Category: Meditation

What I Am Giving God This Year – A Life That Bears Delicious Fruit

I'm reflecting on the custom of gift-giving, which is grounded in God's greatest gift to us. We spend a lot of time selecting just the right gifts for our loved ones. And what shall I give to God? Advent provides me with the opportunity to consider that question.

John the Baptizer came preaching repentance, saying, “Bear fruit worthy of repentance. . . every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire” (Mt. 3:8, 10). In other words, “Give God a life that tastes as good as it sounds!” That’s one of the things I want to give God this year, a life that bears delicious fruit. How do I do that?

I have to recognize the need for change and growth. A plant that stops changing and growing stops producing fruit. Things happen to people that cause them to stop changing and growing and their lives are not fruitful. A life that tastes as good as it sounds knows the necessity of change and growth.

I also have to learn to recognize good from evil. Have you ever bitten into a beautiful piece of fruit that has no flavor or is bitter? When dealing with fruit, it doesn’t take much more than a taste to tell the difference between good and bad. Why is it more difficult in dealing with the fruit of our lives? A life that tastes as good as it sounds recognizes the difference between good and evil. But then…

I have to make a choice. We may not be able to choose our parents or color of our skin or land of our birth. But we must choose how to respond to the people and the conditions around us. To give God a life that tastes as good as it sounds, we’ll have to change and grow, discern between good and bad, and make some responsible choices.

Our tradition includes both John the Baptizer and Jesus the Messiah! With only John, I’d know I am a snake, an unproductive bush. But with the Messiah, I know I have divine help to live a fruitful life.

Christian Baptism is not so much the dedication of a person’s life to God as it is the dedication of God’s life to a person and to a community of persons. John baptized with water for purification. But Jesus brought a baptism that included fire and the Holy Spirit. In Baptism, we are incorporated into God’s life, provided opportunities to turn to God, warned that being a faithful witness is costly, and given the Holy Spirit to help us live a fruitful life that tastes as good as it sounds.

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

December 3, 2020
What I am Giving God This Year – My Undivided Attention

“’Tis the Season!” You may wonder why I’m just getting around to saying this inasmuch as our shopping malls have been displaying Christmas merchandise since Halloween, reminding us that it is the season for gift-giving.

When we worship during Advent, we are reminded of the reason for the season. Our custom of gift-giving originated in our attempt to emulate God who gives himself to us. But, it is easy to forget to put God on our gift lists. After all, isn't the One who has given us the one necessary gift worthy to receive a response from us? So, I’m going to concentrate on what I’m giving to God this year and I especially want to give God my undivided attention.

To say that I am giving God my undivided attention doesn’t mean that I am supposed to find a hermitage somewhere and leave this life behind. It means that in the midst of everyday activities I need to be alert to the One who is looking for me through those events and guiding my response to them.

Advent is about those long centuries of waiting for the promised Messiah. Advent is about the thrill of knowing that promise has been fulfilled. Advent is about the expectation that the Messiah will come again to take us unto himself. But mainly, Advent is about watching and waiting for his appearance in the present moment.

Jesus said, "Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come" (Mk. 13:33).

A tourist stepped into the beautifully kept garden of the Castle Asconti in northern Italy. He encountered the gardener and asked when the owner was last there. “Twelve years ago,” the gardener said. The tourist then observed, “But you keep the grounds as though your master was coming back tomorrow.” The gardener quickly replied, “Today, sir. Today.”

A Christian watches and works as though the Master will return this very day because he does. He greets us in the mystery of Word and Sacrament on Sunday morning and at the intersection of the highways we travel on Wednesday afternoon. In this sense, as in the ultimate sense, his coming into our lives is something to which we should look forward. That merits my undivided attention.

Collect for the First Sunday of Advent

Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

November 24, 2020
Something More Precious Than a Precious Stone

I have a great old roll top desk in my study. I'm sitting at it now as I compose this reflection. There are a number of treasures on my desk, including a small stone. This stone was given to me by a dear friend and colleague, The Rev'd Jim Nelson. He gave me the stone to remind me of a parable he tells.

