our lives. Jesus comes to us, wherever we are and go. The fact that Jesus — the King of Kings — was born in an animal stable (not a palace), to teenagers (not the rich and powerful) and whose first visitors were the ruddy shepherds (not the highly educated) — should tip us off to this truth: Jesus comes into the least expected places of our lives — not just here at church, or at the altar. But in our homes, in our places of work, in the marketplaces, in our schools.
Merry Christmas!

The Falling and the Rising

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It is the first Sunday after Christmas. How do you navigate this ‘hangover’ time? Are you wandering now into the proverbial ‘deep valley’ after having experienced the ‘mountaintop’ of festive frivolity?

For some, the reality of the cost of gift giving has begun to sink in. Perhaps for you, your expectations were high coming into the season, only now to discover it was not what you thought it would be. For others still, the toys unwrapped on Christmas morn are already a tiresome bore, left on the shelf somewhere.

There is good reason to suggest that choristers ought to visit the nursing home with joyous carols, not before Christmas Day, but in the dog-days of late December and early January. It is this time that many of us may need a pick-me-up, more than ever. I am grateful some of you thought to organize a congregation meal together for Epiphany rather than when things are crazy in mid-December, when we are at the height of all expectation and activity.

We read in the Gospel text today, “Then Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary: “This child is destined for the falling and rising of many …” (Luke 2:34)

Notice the backward order of the words in the scripture — “falling and rising”. In the world, as it may be how we feel at this time of year, it’s ‘rise and fall’: The rise and fall of the Roman Empire, the rise and fall of the Third Reich, the rise and fall of a business tycoon, the rise and fall of a celebrity.

In Macleans magazine, they evaluate 2014 newsmakers in terms of “winners and losers” — and include the likes of famous Canadian radio host, Jian Ghomeshi, who “fell from grace”, we say, whose stardom rapidly disintegrated this Fall (Dec 8/15, Vol.127, Nos.48/49). This is the way we see the rhythm of history and what the world notices. First, one rises; then, once on top, the only way is the way down.

But with Jesus it’s the other way around. With Jesus, it’s fall and rise. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:24). Anna fasts “night and day”, not ‘day and night’. Jesus did not fly directly up into heaven once danger flared. He suffered and died, and then was raised to glory. The movement is down, then up (Philippians 2:5-11). We fall, and from that lowest point, we rise.

You may just fall. But if you rise, it is because you have first fallen. Rising doesn’t come without falling.

If you have arisen, you would have done so rising from the ashes of defeat, failure, having come through some of the worst time of your life. If you have arisen, you would know what it means to be at ground zero. There is spiritual power and great wisdom in embracing your own vulnerability, your own limitation, your own shame, anger and fear.

There is inherent value in being open and honest about your pain — not denying it, not pretending it away, not hiding it, nor distracting ourselves from it. Because it is in facing our own ‘stuff’, even our own mortality, that we will experience the turn.

Simeon, the elder, can now be hospitable to his impending death after encountering the vulnerable, infant Jesus (Luke 2:22-40). There is no rising without first falling. Ironically, this is also the message of Easter. And this is how Christmas and Easter are indivisible: We can see it from the perspective of Mary …

Mary must have shuddered at Simeon’s words. Mysteriously he speaks of a “sword piercing her soul” (v.35). It is moving to think of Mary, feeling Jesus kick in her womb, hearing his first cry, nursing him, watching his first steps. After all, she will witness thirty years, which is telescoped into a single verse: “The child grew and became strong” (v.40). Jesus leaves home and marshals a following.

But wicked men turn against her son — who is pure, good, all love. Mary has to watch as Simeon’s prophecy is fulfilled. Her heart breaks as she sees the lifeblood she had given him drain out of his beautiful body on the Cross. The fall.

But then the rise, on Easter morn. Who, among all who witnessed Jesus risen from the dead, was more joyful to see him alive than his own mother? (thanks to James C. Howell, “Feasting on the Word” WJK Press, Kentucky, 2008, p.168, for his words and thoughts on ‘falling and rising’).

So, when we are at the bottom, how do we cope when “in the Fall”, and when we still await “the Rise”?

As I reflect about looking back over unhappy times in my own life, as I reflect on dashed expectations, disappointments and unfulfilled ‘wants’ — I wonder. I wonder if crying out for the Lord is a cry of despair, or a cry of hope? (thanks, Rev. Doug Reble, for this insight). For me, I have to confess: I would not give up on hope.

Because of Jesus. Mary and Joseph, in this part of the Christmas story, take Jesus to the temple in order to fulfill the letter of the Jewish law (Luke 2:22-24). Their diligence may raise questions for Christians who feel no obligation to the Old Testament’s laws. What is the purpose of the ‘sacrifice’ for their purification?

From a Christian faith perspective, we would say this child was in no need of any such purification. Jesus did not need to be purified. Karl Barth wonderfully wrote about Jesus’ baptism — which we shall read in a couple of weeks — that Jesus needed to be washed of sin; but not his sin, but our sin: “No one who came to the Jordan was as laden and afflicted as He” (cited in ibid., p.164).

