Kenwood United Methodist Church

Fighting Fear

3^rd Sunday After Pentecost, Year B ~ Mark 4:35-41

Kenwood UMC ~ June 21, 2009

I watched someone fight fear this week. It was the final day of level three swim lessons for Kate, our oldest daughter. The swim instructors had told her that she would have the chance to jump off the diving board. She wasn’t so sure she wanted to. There were lots of things that were stirring up fear in her. The diving well was very deep. 12 feet. She couldn’t touch. She’d swum across it. She’d treaded water in it. But she’d never jumped in. And this wasn’t off the wall, after all. It was off a diving board up in the air. What about those brief seconds before she hit water?

She stood back, not eager to be the first in line. I stood across the pool, not sure if she was really going to go through with it. She had a look on her face that was at once fearful and determined. Her arms were crossed. It was her turn, and she climbed the ladder, walked to the end of the diving board, looked down for just a moment and jumped.

Courage had won! I went over to congratulate her, and encouraged her to do it again. She really didn’t want to—she was just glad she could say she’d done it. But she decided to. I don’t really think she was any less afraid, but somehow she knew that it would be OK. She’d make it to the side and out of the water just fine.

Whether we are jumping off of diving boards, or confronting another challenge that makes us fearful, we know what Kate was feeling—and we know what the disciples were feeling that night. They were trying to cross to the other side—to head into new territory to share Jesus’ message, and a horrific storm comes us. They are afraid. They are frozen by their fear.

Where are those places of fear for us, when we are trying to cross into new territory and don’t know what’s ahead? I will confess I’ve felt some of that as we prepare for our building program at Kenwood. There’s lots about the months ahead that I don’t know and can’t predict. It is easy to be afraid.

I know people who are in a place of deep fear right now because of the economic recession. People who are afraid they won’t have the money to pay for health insurance or for the inevitable car repair. People who are afraid things may never turn around. It is easy to be afraid.

I encounter people frequently who experience fear as one of their emotions when a loved one dies. How, they wonder, can I continue to live without this person? How can I make sense of life now? It is easy to be afraid.

I have been following first hand accounts from the people of Iran this week on Twitter. Twitter is a social networking site which has been a primary conduit for information in the midst of the Iranian election crisis. I’ve seen countless message from people who are afraid as they watch police beating protestors, or see gunfire from their windows. It is easy to be afraid.

And in those times of fear, we raise the question with the disciples: do you not care about us, God? Jesus, do you not see the danger we are in? Wake up!

And what does Jesus do in the midst of those fearful anxious times? What can we learn from this story about how Jesus is present? Well, first of all, I would invite you to notice that Jesus is in the boat with the disciples all along. He does not invite us to cross into new territory without going along with us on the journey.

Jesus also takes the storm seriously. When the disciples wake him up in a panic, he responds. He doesn’t brush off their concern or toss it aside. He takes it seriously and does something about it. In the same way, in our moments of fear and panic, we can turn to Jesus. We can cry out to God, and we can know that God will hear us and will meet us. God will calm us down—we will not stay forever in a state of anxiety and panic.

And then God will do one thing further. God will remind us of what we already know. When Jesus turns to the disciples and says, “why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” he is not saying it in an exasperated way. He says it as a gentle reminder. They do have faith. And faith can anchor and calm us when we are overtaken by anxiety and fear. Faith reminds us that God is with us.

When we encounter a new experience that stirs up fear within us, God is with us in the boat. God does not leave us alone, but accompanies us, takes our fear seriously, and fights it with overwhelming love and care for us. So let us jump off the diving board. Let us go over to the other side of the recession, the other side of grief, the other side of this building program, the other side of our fight for justice and righteousness. Let us go over to the other side with the faith that Jesus is in the boat with us and will see us safely through the storms.

Revealed Among Us

Easter 3 Year B ~ Luke 24:36b-48

Kenwood UMC ~ April 24, 2009

            The disciples thought they were seeing a ghost.  Christ has risen—they know it intellectually, several have already seen him.  But when he appears in the room with them, they thought they were seeing a ghost.  They could not believe he was really present with them.

            Realizing that his verbal assurances were not enough, Jesus eats with them.  Surely, if he eats fish and bread he must be real, and not a ghost, right?  But they must still have questions, because then Luke’s gospel reports that he interprets for them once more the Old Testament stories and prophecies about him.  He has to remind them of what he has shared so many times before during his life and ministry.  And, he then ends with this direction—be my witnesses.

