Finding Ourselves

A Sunday reflection on the lectionary readings for the thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost.

Jesus is sounding a bit harsh in our reading today, y’all. He can’t really be telling us to hate our families, can he?

No, I don’t think he’s saying that at all, it just doesn’t jive with the God of Love but when the words of Jesus as recorded by the writers of our scriptures make us say WHAAAT? it’s intentional. We are supposed to stop and really pay attention to the questions in our heads and hearts. Then we prayerfully consider what has Jesus said just before and after this? What’s the context in which he’s saying and doing? Who’s he talking to? Who’s he talking about? We have to be willing to acknowledge our own undiscovered biases that prevent us from seeing and hearing the Kingdom of God-on-earth-as-in-heaven.

Jesus is not saying that families don’t matter. He’s saying that our understanding of family needs to be grounded in God’s Kingdom not our own. The label ‘family’ doesn’t make us a family, how we love each other does. A particular last name doesn’t make us family, seeing each other as God’s beloved children does. Jesus is expanding and deepening our understanding of family so that it isn’t some artificial loyalty based on human ideas but healthy relationships nourished by love as God loves us. When Jesus says ‘hate’ here, he’s using hyperbole to help us look deeply at what we call ‘family love’ and assess it with God’s Love. Are we demanding loyalty regardless of behavior or are we loving as Jesus shows us in flesh and blood how to love. Do we live in a way that makes family loyalty more important that our faithfulness to the Good News of God in Jesus?

Jesus is speaking of our orientation toward the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven and the core of our identity. I first posted the following list on social media a few years back and I have added to it and reposted it a few times.

  • When we find our identity in our romantic relationships, when we lose those relationships we lose who we are.
  • When we find our identity in our spouse, we are not honoring them (or who God made us to be) by offering our authentic selves to them but rather giving them a false selfie of who we think they want us to be.
  • When we find our identity in our children, and they grow up and leave home (as they should), we are as empty inside as our nest.
  • When we find our identity in our job, we become human “doers” rather than human beings. And a job loss or even retirement means a loss of identity.
  • When we find our identity in the things we own or how much money we have, we are seeking fleeting pleasure rather than everlasting life.
  • When we find our identity in our social status or political party, we begin to rewrite the Gospel to define how we want the world to be so we can maintain our standing in it instead of letting the Good News of God’s Love shape us.
  • When we find our identity in the power we hold over others, we’ve completely lost the Jesus-plot and are no longer following him.

When we find our identity in God, The One who created us in the divine image of love and community, who we are is eternal. We are who we are created to be, able to offer our real selves to others and to see them for who they truly are. In God, our identity is lived out through all our relationships as we seek to see God in all people, striving to love them as God loves us.

All of these types of relationships are significant in our lives but they are not to be the foundation for who we are. We are not defined by others in our life nor should we let other’s definition of who they think we should be determine who we are. God made us good and holy as his beloved children. This is the core of our identity that can never be lost or destroyed, although sometimes we do forget.

Jesus’ invitation to follow him is an invitation to remember who and Whose we are. It’s an invitation to live in the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven here and now. In our reading from the book of Deuteronomy, Moses tells the people of Isreal that God has offered them the choice of life and goodness or death and evil. The word we translate into English as life isn’t an individual word, it is used to mean relatives or community. God did not make us to navigate this complex world individualistically. As images of the Triune God we are made in the image of the ultimate community, the perfection of communion.

When we live from the image of God within us, when this is the core of who and Whose we are, we are most fully human because we cannot help but see the image of God in others and work with God’s help to live for the greater good of all. This is how we are to experience family in God’s Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. This is the life and the good we are made of and for.

Life in God’s Kingdom is life lived in relationship with God, others, and ourselves. It isn’t self-centered to do the hard work of pealing back the layers of the false selves we create to maintain power over others or fit in or people-please or survive difficult or abusive relationships. To go deep within ourselves to find the light of the image of God within is the Jesus-centered work of discovering who and Whose we are so that we thrive in our relationships with others, accepting the responsibility for our own behaviors, thoughts, and emotions and letting others be responsible for theirs. In community with each other as we all do our best with God’s help to follow Jesus here and now, we are family. We have chosen life and goodness. We have chosen to be fully human. We are the Kingdom of God.

NOTE: The image is by Natalia Kadish. Here’s her explanation of her piece:

Artist’s statement: Each of the seven species of fruit represents a different kind of Jewish person. We should all be growing on one tree together in harmony.

The water represents how Hashem feeds us spiritually as well as physically. Torah and spirituality are likened to water.