No one ever came to the temple for purification as laden with sin — not his, but our sin. Jesus took it all on him. Jesus was purified, for our sake. Jesus takes it all on him — whatever burden we carry — so that we can have a new start, a fresh beginning. Therefore, we can hope.

In this coming new year, 2015, may you be blessed with hope. A hope which carries you through the weeks, months, or even years of “lonely exile” and into the peace, love, and joy promised in Jesus Christ. May your falling turn into a glorious rising, “soon and very soon”.

Holy Innocents

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There is a rather obscure and tragic story from the bible not widely told. But it is part of the Christmas story (Matthew 2:16-18).

Herod was infuriated that the Magi had tricked him. Their agreement was that after paying homage to the newborn Messiah, the Magi would come back to Jerusalem and report to Herod where this new King was. Instead, they had gone home by a different route.

Enraged, the evil and paranoid dictator massacred all boys under 2 years of age in the Bethlehem area — just to be sure he would not have any competition from any Messiah, for years to come. Machiavellian in spirit, such brutality is reserved for the annals of history when humankind was barbaric and unenlightened, right? Surely, we have evolved to higher levels of sophistication. Or?

Last week alone, 132 schoolchildren and nine staff were massacred in a vicious attack by the Taliban in Peshawar, Pakistan. Then, in a Nigerian marketplace, some children were murdered by suicide bombers. All this tragedy, just in the past week.

The world today, never-mind first century Palestine, watches the anguish of grieving parents burying their children. And, in the words of Primate Fred Hiltz (Anglican Church of Canada), “we are left wondering how such evil intent to kill innocent children continues to stock the earth.”

The world, it would seem, has never been an easy place to bear and raise children. The dangers have threatened throughout the ages. Not only two thousand years ago, but to this day, we shake our heads and wonder: Why would anyone want to bring a child into the world today?

I think we could, then, sympathize with Mary’s initial response, after the angel Gabriel visits her with the astounding news that she will bear the Christ child. The Gospel text for today simply indicates that Mary was “perplexed” (Luke 1:29) by this encounter.

I think we can relate. What the angel proposes is both irrational and incredible. One would have to suspend belief — in at least two ways:

The angel’s message basically boils down to two instructions: First, “Do not be afraid!”
and then, “You will bear Christ!” Why? How so? “How can this be?”

“Do not be afraid!” “Fear not” — This message is actually repeated in the bible some 365 times (one for each day of the year). But this time is a dark time, and a dark place. How can we not be afraid!

At the same time, the Word instructs us to “fear the Lord”. Fear, in this sense, is humility before the Divine. Fear is respect before that which is indescribable, uncontainable, Mystery. “Fearing the Lord” is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10). Those who fear the Lord, as Mary then sings, upon them mercy endures forever (Luke 1:50). In the end, fearing the Lord is about trusting in God above all else.

What kind of God do we worship? Look at Jesus: Our Lord is known for having taken children in his arms, blessing them and upholding their awe and wonder in the love and trust of those who care for them (Mark 10).

Sometimes I think we get things mixed up about God — that somehow God is like a dictator who keeps a checklist of who’s following the rules and who isn’t — and then punishing those who are deviant. God, in this view, is like some cosmic police-officer.

But if Jesus shows us who the Father is, then the picture is entirely different. “Jesus did not come to change God’s mind about humanity. Jesus came to change the mind of humanity about God” (twitter: @RichardRohrOFM). Jesus shows us that the God we worship is nothing like what we had come to expect in the likes of ruthless, dictators personified in power-obsessed Herod.

We don’t have to be afraid — afraid of God — because of who God is: “slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love” (Psalm 103:8).

The second message may be even more perplexing: “You shall conceive in your womb a child … by the Holy Spirit … and he shall be Son of the Most High”! (Luke 1:31-35)

Scholars have long puzzled over the past tense on the lips of this soon-to-be pregnant woman. Mary, who before giving birth speaks of her offspring’s approaching mission as already accomplished — finished and done (i.e. “the Lord has scattered the proud; has brought down the powerful; has lifted up the lowly, has filled the hungry with good things”, etc.) She announces how the wrongs of her dark history have already been made right. (Luke 1:51-54).

The use of the past tense to announce a consummated future, is a statement of profound and deep faith. This grammatical curiosity from the Word of God suggests life-changing ramifications. Our challenge, I believe, is in the spirit of Mary’s faith, to cultivate the ability to see God’s promises as already having come to pass.

When we can express our faith from a trusting-in-God heart, how wonderfully this can change our whole outlook on life! Because we have to wait for it — something that, beyond our agency, will surely come to pass!

We are almost there. The liturgy in Advent forces us to wait for singing the joy of Christmas, unlike our culture that is already getting tired of Christmas when it hasn’t even happened yet. In church during Advent, we haven’t sung the Christmas carols for a reason.