This post resurrection encounter with the disciples offers us a foundation to think about how we are to live as resurrection people.  Jesus invites the disciples to do two things: recognize his presence among them, and be his witnesses.  As his disciples today, we have the same task:  recognize the spirit of the resurrected Christ among them, and then go share the word about his resurrection.

But how?  How do we see Christ revealed among us?  What gives us a knowledge that Christ is present, in our midst, as real today as he was then?  The beginning here is faith—a willingness to believe that Christ is in our midst which compels us to look for him  We must be willing to see him in the everyday things of life–while not literally, then in Spirit.  When we gather for worship, we must see him in the cross.  We must hear him in the music.  And we must meet him in the community shared with one another.

I see Christ revealed when someone helps someone else down the front steps after church.  I see Christ revealed when someone who has experience with job layoffs is willing to sit down with folks who are going through that right now and share his experiences.  I see Christ revealed when someone gives up a few hours to sit with someone at their bedside.  I see Christ revealed when someone gives time and skill to prepare barbeque for a fundraiser to help send kids to camp.

And in all of these places I am seeing Christ revealed in tangible action.  I am seeing Christ revealed as people are being witnesses.

Christ was revealed at Elmont Elementary because six Kenwood servants spent eight weeks working with six kids on their SOL skills.  Did we talk about Jesus?  No.  We revealed him by our actions and priorities.

Christ was revealed when a member of a small group at Kenwood was facing a challenge, and the group members gathered around the person, placed hands on their head and shoulders and prayed for them.  Did Jesus literally show up?  Yes, in the groups’ words and care.

If we are his witnesses, Christ will be revealed among us. It will happen in unexpected ways, in unplanned ways, in ways that sometimes make us laugh with joy or cry out in amazement.  But if we are his witnesses Christ will be revealed.

And ultimately, it is up to us.  We can’t sit around and wait for him to arrive—we have to go and carry him with us, into places that are hurting and hopeless. 

            Let us profess our faith together using the statement of faith in your bulletin.  We profess that when we recognize Christ, we are able to become Easter people and bear him into the world in ways that are transformational.

Welcome to the Wondering

Easter 2, Year B ~ John 20:19-31

Kenwood UMC ~ April 19, 2009

No one believed it. She didn’t look the part. It didn’t matter what anyone said who had ever seen it before, it just couldn’t possibly be true. It was so incredibly unlikely that it was laughable. Everyone was a skeptic.

That was the feeling in the audience of Britain’s Got Talent last Saturday night when Susan Boyle walked onto the stage. The homely-looking, plain speaking Scottish woman looked like she didn’t belong—like someone had put her on the show as a practical joke.

Until she opened her mouth and offered an amazing rendition of “I Dream A Dream” from Les Miserables. She had the audience and the judges from the first note and they were on their feet applauding by the time she was done.

I know because like many of you, I went and watched it on-line. I know you did because you were forwarding it to me, posting it on Facebook, and talking about it at work. The You Tube version of her performance had over 5 million hits, and it was shown on news programs throughout the week.

And, as I, too, was wowed by her, I found myself asking…why. Why all the fascination? What was happening here?

And, as usual, I took my musings into my sermon preparation. And I was struck by the similarity between our fascination with Susan Boyle and Thomas’ conviction that he needed to see Jesus in order to believe it was really him.

Why couldn’t the audience—and most of us who viewed the performance—believe that Susan had what it took to be a professional singer? Because it just didn’t make sense with everything we know about celebrities—they are polished, fit, trim, packaged just right. Susan was none of that. And so we doubted her.

Thomas doubted the story of the resurrected Jesus that his friends told him. It was too much—too much to take in too much to believe.

And there are still a lot of Thomas’ out there. They are the people who come to the church with lots of wondering and questioning. They are not willing—or able—to take things at face value. They need to probe and examine, to explore and investigate, to discover in their hearts that Jesus is real, for them.

I like the Thomases. Perhaps it’s because I have a bit of Thomas in me. You see nothing turns me off more than when someone says, well, let me explain faith to you because I have all the answers. I wish faith were as easy as a three step process, and then we had it all figured out. But Thomas reminds us that it isn’t. Some people can take things at face value—others need to experience it for themselves. Thomas had to experience the risen Christ in order to believe.