Answering the Call

A sermon preached at Grace Episcopal Church, Cuero, TX. The lectionary readings for the twelfth Sunday after Pentecost are here.

Good morning! Before we dive into todays readings, let me take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Nancy Springer and I’ve been a priest in the Episcopal Church for 13 years. My first posting out of seminary was at St. John’s in McAllen, the same church where Peter Thaddeus was a member. I was privileged to work with Peter on the vestry and when he was Senior Warden, we led Bible Studies together, and worked tirelessly alongside other churches in the area to minister to the migrants who came to our country trying to find a better life for their families. Like Peter, I was a “second-career” priest although I got a bit of an earlier start in this calling he and I share. Each of our stories of ‘how we got here’ go to show that it’s never too late to learn to hear God’s calling to be who God made us to be in this life.

One of the studies Peter and I led together was a book called The Call by a man named Os Guinness, the great-great-great-grandson of the founder of Guinness Brewery. Os is a theologian and social critic who’s writings weave together faith and everyday life. In The Call, Os says that every person has two Calls in life. Our primary call is toward God, always deepening our relationship with God as we journey through our secondary call which is the way, with our particular and unique talents and skills, we each participate with God in the building up of the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven.

In other words how we live our ordinary, day-to-day lives in relationship with God and following Jesus. Our calling isn’t about doing something grand and world-altering, although for some it is. For a few of us it is about working in the church. For some, like Peter and like me, our calls changed later in life. For everyone, each of us here, our Call is living life as image bearers of our loving God, with all that fills our days regardless of our age, occupation, or social status.

In our gospel story today, Jesus is watching a group of folks gather for a meal on the sabbath. If you noticed, we skipped a bit of the story in which Jesus heals a man and then asks the Pharisees if it’s permitted to heal on the Sabbath but they don’t give Jesus an answer so he asks them if their child or animal fell into a well on the Sabbath would they save them. The Pharisees, the ones looking for Jesus to say or do the wrong thing, still don’t answer because they are worried what their answer might expose about their worldview. And so Jesus turns his attention to the dinner guests and tells them all a story of a seating chart at a wedding banquet. Here’s a hint to interpreting Jesus’ parables: when he talks about a wedding banquet he’s really talking about the Kingdom of God and we are the invited guests.

The point of Jesus’ story isn’t to teach them image-management tactics, but to show us how silly trying to orchestrate how others see us really is. We don’t want to risk being asked to vacate an honorable place by someone who is more prestigious so we sit in the back so that everyone will see how important we are when we are asked to sit closer to the host. Pretending to be humble in hopes of being honored is just as prideful as seeking to be honored to begin with. When we seek to be first we will be last but when we put ourselves last in order to be the first we’ve still put ourselves first.

The point of Jesus’ story is to illustrate the equality of God’s Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. Living in God’s Kingdom isn’t about rank or status but about everyone being equal. There is no first or last. There is only mutuality. When the powerful are brought low and the poor exalted it’s because everyone is brought to the same level, which is lower than the powerful are used to so it feels like being last and higher than the poor are used to so it feels like being first.

Our life as we follow Jesus isn’t about our own glory but revealing God’s glory to the world. And God’s people have struggled with this since the beginning. The prophet Jeremiah gives us God’s lament “my people have changed their glory for something that does not profit.” Instead of relying on God they sought their own source of living water.

In God’s Kingdom, no one’s Call in life is more important than anyone else’s. Everyone’s primary call is growing deeper in relationship with God, growing in the wisdom that we all are called to reveal the image of God within us so that others see the light of God’s love in this often dark and scary world. Whether we do that in our secondary calling by wearing priests robes or volunteer name tags or with a mop and a bucket or in an office or factory or on a ranch or sitting at the highest bench in the court house or the serving line in a soup kitchen, when we live into our secondary Call from the Divine Image within us all, we are taking up the unique and particular place intended for us in God’s Kingdom.

There is nothing any of us can do or not do in this life that would cause God to love us any more or any less than God loves us. We don’t have to pick the right seat, in the front of the room or the back, to prove ourselves worthy to God or anyone else. We are all worthy of God’s love and are given a place in God’s Kingdom. When we try to prove ourselves more worthy than others, we’ve lost the Jesus-plot.

Instead of competing for the best or worst seats at the banquet, we need to be looking for those who aren’t at the banquet and invite them in. Our motivation and goal in God’s Kingdom isn’t to be first or last but to love because we are loved.