Not only because Christmas doesn’t start until the 25th. But also because, as I’ve heard it said, Mary’s song must be the first Christmas song. Because it sets the right tone. It sets the tone of faithful praise and adoration. It brings truth and grace into sharp relief. It announces that the promises of God will come to pass:

For the lowly, the humble, those who respect the Lord. God will make things right for those who trust in God and God’s word.

How would you sing, this Christmas? How can you, now in your life, bring forth words, as well as a heart of thanksgiving, affirmation and hope? How has God been merciful in your life? Make a list, and check it more that twice!

My hunch is that even though life may indeed be difficult for you — whether burdened by grief, by sorrow, by depression, by financial ruin, by ill-health or a pending diagnosis, whatever — there are moments, even now, even barely perceptible, where you can point to a glimmer of grace, a memory of joy, and a hope that surpasses all understanding.

This is the song to carry you through the season. Because sleeping below our awareness of reality is the truth that God has already fulfilled his promises. And now, it’s simply a question of accessing the power of that truth, releasing it from your heart, for your life and for the benefit of a world shrouded in darkness.

Thanks be to God!

Santa is not God – the true gift

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During Advent, the church has fasted. Not from food! Rather, we have refrained — tried to, at least, in our liturgies — from singing Christmas Carols. This was part of our preparation as we made room in our hearts by waiting and watching for the coming of Jesus.

But now, the wait is over! Christmas is a time for singing, a time for the carols. It is well to gorge on them now while they are plentiful, because it will be another year before we will sing them again.

Martin Luther, who loved Christmas, claimed that “music is a fair and glorious gift of God.” Music, he said, “makes people kinder, gentler, more staid and reasonable. The devil flees before the sound of music as much as before the Word of God” (from the foreword to the “Wittenburg Gesangbuch” (1524), Martin Luther’s hymnbook).

So, I would like you to ponder with me what is this ‘gift’ of Christmas so well expressed in the music of the season. I invite you to listen to lyrics from a couple of different popular, contemporary Christmas songs — that are normally not sung in church. But each of these songs have something to say to us about the gift of God at Christmas — the Gospel message about the Word made flesh in Jesus Christ.

Let’s see if you can identify them. Listen first to the words that we’ve probably heard in shopping malls since shortly after Halloween. It’s pretty easy to guess this one …

“You better watch out, you better not cry
You better not pout, I’m telling you why
Santa Claus is coming to town

He’s making a list, he’s checking it twice
Gonna find out who’s naughty or nice
Santa Claus is coming to town

He sees you when you’re sleeping
He knows when you’re awake
He knows if you’ve been bad or good
So be good for goodness sake

Oh, you better watch out, you better not cry
You better not pout, I’m telling you why
Santa Claus is coming to town, yeah
Santa Claus is coming
Santa Claus is coming to town!”

(Answer: Santa Claus is Coming to Town)

How does this popular song reflect (or not) the nature of God’s gift and grace at Christmas? And I’ll give you a hint: God is NOT Santa Claus. Yes, both Santa and Jesus are coming at Christmas to a town near you. But that’s where the similarity stops. Why?

Does God make a list? Does God check it twice? Does God try to figure out who’s naughty and nice, in order to determine who get’s the gift of Jesus’ love and presence?

If you look at all the characters in the New Testament, characters that meet Jesus, starting with Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, the tax collectors, those fishermen disciples, women, lepers, outcasts …. do they deserve the gift? If Santa was making a list of who’s been naughty or nice, we’d probably have to exclude everyone in the bible!

“They were people who were considered taboo, contagious, disabled, dangerous or excluded for all kinds of reasons” (Richard Rohr, “Preparing for Christmas” Franciscan Media, Cincinnati, 2008, p.56). They were poor, ordinary folk, whose sin, whose imperfection was visible, apparent. According to the message of Santa Claus is Coming to Town, they would have received a piece of coal in their stocking!

Santa is not God. The greatness of God’s gift is precisely because it is not conditional on our hard work to be ‘nice’. The greatest gift at Christmas is not something for which we must toil or earn by our hard work. But something that is given, that is already there, inside us!

Okay, time for the second song. Hear if you can recognize it by the lyrics; it tells a beautiful story …

“A poor orphan girl named Maria
Was walking to market one day
She stopped for a rest by the roadside
Where a bird with a broken wing lay
A few moments passed till she saw it
For it’s feathers were covered with sand
But soon clean and wrapped it was travelling
In the warmth of Maria’s small hand
She happily gave her last peso
On a cage made of rushes and twine
She fed it loose corn from the market
And watched it grow stronger with time
Now the Christmas Eve service was coming
And the church shone with tinsel and light
And all of the town folks brought presents
To lay by the manger that night
There were diamonds and incense
And perfumes
In packages fit for a king
But for one ragged bird in a small cage
Maria had nothing to bring
She waited till just before midnight
So no one would see her go in
And crying she knelt by the manger
For her gift was unworthy of Him
Then a voice spoke to her through the darkness
Maria, what brings you to me
If the bird in the cage is your offering
Open the door and let me see
Though she trembled, she did as He asked her
And out of the cage the bird flew
Soaring up into the rafters
On a wing that had healed good as new
Just then the midnight bells rang out
And the little bird started to sing
A song that no words could recapture
Whose beauty was fit for a king
Now Maria felt blessed just to listen
To that cascade of notes sweet and long
As her offerings was lifted to heaven
By the very first nightingale’s song.”