A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream. The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food. The hungry traveler saw the precious stone and asked the woman to give it to him. She did so without hesitation. The traveler left, rejoicing in his good fortune. He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime. But, a few days later, he came back to return the stone to the wise woman. "I've been thinking," he said. "I know how valuable this stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious. Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me this stone." Sometimes it's not the wealth you have but what's inside you that others need…A Precious Gift inside you.

As we move slowly through this time of COVID, so much of our attention seems to be focused on our own little worlds at a distance from others. In order to combat feelings of isolation and self-centeredness, we need to cultivate the spirit of generosity. I believe that the wise woman in this parable had the inner gift of generosity and I pray to receive it every single day when I see the stone my friend Fr. Jim gave me. It is something that is more precious than a precious stone,

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

November 12, 2020
Only God Can Make a Saint

On Sunday, we’ll observe the Feast of All Saints. Normally, on this feast day, we help God make some saints when we administer the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. Due to our COVID protocols, we won’t be able to do that this year. But we will renew our own Baptismal vows. We will recall that by water and the Holy Spirit, we are sanctified through Baptism. Through Baptism, we become “holy ones of the Most High” who “receive the kingdom.” We have been Baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, sealed by the Holy Spirit, and marked as Christ’s own for ever. Throughout our lives, we are formed as saints of God who live in communion with all the rest of the saints.

Whatever else we may be called during the course of our lives, in God’s eyes we are saints – blessed, sanctified, made holy, not by our own will but by the will of God. We are saints of God by grace and adoption. Above every other reason, when we return week by week, whether in person or virtually, to worship with other saints, we return to be reminded who we are and to give thanks – to offer Eucharist – for the divine gift of and vocation to sainthood. For we were created by God to bear the divine image, to be shaped and formed by the will of our Creator, to be filled with the fullness that only God can give.

We become members of the Church through Baptism. The Church is a unique institution in God’s eternal purpose, where the saints live in unity with God, one another, and those who have gone before us. We sometimes speak of the Church’s message, but if you read the New Testament carefully, you will see that it is the other way around. It’s not so much that the Church has a Message as that the Message has a Church. The saints, who are the Church, are the delivery system for the Message. That is our inheritance; our gift from God.

A colleague of mine enjoys telling of a time when a little boy was visiting his grandfather, whose church had beautiful stained glass windows. The little boy asked his grandfather who the people in the windows were. His grandfather told him, “Those are saints.” And the boy exclaimed, “Oh, I get it! Saints are people that the light shines through.”

Saints of God, you and I are people through whom God’s light shines. Throughout our lives, as our wills are transformed and we grow less resistant to God’s grace at work in us, the light of Christ shines more brilliantly through us.

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

October 29, 2020
Creation Has Been Given Into Our Care
During the next few weeks, we will be hearing a lot about faithful stewardship in preparation for Consecration Sunday, October 4. We're asking everyone to save the date and plan to worship together that morning either in the parking lot or online. While we are passing through this pandemic, we need all the hope, gratitude, and generosity we can summon. That's why we've chosen as our theme the words of the Prophet Jeremiah: "For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope" (Jeremiah 29:11).

Members of the parish will be sharing wonderful testimonials about stewardship and their faith journeys. I hope you will take the time to read them and listen to them. I, too, have a story to share. It is basically the same every year. I shared it with you when I arrived last year and I'm sharing it again for emphasis, for it represents the theological foundation that guides how I follow the spiritual practice of stewardship.

Creation Has Been Given Into Our Care.

In the very first chapter of the very first book of the Bible, we read that God created human beings in God’s own image. God blessed our species, entrusted the rest of creation into our hands, and gave us all the gifts we will need to fulfill our unique purpose.