Life in God’s Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven is about lifting each other up, not trying to outshine each other. The Pharisees were more concerned about their reputations than they were about the man whom Jesus had healed. When we listen to the call from God in our lives, we discover that life isn’t about reputations or prestige or monetary wealth but about living in right relationship with God, our neighbors, and ourselves. With all that we are and all that we have and all that we do, we participate in the building up of God’s Kingdom, right here and now. We participate with God in answering the prayer ‘your will be done on earth as in heaven.’

This is the good news and freedom Jesus offers us as we follow him into the Kingdom. Amen.

Learning from stories, part 2 (MMOW7)

Matthew shares a parable of Jesus in which a landowner hires laborers throughout the day and then pays all of them the same daily wage (Matthew 20:1-16). It doesn’t surprise us that those who were hired first thing in the morning are upset that those who were hired late in the afternoon are paid the same. The landowner explains that everyone received what they were promised, a day’s wage. Those who were hired first felt entitled to more because others received the same as they did.

Why are we often discontent with having the same as others? Why do we think we deserve more? These are not characteristics of the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. In God’s Kingdom there is no first or last. We are all first and last. There is no greater than or less than. We are all joint heirs with Jesus. There is no holding power over others but power with that enables the mutuality of all who are in God’s Kingdom.

All three of our gospel writers share another parable of Jesus about entitled laborers (Matthew 21:33-45, Mark 12:1-12, Luke 20:9-18). In this story, the landowner leases the vineyard out and moves far away. At harvest time, the landowner sends his representative to collect the rent and the tenants beat him and throw him out. This happens repeatedly. Finally the landowner sends his son. The tenants kill him. At this point in the story, Jesus asks those listening to the parable “what will the landowner do to the tenants?” They say that the landowner will kill the tenants and get new ones. Jesus doesn’t completely confirm their answer as he reminds them of the prophet Isaiah’s words “the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” God had entrusted the ancient Israelites with the fruit of God’s Kingdom and they tried to take it for their own.

The tenant farmers thought that they were in control of the vineyard. They felt entitled to take what they wanted even at the expense of the lives of others. They made power and wealth more important than other human beings. The fruit of all that we do is to be for the building up of God’s Kingdom, not our own.

God’s kingdom was never to be exclusionary. God has from the very beginning wanted to include all human beings. God chose to spread this news through a particular people but always provided provision for all to be welcome and equally included. It was never God’s people’s responsibility to decide who was allowed in and who isn’t. We’ve never been given the authority to design God’s Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven by our own standards. We are the laborers given full benefit of the Kingdom. We are the tenant farmers and the produce of the vineyard is not ours to take but entrusted to us so that all benefit from God’s provision.

God’s provision isn’t the extra we get over and above our needs. All that we have and all that we are is God’s provision. Our very life is a gift of our Creator. Nothing is of our own creation. We have an active role in nurturing and maintaining our lives but our life is a gift. Whenever we begin to live as if we know better than God what the design for our life should be, we disrupt the equitability and mutuality of God’s Kingdom.

We are not ‘owners’ in this life but stewards of the greatest gift of life. And this does not mean we are worthless or insignificant. We are invaluable. We are made by God in love, by love, and for love. We do not, nor can we, earn God’s love. God loves. We have the choice to receive God’s love and enter into relationship with our Creator. The invitation is always open. We have the choice to live as we are created to be, beloved children of God, or as gods of our own kingdoms. Either way, God loves us because God’s love is not transactional. We have the choice to live relationally with God and each other or transactionally for our own benefit. We have the choice to lead our own kingdoms or follow Jesus into the Kingdom-on-earth-as-I-heaven.

Reoriented in Worship

A reflection on the lectionary readings for the eleventh Sunday after Pentecost.

I could wrap up the gospel narrative today with one sentence: if we show up for our community worship to prove how holy we are instead of for connection, we’ve lost the Jesus plot.

But y’all know that I won’t stop with just putting the tip of our toes in. We’re always in for a deeper dive. So, here we go.

Worship, that posture that helps us stay oriented toward who God is and Whose we are, is our purpose. It isn’t the means to anything. It is the end, the telos. It is what we are made for. All the rest of our life is shaped and transformed by our time in worship.

In the reading and hearing of scripture, the shared prayers, the songs of praise and the songs of lament, our corporate confession, receiving the gift of forgiveness, and the gathering around God’s table to receive the nourishment of God we are oriented, and regularly reoriented, toward the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. Our time together in worship of our Holy Loving God refreshes us and heals us and restores us. It is an absolute necessity for us to live as God’s people.

