People and Trees

As we’ve talked about seeing this week, I realized how often Jesus speaks of eyes and light and seeing. I tried to do a search to see how many blind people Jesus heals in the good news stories we have but often the writers simply say he healed many who were blind or lame or deaf. I think it safe to say that Jesus helped a lot of folks who had vision issues both physical and spiritual.

In Mark’s telling of the good news story of Jesus, we get this curious story of a man brought to Jesus to be healed of his blindness. Instead of healing him instantly right there before the crowd’s eyes, Jesus takes the man away from them. He first spits in the man’s eyes and asks the man if he sees anything. The man says he can see people but they look like trees. This time, Jesus puts his hands over the man’s eyes and the man is able to see in perfect focus.

Why, do you think, that Jesus took this man aside? He’s done lots of public healing in full view of everyone. Why was this time different?

Perhaps Jesus knew the the people’s motivation for bringing this man was to see a good show, to watch this Miracle Worker they’d heard about in action. Perhaps Jesus knew they weren’t ready to understand that the healing he offered went far deeper than physical conditions. Perhaps Jesus knew they weren’t ready to accept healing for their own lives and relationships and would have been satisfied to simply observe someone else’s healing.

And then there’s the two part healing. What’s up with that? We know it isn’t because Jesus was off his game. Jesus was intentional with all that he did; everything he says and does is intended to teach and form us into Kingdom people.

The healing Jesus brings us is so much more than physical. This man could see better than he was able before Jesus spit on his eyes (was he able to see at some point in life because he knew what a tree looked like?) but he wasn’t fully healed. To be fully healed this man needed to see people properly, to see them clearly (see this post: Seeing Clearly).

We cry out to God to heal our physical needs and physical healing is no small issue yet Jesus offers us so much more. Jesus offers us spiritual wellbeing that enables us to see the world as God sees, to see the image of God in ourselves and others so that we see each other properly.

Where in our lives do we need to allow Jesus’ love to heal our vision fully?

Seeing as God Sees

We’ve talked about seeing the image of God in ourselves and each other and we’ve talked about how we see the world around us. Do you ever think about how God sees us?

When our faith ancestors told the story of creation, we are told that God looked at all that God had made and said it was very good!1

Multiple times the writers of the good news story of Jesus tell us that when Jesus saw the people waiting for him that he was heart broken and had compassion for them because they were hurting, confused, and lost.2

In John’s telling of the good news story Jesus says, “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn its people. He sent him to save them!”3

When God looks at us God sees good. God sees beloved children. When we choose to walk any other path than following Jesus, God sees children who have wandered and need help to find their way again. When we are hurting God sees our need for comfort and healing.

Jesus came to show us that we are in relationship with God not just when we feel like we are good enough or do the right things or when it’s convenient for us or we enter the proper building or room but at all times. Jesus came to teach us that when this unconditional, eternal, and everlasting relationship with our Creator is the foundation of our worldview that we are freed from the stress and anxiety of having to figure life out on our own. We are freed from having to earn our way to being loved or accepted. We are freed from having to prove ourselves worthy or perfect. We are free to be who we are created to be, to live from the image of God within us.

We don’t have to work to win God’s love. God loves us. God sees us and loves us.

As we answer Jesus’ invitation to follow him, we learn to see the world as God sees it. We see the good, we see others with compassion and are moved to help God heal the hurt, bring loving order into the confusion, and point the way toward God for those who are lost.

We all have the eyes to see and the ears to hear the good news of God’s love. And with these eyes we can see ourselves and each other as God’s beloved children and with these ears hear God say, “I love you.”

How does knowing God sees you with eyes of love and compassion help you see others differently?