(Answer: Garth Brooks, “The Gift”)

The gift is an experience of grace, of something wonderful happening to us and in us and around us that is beyond our own efforts. All we need to do, is bring it forward, and offer what we have that is true to who we are — including our weaknesses, our limitations, our lowliness.

And God makes something beautiful out of our simple offering — the gift of our hearts, our minds, our hands. Like the healing of the bird, and its free song, it is a gift of pure love, a love that is shines unrelenting in the darkness and brokenness of our lives.

Last week at our children’s school concert, as is usual fair at these events, each class and grade goes on stage and presents a seasonal skit or song.

Near the end of the program, the audience was delighted to receive Ottawa singer-songwriter Craig Cardiff on stage with his guitar, surrounded by the grade 2-3 class. They danced and sang a simplified version of Craig’s popular song: “Love is Louder Than All the Noise”.

In the second verse, he writes:
“Was your messy heart chosen
or was it overlooked?
Are you the crazy in the corner,
writing it in your book?
A cynic with a cynic’s hook
waiting for the sky to fall?
Were you to be taken from me
by word by craft or by bomb
I would rage into an army
and bring you back with songs…
We said love is louder
than all this, all this noise.
Love is louder than all this noise.”

In the singing that we enjoy in this festive season, may our hearts, our minds and our hands sing loudest of the love of God. This greatest gift doesn’t come from our belief and ability to impress, nor from the resourcefulness of our own doing, nor from all the glitter and glamour.

The greatest gift of Christmas comes from a simple desire to love, and the openness of heart to be loved.

Christmas: Jesus all grown-up in us

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In the Monastery of the Holy Spirit in Conyers, Georgia, Mary — the God-bearer — is depicted in a magnificent rose window above the altar. What strikes me is the size of Mary’s womb. Mary sits in this glorious stained-glass circle with outstretched arms and a womb so large it contains Jesus standing as a grown man, with his arms open wide. (Trisha Lyons Senterfitt, “Feasting on the Word; Advent Companion”, WJK Press, Kentucky, 2014, p. 90)

Why the adult form of Jesus? After all, isn’t the Christmas story of Mary giving birth to the Son of Man about a baby Jesus? Was the artist of this stained glass window confusing metaphors?

Or, is there something more going on here worthy of our reflection?

After all, the historical Jesus was a man. But Christ was not his last name. “The Christ” includes the whole sweep of creation, and history joined with him, including you and me. We are members, each and every one of us, of the Body of Christ — this ‘mystical union’ we call it in our liturgy; Lutherans have sometimes called it the ‘invisible union’ of the church. Though we cannot claim to be the historical Jesus, obviously, we are, as Martin Luther described it, “little Christs”. We rightly believe in Jesus Christ — and both names — ‘Jesus’ and ‘Christ’ — are important. We, like Mary, are Christ-bearers.

The celebration of Christmas is not merely a reverie about a baby born in Bethlehem. We do the Gospel of Jesus no favour when we make Jesus, the eternal Christ, into a perpetual baby, a baby able to ask little or no adult response from us. That may have been the role of Advent — the season of preparing the way of the Lord, when we consider how to make room for the birth of Jesus in our lives. A baby image can be helpful, to start with: A sign of grace that results in a sweet feeling of love.

But, eventually, we have to grow up. A mature Christianity, today, receives the risen Christ in his fullness. In relationship with Jesus the Christ, there come expectations. God wants to relate to us in our adulthood — expecting a full, free, responsible, participatory (Philippians 3:10), cooperative (Romans 8:28) and mature (Ephesians 4:13) adult response from us. When we pray, “Come, Christ Jesus”, we are asking for our own full birth and transformation. God, in our growth, wants ultimately to have an adult relationship with us.

When we read in the Gospel today that we have the power to become “children of God” (John 1:12) we are not relinquishing any responsibility and mature engagement with our faith; being a ‘child of God’, a wonderful expression, simply indicates that God is God and I am not; being a ‘child of God’ describes a quality of trust towards God, a trust that despite any delusion on my part that I can somehow earn God’s favour. Because God still has faith in me. God will never give up on me.

But Christ has come! And it is the risen Christ in 2014, not the historical baby, of two thousand years ago! (Richard Rohr, “Preparing for Christmas” Franciscan Media, Cincinnati, 2008, p.8-9)

In our lives we have the capability already born within us to have room for our transformation. We are all ‘pregnant’ with the possibility of new life, becoming more than we are, growing up into the fullness promised to us in Christ. For God is with us and in us.

So, what does that path to our transformation look like?

