My plans for the rest of the summer still involve a couple short trips into Algonquin Park. And a stay in the Park isn’t complete without a paddle in a canoe or kayak.

On my reading list this summer is a recent national best seller by Roy MacGregor entitled “Canoe Country” in which the author surveys the importance of the canoe as a symbol for Canada. I am enjoying the stories he tells of his paddling exploits.

So I have to tell you one: On a journey down the Dumoine River in Quebec, MacGregor describes running the fabled white water rapids called “Canoe Eater”. The name itself suggests what can easily happen running these rapids.

While Roy was a seasoned paddler, he had mostly canoed flat water lakes and rivers. White-whiter was something relatively new to him. Just fresh off a white-water course, he was looking to learn more about this cherished mode of river transportation.

Roy details the two different approaches to running Canoe Eater rapids. Two canoes. Two different pairs of people. Two different approaches. 

The first pair beached their canoe above the rapids and scouted the shore line all the way to the bottom. They read the river, looking for the path between the standing waves, over the haystacks and along the deepest portions of the torrent of flowing water. They even memorized the route: Ferry left here, paddle hard to the right there, and so forth. After the scouting and memorizing were done, the pair, including Roy, got back in the canoe atop the rapids and aimed to replicate their plan.

The second canoe. This pair was led by Lorne, a retired judge. During his days in court Lorne had the reputation of being meticulously prepared for each case he judged, and painstakingly by-the-book.

But for the irony of it all, his super-conscientious, hyper-planned personality in the courtroom was at odds with what took over in the canoe. He was one to show disdain for scouting rapids. Instead of first disembarking and reading the river, Lorne approached Canoe Eater the way he approached any set of rapids:

He stood in the bow of his canoe “like Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic,” about to spread his arms to take in and survey the water lines from his perpective. “The ultimate freelancer, he would make it up as he went.”^[1]

Of the two canoes, which one do you think made it through Canoe Eater rapids, and which one dumped?

In the concluding sermon in our series this past month we ask one last time: Why do we have congregations? Congregations are the only place in our society where a community learns to love. Congregations are schools of love. In school, we learn. 

How do we learn the faith? Emphasis on how. Three ways:

First, we practice. When we practice loving others, it’s the best and only way to learn our faith. If we are not ready to practice loving others, frankly, we are not ready to learn anything about God, faith or the church. The two are inextricably linked: learning faith and loving. 

Most paddlers on the Dumoine are experienced. These paddlers have taken white-water canoe courses and have spend thousands of hours paddling. All the people in McGregor’s party were expert paddlers and some had already canoed and practiced on this river before. We have to practice, over and over again, how to love.

The second way we learn  faith is being able to change our way of thinking about things. A colleague of mine told me recently that she begins each worship service with these words: “You may not get what you want in this service, but I trust that the Spirit of God will give you what you need.”

Schools of love will challenge us to grow, and that may not always feel good at first. Being challenged in faith is not an indictment against the past. It is simply (yet not easily) a challenge to grow.

In the Gospel text for today, the crowd came looking for Jesus to seek out and learn more. They came with expectations: They thought they knew where Jesus and his disciples were. But he wasn’t there. They had to go somewhere else to find him, to Capernaum by the sea. They themselves had to get into boats to go there – that’s not the mode of transportation they initially thought they would be using to find Jesus. They had to change their way, literally.^[2]

“Faith isn’t about having everything figured out ahead of time; faith is about following the quiet voice of God without everything figured out ahead of time.”^[3]

Maybe you’ve already guessed it right. Who dumped their canoe? And who made it through? At the first turn in Canoe Eater rapids, the well-prepared, well-intentioned, meticulously-planned pair hit the flat rock they wanted to avoid, then dumped the canoe into the fast-paced and frigid waters of the Dumoine River. Roy MacGregor obviously lived to tell the story; they came out of the water feeling good, if not soaking wet, at the bottom of the run.

Roy had watched from shore as Lorne, the meticulous judge, chose the far side, quickly kneeling from his standing position, “prying the bow over into a dark tongue that seemed to pull them like a giant slingshot down into the churning waters. They danced, slammed, slipped, twisted, shot free and bounced through Canoe Eater, deftly turning to the left at the bottom into quieter water, swirls, and small, harmless whirlpools.”^[4]

Like Lorne in the canoe, sometimes our learning in faith will mean we have to change tactic from what we are normally accustomed to, for the sake of others, and for the sake of life to the world.

Finally, learning the faith is about looking for signs of life in the world. The crowds ask Jesus how to do God’s work. Believing in Jesus is about watching for “signs” of Jesus. That’s important for us, over two thousand years later. We have to perceive correctly. And what is that sign of Jesus? 