This ancient passage is the basis for our Christian theology of stewardship.
- To be created in the “image” of God means to be a living witness to the Creator and to be an official representative of the Creator on planet earth.
- To “subdue” the earth means to bring things under control and to manage them according to God’s purposes.
- To have “dominion” means that human beings have been appointed as the rulers and protectors of all living things, serving under the ultimate sovereignty of God, their Creator.
So, human beings have been entrusted with the vocation of stewardship, the call and commission to represent our Creator in caring for everything in the amazing universe that has been given to us to sustain all life.

God doesn’t expect such things from other creatures nor has God equipped other creatures for such a role. Birds, for example, build essentially the same kind of nest every year. A robin builds a robin’s nest. A cardinal builds a cardinal’s nest. A hummingbird builds a hummingbird’s nest. From one generation to another, each kind of bird builds the kind of nest into which it came into this world.

Humans, on the other hand, have the capacity to build an infinite variety of buildings for an infinite variety of purposes. We build houses, schools, hospitals, office buildings, convention centers, and churches. Every one of them can be different from the others and from those that we built a generation or a year ago.

The vocation of stewardship is given uniquely to human beings. Therefore, it is one of the chief attributes that makes us human.

Everything we have, whether spent, saved, or given away, is a sacred trust from God. We are stewards of all of it.

Nothing pleases God more than for us to consciously live our lives as God envisioned. To understand ourselves as stewards of God’s bounty is the perfect way to do that. When we deliberately surrender to God a portion of our time, talent, gifts, and service, as a spiritual practice, we consecrate all the rest of our resources and declare our intention, with God’s help, to manage the rest in ways that please God. In that way, we become fully alive children of God.

What a remarkable way to honor and glorify God.

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas
August 27, 2020
Looking Forward Together

Last Sunday we had our first Drive-In worship service at St. Martin’s. We had about twenty cars in the parking lot and forty-five worshipers. The devoted people who have been providing online worship for the past five months successfully made a quantum leap forward in adding the celebration of the Holy Eucharist so those outside could receive. Our Regathering Team contributed in very helpful ways to our planning. St. Martin’s staff took care of numerous details that are necessary to such a service. Conversations with our Bishop and other clergy sparked creativity and identified resources, We are grateful to all of you!

Even after we are able to resume some level of in-person worship inside the church, I expect we will continue the Drive-In worship for those who are uncomfortable or unable to be inside. On August 23, our Eucharistic Visitors will begin taking the Sacrament to those who are unable to get out. In September, our Christian Formation Commission along with Children’s and Youth Ministries, will be rolling out some new online opportunities to learn and grow together in our faith. Sometime in October, we plan to offer a Discovery Class for those interested in membership or exploring their relationship with God and the Church.

There is much to look forward to! In the days ahead, you’ll find us recalling this encouraging word from the Prophet Jeremiah, “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope” (Jeremiah 29:11). We’ll be listening more closely and looking more deliberately to see God’s hand at work in the world around us. Surely, there are signs of hope from God all around us. When we find them, we’ll join hands with God and one another to help bring in a new and better time beyond this pandemic. Offering hope to the world is central to our mission, isn’t it?

Whenever I think about the mission God has entrusted to us, I am always guided by the words of Titus Pressler, “Mission is not fundamentally something we do as Christians but a quality of God’s own being. It is not a program of ours but the path of God’s action in the world. The mission of the Church, therefore, derives from the mission of God, and it has meaning only in relation to what God is up to in the universe. Already engaged in mission, God simply invites us to participate in what God is doing.”

On the evenings of August 20, 23, 27, and 30, we will be engaging in virtual holy conversations about what God is up to in this parish. We’re calling the series, “Yearning to Know God’s Will.” Our conversations will be about discernment, honoring the past, embracing the present, and reaching out for what lies ahead. Click HERE for more information and to register. I hope we have broad participation!