1Genesis 1:31

2Mark 6:34, Luke 7:11-15, Matthew 14:13-21

3John 3:17

Finding Good or Finding Bad

“Everything is clean to those who are clean, but nothing is clean to those who are corrupt and without faith.” (Saint Paul’s letter to Titus, the pastor to the church in Crete, the first chapter and fifteenth verse)

This past week here in Texas, we were all taken by surprise that our utilities, something most of us don’t spend a lot of time pondering except if our bill is out of bounds of our expectations, are not completely and absolutely reliable. Through an unfortunate series of events (to put it mildly) which included unusually extreme weather events, a majority of Texans found ourselves without electricity, natural gas, and then water. And these failures then disrupted the distribution of gasoline and groceries. It was a perfect storm that kicked off a domino effect unlike anything we’d seen in memorable history.

As I regularly checked the updates from my local utility provider on social media I saw two kinds of reactions: those who continually offered their thanks to those who were doing all they could to repair and restore our local utility infrastructure, and those who were yelling about how incompetent everyone else was because they didn’t have what they needed. There were those who expressed concern for those who were working outside in incorrigible conditions while their own families were without the same utilities we were and there were those who wanted to place blame and find fault and demand they get what no one had access to.

We see this dichotomy of responses not just in crises, but in daily life as well. We witness it in something as common and simple as slowed traffic: there are those who try to race to the front, cut others off, demand and defend their place in line, and there are those who wait patiently, let others go in front, and understand that we are all in the same situation with someplace to get to.

Our responses to the events of life come from what we choose to see – our fellow human beings created in God’s image with struggles and joys just as we have or others whom we are in competition with and must defeat in one way or another. If we look for the good – and God – we will find it. If we look for what’s wrong, we will find it.

If we look for opportunities to reflect God’s love and compassion, we will find them. If we look for God’s image in others, we will see it. If we look for things to be grateful for, we will be grateful. If we look for signs of hope, we will be hopeful. If we look for ways to argue, we will create a fight. If we look for things to be angry about, we will be angry. The choice is ours.

How do you see the world around you? What is it you find?

Seeing Clearly

In Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says to the crowds, “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.” (Matthew 7:1-5)

Have you ever noticed the last verse in the passage says, “then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye”?

“You will see clearly.” Do you see what Jesus does here?

Jesus isn’t telling us to lord our perceived perfection (because none of us are log or speck free) over someone else. He’s showing us that when we address our own brokenness and imperfections, we will see clearly that all of us are imperfect and need grace and understanding. We will see clearly that we are not made good by labeling others as bad and we are not made perfect by pointing out others’ imperfections.

Our ability to be loving and kind can only come from within us and as followers of a Jesus, we believe it truly comes from the power of God’s love for us and for all people. To be formed by God’s love enables us to see the image of God in ourselves and in all people.

When I can see the image of God in others, then I clearly see them. I clearly see that it isn’t my duty to remove their speck but, with God’s help, to take care of what in me is blocking my Christ-like vision for others. I clearly see that every one is a beloved child of God just as I am.

This eye work is ongoing. One dose of eye drops doesn’t fix things for the whole of allergy season and one set of prescription lenses doesn’t last our whole life. Our vision needs regular care. Following Jesus keeps us looking in the right direction. Clearly.

I see the image of God in you. Do you see it for yourself?

Lord, My Lord

I was going to start this out by saying I’m a huge Downton Abbey fan but the truth is that I’ve been a fan of all things British and Royal long before Lord Grantham and the Crawley family. (Yes, I got up at 3am on July 29, 1981 to watch Princess Diana marry Prince Charles and I follow the Royal family more closely than I usually admit in polite company.) But, for now and for the sake of brevity, just know that what I want to get us talking about with or without a clever introduction is the word “Lord.”

It is the English word used to translate the Hebrew word YHWH, the unpronounced proper name for God, which comes from a primitive root word meaning “to be”. In the New Testament, the Greek word translated to the English “Lord” is kyrios which means the one to whom a person or thing belongs. As the culture of our faith ancestors changed, the word used to refer to our Creator changed, not just from one language to another but also in the way the relationship between Creator and Created is perceived. The reference to God changed from a relational way to address the nameless One to a title denoting rank and power.

