Do You See Him? (Sermon)

“Do You See Him?”

John 15:26-27, 16:12-16

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

10/26/14

          It’s almost time for Jesus. The hands of the past are pressing him into hands of the future. His disciples don’t understand this, of course. There’s no failure or shame in that. Their Jesus experience is simply incomplete. Had we been there, we would have shared their bewilderment.

          When reading chapters 14 through 17 of John, the Farewell Discourse, I imagine faces that looked like mine when I sat through a high school physics or chemistry class. I stared at all those formulas with glassy-eyed detachment. They were like recipes for some casserole you couldn’t eat. I see that same confusion and frustration on the disciples’ faces when Jesus says things like, “He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” So much of what Jesus says in this long speech is so dense it that it seems to do more to conceal him than to reveal him.

          Things are somewhat different for us. Jesus’ words can still be dense and challenging, but because you and I inhabit a post-Easter world, we read them with a much different spiritual memory. Our Jesus experience may not be complete, either, but when retrospect allows us to see how God has been our shepherd, we can interpret that as Jesus fulfilling his promise to be with us always. Commenting on today’s passage, Fred Craddock affirms hindsight saying, “[T]he Christian life is to a large extent an act of memory.”¹

          Now, that is not to say that we live in the past. We live in a dynamic creation, the gift of a dynamic God. To try to live in the past, or to sit back waiting for some cosmic pendulum to return things to the way they were is to choose a kind of living death. So, to describe the Christian life as “an act of memory” is to say that as the church, we are a community of people whose vocation is to generate new experiences through which, in time, the Holy Spirit creates and deepens faith. These experiences are not about imposing doctrine. They are about growing stories, stories which flower into awareness, and awareness which produces the fruits of memory and hope. When remembrance becomes a spiritual discipline, we encounter a vibrant storehouse of images and language that help us to recognize the presence of the risen Christ, who reveals to us God’s unfolding future.

          “A little while,” says Jesus, “and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me.”

          Do you see Jesus? More specifically, do you see Jesus here?

          Some years ago at a celebration for graduating high school seniors, a father shared a story about his son. The young man had been a very active, curious, and mischievous boy. One Sunday morning, the boy, his name is Brandon, had crafted a perfect paper airplane out of his bulletin. During the pastoral prayer, the father kept a quiet eye on his son. He saw how proudly and carefully Brandon put the finishing touches on each crease. Dad waited for the “Amen,” intending at that point to remind his son what was and was not appropriate to do with a paper airplane in church, during worship on Sunday morning. He waited too long. As people raised their heads from the prayer, they all witnessed the long, silent, graceful flight of Brandon’s paper airplane as it swept forward from the back of the sanctuary, buoyed by the thermals rising from the congregants who were all warm with the Holy Spirit. The plane sailed all the way to the front of the church where it came to rest at the foot of the pulpit.  Oh, it was a thing of beauty – to everyone except Brandon’s mama.

          “I remember that time,” said the father, “that time when my son almost met Jesus right here in this sanctuary.”

          He referred, of course, to the mother’s suddenly less-than-nurturing desires toward her little darling. But the father’s teasing comment raises a relevant question: “Is this a place where Jesus is alive, at work, and real to us? Or is this a place where we almost meet Jesus?”

          Is this a place where we tell the stories of faith, biblical stories and our own stories, in such a way that we see Jesus in our worship, our service, and our fellowship? Or is this simply a place where we talk about Jesus, where we are polite and nice to one another, but where, all-in-all, Jesus is someone whom we almost meet?

          I will tell you this: It is much safer and much more comfortable if this is a place where we almost see Jesus. He is no meek and mild milquetoast. He’s not even feral. Jesus is the Ruach, the Wind of God. He is wild, untamed and untamable. He does not let us remain comfortable and satisfied. He is that loving energy who continually goads us toward the heights and depths of human life, the joys and the sufferings, places we will never fully appreciate if all we do is almost see him.

          In his famously pithy confession of sin, British writer G. K. Chesterton wrote: “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried.”²

          The truth is, you see, this church, like virtually all others, is a place where we both see and almost see Jesus. As imperfect creatures, we often conceal, disguise, and even disfigure him. But we do have our moments, moments of vulnerable and transparent faithfulness when with joy and gratitude we see and make seen the risen Christ.

          Next Sunday is Consecration Sunday. We will make our commitments of time, spiritual gifts, and money to God through Jonesborough Presbyterian Church. What we do next week is not to make some kind of graceless payment, or to fulfill some sort of moral obligation. And in asking for everyone’s support of the work of this part of the body of Christ, we are absolutely not selling indulgences. What I hope that all of us do next week when we make our commitments is to say, “We have seen Jesus in this place, with these people. And we want to be an active part of a community who sees Jesus and is helping to make him seen. We want to continue becoming an Easter community, a place made vibrant through the feisty promise of resurrection.”