The woman in our story today came to worship, bearing the weight of all that ailed her: living in a broken human system that told her she had no value as a person and that her needs were of no concern to the religious leaders. I know a similar weight and what it is to feel too weak in body and soul to bear it (this is how the word translated as ‘ailment’ is defined). The weight of being treated as if you are invisible or that you have no value does cause shoulders and spines to bend in physically as our soul tries to protect itself from the destructive nature of disregard. But Jesus saw her as an invaluable daughter of God. Jesus saw the weight that she was forced to carry and he released her from it. And the other men in the room were angry.

The word recorded by Luke to set her free is the same word Matthew uses to tell the story of Joseph pondering what to do after knowing Mary was pregnant. It’s the same word used by Simeon to proclaim The Messiah as Mary and Joseph bring baby Jesus into the Temple. It’s the same word used when Pilate released Barabbas. It’s not a healing or restoring word but a setting free and releasing word. The woman was bound by the brokenness of this world and Jesus released from any obligation or assumed responsibility to remain bound by a system that devalued her.

When we bring the weight of the world we are bound up with to God, we are set free from the trappings of being told we are not enough. In our worship we are fed and strengthened by God’s love and connected to one another. We are reminded that we are most complete in our relationship with God and each other because our true identity and value and worth comes from the Image of God within us.

How others treat us doesn’t define who we are. We are God’s beloved. This is the core of our identity, who and Whose we are. This is the wisdom that releases us from the weight of the broken, human-made, oppressive systems in this world that say some people are less valuable than others. This is the healing balm that strengthens and equips us to boldly work together with God’s help to see and acknowledge these systems. Even if we can’t dismantle them we can together live in such a way that the people we encounter know they are loved and valued by God and by us. We can release them from the inequitable role the world has forced on them. We can illuminate the Way into the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven where all are loved and all are equal.

In our reading from the letter to the Hebrews, we are told “since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us give thanks, by which we offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire.” We are receiving this Kingdom, not we will some day when we die but actively, right here and right now, in this life we are living, we are receiving. With each act of worship. With each prayer. With each song. On our knees (as we are physically able or metaphorically if we are not) with our hands open wide we receive the body and blood of God’s life with us as one of us that continuously transforms us into Kingdom people. The fire that is God isn’t a destructive fire but the kind of fire that purifies, that removes in us that which tries to conceal the Image of God within.

Regardless of the failings of the human made systems of this world, God’s Everlasting Kingdom is here. Not just in the church building but each time we reveal the Image of God within us and remind another that they too are God’s beloved. And when we come together in worship and receive God’s goodness and love, we become more and more whole. We are shaped and transformed into who and Whose we are made to be.

What we do in our worship isn’t an interlude in our week. It isn’t an ego boost or an escape or some type of holy spa treatment to make us feel better about ourselves. Worship grounds us in the reality of our life in the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven and enables and equips us to shine the light of God’s love so that the people we encounter each day know they, too, are invaluable children of God.

Keep lovin’ louder than the hate, Y’all.

Learning from Stories, Part 1 (MMOW6)

It is challenging to seek out the biases that guide our thoughts and behaviors because as the old cliches say, we can’t see the water we swim in nor the forest through the trees. Our brains often try to tell us that the way we view the world is the only way. Present in the Trinity at our creation, Jesus not only knows how our brains work, he lived as one of us and experienced this life as we do. And so he used parables to help us broaden our perspectives.

A parable is defined as a story with a moral or spiritual lesson. As Jesus used them they are so much intricately layered than that. Jesus taught with parables to provoke our imaginations and help us see what God is up to in this world. Instead of zeroing us in on a simple moral lesson, Jesus’ parables are meant to equip us to step out of the fishbowl or forest so we can begin to know ourselves authentically as God made us.

Matthew (1:10-17), Mark (Mark 4:10-12), and Luke (8:9-10) each share Jesus’ explanation for why he used parables. Jesus spoke in parables to distinguish between those who had eyes to see and those who had hardened their hearts again God’s love for all. It wasn’t to keep secrets but to speak in a way that equipped those who were willing to see their true motivations and open to the transformation of their hearts. Those who were blinded by building their own kingdoms couldn’t understand the nature of God’s Kingdom revealed in the parables.

We don’t earn our way into the Kingdom by having the proper eyes and ears. We enter the Kingdom by responding to the invitation ‘follow me’ and allowing our hearts (aka the eyes and hears that enable us to be present to the Kingdom already here) to be transformed by God as we journey together following Jesus. If we aren’t willing to be transformed we can’t see the path into the Kingdom. We can pretend and tell others we are following Jesus but in time our behaviors will reveal that we don’t have the eyes to see or hears to hear who God is and Whose we are.