As Americans, we bristle (whether consciously or unconsciously) at the use of the word Lord because of our understanding of its use to denote possession of one person to another. Our country was born because we didn’t like the idea of being ‘owned’ by another country.

We promise at our baptism to follow and obey Jesus as Lord but how do we understand the relationship intended by the use of the word “Lord”? Do we use Lord as a form of address for the One who is Love? Or do we let it carry all of the etymological baggage of being controlled or possessed by another?

And, so, I wonder how the expression of our faith in our worship, writing, song, and every day life would be different if we had maintained the Hebrew tradition of using a name for God rather than using a title with existing cultural meaning. Titles that denote rank or class are used so that people know where they fall in the ranking system, their ‘place’ if you will. God didn’t come to us as Jesus in order to ‘put us in our place’ but to draw us into relationship as God’s beloved children.

When we choose to follow Jesus, to obey him as our Lord, we are entering into a life-changing relationship with the One who knows us better than we know ourselves. In all of the stories we have of Jesus’ ministry, never does he seek to possess or control another. On the contrary, he gives them every opportunity to walk away* if they decide that following him is too much. The way of life that Jesus shows us isn’t about control but about growing in relationship with the very One who gave us the gift of free-will to choose love and life as it is intended for us or to go our own way.

How does letting go of the possession and control meaning of Lord change the way you will address God?

*See John 6:27-71, Luke 18:18-30, Matthew 19:16-30, Mark 10:17-31

Our Mortal Nature

In our conversation on Ash Wednesday, I quoted the Invitation to a Holy Lent from the Book of Common Prayer and said we’d spend some time throughout this season talking about the language used. The invitation concludes with the asking us to “mark” our mortal nature by kneeling before God. “So,” I hear some of you asking, “just what is our mortal nature and how do we acknowledge it by kneeling before God?”

Kneeling is an act of devotion and submission. In our 21st Century western world culture, most of us have a difficult time with the submission part. We may be willing to follow rules and stay (even loosely) within cultural norms but to admit submission to another really dents our egos.

In the ordination service for deacons in the Episcopal Church, there is a place in the service where the person being ordained kneels facing the bishop and the bishop places her or his hands on the ordinand’s head and prays. For me, as I’m sure it is for others, this was the most significant moment of the whole service. It seemed as if Bishop Reed’s hands weighed more than my whole body and would crush me. My first impulse was to push against the weight and stand. Thankfully I didn’t.

As Bishop Reed prayed these words, “Therefore, Father, through Jesus Christ your son, give your Holy Spirit to Nancy …” the weight lifted and I knew I had no need to fight against this, that whatever may come, I’d be given the strength I needed and that there was no greater freedom in this life than to submit my will to God’s.

And this understanding of submission isn’t limited to deacons and priests. When we are baptized, we are submitting ourselves to Jesus. In the Episcopal Church, one of the promises we make at our baptism is to follow and obey Jesus as our Lord (we’ll discuss the title Lord tomorrow, so stay tuned).

Jesus tells us that when we follow him, when we submit ourselves to God, we find our true mortal nature because this is the life we are created to live1. God created each and every one of us to live in loving relationship with God. Developing the wisdom that we are the created and God is our creator doesn’t take away our value or worth, it unmasks our invaluableness (is that a word?).

I still find myself from time to time fighting against this submission. I think, that too, is part of our humanness. And God is always lovingly waiting for me to return and rediscover my true mortal nature as God’s beloved child.

How and why do you find yourself fighting against the wisdom of submission?

1See the 10th and 16th chapters of Matthew’s telling of the good news story and the 9th chapter of Luke’s telling.

Good News

For the first Sunday in Lent: http://lectionarypage.net/YearB_RCL/Lent/BLent1_RCL.html

I interrupt our regularly scheduled program to stop and ask: How are you doing? For those of us in Texas, this past week brought a(nother) forced time in a wilderness of sorts. What a disorienting first-world thing to be in our homes with no electricity or water and unable to get anywhere because of impassable roads.