As we move through this time, I invite you again to pray this discernment prayer from The Book of Common Prayer daily:

O Lord, mercifully receive the prayers of your people who
call upon you, and grant that they may know and understand
what things they ought to do, and also may have grace and
power faithfully to accomplish them; through Jesus Christ
our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Blessings,

The Very Reverend Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church

August 13, 2020
Sometimes it’s the little things…

I was outside in the garden this morning and noticed a familiar sound, that of cicadas. Like many of you, I grew up hearing the sound of cicadas in the trees of my yard. Perhaps it is because I became accustomed to that sound at an early age, but I find it both familiar and comforting. However, this is not the case with some people.

An American pastor was traveling to England on an ocean liner a few years after the Second World War. He and an Englishman struck up a conversation. The pastor learned that the Englishman had lived in London during the war and experienced the terror of Nazi air raids. After the war, he moved to Missouri but was now returning home. He liked living in America but was returning to England because the sound of cicadas was driving him mad. Here was a man who had lived through the horrors of war, air raid sirens, bomb shelters, children running for their lives, and exploding bombs in London, but he was unable to live with the sound of a bug.

Sometimes it’s the little things that get to us, isn’t it? We often find strength to rise above the big things – a major illness, the death of a loved one, financial woes, loss of a job. But some little things try our patience – a shoelace that won’t stay tied, some grammatical error, a musical selection, a splinter in a finger, someone else’s annoying habit.

In the Parables of the Kingdom (Matthew 13:31-52), Jesus reminds us to pay attention to the little things – a coin, a pearl, a weed, a widow, an orphan, a hurt. If we are alert and receptive, we may recognize the hand of God at work in the unexpected places and experiences, even the ones that annoy us. God's reign also extends to those places.

The writer of Proverbs also gives us a word of wisdom in dealing with small things:

Four things on earth are small, yet they are exceedingly wise: the ants are a people without strength, yet they provide their food in the summer; the badgers are a people without power, yet they make their homes in the rocks; the locusts have no king, yet all of them march in rank; the lizard can be grasped in the hand, yet it is found in kings’ palaces. (Proverbs 30:24-28)

May God give us grace to remain spiritually grounded and alert to the divine presence, especially when some little thing has claimed our attention!

Blessings,

The Very Reverend Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

P.S. – Here's a fascinating video about the life cycle of the 17-year cicada. I've never seen them in such numbers. The Englishman probably did and that's what got to him. Don't watch it if you are seriously bothered by bugs.

July 23, 2020
A Preacher’s Candy Shop

On Sundays, we have been reading our way through the stories about the Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) in Genesis, through the Letter to the Romans, and through the Gospel According to Matthew. The Preacher sometimes is able to tie more than one reading together in a coherent homily. Sometimes, that is just impossible.

Then, there are Sundays like the one coming up where the decision about which passage should form the basis of the homily is incredibly difficult because each of the readings and the Psalm are so powerful that the Preacher has a hard time deciding what to do. Each text almost preaches itself.

It’s a Preacher’s Candy Shop!

There is the passage in Genesis about Jacob’s flight from Beer-Sheba to Haran to escape the wrath of his brother Easu, whom he had cheated. One night, he uses a stone for a pillow and dreams of a ladder to Heaven on which angels are ascending and descending. The dream is so powerful that it changed his life. “So Jacob rose early in the morning, and he took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up for a pillar and poured oil on the top of it. He called that place Bethel” (Genesis 28:18-19a). Bethel means House of God. Bethel is about eleven miles north of Jerusalem. It became a principal place of worship for the descendants of Jacob (Israel). Jacob’s sacramental action described in the text is nothing less than the consecration of the stone and the place. “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!…How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” (Genesis 28:16-17).

Jacob was not seeking God. He had stolen his brother’s birthright and his father’s blessing and was running for his life. There, in the middle of nowhere, God found Jacob and blessed him. That’s the kind of God we worship: one who shows up in unlikely places, to unlikely people, and gives undeserved blessings that transform our lives and, through us, the lives of others. We will be reading more amazing stories about Jacob in the coming weeks. In each one, we will see how God’s patience with Jacob was grounded in God’s hope for Jacob and his descendants.

Then there is Psalm 139. A perfect response to the reading from Genesis, it is an unbridled outburst of praise for the eternally patient God who has always known us, loved us, pursued us, blessed us, and guided us. Just read it!