In one of the few parables that are in all three of the synoptic gospels (the label for the grouping of Matthew, Mark, & Luke as distinguished from the Gospel as written by John) Jesus tells a story of a man who was a bit enthusiastic with his planting.

The seeds are going everywhere. Some seeds grow a bit but don’t thrive. Some end up in lifeless and volatile environments. Some land in a healthy situation and thrive and do what seeds are made to do, produce fruit. This is also one of the few parables Jesus explains to the disciples. Each of the three writers offers the story and Jesus’ explanation with their own nuances. Matthew writes that the seeds are the word of the Kingdom; Mark writes they are the word; Luke writes the word of God. Throughout our scriptures, the word WORD is understood to be the revealing by God of the character and purpose of God.

God, the Creator of all there is, reveals the Godself continuously in and through all that is created. When we humans have the eyes to see and ears to hear, this self-revealing God is illuminated by our lives so that others may see and hear, too. But we have to be careful not to let that go to our heads. It is God who does the revealing. Like the sower who scatters seed with the joyful energy of abundance, it is God who relentlessly seeks us to show us how to be fully human as God made us to be. We participate with God, following Jesus, shining God’s light of Love on the pathway of the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. We can’t control or coerce how others receive God.

We can do the work to build up a community where all are invited to be transformed as together we follow Jesus into the Kingdom-in-earth-as-in-heaven. As Jesus-led leaders, we know that we, too, follow. Being in a leadership role does not elevate us above anyone else nor does it mean we possess the ability to do what God does. When we accept a leadership role we also accept the responsibility and accountability to enable and equip those whom we lead to do what is their’s to do in the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven.

Does this understanding of the purpose of parables and this particular parable help you broaden your perspective? Are there thought patterns or habits of yours you are discovering that may not be congruent with following Jesus?

Undiscovered Biases, Part 2 (MMOW5)

I want to share a few more personal anecdotes from my experience with leadership in the church to help us all open up to our undiscovered biases (and, please, if you detect any of mine, please speak up!) before we start diving into some of the parables Jesus tells from which I’ve discerned what I’ve come to call Jesus-led leadership.

A few years ago, when I had been at a parish for about 6 months, we were in the moments before a high holy day worship service. Those who were serving during the service were all preparing, putting on vestments, reviewing the bulletin, and asking questions about the flow of the service. One man who was serving as an acolyte came with bulletin in hand and asked about the movement at a specific place in the service. I talked him through it and asked if he had questions. He said no and then walked over to the other priest (who is a man) and asked him the same question and was given the same answer. Another man who was a visiting deacon came with bulletin in hand and asked about the movement at a specific place in the service. I talked him through it and asked if he had questions. He said no and then walked over to the other priest (who is a man) and asked him the same question and was given the same answer. Another man who is a retired priest came with bulletin in hand and asked about the movement at a specific place in the service. I talked him through it and asked if he had questions. He said no and then walked over to the other priest (who is a man) and asked him the same question and was given the same answer. Other women who were serving asked me questions as well and then didn’t proceed to go to the other priest to repeat their questions.

Unfortunately, this was not an unusual scenario in the church, even in the Episcopal church that has been ordaining women since 1979. And, I bet you not one of these three men or the other priest saw anything amiss with their actions. These are the undiscovered biases we all have. At the time, I didn’t have the time or energy to talk with any of them about their actions. And, I told myself, they are still getting used to me.

Not long after this, some members of the parish were gathering for a special class I was leading on a Saturday. Just before we began, a call came in about a parishioner who was supposed to be joining us but was having a medical emergency. The other priest of the parish left to meet them at the hospital and I would continue with the class for those present. I called the room to prayer for the parishioner, their family, the medical team, and the safety of the priest in making his way to the hospital. After the prayer, I began to hand out the class materials so we could begin as we were already about half an hour behind schedule.

One of the class attendees who had stepped out of the room when the other priest left for the hospital came back in and without looking at or communicating with me, called for everyone’s attention and began to pray. Now, I know there is always room for prayer but he interrupted me offering directions for the group and prayed as if I hadn’t. And when he sat down he looked at me and told me I could begin, as if he were in charge of the room. I saw looks of perplexity on many faces (and if I had a mirror on my own I’m sure), shrugged, and continued. Undiscovered biases, I told myself.

Jesus-led leadership is given, not assumed or taken. To take, assume, or demand authority isn’t leadership but an attempt at domination led by our egos not Jesus.