In a modern painting of the manger scene by German artist Beate Heinen, Mary and Joseph hover over their newborn baby boy Jesus. There are no angels in the painting, neither ox and donkey nor any of the people, who in our imagination usually gather around the crib – shepherds and kings; just the three of them: Mary, Joseph and the child lying in a manger, which looks conspicuously like a coffin. The scene is set in a cold cavern like stable from which a winding path leads to a distant hill with three crosses. (Thank you to Rev. Thomas Mertz for this illustration)

In all the glory and celebration of the Advent and Christmas season this image sticks out like a sore thumb. As we celebrate the renewed life and hope for our world in Christ, the reminder to suffering and death creates a stumbling block. And it always has.

“How then is it written about the Son of Man, that he is to go through many sufferings and be treated with contempt?”(Mark 9:12) The words though spoken by Jesus reflect a nagging question on the minds and in the hearts of the disciples: “How can it be that our salvation comes through the suffering of God?” A few years later Paul wrote to the Corinthians that the message about the cross is foolishness (1 Corinthians 1).

You will notice that halfway between the manger and the hill in Beate Heinen’s painting there are three wanderers – a reminiscence of Jesus meeting two of his disciples on their way to Emmaus; still struggling and pondering the same questions, facing the foolishness of the cross.

As all believers they travel the road between the Good News of Christmas, the pain of Good Friday and the Glory of Easter. And it is not until they gather around a table, worshipping and united in the breaking of bread, that in the presence of God all starts to fall into place and their questions come to rest (Luke 24:13-35).

“The word made flesh” is the proclamation of the festive celebration of the Nativity of our Lord. The word made flesh! Meaning, that the Word — Jesus Christ — comes into our very ordinary humanity. But not the glory of humanity in all its splendour and might.

Rather, as the Christmas story reveals, Christ comes into the darkest night of our souls — in the outcast, rejected places. Christ comes into the impoverished places of our lives, and of humanity. As at least one theologian has put it (i.e. Gustavo Gutierrez), the Word made flesh should read: The Word made poor. That’s where Jesus is born and is at work. As Saint Paul put it, “For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich” (2 Corinthians 8:9).

As bread is broken around the Holy Communion, Christ comes into the broken places in us and into the world where healing is needed. The circle in the Georgia Monastery stained glass reminds me of the trajectory of my life — the promise of completion, wholeness, fulfillment is there, in Christ Jesus. I am continually being re-made, transformed; I am growing, in Christ Jesus. And so are you.

The rest of the world wants to finish Christmas this morning. But the true Christmas message that begins today does not allow us to keep stuck in our baby Christianity. But invites us to grow up — no matter how young we are — in a maturing faith, deepening commitment, and active Christian witness to the newborn King!

May we grow into a fuller, deeper celebration of Christmas in the days to come, as we ponder the mystery of God’s incarnation, God entering our humanity.

An Advent-Christmas funeral sermon

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In some churches, the manger scenes during the Advent season are left intentionally incomplete: For example, as in our creche, the manger is empty; during the four weeks leading up to Christmas, the figurine of baby Jesus is not there. Until December 25th.

In one congregation that worships in a large, cathedral-type building, the magi start their journey at the beginning of Advent somewhere in the narthex (the entrance). Each successive Sunday in Advent, the magi move closer to the manger scene which is set up at the front near the altar.

And, each Sunday, the children of the congregation are charged with a treasure-hunt search for where the figurines of the magi have been placed that week — whether on a decorated window sill, or beside a poinsettia plant, or on the steps to the chancel, etc.

Not only do these traditions emphasize the important Advent themes of waiting and watching with expectation for the coming Christmas joy, we are reminded at this time of year that we are, all of us, indeed, on a journey towards the manger, towards a new encounter with Jesus.

I believe Grant’s love of hiking revealed his ability to see the Big Picture. You see, when you go on a hike, following a trail that spans hundreds of kilometres as Grant has done on occasion, you are not just meandering aimlessly. Oh, yes, the trail can take many twists, turns, ups and downs.

But part of the joy of long-distance hiking is understanding in your imagination where you are headed, where you began, and the relationship between the two. No matter where you are along that journey, you can see the Big Picture.

One of my favourite visual effects of modern cinema does this well: From the perspective of the TV/movie camera, a scene of someone or something that happens on the ground in one moment of time is suddenly zoomed out; we move backwards up into the sky — still focused on the ground, but quickly disappears through the clouds and then into outer space. And we can see the planet earth and the solar system. And we can understand how that particular event or person on earth relates to the cosmos!

To have this Big Picture vision is to see our present reality, on the ground, from the perspective of not only history (where you’ve been) but also from the perspective of the future (where you’re going). Grant was a Big Picture kind of guy. He enjoyed the long-distance hike.

The ancient caravan routes through the Holy Land, Judean desert I think informed the prophetic writings, many of which we read in the Bible. These caravan routes were the life-line of the economy, and framed the boundaries of social order.

When you followed a caravan route you were walking a path trodden by generations of people who came before you, and a path that was followed by many once you were gone. This is the experience of people who journey, in every time and place.