And that’s why I think it is vitally important for us as a church family to provide people with the opportunity to experience the power of the Holy Spirit in their lives, to experience faith in real life. I think God wants us to open our doors to all kinds of people—and especially people with questions. You know, it’s easy to be scared of them. I remember when a young women inquired about enrolling in the first Disciple 1 class I was leading in a previous congregation I served. She said, you know, I am really interested in this class, but I have to tell you that I don’t completely buy into this Jesus thing. Is it OK to take the class?

I could have shut the door on her, assumed she was a Susan Boyle and said, I’m sorry, you can’t participate. But I didn’t. I instinctively and immediately said, sure it’s OK to take the class. It’s a great place to explore your questions about Jesus and faith.

I’d be willing to bet that there are a lot of us who know some Thomases—people who have questions, people who are curious, people who are exploring. It is easy to relate to them but not to talk about those questions. It’s easy to write them off like Susan Boyle and assume they’ll never be a part of the body of Christ. They’re too cynical. But I think Jesus offers us a different model. I think he says we should jump right in, and welcome the questions, welcome the dialogue. Welcome the people who don’t quite fit our mold, who make us look at things a little differently. Welcome them and trust in the power of the Holy Spirit to work in and through them, to strengthen their faith, and to use them to strengthen our faith community. Welcome the wondering. Embrace uncertainty and mystery. And commit to living together as God’s people as we work it all out.

Amen.

The Journey Leads to Transformation

Easter B ~ Mark 16:1-8

Kenwood UMC ~ April 12, 2009

I’ve always been fascinated by medical science—not by doing it, but by thinking about it. Early in those days as a teenager when I started seriously considering what to do with my life, I thought about being a biomedical ethicist, because I loved to think about all the ethical issues surrounding medical technology. And that’s why the headline on Friday on cnn.com caught my eye as I was sitting down to finish my sermon.

Tracy Toms can vouch for it….I was on the phone with him and got online to check the weather to make sure we could still plan on an outdoor Sunrise Service, and as I surfed over to the weather, the headline on my home page caught my eye. “Doctors in Boston perform second U.S. face transplant.”

Cool! I exclaimed to Tracy, a “face transplant”. I am sure he had absolutely no idea what I was talking about….and I probably didn’t either. But as soon as I hung up, I checked out the article. Doctors in Boston had performed the second ever face transplant in the United States, giving a man who had suffered traumatic face injuries in a accident several years ago a completely new bottom half of his face from an organ donor.

Now that’s transformation. More than plastic surgery, that’s putting someone else’s face on yours—like was dreamed of in the 1997 movie Face/Off when an investigator has his face surgically duplicated to become identical to that of a criminal he is trying to catch. Wow. The stuff of science fiction becomes reality in 12 short years. That’s transformation.

But the kind of transformation we are talking about this morning is not science fiction….and it also in many ways is not that dramatic. No, I’m not talking about the transformation that happens in the resurrection. I’m talking about the transformation that happens in US as a result of the resurrection.

But before we get there, let’s get back to the drama we find at the tomb on that first Easter morning. Mary Magdalene and Salome, who remained with Jesus at the cross, have gone to the market and purchased spices so that that can properly anoint his body for burial. They proceed to the tomb early on Sunday morning, worrying about how they will get the large stone moved out of the way. They discover that their worries are for naught because they find the stone already gone and a stranger sitting there, who tells them not to worry, that Jesus has been raised. He asks them to go and tell Peter and the disciples that Jesus goes ahead of them to Galilee, as he had promised.

How do they possibly process the news? It is completely absurd, completely unexpected, completely out of line with anything that they have known or experienced. It doesn’t matter that Jesus told them it would happen—they hadn’t believed him. At best they figured he was talking in symbols. But his physical body, completely gone, raised from the dead to live again?! They could not process it.

And so, Mark’s gospel says, they flee in terror and amazement and say nothing to anyone. And there’s where it ends, originally. There are some verses tacked on after verse 8—12 of them, to be exact. But scholars are pretty sure that these twelve verses are a later addition to the Gospel, not part of the original manuscript.

But if it ends there, in fear and silence, then how did the story continue? How did we meet Paul and Timothy, Dorcas and Lydia in the book of Acts, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of Christians since?

The answer is simple—transformation took place because of the resurrection—transformation took place in the disciples. As the reality of what had happened sunk in, the women were transformed from terrorized silence into wondering questions. And pretty soon those wondering questions gave way to astonished belief. And then astonished belief gave way to courageous preaching in the face of persecution…..and here we are today.

And the same kind of transformation can happen to us because of the resurrection. Many of us probably came here today with doubts and questions. We don’t understand something about God or the world or how God works in the world. But the more we learn about Jesus…the closer we draw to him…the more our questions can be transformed into faith. And as out faith grows, it transforms us into disciples. It’s a process that continues throughout our lives and beyond. A process that begins here. Today. With the good news that Christ is risen.

I hope you didn’t come today expecting something dramatic—a face transplant or a heart transplant or an attitude transplant. I hope you didn’t expect to leave a completely different person than you entered. But I do hope that as we share in the resurrection story together you can experience transformation. I hope you will be compelled to join the women at the tomb in a journey that moves from questions to faith. I hope that you will be drawn into this community and our journey together, as we learn more about Jesus and seek to follow him together. I hope that you will be nudged, urged, or encouraged to join the journey—a journey that leads to new life emerging even….even out of death.

You see, that new life allows us to see the world differently. The commonplace becomes extraordinary.

· A crown of thorns, when seen with the eyes of faith, transforms into a crown of glory.

· A cross of crucifixion transforms into the cost of love.

· The oils of embalming brought to the tomb become oils to anoint of a savior.

· The tombstone at sunrise transforms into the door to resurrection.

· The darkness transforms to everlasting light.

· The crucified Savior becomes the living Word.

· A cup of wine becomes a promise fulfilled.

· And some broken bread transforms into the feast of life.

And you and me? Ordinary people. We are transformed into followers of Christ who love and serve him in the world.

Thanks be to God for resurrection transformation!

On the Journey You Must Go to Jerusalem

Palm Sunday, Year B ~ Mark 11:1-11

Kenwood UMC ~ April 5, 2009

Our drama this morning ended with the question, “who do you see when Jesus rides by?” And it’s an important question for us to bring to this Palm Sunday worship. We may not see either a king or a traitor. We may see something quite different: a prophet whose way of love we want to embrace but don’t quite know how; a savior who has pulled us up out of the depths of despair; an inspirational visionary who offers a new way of justice; a loyal and compassionate healer.

But whomever we see on that donkey, we travel with him. Because we have been traveling with him on this Lenten journey, and we have been seeking to know him better, to draw closer to him, to embrace his ways. And along that journey we’ve looked at five practices that could help us draw closer to Jesus:

· The practice of gathering with the community of faith

· The practice of making covenant—fulfilling our promise to God

· The practice of obedience to God’s Word—which comes through study and formation

· The practice of confessing our sins

· And the practice of expecting blessing, even in the most difficult of circumstances.

Now certainly, that’s not an exhausting list of practices that can help us draw closer to Christ, but it is a good start. But today we face a stark and sometimes difficult reality—no matter how good we are at those practices, no matter how hard we work on them—they do not protect us from the journey into Jerusalem. Following Jesus does not mean that we get to skip over the hard parts of the journey.

And what is that journey into Jerusalem like? It is what happens when everything in life seems to be triumphant—or at least manageable–and then, overnight, it turns into distress and despair.

That’s what happened to Jesus, you see. At the end of our scripture lesson from Mark today we leave him at a turning point. The crowds have hailed him, the celebration has burst forth as he rode toward Jerusalem, but when he gets there we sense that a turning point is happening. He isn’t actually in Jerusalem until the very last verse, he’s just going there. When he arrives he doesn’t do much more than enter the temple and look around, before he goes to his friends’ home in Bethany.

I think it’s fascinating that the crowds along the road didn’t then gather at the temple to hear him teach. I wonder if it might have something to do with the fact that they wanted Jesus to overthrow the Roman rule—but they didn’t really want to hear the hard truths he had for them about changing the way they lived their lives. Whatever their reason, they are gone, left behind along the way, going back to their homes and lives, and Jesus goes to have dinner with friends.

And he goes to that home in Bethany knowing what lies ahead. Sure, he may not know exactly how things will unfold this week—but he knows it will be a difficult week, full of struggle and suffering. And yet…he does not run away, he does not flee from this week that lies ahead. Because he knows he must go there—it is unavoidable.

And we must go there with him. We must go into this week of suffering with Jesus, because it is only when we travel through this week with him that we are able to fully understand how much he suffers. And it is only when we truly are able to understand how much Jesus suffers that we are able to understand how he is able to stand with us, when our journeys lead into our own Jerusalem. That’s why Jesus’ suffering matters—not so we can view it as a kind of a side show at a circus that is strangely fascinating. But, so that we can know, when we are in the depths of our own personal struggles, that God has risked it all—God has experienced the same kind of pain, the same kind of despair, and God will not run away from it. In Christ’s suffering, we can find the assurance that when we go to Jerusalem, Christ will be there beside us—we are not alone.