When I accept the role of leader in a group, I also accept the responsibility and accountability that comes with the authority given to me. To want authority without the accountability and responsibility is not leadership. Jesus-led leadership is never assumed but always an answer to an invitation. Jesus-led leadership is cultivated in ongoing relationships grounded in Jesus’ invitation ‘follow me’.

Courage for Peacemaking

A reflection on the lectionary readings for the tenth Sunday after Pentecost.

What on earth is Jesus talking about in our gospel reading today? Is he having a bad day, is he drunk? How can he contradict all that he teaches and preaches elsewhere about peace?

Jesus, as he often does, is intentionally causing us to say ‘whaaaat?!?!” He isn’t contradicting himself, he’s teaching; us what true peace MAKING is and illustrating the difference between peacekeeping and peacemaking. Jesus knows that sometimes you have to completely shake up the status quo in order to create actual peace. Not the kind of peace thought of only as the absence of conflict but the Kingdom peace that even in conflict provides courage and wisdom to keep following Jesus toward equitable justice and mutuality.

In the Roman occupied Jewish culture of first century Palestine, the Pax Romana was a artificial peace. To keep this peace, everyone had to know their place and stay in it. If, for example, a daughter decided to step out of her defined place in the name of justice or compassion, this would impact the whole family. And those who were more concerned with keeping the artificial peace would do what they could to keep her in line with the status quo, even if it meant causing harm.

Jesus’ own mother and siblings attempted to do this with him. Mark tells us of a time when Mary and Jesus’ siblings came looking for him because they thought he was out of his mind. Why on earth would anyone risk everything by shaking up the status quo? Because the peace of God’s Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven is continuously created and nurtured, not kept under threat of harm. Kingdom peace is created by undoing the systems that keep certain people marginalized and oppressed, even if those systems are our families of origin or our religious institutions.

If our family of origin is an abusive system that requires everyone to tiptoe around the least emotionally intelligent person or to protect the abusers, it is not congruent with the good news of God’s love. If our church community isn’t lead by the love of Christ, it is not congruent with the good news of God’s love. If our political leaders promote hate and demand loyalty above all else, we cannot follow them and Jesus at the same time. If the societal systems we are in seek to control who’s first and last they are not kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven systems, regardless of the name on the building. Just because something holds the label of family or charity or church doesn’t mean it functions with God’s love.

To love God and our neighbor and ourselves requires that we strive together with God to love honestly, authentically, and equitably for the building up of the kingdom. Sometimes to make room for the building up of the kingdom we have to stand up to who or what is counter to the kingdom. We have to speak truth against lies. We have to call out people who are self-serving instead of other-focused. We have to stop participating in the abusive and oppressive cultural, societal, and family systems. And when those who are living counter to God’s Kingdom choose not to see the light of God’s Love we can’t compromise the Kingdom characteristics to maintain anyone’s comfort zone. We have to disrupt the status quo just as Jesus teaches us.

My core identity, your core identity begins in who we each are as beloved children of God. We are all made in God’s image. If I find my core identity in my family of origin, or my role in my family, or the country of my birth or choice, or any human made institution or club or group, I am not grounding myself in who and Whose I truly am.

And, yes, we also have to be careful that we aren’t throwing the baby out with the bathwater or disrupting things just to be disruptive. Jesus shows us how to look at the internal motivations of our own hearts and the family and societal systems we are in and bump them up against the good news of God’s love to discern what we are to do because of who and Whose we are. Just like when we look at the sky and honestly name what is happening, we have to be honest with ourselves and how we witness others behaving.

So often we think we are being nice when we turn a blind eye to other’s harmful behavior. The abusers and oppressors count on those who say things like “be the bigger person” to keep their control. Ignoring abuse and oppression does not make it stop. The only way to stop abuse, be it at the family level or by the government or any system in between, is to name it for what it is and hold those responsible accountable, without becoming abusers or oppressors ourselves. This is what Jesus teaches us by his own behavior and ministry on this earth. This is how we light the path into the Kingdom for others to know they are God’s beloved, too.

Our prayer for today asks that we be empowered to “follow daily in the blessed steps of his most holy life.” Jesus didn’t settle for a status quo just to be comfortable. He showed us how to live into the Kingdom characteristics that see the image of God in all people. Jesus knows that peacemaking is hard and often disruptive and he promises that when we follow him into the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven we will have the true peace of living as who and Whose we are, beloved children of our loving God. Instead of settling for being comfortable we will know the comfort and courage of our true selves that grow from the image of God within us. Amen.

That First&Last Thing (MMOW4)

Jesus tells us over and over that the first shall be last and the last shall be first (see Matthew chps 19 & 20; Mark chp 10; Luke chp 13) . It’s a key component of the whole Gospel message that those who are marginalized by earthly powers and kingdoms are not marginalized in God’s Kingdom. But here’s the thing we’ve gotten out of whack: Jesus isn’t reversing the order, he’s undoing it completely. If the first are last and the last are first then the last are first and the first are last and the first are last and the last are first … get it? When you say or type it over and over you can’t remember who’s first and who’s last or even where in the order of words you are. No one is marginalized in God’s Kingdom.

The Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven is about all people being equal. There is no status, no rank, no superiority. In God’s Kingdom there is God and all of God’s beloved children. This is the foundation on which forgiveness, mercy, grace, and redemption, as Jesus shows us how to live them, work.

These Kingdom character traits are about our behavior, not controlling anyone else’s. We don’t demand others forgive, others offer mercy and grace, or others restore broken relationships. We forgive others (we’ll talk more on forgiveness in later posts but for now let me just say forgiveness is about our own growth and wellbeing, if another person doesn’t think they’ve done anything wrong, why are they demanding our forgiveness?). We let God’s grace and mercy guide us. We participate with God in the redemption of this world. We follow Jesus.

When we reverse the “first and last” order, we aren’t working with God on the redemptive journey of creation, we are seeking revenge or retaliation. When we look to oppress the oppressors, we aren’t living within the Kingdom economy, we are elevating ourselves and claiming false power, just as the original oppressors. Now, this doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be justice or accountability. There absolutely is justice and accountability in the Kingdom. But we have to separate out revenge and retaliation from our ideas of justice. Justice in God’s Kingdom is always paired with mercy. Without mercy justice devolves into revenge and with out justice mercy devolves into a ‘everyone gets away with all the bad behavior’ free-for-all.

And for everyone to be equal, we have to allow for everyone to take up their own human-sized space in this world. No one should make themselves smaller to accommodate anyone else’s ego trying to take more space than they should.

If you make me uncomfortable yet you aren’t causing harm to another or me, it isn’t you who’s the issue. My ego is the problem. When we are uncomfortable around someone we need to check in with ourselves. Am I uncomfortable because the other person is causing harm to me, someone else, or themselves? Or am I uncomfortable because they are different than me and what I think should be standard for all human beings? And why do I get to decide ‘the standard’ for being human?

As I said in the previous post, I’m not advocating for doing away with authority structures or institutions. I’m trying to help us rethink what we think we know about leadership and discern what it is to be Jesus-led leaders. In seminary, we didn’t do much (if any intentionally) leadership analysis. In my experience in the church I observe a lot of folks trying to fit corporation style leadership models into the church. I find this to be contradictory to what Jesus teaches about leading in the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. I want to be intentional when I lead and I want to follow Jesus as I lead. I hope and pray that my exploration of Jesus-led leadership helps you.

There’s lots more to come. Stay tuned. And if you haven’t already, go back and read the first three MMOW posts while you’re waiting for the next one. And share your thoughts and experiences with me. I’d really be grateful if you left a comment.

God’s peace, Y’all.

Eyes to See (MMOW3)

Four years ago I was invited into and excitedly agreed to enter into a co-leadership experiment. Neither one of us would outrank the other, we would collaborate and communicate and share all responsibility. At the time, I thought we had all the right conversations to avoid confusion and that our expectations were the same. I was wrong. But I still believe the co-leadership thing is doable. I believe it is exactly how Jesus shows us in flesh and blood we are to do this church thing, how we are to live.

Now that it has become public that this particular experiment failed, people I know who are leaders in the church are saying ‘it can never work’. I’m saying, respectfully of course, that by following Jesus it can. It should. It must if we are to be Jesus-led leaders. It is ego that says it can’t work and it is ego that caused it not to work.

It is ego that causes us to view life through the lens of competition and ego that demands we think of and work to prove ourselves as being the best or number one or top-dog. It is ego that tells us we have to take others down to make enough room for ourselves. And when ego is ruling the kingdom we cannot ‘co’ anything. We cannot work with ourselves, others, or even God because our hands and heads are too busy trying to hold power over others to protect ego.

When we choose to follow Jesus, we must check our egos at the gate to God’s Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. The leadership that Jesus shows and teaches by his life is a co-leadership. To lead and to have power over others are not the same thing. Jesus does not teach us to hold power over anyone. In fact he very clearly tells us not to. He redirected the disciples when they questioned him about who is the greatest and who among them would have the best seats in the Kingdom. When we see leadership as power, we’ve lost the Jesus plot.