I like our Bishop’s repeated advice to pastors whenever we gather for clergy and leadership retreats: “Remember, we are one and all merely ‘interim’ pastors”. Even pastors who are tenured and may remain years, even decades, in one parish are still, only, ‘interim’. They are interim because there were pastors who preceded them in the congregations’s history, and hopefully there will be more pastors coming once they are gone.

The point is not a focus on the pastor so much as seeing that pastor in the context of the larger history and journey of a congregation. It’s to regard an individual from the perspective of the Big Picture.

I can see why Richard Rohr uses the term, Big Picture, to understand the Kingdom of God. Because even though we are in constant transition on the caravan route, both the memory of the past and the promise of the future impinge on the present moment. In the Big Picture, the twin pulls of historical and future vision reveal a “vibrant now” in which God’s kingdom is complete and dwelling among us (Gail Ricciuti, “Feasting on the Word; Advent Companion”, WJK Press, Kentucky, 2014, p.94).

Being in the present moment, while informed by the past and motivated by the future promise, requires that you keep both feet on the ground. Hiking is an activity that requires the hiker not merely to keep moving, but to keep focused on the ground, one step at a time. It’s a cliche, but it’s a good one: a journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.

As such, the journey of faith is grounded in the moment. It is earthy, real. Your boots, feet and legs get dirty, scratched, bitten, sunburned. The Big Picture ultimately, for it to be effective, is anchored in the present, gritty, sometimes ugly circumstance of life.

Even when we experience death, loss, suffering and pain; this is part of the route when we have to go through the wilderness, the desert, and navigate the ‘dark night of the soul’ (St John of the Cross).

When I hiked part of the Bruce Trail near Tobermory on the Bruce Peninsula years ago, I remember first following the trail from the parking lot to a cliff- edge standing over a hundred feet above the crashing surf of Georgian Bay. It was a beautiful vista overlooking the bay, the sky, the water birds. The memory is vibrant: breathing in the marine smells, feeling the warm, morning sun. I relished the moment, standing still, taking it all in.

I didn’t want to turn my back on it, and continue on the hike. I wanted the moment to last forever. I felt that should I continue on the trail, I would never experience such a blissful moment again. It wasn’t easy to rip myself away. However, in the course of the day, there were many more such views I enjoyed along the trail.

The poet T.S. Elliott wrote: “The end is where we start from … or say that the end precedes the beginning” (ibid.). Grant met his ‘end’, we say, in dying. But that ending was just the start of something new. Our faith in God, the promise of salvation, Jesus’ resurrection, and by the guidance of the Holy Spirit — we are, each and everyone of us, including Grant — well equipped for the journey of life and death.

Because even though we might need to keep putting one foot forward and turn our back on the old, there is in each turn only something new waiting for us — a new perspective, something beautiful, something beyond our wildest dreams.

When we finish our walk on earth, the journey to Jesus merely takes on a whole new dimension. This Christmas, like the Magi who finally arrive at their destination to encounter the Christ child, Grant arrives home — his home with the Creator God and his Saviour Jesus. Now, he can experience life and union with God in a whole new, and deeper way.

One thing remains. The caravan is a journey undertaken with others, together. No one would even consider travelling the caravan routes through the desert alone. Jesus travelled with Grant throughout his life on earth, just as Jesus embraces Grant this day, with all the hosts of heaven.

Psalm 139:7-10
Where can I go from your spirit?
Or where can I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
If I take the wings of the morning
and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me fast.

Dream-state

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“Who are you?” the scrutinizing Levites ask John the Baptist (John 1:19-28). “Who is this man?” Because if John the Baptist is indeed preparing the way for the Messiah, he must be — according to tradition — the prophet Elijah.

There seems to be confusion in the ranks about his identity. If he is who he claims to be, then either their beliefs need to be changed, or else John the Baptist is a liar. ‘Who he is’, is a question of great importance.

I admire John the Baptist’s self-confidence. He does not seem to care who they think he is, much less their confusion. Note his rather curt responses to their questions: “I am not the Messiah”, “I am not”, “No” — He is not inclined to make kind, polite conversation. Neither does he care to make things better for them by clarifying.

And when he does say anything positive about his identity — he uses esoteric images from the ancient scripts: He is “a voice crying out in the wilderness”, meant to “make straight the way of the Lord” (Isaiah 40). This is not a clear, rational response to their very pointed questions that demand a ‘straight’ answer. What is apparent and important to John the Baptist, is that he knows who he is.

Who are you? Who are we? A glaring symptom of our confusion today, our disconnection from who we are, and our supreme fear and lack of confidence in our own identity — as people of God, as individuals and members of the Body of Christ — is the heaping layers of distraction with which we surround ourselves. Especially at this time of year!

It’s like we are walking around in a dream-state. Our dreaming disconnects us from who we truly are, and what is really important. On the first Sunday in Advent, we heard Jesus’ instruction to “Keep awake!” (Mark 13:37). On this third Sunday in Advent we sing the hymn: “Awake! Awake, and Greet the new Morn” (EvLW 242). It seems a prevalent theme in our Advent liturgy is to “wake up!”