          Faithful and generous stewardship of our lives and resources proclaims to the world that yes, we are and want to be known as stewards of a Pentecost household, a place where Jesus is alive, active, and real.

¹Fred Craddock, Preaching Through the Christian Year: Year B, Fred Craddock, et al, Trinity Press International, 1993 p. 284.

²http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/g/gilbertkc102389.html

By What Authority (Sermon)

“By What Authority”

Matthew 21:23-32

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

10/12/14

          One of my favorite past times, when I am otherwise on duty in my pastoral role, is to mess with impressionable minds in the youth group. I love to throw out pure nonsense that for one split second the kids almost believe. There is a lifetime of twisted joy in the momentary look of dismay on a roomful of young faces when the preacher says in all seriousness, that in Georgia we consider salamanders a delicacy – sautéed in herb butter and served with white wine. Or that no, Marianne can’t come to the cookout at Bear and Heather’s house.

          “Why not?” they ask.

          “Because,” I say, “every first Wednesday evening she has to meet with her probation officer.”

          “Oh…wait…what?!”

          Such foolishness has given rise to a mantra that comes in the form of a warning: Don’t trust Pastor Allen unless he’s wearing his robe.

          Not only do I enjoy all of this, I am both encouraged and humbled by the implied trust of the clerical robe. All the carrying on returns to a foundational place, a place of identity and authority. For the kids to say Don’t trust Pastor Allen unless he’s wearing his robe is a kind of backhanded statement of faith in the spiritual truth which stands behind the office represented by this garment. It reminds me that I must choose my words carefully when wearing it.

          Now, that does not mean that I should avoid saying difficult things, or that I have to try to please everyone. It means that whether I’m wearing this robe or not, my words must reiterate the words of Jesus and my actions must reflect his challenging love and transforming grace. And that’s dangerous work for me do, because I am not Jesus. Still, a robe like this lays on the one who wears it an authority and a demand similar in gravity to the authority and demand laid on a judge who wears a robe in a courtroom, or a doctor who wears a lab coat in a hospital. It is, of course, most like the authority and the demand laid on all who are baptized and wear the name Christian.

          In the course of all faith traditions, there come, inevitably, times of earthshaking collision between the authority of the robed institution and its powerful defenders and the robeless masses who know that while they may not hold power, they still hold the authority of ones who are named, loved, and called by God.

          In our story today, the robed keepers of institutional power have had enough of the plain-clothes rabbi from Nazareth. Who is he to claim the spiritual authority to bulldoze his way through the temple like that? Who does he think he is calling the moneychangers robbers? Who is he to question, to judge, even to heal in God’s name?

          Jesus may be a Jew who knows the Torah. He may say and do remarkable things, but the chief priests and elders do not regard him as one who speaks with authority, because he challenges their authority. And he challenges the tradition, the scriptures, and everything familiar and comfortable to robes, rules, and rituals. So they ask him, “By what authority are you doing these things?”

          “You answer my question, and I’ll answer yours,” says Jesus. “When John baptized, was he doing God’s work or his own?”

          John the Baptist was another un-robed speaker of daring speech. He is dead now, but the chief priests and elders never had use for that loose cannon who called them snakes and illegitimate children. But the people consider John a man who spoke for God.

          These powerful men now face a quandary. If they say that John was doing God’s work, Jesus will scold them for not believing John. But to say that John followed his own agenda will get them more than a scolding from the crowds who revered John as a prophet.

          So, with authority, these finely-robed men say, “We don’t know.”

          “That’s what I thought,” says the robeless one.

          “Well, what about this,” says Jesus. And he tells them the quick parable about the man with two sons.

          “Which one does the father’s will?” he asks.

          “The first,” they answer, completely unaware that what they thought was a softball was more like a bowling ball falling straight for their toes.

          “John came to you in the way of righteousness,” says Jesus, “and you did not believe him.” Tax collectors and prostitutes are holier than you are, he says. They trusted him, and even when you recognized his authority you worshiped your tradition, your comfort, your institutional power instead of the Spirit that animated John’s life and voice.

          Do you see the sly, subversive thing Jesus does? He answers the initial question. “John came…in the way of righteousness,” says Jesus. And John said “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” Jesus, who is known for his tradition-defying, robe-shredding welcome of those whom the law condemns, is claiming for himself the authority of the Blessed One of whom John spoke.¹

          It is not included in today’s reading, but Jesus goes on to tell the parable of the wicked tenants, and this parable infuriates the chief priests and elders because they know he is talking about them. Seething, they  want to arrest Jesus, but once again, “they feared the crowds [who] regarded [Jesus] as a prophet.”