St. Paul wrote to the Romans during a time of suffering. His words are balm for us during this Pandemic: “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18). We can only hope! Yes, hope! We can’t see what the future holds, but we can and we must hope that it will be better than the present and the past. If we knew what the post-pandemic world will be like, we wouldn’t need to hope for it. “For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience” (Romans 8:24b-25). This is a timely word for us at this point in the “sufferings of this present time.” I don’t know about you, but I’ve reached a point where I’ve baked about all the bread my freezer can hold, put together enough puzzles, binge-watched plenty of TV shows, and listened to all the arguments about mask-wearing I can stand. I need patience! St. Paul reminds us that when we have hope, we will find patience.

Finally, in this Preacher’s Candy Shop, there is the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares. In this parable, Jesus explains that our attempts to purify the Church, or society, or our own spiritual lives for that matter, place us in danger of making premature judgements. What appears to be good wheat now may eventually be revealed to be weeds. What appears to be weeds now may eventually be recognized as wheat. So God holds back the hoe because we tend to be too impatient. Our prejudices toward people with a different color skin, different nationality, different politics, different religion, different language, or any difference, may cause us to write them off. When we are privileged, we tend to do that quite often. What would the world be like if we devoted ourselves to fostering hope in others, especially those who are different from us? Such hope, of course, requires patience.

Take some time to read each of these passages in this Preacher’s Candy Shop and enjoy the flavor of each nougat. As you do, remember the immortal words of Forrest Gump, “My mom always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get.” He’s right. So, we always patiently hope for the best.

Blessings,

The Very Reverend Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

July 17, 2020
Looking for God Too High Up and Too Far Away

The play "Inherit the Wind" is a dramatic account of the 1925 Dayton, Tennessee trial of John Thomas Scopes, a schoolteacher who taught the theory of evolution in defiance of a state law prohibiting the teaching of any doctrine contrary to the Bible. The prosecutor was William Jennings Bryan. The defense attorney was Clarence Darrow. Bryan won the "The Monkey Trial," and Scopes was fined $100. Several days after the trial ended, Bryan died. In the play, the character representing reporter H.L. Mencken, after hearing of Bryan's death, says to Darrow, "Why should we weep for him? You know that he was-a Barnum-bunkum Bible-beating blowhard." To an agnostic Mencken, Darrow says of Bryan, "A giant once lived in that body. But the man got lost – lost because he was looking for God too high up and too far away."

In the 13th chapter of Matthew, we find Jesus in the midst of his Galilean ministry. Jesus had previously employed comparative and figurative analogies, but at this point Jesus chooses to teach in parables. James A. Fowler provides an interesting explanation of parables:

The Greek word for "parable" is derived from two other Greek words, para meaning "beside" and ballo meaning "to throw." Literally, then, a parable is an illustrative story that is "thrown alongside" or "placed side by side" a similar or comparative concept. A parable brings parallel ideas together by drawing a figurative word-picture to illustrate a particular thought. It is often a thought-provoking analogy that leaves the mind of the listener in sufficient doubt as to its application that it stimulates further consideration thereof … This enigmatic nature of a parable allows the story to function as a pictorial ponderable, which leaves an image on one's mind to be considered again and again. As such, the Biblical parables grate against dogmatism and the fundamentalistic desire to have everything figured out and nailed down in precision of under-standing. When attempting to interpret Jesus' parables the issue is not so much whether we "get it" figured out, as whether Jesus "gets to us" by planting a glimmer of His divine perspective of spiritual realities. The parable serves as a dum-dum bullet shot into our brain, which then explodes and begins to color our thinking in accord with the "mind of Christ." (Parables of the Kingdom, James A Fowler, 1996)

The parables of the kingdom, which we will be reading on the next four Sundays, challenge us to look beyond the obvious in our search for the realm where Jesus reigns and into which he invites us to live abundantly. We can get lost in our search by looking for God “too high up and too far away.” God’s realm, as Luke tells us, is to be found within and between us – close in, as near as heartbeat and breath and hands touching. Jesus’ parables call us to look at things in a new way and discover the abundant life we’ve been looking for all along right under our noses, even in the weeds and the dark corners where we'd rather not look.