In the reading for today from the good news story of Jesus, Mark introduces Jesus time in the wilderness after his baptism with the words, “and the Spirit immediately drove him into the wilderness.” Matthew and Luke also tell us that the Spirit led or drove or pushed Jesus into the wilderness. This is one of the very rare (the only than I know of) time when Jesus isn’t actively fulfilling God’s plan by his own actions. Throughout his ministry Jesus tells those he heals not to speak of it because his time hasn’t come. He fussed at his own mom because she was asking him to do something before the time was right. Even at his arrest and trial, he gave himself over to the authorities, they did not forcefully take him. And he willingly gave his life.

I know a lot of resilient and courageous people but I don’t know (m)any who would or even could actively plan a week such as we’ve had to test their mettle. If you plan it, it doesn’t count because you’re prepared and don’t have to figure out which pile of snow is the cleanest to bring in the house and let melt so you can flush the toilet or figure out why you are being sent a boil water notice when you have no water and no means to boil it.

I’m also aware that it feels like it’s been lent for about a year now and that we just keep going deeper and deeper into the wilderness and darkness. I mean, what more can come our way – pandemic, social and civil violence, the politicalization of issues that should be simple acts of human kindness and compassion, a violent attack on our government, and in Texas a near collapse of our electrical system (and the cascading effect of loss of water and the disruption of the food supply system) as a result of profits being put above people.

Ash Wednesday and Lent, even without disaster happening around us, remind us of two things: although the ash process is painful, with intention and effort, good stuff comes from ashes. Ashes can be used to enhance the soil in your garden and boost your compost, as a de-icer, to repel slugs, and to make soap.

I don’t know why the writers of the good news story chose the words they did to convey that Jesus was forced, led, and driven into the wilderness. Perhaps they chose to write it this way so that when we find ourselves in situations not of our active choosing, we know that Jesus meets us there, too, with the compassion and love that enables us to make good stuff from the ashes.

The season of Lent and the actions we choose to observe this time are to enable us to grow deeper in relationship with God. The intentional act of giving something up helps us learn how much of our lives we’ve let get in the way of our awareness of God. When we have all that we need and want we come to depend too much on ourselves.

When the life we have defined and constructed for ourselves begins to crack and crumble we become afraid. Jesus says to us “do not be afraid, follow me toward God, so that even in the wilderness, you will know the abundance of life God intends for you.” This is the message of Good News we all need to hear. With God there is hope, there is light in the darkness, there is ever-flowing living water of life. Together with God’s help lets live into the kingdom Jesus shows us, in this wilderness time and always. Amen.

God’s peace,
Mtr. Nancy+

Who’s Driving?

As we talk about seeing the signs and being the signs of God’s kingdom, we begin to realize that everything about us, our behaviors, words, and habits, all reveal what we really believe. Even the simple, seemingly harmless words we use to describe our response to the events of our life reflect what we really believe deep down.

I have a friend who whenever things get stressful says, “Jesus, take the wheel.” Recently I asked her, “wouldn’t it be better to just let Jesus drive all the time?” Don’t fret, we are still friends. And my question led to an excellent conversation about what it looks like to let Jesus not only drive but actually be the gps which guides us.

When we have to stop and let Jesus ‘take the wheel’ we must admit we weren’t following him to begin with. When we think of Jesus as our ‘co-pilot’ it means we are flying the plane and just hoping Jesus will tag along to be available to get us out of whatever scrapes we get ourselves into.

In the first steps of our journey toward being who God created us to be, we need to follow the signs toward the image of God within us. For many of us, we will find more roadblocks and obstacles on our inner journey that we will ever have walking out into the world to reveal the loving, life-giving God who created us and all things. Most of us find it far more difficult to look at our own faults and foibles than we do pointing them out in others.