“The bread of God from heaven that gives life to the world.”^[5]Life to the world. Not just life to me for my own sake and personal satisfaction. But, the world. Wherever we perceive God giving life in the world, to others, to creation, there is Jesus. Wherever love and mercy and compassion and forgiveness and right behaviour, justice and goodness are expressed and shared – that is ‘life’ to the world. That is the work of God. 

Learning faith is a process of “being formed in the image of Christ for the sake of others.”^[6]This learning takes time, and it is intentional. Being schooled in love means that coming to church is “not primarily about personal satisfaction or fulfillment; it is about being shaped in ways that enable our lives to reflect the life and love of Christ to the world.”^[7]

In congregations, we practice being loving to others. We are challenged to change our minds from time to time. And we train our perception to spot signs of God’s life in the world around us. In so doing, we deepen our trust in God’s being in the world. 

We trust that, at the end of the torrid run and turbulent waters we occasionally encounter on the journey, we eventually come out at the bottom into quieter, small whirlpools where peace and love remain.

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^[1]Roy MacGregor, Canoe Country (Toronto: Penguin Random House; Vintage Canada, 2016), p.57-60

^[2]John 6:24-35

^[3]Attributed to Rachel Held Evans

^[4]MacGregor, ibid.

^[5]John 6:33

^[6]M. Robert Mulholland, Invitation to a Journey (Intervarsity Press, 2016), p.16

^[7]Dave Daubert & Richard E.T. Jorgensen, Jr., Becoming A Hybrid Church(Day 8 Strategies, 2020), p.36-37

In the children’s story entitled, “Six-Dinner Sid”,^[1] a cat named Sid eats six dinners a day. But not in one place, not just in one home does he enjoy a daily meal, but in six different, neighbourhood homes.

By the end of the story, the six neighbours, or hosts, that provide the meals for Sid don’t mind feeding him, don’t mind that he was getting six meals a day, don’t mind giving grace upon grace to Sid. They all loved Sid, who was by nature a six-dinner-a-day cat.

For Sid, the daily meal never ended. It went on, from one house to the next, every day. Kind of like a progressive dinner not just for different courses but a full meal each time! Lucky Sid.

Luke’s version of the Lord’s Supper presents a challenge of timing. For one thing, Jesus “eagerly desired”^[2] to share this meal with his disciples. Yet, in the very next verse, he declares he won’t eat it until the Reign of God is fullfilled, presumably sometime far into the future, at the end of time. Not once but twice in these short verses Jesus says he will not partake of the meal “until the kingdom comes.”^[3]

It’s like the meal is both in the present moment and at the same time never ended, never finished. The Eucharist is part of something that extends beyond any given moment. As with so much that surrounds the meaning and practice of the Holy Communion therein lies a holy mystery involving time and space.

Why doesn’t Jesus eat with his disciples the night before his death? Perhaps Jesus is being a good host. Jesus does not eat until the fulfilment of the Reign of God because as a good host who loves his guests he eats last. He first serves others with the gifts of God.

Jesus’ love is nevertheless not reserved only and exclusively for those first disciples in the Upper Room on that first Maundy Thursday. The Holy Meal began on Maundy Thursday. And, the Meal continues over time and in different places to its completion with the fulfilment of the kingdom of God, when Jesus finally eats—lastly—as a good host.^[4]

The meal is ongoing because we, too, are part of that meal. God’s love in Christ embraces you and me and everyone who comes to the table of the Lord to be nourished in faith. The real presence of Christ is intended to embrace us all, in every time and every place:

Including, in our homes and at different times of the week, online even, whenever we watch the service. As we have been saying long before COVID in the introduction to the Eucharistic Prayer: “It is indeed right, our duty and our joy, that we should at all times and in all places give thanks and praise to you, almighty and everlasting God.”^[5]

Not only here. Not only on Sundays. When Communion happens we’re not the ones creating all these separate Eucharistic meals, but rather we participate in the one Eucharistic Meal already happening.

Sid the cat was blessed with the gift of gracious hosts. In Christ, we have a host who does not hold back the gift of his presence and grace for us. Christ is the host of the one Meal in which we partake each time we eat and drink together in his name—wherever and whenever we are. Christ is the host whose love is so great that he will wait for us until all have eaten their fill. No matter how long the line is to Christ’s table, and no matter if you are at the back of that line, there will always be enough bread for you.

And with Paul, we can then express confidence in God, that God, “who began a good work in you, will bring it to completion”^[6] at the end of time when Christ, too, will eat with us.

“Why do we have congregations?”—this is the question we have been asking throughout this month’s sermon series. Today, we answer by saying that we have congregations in order to connect with each other in meaningful, tangible and loving ways. We do this gathered around the table with all the saints in Christ, of every time and every place. 