          Where, then, does real authority lie? According to the Gospel of God’s Christ, lasting authority lies not in the hands of the powerful, but in the hands of the powerless. It lies in the hands and hearts of those who trust the one who comes robed not in gold-trimmed linen but in fearless compassion and resurrecting love.

          Our reformed tradition is a great gift, a thing to receive and pass on with thanksgiving and hope. And it comes to us through the bold faith of robeless ones who risked life and limb defying the abuses of the corrupt robes of the medieval papacy. Nonetheless, Jesus’ ministry among the keepers of an entrenched institution says that no tradition is immune from such abuses. Even we who celebrate and participate in The Priesthood of All Believers can turn our long-historied practices into ruinous idols.

          Richard Rohr writes: “There are not sacred and profane things, places, and moments. There are only sacred and desecrated things, places, and moments—and it is we alone who desecrate them by our blindness…Our only blindness,” says Rohr, “is our…lack of [reverence, our lack of] fascination, humility, curiosity, [and] awe.”²

          Traditions can be sacred and desecrated, as well. And when a tradition becomes desecrated, it loses its sense of wonder, its sense of expectation, and its connection with the holiness within all things. Those who live in a desecrated tradition tend to become keepers of gates rather than sharers of good news. We become wielders of power rather than tellers of a story, and stewards of that story’s natural authority to transform and heal a desecrated creation.

          God has given us a wonderful story and a sacred community. God has laid upon all of us the authority to receive and convey these gifts for Christ’s sake, not our own. So, when we lay aside our quest for power, opting instead to exercise the spiritual authority of humble gratitude, we will find ourselves in the very midst of the breathtaking marvel of the redeemed and redeeming community of grace called the kingdom of God. And in that community we will discover, more and more, that we trust one another, whether we are wearing robes or not!

¹Lewis Donelson, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4. Westminster/John Knox Press, 2011, p. 119.

²http://myemail.constantcontact.com/Richard-Rohr-s-Meditation--The-Infinite-in-the-Finite.html?soid=1103098668616&aid=DlHIOBDCfik

Mama Said (Story/Sermon)

“Mama Said”

John 2:1-11

Allen Huff

Jonesborough Presbyterian Church

10/5/14

          Life is as good for Mary as it is for most other women in her place and time. Like all Jewish women, she has to be careful about how she dresses and where she travels, especially when she’s by herself. She has to be most careful about who she speaks to, and who is around when she speaks. Like all of her sisters, Mary simply is not free to speak and act as she might always choose.

          On the other hand, most women know that while men may try to keep women under tight control in public life, the men cannot control all things. And one realm of particularly tenacious independence is the realm of Jewish motherhood. In fact, more grown men than will admit it find themselves locked in a maternal orbit.

          When a biblical story wants hearers to sit up and take note, it begins with something like, In the beginning, or, They went up a mountain, or, An angel of the Lord appeared. But to begin a story with And his mama was there, too, escalates the urgency to a whole new level.

          Jesus is attending a wedding in Cana, and his mama is there, too.

          Reuben and Nathan have been hired as servers for the Mordecai-Isaacson wedding. They’ve been told to keep the wine flowing and the matzo balls rolling, and they’ve done that. But now they face a situation. All of Omar Isaacson’s fraternity brothers have come to the wedding. Every one of them. And they’ve all brought dates. Reuben and Nathan feel like they are pouring wine into colanders.

          Insufficient wine at a wedding would mean several things, and none of them are good. It would mean shame for Mr. Mordecai, the wedding host. It would also mean vocational catastrophe for the chief steward, a good friend of Reuben and Nathan. Most of all this party foul would bring entirely too much delight to Mrs. Isaacson, the mother of the groom. Mrs. Isaacson runs the debutante program for the daughters of wealthy Jewish families down in Jerusalem, and she is quite sure, thank you very much, that this Mordecai girl from the boondocks of Cana is not good enough for her son. So, like a hound dog on the hunt, she has her nose in the air, winding this party for flaws.

          Nathan is the first to realize the severity of the problem. He approaches Reuben slowly, smiling at the guests, politely ignoring those who raise their empty goblets asking for more wine.

          “Reuben,” says Nathan trying to sound calm. “Could I trouble you to accompany me to the kitchen, please?”

          Reuben is flirting with one of the wedding dancers and does not want to be bothered.

          “In a minute,” he snaps.

          “Reuben!” says Nathan through clenched teeth posing as a smile. “You. Me. Kitchen. Now!”

          As the two men exchange glares, Nathan mouths the words, No more wine.

          Reuben looks the floor as if he has just dropped something. A moment later he looks back at the dancer, holds up an “I’ll be back” finger, winks at her, and turns to follow Nathan.