Do not be afraid. Courage and comfort come with Jesus meeting us where we are, as we are, with the continuous invitation to “follow me”. As we discover these roadblocks we’ve put between the person we think we need to be and the person God created as an integral part of God’s kingdom-on-earth plan, we will find the freedom and abundance of life we are seeking1.

This work to keep the path of reflecting God’s image in us clear from clutter is part of our daily walk as we follow Jesus. And for me, the song at the top of my playlist is “You make Beautiful Things.” What’s yours?

1If you missed this Living Sunday School post, I encourage you to check it out.

Being Signs

Yesterday we talked about how the signs of God’s love and God’s kingdom on earth are all around us even if we choose not to see them. Have you ever thought about how we, the beloved children of God, are also signs of God’s love?

We are God’s image bearers, God’s beloved children. It is through us that God chooses to reveal God’s divine self so that those who haven’t yet discovered they are image bearers and beloved children can know that they are.

Every single human being that ever was or is or will be are all created in God’s image and Jesus calls us to be godly people, to live into that divine image. Jesus is our human example of godly behavior, what we strive for as we follow him.

Being godly doesn’t mean we are “in charge” or better than others. We can’t let our egos get away with such thoughts. We’ll never be God. We’ll never be divine. But we do have the God-given ability to reflect God to others, to let others see the God-image in us, not for our own glory but for the benefit of God’s entire kingdom.

Through us – our words and behaviors and habits – God gives signs of the now-and-not-yet-Kingdom-on-earth-as-it-is-in-heaven to the world. In the tenth chapter of Matthew’s telling of the good news story Jesus tells those who follow him to proclaim the good news: that the kingdom of heaven is here and that we are the very instruments by which this kingdom is to be on earth as in heaven.

In what way can you be a sign of God’s love in this world today?

Signs along the Way

When I was a child, whenever we’d be traveling by car with my Granddaddy, we stopped at every historical marker. Every. Single. One. It didn’t matter if we’d stopped at this particular marker before or if we were on a schedule, or if one of us needed instead to find a rest stop (that’s Texas lingo for needing to find a bathroom and our roadside rest stops are fabulous). We’d pull over, read the information on the sign, look around for a bit, and then get back in the car as Granddaddy tried to engage us in conversation about the event the marker was commemorating. And it wasn’t just historical markers that sparked Granddaddy’s interest – he’d read out-loud most every sign we passed: it’s so many miles to such and such town; if we were to turn at this road we’d get to this farm or that town; look to see if this creek or draw or river has water; there’s a Dairy Queen in 10 miles.

Granddaddy taught us how to discover the world through the signs around us. Signs help us navigate and know where we are and where we are going and if we look for them, we just might discover something we didn’t know before.

In Matthew’s telling of the good news story of Jesus’ ministry (The Gospel according to Matthew chapter 16), we learn of a group of religious leaders demanding a “sign from heaven” to build their case against him. Jesus points out to them that they regularly get all sorts of signs from heaven and accept what they mean without question, yet they can’t see the love of God in the healing or feeding thousands from a single sack lunch that Jesus has done.

Jesus is the sign pointing to God’s love and God’s Kingdom on earth, right in front of them and they choose not to see it. They know that if they acknowledge that Jesus is the son of God, the chosen one, the Messiah, then they’ll have to listen to him. All that Jesus teaches undoes their earthly power and prestige and so if they just pretend they don’t see, they won’t have to change. The signs weren’t kept from them, they chose not to see them just like, as Jesus points out to them, in the story of Jonah1.

The signs of God’s kingdom on earth are all around us and in us, if we choose to pay attention to them, even when they are pointing out what we don’t want to see or hear.

What signs of God’s kingdom are you seeing today? What signs are you trying to ignore?

1The people Jesus was speaking to would have been very familiar with the story of Jonah. Jonah tried to ignore God’s plan and in doing so put others in danger. And, yet, even through Jonah’s rebellion, God fulfills the plan for the people of Nineveh. You can read the whole story here , it isn’t very long. Or, even better watch Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie!