A Let Your Hair Down Kind of Love (Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent)

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent
3.13.16
John 12:1-8
Calvary - St. George's Church

In the Gospel of John, Jesus’ ministry begins with an overflow of an expensive wine. In today’s Gospel lesson, just days before his death, his ministry is confirmed with the outpouring of a costly perfume.

Now many of you are familiar with Jesus’s first miracle. Jesus and his mother Mary are at a wedding feast. A party designed to last a week. Only the wine runs out far too soon. While this may not be the biggest deal for us today (something we might at most roll our eyes at), in this honor-and-shame culture this is a great disgrace.

Jesus, seeing this, decides to act. And he makes a way where there is no way. And when he’s finished what was about to be shame is replaced with honor. For not only is there wine enough to spare, but the best wine has been saved for last.

Now John does not call this act a miracle. He calls it a sign. And he calls it a sign to get us to look beyond the event itself to what it points to. To the overflowing love and grace of God for people so prone to shaming themselves. People like me and you.

Strange Gifts?: Sermon for the Feast of the Epiphany

Sermon for the Feast of the Epiphany

Matthew 2:1-12

January 6, 2016

Calvary - St. George’s Church

What’s the strangest gift you’ve ever received?

The Huffington Post (the ultimate source for reliable news and opinion) recently ran a list of the “15 Weirdest Gifts Celebrities [have] Received From Fans.” Most of the gifts were quirky or fun: Ariana Grande received a 42 lb pumpkin, The Jonas Brothers a dead shark, and Taylor Swift, no stranger to being number one on the charts, got the top spot for being gifted a turtle shell. The list wasted about five minutes of my life, but I'm actually glad I fell prey to the click-bait because I found one of the gifts rather interesting. Nabbing the unremarkable fourth place spot was the legendary rocker Alice Cooper who, on an ordinary day just like this one, found a coffin on his doorstep. You heard right, a coffin. Was this from some hater who wanted him dead, or was this a fitting albeit creepy gift to one of music’s darkest musicians? Alice and we may never know.

But put up with a little bit of foolishness with me. What if you were in Cooper’s shoes? What if someone gave you a coffin? What if someone gifted you a place in our columbarium?

If you’re in your early 30’s, with decades of life ahead of you, you might take this as some joke that bombed. But if you’re in your 70’s or 80’s, with only so many years left in life to look forward to, then a present like this might cause distress or offense.

The magician-kings in our Gospel lesson for today are said to give three gifts to the Christ-child: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. The first two gifts don’t seem so strange. Gold would symbolize wealth and power and frankincense his role as the spiritual leader of his subjects. Both fitting gifts from one king to another. The third though seems rather strange. Myrrh is a spice or ointment that was used to embalm the dead. This means Cooper's gift was not so unique after all. A coffin, more or less, was laid at the foot of Jesus' mother Mary on the thirteenth day of his life. But while this may seem rather strange to you and me, Alice Cooper and the Huffington Post, to the magician-kings even the myrrh was a thoughtful gift. Even the coffin offered at his doorstep was a way of paying him homage. Because these gifts taken as a whole were a way of honoring a king’s life from exciting beginnings to a gentle end.

'Take Up Your Cross' (Sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost) Mark 8:27-38

Sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Mark 8:27-38

9.13.15 (Sunday of a Baptism)

Calvary - St. George's Church, Manhattan

What does Jesus mean when he tells us to "take up our cross?"

Over the millennia, this phrase has been interpreted in a variety of ways. Mostly in good, helpful ways, but, on occasion, it’s been used to for ill.

I’m going to begin with two popular misinterpretations of this phrase, before taking a stab at what Jesus is really getting at.

So, two things he doesn't mean.

First, when he says ‘take up your cross’, Jesus does not mean: submit to oppression. Women and people of color, in particular, who have suffered abuse, have often had Jesus’s words used to keep them suffering... Does your husband mistreat you? Does your slaveowner beat you? Put up with it, so the false interpretation goes, for this is your cross to bear…

Too often ‘take up your cross’ is taken to mean, tell those who are suffering injustice to suffer it a little more. This is not what Jesus was talking about.

The second misinterpretation of this phrase is the way we often use it in everyday conversation. Sorry everybody, but ‘my cross to bear' is not a difficult spouse or a nagging in-law... Unfortunately, it isn’t even something as awful as crushing student loans.

Rooted in Trust (Sermon for the 13th Sunday after Pentecost) Ephesians 6:10-20

Sermon for the 13th Sunday after Pentecost

Ephesians 6:10-20

8.23.15

Calvary - St. George's Church, Manhattan

“Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power. Put on the whole armor of God. For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, the authorities, the cosmic powers of this present darkness.”

If anyone has ‘been strong in the Lord,' it’s Dietrich Bonhoeffer. When nearly every German minister capitulated to the horrible desires and decrees of the Third Reich, Bonhoeffer remained steadfast. 

His dissent began early. Two days after Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, with storm troopers already on the streets, the 27 year old German pastor gave a dangerous radio address proclaiming resistance to the Fuhrer and support for German Jews.

The rest of his life, until he was executed in a concentration camp in 1945, was one of resistance against the ‘rulers and authorities; the cosmic powers of this present darkness.’

Bonhoeffer was so rooted in confidence and trust in his Lord that his very real fear and anxiety were simply swallowed up.

I Don't Want to Hurt Other People Any More (Sermon for the Last Sunday of the Epiphany) Mark 9:2-9

Sermon for the Last Sunday of the Epiphany

Mark 9:2-9

February 15, 2015

Calvary - St. George's Church

About 10 years ago, someone hurt me so badly that I thought I would never recover. I had experienced a terrible betrayal. I couldn’t believe that someone I trusted so much was capable of doing what what this person did. I felt like a victim and I was bitter.

A few years ago, the event long behind me, the scars fully healed, my indignation less dramatic, the same thing happened. There was hurt, there was betrayal, and there was a victim. Only this time the shoe was on the other foot. This time I was the one doing the hurting. This time I betrayed someone close to me. And it took me until it was all over to realize that I had done the very thing that I had so vehemently decried only a few years earlier. It was a moment of epiphany; a haunting that stopped me in my tracks. I felt awful and I never wanted to hurt someone like that ever again.  

Today is the Last Sunday of Epiphany. In three days—on Ash Wednesday—the season of Lent begins. On this the final Sunday before Lent, the church celebrates the transfiguration of Jesus. Today, I’m here to tell you why the message of the transfiguration is good news for victimizers who are tired of hurting people.