          In the kitchen, they mull over the wine. They have no idea what they are going to do. But neither do they have any idea that someone has overheard them.

          For the last half hour, Mary, from Nazareth, has been graciously nodding her head as another woman brags on her children.

          “And my son,” says the woman, “has broken all company records for the sale of purple cloth and toga linen to government buyers. And I suspect that in five years Herod will be paying interest on loans to my son instead of collecting taxes from him.”

          “Is that right?” says Mary. Then, without impatience or weary spite, she says, “Well, bless his heart.”

          As she listens to the woman boast, she manages to hear key words and to see the facial expressions in the exchange between Reuben and Nathan. When they disappear into the kitchen, Mary looks at the woman with the powerful son and says, “Darling, would you please excuse me. I need to speak to someone. Enjoy the feast. I hear the wine is excellent.”

          She catches Jesus’ eye from across the room and with a quick tilt of her head tells her son to follow her. Jesus has been chatting with some of his new friends, relaxing, sharing stories, getting to know them, blissfully anonymous in the crowd. But he knows the look his mama gives him, so he slips away from his company and follows her.

          When Jesus steps into the kitchen, that nerve center of hospitality, he sees his mother standing next to the two servants. Their faces droop like a couple of feedbags on a fencepost. Mary does not give her son a chance to say or ask anything.

          “They have no wine,” she says. And that’s all she says.

          “Mom!” says Jesus. “That’s not my problem. Not right now.”

          Mary has imagined a day like this, a day when she lends the authority of her voice as well as the sanctuary of her womb to the Creative Mystery at work within her and beyond her – the Mystery who is revealing an eternity that is as near as her breath, and a holiness that is as intimately hers as the children to whom her body and her love have given birth. It is another day of clear-minded betrothal to that Mystery, and another day of blind faith.

          Standing in this kitchen on this day, she thinks of Moses’ unnamed mother setting her son in the reeds growing in the shallows of the Nile. Who would find him? Another Hebrew? An Egyptian? A crocodile?  What would become of her fine, fine son?

          She thinks of Rebekah scheming Isaac’s blessing upon Jacob, her favorite, younger son. To arrange this deception will mean that Jacob must flee from her as surely as he must flee from Esau – the reasons being both perfectly the same and perfectly different. And Rebekah knows that she may never see her son again.

          She thinks of Hannah promising to God her only child. For the simple privilege of having the capacity to bring even one life into the world, she will give up her son.

          When Mary speaks, there is nothing playful in her voice, nothing to suggest that she is guest at a wedding. Hers is the voice of a mother surrendering her son. She turns toward Reuben and Nathan, and in a low, flat voice she says into the warm, moist air of the kitchen, “Do whatever he tells you.” And she leaves.

          Jesus has envisioned a day like this, too. But in his vision he decides when to make himself known. He decides when to step into the river, when to accept the fullness of his blessing, when to make the wild and reckless promise of himself to God. And maybe he still can decide. Maybe he can put off the arrival of his hour. But his mother’s eyes still burn in his. Her words still flutter in his ears. They sound, and even feel, like the wings of a dove on the rise.

          If Jesus tells the servants nothing, they will do nothing – and the wedding feast will lose its joy. People will begin to grumble, and the celebration will turn into a committee meeting.

          If he tells them to do something, they will do that – and heaven knows what will happen next. The truth is, of course, that whether Jesus tells the servants to do anything or not, his mama has opened a door that cannot be shut. He is not facing a now or never situation. He faces the past, present, and future of his own identity.

          “Do whatever he tells you.” That’s what Mama said.

          Jesus looks around the kitchen. Then he looks at Reuben and Nathan and says, “Fill [those] jars with water.”

          The sign Jesus performs in Cana is not about coercing people into belief through some sort of magic. It’s about revealing to the creation a presence in the creation that transforms water jars into vessels of holy, spirited wine.

          A miracle, you see, is not something that happens outside of reason. Miracle is the very realm of our existence as God-imaged human beings. Miracle is the here-and-now Kingdom of Heaven. We live in its midst like fish in the water.

          Miracle saturates what appears to be the emptiness between you and me, between any two people, between any two creatures, for that matter. The miracle of presence is a given for us, but it is no small miracle in itself to become aware of it, to give humbly and to receive gratefully love, encouragement, admonition, and stories. And in that giving and receiving, in that exchange of grace, the space between us becomes – it always becomes – new wine.*

*This story/sermon was offered on World Communion Sunday, 2014, which was also the Sunday of that year’s National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough. My thoughts on the relationship between Jesus and his mother have been influenced by Dr. Jap Keith, a former professor of pastoral care at Columbia Seminary who once remarked said, “God and mothers call a lot of oldest children and first sons to the ministry.”