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^[1] Inga Moore, Six-Dinner Sid (New York: Simon & Schuster, Aladdin Paperbacks, 1991)

^[2] Luke 22:15

^[3] Luke 22:16,18

^[4] Thank you, to the Rev. Dr. Allen Jorgenson, Professor of Systematic Theology at Martin Luther University College, for articulating this response to the question of timing.

^[5] Evangelical Lutheran Worship (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Publishers, 2006), p.108

^[6] Philippians 1:6

Two items I will have with me every time I venture outdoors for a canoe camping trip: A spork (one end is a spoon and the other a fork) and my hat. Well, on the first night of this recent trip, both suffered serious damage. 

While washing up after dinner by the campfire, my plastic well-used spork exploded in serveral pieces. It was done. And then the strap for my well-worn hat, essential for keeping the hat on my head during windy lake crossings, ripped. It was done. What would I do if in the next gust my hat would fly away? Even more concerning, how would I eat my food for the rest of the trip without any cutlery?

Fortunately, I was not alone. John was with us. And he is an outdoor survivalist. For those my age, remember the original TV show “MacGyver”? Well, he was MacGyver. Bush-crafting is John’s passion. And, wouldn’t you know it, he had some paracord handy – that orange rope that can hold up to 500 pounds. He cut some off, melted the ends with his lighter, and in no time had my hat all strapped up.

Then, John eyed a deadfall cedar tree lying on the ground at the edge of our campsite. He said, “That wood is perfect for carving …” He took out his knife and before our next meal the following day, had carved a spoon for me. Impossible! I would never have thought …

Living in faith will challenge us to live into what we might first think impossible. Having faith, according to Brian McLaren, is “to blur the line between what we think is possible and what we think is impossible.”^[1] What we think is possible and what we think is impossible will be different for each of us and will depend on the unique circumstances and challenges each of us faces.

Normally, that line is not blurred. Normally, that line between what we think is possible and what we think is impossible is a hard and straight line that we dare not cross. Because in this world we are rewarded for reducing our reality “to a series of scientific obversations and algorithms.”^[2] We are rewarded for presenting only what is empirically justified.

And this is not all bad. Naming what is possible respects our limitations. At times we need to acknowledge our vulnerability, our limits and the real constraints pressing on our capacity to function and produce.

When followers of Jesus come up against the prospect of scarcity at the feeding of the five-thousand, in their minds they immediately want to offload their responsibility for others. They advise Jesus to “send them away so that they may … buy something for themselves to eat.” Even when Jesus challenges them, “You give them something to eat,” the disciples are still in the ‘what is possible’ side of the line; you can follow their logic: “Are we to go buy enough bread for everyone?” ^[3] You can just hear them saying – “We can’t afford that!”

Our minds naturally resist thinking beyond our limits, and our fears. Our minds will want to understand God and the world we inhabit according to the rationalized conditioning of our culture. Yet, while our world and faith can be understandable through our heads in many ways, our world and God is most powerfully experienced through our hearts.^[4]

In this sermon series, we have been considering the question: “Why congregations?” And a vital piece to answering that question is something many of us have cherished coming together to worship and serve, because congregations create space—onsite and online—for awe and wonder. 

To be in awe and express wonder is to cross that line from what is possible to what is impossible. The stories of Jesus’ miracles and healing that we read about from the Gospel of Mark intend to create a sense of awe and wonder about God and God’s good purposes on earth. That’s why we have congregations: To learn, and train the heart’s eye to see the possible in what might appear, at first, impossible.

Yet, this awe and wonder of God is born not from some herioic, newsworthy spectacle. The character of God’s greatness that moves us into the realm of awe and wonder comes from the simple things, and the often mundane and hidden acts of service and love.

Paracord is just a piece of rope. And felled cedar logs are common in the bush. Yet, John took these simple gifts and used his skills to express caring love for me. Simple things and simple, generous acts created in my heart a sense of awe and wonder for the goodness in it all. My inner vision of God expanded in that experience.

Brian McLaren promotes what I call ‘possibility thinking’ in reflecting on the vision and poetry of Isaiah^[5]; he writes, “Could we ever come to a time when swords would be beaten into plowshares? When the predatory people in power—the lions—would lie down in peace with the vulnerable and the poor—the lambs? When the brokenhearted would be comforted and the poor would receive the good news? 

“If you think, Never—it’s impossible, then maybe you need to think again. Maybe it’s not too late for something beautiful to be born. Maybe the present moment is pregnant with possibilities we can’t see or even imagine.”^[6]

When we grasp this essential truth, we are freed – freed to love, to celebrate, and to hope.

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^[1] Brian D. McLaren, We Make the Road by Walking: A Year-Long Quest for Spiritual Formation, Reorientation, and Activation (Jericho Books: 2014), p.68-69.

^[2] Cameron Trimble, “Why Congregations?”,  https://convergenceus.org/category/cpr-connects/, 10 June 2021

^[3] Mark 6:36-37

^[4] Cameron Trimble, ibid.

^[5] Isaiah 2:4, 11:6, 61:1-2

^[6] Brian D. McLaren, ibid.

Read Mark 6:14-29,15:39

My brother and I paddled across several small lakes on our journey down towards the Barron River Canyon this last week. We had to portage several times to get from one lake to the next. Each time we put in, we surveyed the far shore of the lake we had just entered to determine our direction forward.

When we started paddling across the long Highfalls Lake, we knew from the map that at the far end we should find a narrowing of the lake into a river which would take us to the next portage. Yet for most of the paddle up the lake, I couldn’t see any exit. All I could see was a typical rocky and forested shoreline barring any water-way forward.

Were we in the wrong lake? Did we make a wrong turn somewhere? Did we just spend the last hour hiking a brutal portage just to have to turn around and go back? Despair started to settle in.

Yet as we finally neared the far shore, the closer in we paddled, gradually the unique contours of the shoreline revealed itself. And, sure enough, angling off to the side, a narrow river opened to us the way forward.

John the Baptist is known for his radical way of introducing people to faith. Standing in the Jordan River he baptizes with water people yearning for new life. Then, John the Baptist introduces people to Jesus, who will baptize not only with water but with the Spirit of the living God.

The Gospel text for today^[1] describes the grusume circumstances of John’s death. Yet a closer reading suggests that this story really points a clear finger at Jesus. For one thing, this story begins with a debate about who Jesus is: Is he Elijah, or a prophet, or John the Baptist raised from the dead?

In Mark’s Gospel, the answer to this question is not revealed until the crucifixion. Here, a Roman soldier watching Jesus die on the cross recognizes Jesus for who he is: “Truly, this man was the Son of God.”^[2]

God’s revelation in the Gospel centres on the cross. The cross represents the place, the moment, where God is most profoundly revealed for who God is in Christ Jesus. In the moment of Jesus’ greatest vulnerability is the place where we witness God’s truth, God’s message and God’s love.

When death confronts us—whether our own or the dying and death of a loved one—we are at our most vulnerable. And the Gospel of Jesus announces that especially when we are most vulnerable God is most present, and most clearly revealed to us.

Vulnerability requires us to approach a distant shoreline. Vulnerability, as difficult a way it is, calls us to approach another person with love and tenderness, mercy and curiousity. It doesn’t happen quickly. As in the canoe paddling across the lake to the distant shoreline, the vision of the other happens slowly, gradually, and after some hard paddling.

When congregations allow for vulnerability of its members, God is present. When congregations allow for “our full selves to show up”^[3], Christ is with us. In short, it is in God’s vulnerability where we learn how to be with one another and how to treat one another in Christ Jesus. And that’s why we have congregations; that’s why people will gather in Christ’s name. Not to show off, but just to show up as we truly are.

Paul writes in the New Testament, “By grace you have been saved”^[4]. That’s one of the earliest insights in the Christian tradition: it’s not by what you do that you earn God’s love. Not because you appear attractive and have purged out all the sin in your life does God accept you. But as you are. Not by performing impressive feats nor by being considered good, not by your works. But by gift, that you have been saved. 

That means you belong. God has taken you in. God embraces you as you are—shadow and light, everything. God embraces it all, by grace. And it has already happened. For you, and for everyone.^[5]

Dare to approach closely the other shore. Resist the temptation to stay at a distance. Resist the temptation to draw conclusions about others too quickly. Resist the temptation to believe you know everything about them without taking the time and energy to get to know them, shadow and light. Because from a distance your vision may be impaired.

Yet when you do come closer you will discover the way forward. Closer in, not only will you notice the crags, the cracks as well as the beauty in the unique features of the other person’s life, you will find the water-way into channels that lead to deeper connection and a deeper love.

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^[1] Mark 6:14-29

^[2] Mark 15:39; read Richard Rohr, “Mark’s Good News: A Secret Message” Great Themes of Scripture: New Testament (Daily Meditations, www.cac.org, July 5, 2021)

^[3] Cameron Trimble, “Why Congregations?”,  https://convergenceus.org/category/cpr-connects/, 10 June 2021

^[4] Ephesians 2:8

^[5] Richard Rohr, “The Shadow in Christianity”, Shadow Work (Daily Meditations, www.cac.org, June 16, 2021)