Jesus-led leaders don’t attempt to control anyone or anything. They don’t insist on always having the final say or the only say. Jesus-led leaders work with others always seeking the best for the community they lead/serve, not what strokes their ego. Jesus-led leaders use the power of their position to equip and enable others to fulfill their ministries in the Kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. Jesus-led leaders work with others for the building up of the Kingdom. If in our leadership we are causing harm, we must stop and seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance to recalibrate our compass toward God.

Now, please don’t hear me that there shouldn’t be authority structures. There needs to be if we don’t want chaos. God brings order to chaos and our agreed upon, healthy, authority structures bring order to human life and enable us to thrive. Even within the existing authority structures we are in, we must continuously pay attention and locate our undiscovered biases that perpetuate holding power over others. We must ask for the eyes to see and ears to hear how world-oriented leadership causes harm and be willing to grow and change.

Love Treasure

A reflection on the lectionary readings for the ninth Sunday after Pentecost. The readings are here.

Do not be afraid. Jesus says this phrase more than any other. Without having counted myself, I’d confidently say it’s a statement made in scripture more than any other single phrase. I don’t know if it is there 365 times as some say, but it is in there a lot. And it’s not because Jesus doesn’t know the world is a frightening place. He knows that very well. More on that in a bit.

But first I want to talk about how we use the word ‘world’. Most of the time when we use the word ‘world’ we think of it as Paul does, somehow separate from God’s kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven. But Jesus talks of the world and the Kingdom in a way that reminds us we are in this world because this is God’s creation, it is where God created us. We broke the lease in Eden and God sent us out of Eden into the world, protected and cared for, and cautioned against the dangers. And the most dangerous, harmful things in this world are our fellow humans seeking to bring about their own kingdoms in this world.

Jesus comes to us and begins to reintroduce us to the ideals of God’s Kingdom, life as God intended when God made the agreement with those early humans to live with and obey God. God’s Kingdom isn’t any particular ‘place’, but the Way we live in this world that makes the Kingdom visible within it.

The ‘world’ that condemned and killed Jesus wasn’t the people outside of the Temple but those who ran God’s temple while building up their own kingdoms. When we seek to build our own kingdoms, kingdoms we weren’t created for, fear is the normal byproduct. Humans seem to know instinctively, even if we don’t admit it to ourselves or anyone else, that our kingdoms are fleeting and temporary. We know instinctively, too, that God’s Kingdom is the everlasting Kingdom we are created for. And, so, we are afraid, afraid that our kingdoms will be taken from us and so we shape our human relationships – and our relationship with God – by this fear. We create a world for ourselves based on scarcity. If you have something I don’t have I must take it from you, or even defeat you. This human made form of a kingdom puts us at the center, not God.

Abram was afraid and he made his own plan to find an heir. With God’s reassurance Abram grew to treasure God’s promise and plan. Abram turned his heart toward God. Of course, we learn as the story continues to unfold Abram, aka Abraham, and Sarah continue to have moments of fear and doubt and again take matters into their own hands and operate from a place of scarcity created by fear, but God never abandons them. God proceeds with the Kingom-on-earth building and works in, with, and around, the human made kingdoms.

We are told by Jesus and throughout all of scripture to not be afraid because fear is the human emotion that drives the dangers of this world. People who let life be shaped by their fear of losing their self-made and self-centered kingdoms rule with fear. They use their fear to make others afraid so that we too are shaped by fear. It is a dangerous and vicious cycle.

Jesus reminds us of the image of God, the image of Love that is the true center of our createdness. We have to let go of our fear to find it; for some the Image is buried deep under layers and layers of fear: anger, hatred, greed, self-importance, just to name a few. When Jesus tells us to not be afraid, he isn’t pretending there aren’t things to be afraid of, he isn’t denying that fear is a natural human emotion that God gave us as a warning system. Jesus is calling us to remember that we weren’t created in fear for fear but in love and for love.

It is God’s Love and the image of that Love within each of us that we are to let shape us, guide our behaviors, build our relationships. Because it is loving relationship – with God and each other and ourselves – that is the treasure we are created to have. And this treasure is abundant and everlasting. Loving relationships seek mutuality, not control or coercion or power-over others in any way.

We enter into God’s kingdom-on-earth-as-in-heaven every time we choose to seek mutuality with others. When we make loving, healthy, other-focused relationships our true treasure we have the power stronger than our fear, even as we walk among the dangers of this world. Because like Jesus, even when the kingdom-of-self-seeking powers of this world attack us and try to shape us by fear, we know we are living in the greatest power of all, Love.

Keep loving louder than the hate.