And so, we ask for strength for this journey. Strength to follow Jesus in this holiest of weeks. Strength to read the scripture stories of the events of this week on our own. Strength to gather with the community on Maundy Thursday. We ask for strength as we pray together the prayers of the people that are printed in your bulletin. Let us pray.

On the Journey We Expect A Blessing

Lent 5, Year B ~ Jeremiah 31:31-34

March 29, 2009 ~ Kenwood UMC

How many of you have eaten out in the last week—whether it was takeout, lunch with friends, dinner out—raise your hands?

Eating out is something a lot of us do with great regularity, but many of us don’t eat at a restaurant like the one I heard about this week. The website reads: Imagine a restaurant where there are no prices on the menu and where the check reads $0.00 with only this footnote: “Your meal was a gift from someone who came before you. We hope you will pay-it-forward however you wish.”[1]

For real? Yep, it sure is. Karma Kitchen is a restaurant in California where there are no fixed prices, and you don’t pay for your own meal. Instead, at the end of the meal you leave money in any amount for someone who comes after you. Karma Kitchen is run entirely by volunteers as an experiment—a shift in perspective. Restaurant co-founder Viral Mehta explains that “It’s a very simple shift but the shift is fundamental. It is a shift from transaction to trust. From a contract to a compact. From being separate to creating community.” Most customers choose to pay handsomely for their meals. Any income beyond expenses goes to charity.[2]

Let’s stop and think about that for a minute. Eating out is usually based on consumption, right? You pay for what you consume. What a radical shift to make to pay for what others consume. What generosity of heart. Are these people nuts?

No. They are not nuts, but they are pretty bold. And it makes us wonder—exactly what are their hearts like? What does it take, especially in this economy, to have enough trust in your community that you can give things away? You know, I really like that idea…the idea that I might live in a community focused not on looking out for itself, but on loving and serving others, and assuming that if we do that we’ll be taken care of along the way.

Wait. I do live in that kind of community. It’s called the church, God’s people. And through the story of scripture we learn that God’s people have God’s love inscribed on our hearts—we are made in God’s image, and created to reflect that image of love and grace in the world.

But wow does it get hard to reflect that image sometimes. Like when the economy is tanking and you wonder if you’re next. Our you find yourself in a depression because that mysterious health care issue just can’t be resolved and you can’t do the things you want to because of it. Or you find yourself in the season of Lent, drawing closer and closer to Holy Week, thinking about Jesus’ suffering, and the betrayals by so many he loved, and wondering if you would do any better…..

We all find ourselves in the midst of times of struggle and suffering—most of us probably will encounter that kind of a period more than once in life. The people to whom Jeremiah spoken today were in such a time. They are the people of Israel, people with whom God has made a covenant over and over again. And people who have broken that covenant over and over again. And this time they find themselves in exile because they have not been faithful to God. They have been banished from the Promised Land, and find themselves cut off from the Temple, theirs ways of worship, customs and ways of life.

And amidst this suffering, Jeremiah delivers a word from God: God is making a new covenant, different from the ones made previously. This covenant is different because it does not depend on actions or exterior things to be kept—instead, God’s law is written on our hearts. We are changed from the inside.

This change takes place because of the covenant given in Christ, and it transforms us on the inside. It shapes us into new people and it makes possible our practice for this week: the practice of expecting a blessing. As Christ’s people, we no longer have to worry about whether we will have everything we need, whether God will take care of us. We can afford to pay it forward, like the diners at Karma Kitchen. We can afford to do this because we live expecting God’s blessing. No matter how horrible things get, no matter how lost we feel, as Christ’s people we expect that God will change things, God will provide a blessing. And so we live in that expectation, having hope in all circumstances, and inviting God’s blessing into our lives.

I want to invite you this week to look for places of despair in your life, and in the lives of those around you. And I want to invite you to open the door for God in those places. I want to invite you not to say, “this is hopeless” but rather to proclaim, I believe God is working in the midst of this to find a way through. When we expect blessings, when we expect God’s presence, we will transform not only our hearts, but also the world around us. Let us live as people who expect God’s blessing.

[2] “Deep in Our Hearts” by Ray McGinnis, Spirit Sightings, www.seasonsofthespirit.com, March 29, 2009.