Listen to the way Richard Rohr describes our way of life:

“It’s safe to say that there is confusion about what is needed for life and what is really important for life …. We have created a pseudo-happiness, largely based in having instead of being. We are so overstimulated that the ordinary no longer delights in us. [In our culture] … middle-class people have more comforts and securities than did kings and queens in the times when royalty flourished. We have become human doings more than human beings. And the word ‘rest’ as Jesus uses it [‘Come to me … to find rest for your souls’ (Matthew 11:28)] is largely foreign to us.”

What the Gospel says, is that simplicity “is the only place that happiness is ever to be found … Such a message is about as traditional, old-fashioned and conservative a gospel as we can possible preach, and it will always be true” (Richard Rohr, “Preparing for Christmas; Daily Meditations for Advent”, Franciscan Media, Cincinnati Ohio, 2008, p.27-28).

How do we wake up from this false, dream-state of distraction and over-stimulation? How do we wake up to our true selves? And how can we embrace a more simpler life of ‘being’?

These are the real questions I believe we need to be asking during Advent, and as we approach the Christmas season.

It’s not easy. It might take some discipline. Because we may be “Like people who have lived by the train tracks for years, we no longer hear the sound of the train. After years in church, we get used to the noise of Advent, to the message of the coming Christ, so much so that we no longer notice it. Or if we do, it has ceased to jolt us awake and has become instead a low, dull rumble …

Like the house hunter who noticed the train tracks on moving day, but later sleeps through the whistles and the engines that rush by, we can miss the thing in the season of Advent that might have been the most obvious and important at one time …” — the presence and love of Jesus coming into our lives again. (Lillian Daniel, “Feasting on the Word; Advent Companion”, WJK Press, Kentucky, 2014, p.66).

And this is God’s dream, coming to us. As Christians, we carry the mantle of God’s dreamers. This is our heritage — the dreams of the prophets and those who spoke God’s restorative vision to a people in exile, a people depressed, discouraged, downcast. And, who were given a vision — a dream — of a straight path through the wilderness of their lives.

To this day and age. If God could inspire Jacob in the desert with a dream of a ladder reaching down from heaven (Genesis 28:10-17), God can dream in us. If God could give guidance to Joseph wondering what to do with Mary (Matthew 1:18-25), then God can dream in us.

Twenty-five centuries after the psalmist expressed the words: “We were like those who dream…” (Psalm 126:1), Martin Luther King said, “I have a dream”. And with those words ignited a vision in the 20th century for justice towards an uncertain future. A generation later, (the first African-American) President Barak Obama, tantalized a nation, and the world, with his eloquent words of hope. Today, Malala Yousafzai inspires us to support education for women, in a dark and conflict-ridden world.

God’s dreams of a just and peaceful kingdom are born in the visions of the people of God, and in the heart of each child of God. In the end, it is not ‘my’ dream, maybe not even ‘our’ dream alone; it starts with God’s dream — when the wolf shall live with the lamb (Isaiah 11:6;65:25), and swords will be beaten into ploughshares (Isaiah 2:4).

The problem with dreaming is not the dream itself, necessarily, but whose dream it is. The problem with walking in a dream-state at this time of year, distracted by all the ueber- stimulation of our culture, is when it is our dream — my dream, alone, when I got caught up in my stuff so much that I don’t see the other; when I don’t see the other as God would.

Who are we? We are who we are meant to be when we bear witness in our very lives to the vision and dream of God. We are who we are created to be, when we let the light of God’s love that burns in our hearts, radiate out to a world shrouded in cold darkness.

And then, paraphrasing the famous words of Elliot Wolfson, God’s dream “dreams the dreamer as much as the dreamer dreams the dream.”

May God’s dream, dream in us.

How to know peace

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How can we know peace? Not only are we anxious and stressed to get everything done this holiday season, our hearts may also be heavy with grief with loss, and aware of the tragic violence facing so many people in other parts of the world today … Then what of ‘peace?’

Cardinal Thomas Collins was the guest speaker at an event I attended on behalf of Bishop Michael Pryse (Eastern Synod, ELCIC) earlier this week on Parliament Hill. He spoke to a room full of parliamentarians and multi-faith religious leaders on the theme of “Faith in a Time of Crisis”.

In his opening remarks he admitted this theme could be interpreted in a few ways: He said, the most obvious, was to look at the places of violence and conflict in the world, images that are splashed all over the media almost on a daily basis.

Then, “Faith in a Time of Crisis” might also be applied to our Canadian context, where changing economic realities and public violence hit close to home, as it did in downtown Ottawa a few weeks ago in the shootings and deaths on Parliament Hill.

But, Cardinal Collins settled on the crises we face ourselves, personally, in our own lives: crises of losses, frail health, broken relationships and despair. He looked straight into the eyes of our Members of Parliament and government leaders, and with a twinkle in his eye spoke about the virtue of humility.