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

P.S. Enjoy this recording of the Cambridge Singers performing John Rutter's setting of Psalm 119:18-24, "Open Thou Mine Eyes."

July 10, 2020
Reflections on Matthew 10:34-39

Last Sunday’s gospel contained some disturbing words: “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” The Prince of Peace, Jesus, said that, according to St. Matthew. As if that weren't enough, he went on to say, “For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one's foes will be members of one's own household.” What kind of family values are these?

Maybe the next two sentences provide the explanation: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” Living in a relationship with Jesus, being his follower, continuing his message and his work, is not going to be easy. It will cause people to reject you and then you'll have to make some difficult, perhaps painful, choices.

I once knew a woman named Julie. Julie was born in China and reared in a very strict Chinese family. When she became an adult, Julie heard the Gospel and the call to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Her family was not pleased. In fact, they told her that she could no longer be a member of the family if she remained a Christian. Julie faced a very painful choice. Not to be a member of a family would make her a nobody. She would have no place to live, no name, and no respect. It would be as if she were dead – like losing her life.

Julie left her family and left China. She lost that life. She came to the United States where she found a family among fellow Christians. She found life.

For Julie, the words of Jesus made perfect sense. Few of us will ever have to pay such a price, but nevertheless we should pay attention to the disclaimer Jesus put right there on the package for all to read: “Beware! Following Jesus can be hazardous!”

Then what's the payoff? Why would anybody risk everything to follow Jesus? What's in it for me? Jesus called it “eternal life,” “the kingdom of God,” “the kingdom of heaven,” “abundant life.” I sometimes call it “life beyond ego.”

The ego derives identity, worth, meaning, and power from surroundings. Family, social ties, possessions, ideologies, approval, and many other outward reinforcements give life to the ego. But the ego is not the true person. Take away those ego-inflating things and the ego panics.

The true human being finds identity, worth, meaning, and power in relationship to God. That “life beyond ego” in turn informs and assigns meaning to everything else. It is as if we begin to look at creation through the eyes of the Creator and discover a new realm of wonder, love, and praise. It is a realm of life that is not dependent upon approval of family, social status, political influence, the number of possessions, or anything other than God.

Our God-given identity, declared in Baptism, is the one thing that nobody can ever take away from us. But we are passive recipients of that identity, aren't we? We are told that Baptism is a gift, not earned or deserved. The inestimable price of that identity has been paid by Jesus Christ. Yet, it is one thing to know that and another thing to live like we actually believe it. That's where Jesus' disclaimer comes in. The world around us, filled with ego-inflating values and things, won't understand and may withdraw its approval if we act like we believe true life, abundant life, eternal life, is not dependent upon it. “Those who find their life (ego) will lose it, and those who lose their life (ego) for my sake will find it (eternal life).”

Remember the rich man who came to Jesus asking what he had to do to inherit eternal life? “Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, you lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then, come, follow me” (Mk. 10:21-22).

The man was shocked when he heard what Jesus said. He went away grieving because, the text says, “he had many possessions.”

But, even though Jesus’ words grieved the rich man, the text also says that Jesus said what he did out of love. He loved him enough to tell him the truth! He told him that while he was rich in the world's terms and in terms of the ego, he lacked treasure in heaven. The way to get his ego out of the way of eternal life was to be liberated from those things that inflated his ego. The man was not truly free. He was possessed by his possessions. Jesus wanted to liberate him for a life that is not limited by possessions.

So, out of love for us, Jesus tells us the truth. He warns us that following him and living the life he promises will cost us in terms of whatever gives our ego its sense of identity and security. I wonder what would happen if a dozen or so of us actually lived like we believe him. Let's throw caution to the wind and find out!

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

June 25, 2020