I couldn’t help but think about the examples of humility in the Scriptures, especially in the New Testament. Unlike the self-righteous Pharisee praying in the temple, the tax collector beats his breast and prays, “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner”; apparently, the person who exercises humility is the person of God (Luke 18:9-14).

In the Gospel text for today, John the Baptist confesses, “I am not worthy even to untie the thong of Jesus’ sandals” (Mark 1:1-8). John the Baptist points to the coming Saviour, Jesus Christ. He knew that he would ‘decrease’ so that Christ would ‘increase’ (John 3:30). We might not think of John the Baptist as particularly humble, what with his rough-and-tumble persona.

But he was merely the messenger, preparing the way of Jesus. Jesus would be ‘the way, the truth, the light’, not John the Baptist. He understood, as we all are well to do, that God is God, and we are not. Even though we are valuable members, each and every one of us, of the Body of Christ, we are still just a part of the larger, “Big Picture”, as Richard Rohr calls the kingdom of God.

It’s easy to slip into that frame of mind that believes we are God, and that it’s up to us. It’s easy to identify with the unholy trinity of “me, myself and I.” We might sooner go to confession and, instead of saying, “Father I have sinned …”, say, “Father, my neighbour has sinned; and, let me tell you all about that!” The words, ‘pride’ and ‘sin’ both share the same middle letter … ‘I’!

Unbounded self-assuredness is not the way of the Gospel. The Gospel of Mark opens with John the Baptist preaching repentance. Indeed, “scripture proclaims hope for troubled souls and judgement for the self-assured. Against our human tendency to read the Bible in self-justifying ways, confirming our prejudices and excusing our resentments, we must learn to read self-critically, allowing Scripture to correct us. As the Swiss theologian, Karl Barth says, ‘only when the Bible grasps at us’ does it become for us the Word of God” (David Bartlett & Barbara Brown Taylor, eds. “Feasting on the Word – Advent Companion”, WJK Press, Kentucky, 2014, p.160).

It’s much harder, to see yourself as the problem. Cardinal Collins used the image of going in for an oil change, to describe his own need, regularly, to confess his own sins, to be grounded again in the truthful reality of his life. Some of us, he feared, unfortunately take better care of our cars with regular maintenance than we do with our own souls.

Humility means to be grounded, to be in touch with your humanity (‘humus’ — Latin for the earth, ground). Humility is to recognize your own complicity in a problem or challenge we face, AND taking responsibility for your own behaviours. Humility also reflects the desire to be changed, and to change yourself. The famous poet, Rumi, once wrote: “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” Do you want to change yourself?

Now, you also probably know this: whenever you embark on a journey of transformation, you will encounter resistance to this change — both from external sources and from within yourself. Listen to how a congregation undergoing intentional change identified very honestly in their reporting what they anticipated to be different states of resistance; they wrote:

“If we are going to try to make some changes – guaranteed – there will be resistance! (If there is no resistance, that shows that nothing is changing.) We will encounter (at least) four waves of resistance: 1. against the very need to consider change 2. against no matter what changes or types of changes 3. against specific changes 4. against personal changes and transitions, without which there is no way changes in the congregation, as a whole, can happen.” This shows great insight, and wisdom! Even in a climate where a collective change must occur, they recognize that the body can’t change unless its individual parts do.

Now, you may be starting to wonder what the desire for peace has to do with change. In fact, you may see change as the grounds for anything but peace. Well, the two are related, in the act of confession.

In the Lutheran Church, Confession has not been practiced as a formal sacrament; traditionally, the only two sacraments that have been practised as such are Baptism and Holy Communion – although to varying degrees among different Lutheran expressions, confession, too, has been practiced sacramentally.

Whatever the case may be, there is agreement that Martin Luther did place immense importance on the practice of confession. In our current worship books, there are orders for individual and corporate confession. I encourage you to look into these prayers, especially at this time of year. The point is, when you practice humility in the act of confession, the heart is naturally opened up to change for the better, and find peace.

Admittedly this path to peace, is a way through the desert. We enter one of the greatest paradoxes of the Christian faith: that it is through the suffering that comes to us all in various ways that we can experience the grace, the mercy, and the profound love of God that changes us, transforms us, into a new creation. John the Baptist preached “in the wilderness”; Isaiah (40) proclaimed words of comfort to a people moving “in the wilderness”.

But, if you want to see the stars, you have to go out into the wilderness — where it is ‘dark’, where it is quiet, where silence and stillness of the night characterizes reality much more than the usual distractions, stimulations and the incessant rushing-about that describes our lives more today, and in this season.

If the Christian faith has anything of enduring value to offer our retail-crazed, commercialized, high-octane holiday season — it is the gift of “Silent Night, Holy Night”. Because the light of the world is coming. As John the Baptist pointed to the brightest star that was coming into the world, we can do well to pay attention the ways in which Christ comes to us.

In our humility, in our acknowledgement for the need for forgiveness and grace, we learn to depend on God and one another for signs of God’s coming to us, again, and again.

Peace be with you.