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  • Easter is more than a day.

    During the forty days of Lent each year we spend time getting ready for the celebration of Easter.  There is fasting, self-denial, prayer, intensified devotion, scripture study, and other disciplines designed to cleanse our hearts.

    Then, comes the big celebration.  Easter.  Like so many Christian holy days, Easter seems to disappear the next day as life returns to "normal."  But Easter should be more than that to us!  It certainly was to those early disciples.  Easter is more than a day!

    Easter is a season of celebration.  The Risen Christ walked among his disciples for forty days after his resurrection.  He taught them, ate with them, prayed with them, and loved them.  Before he was taken up into heaven, he promised to send the Comforter, the Holy Spirit.  The promise was fulfilled on the fiftieth day when they were in Jerusalem celebrating the Jewish feast of Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks.  In Greek, it is called Pentecost.  Pentecost is seven weeks, or fifty days, after the observance of Passover and commemorates the spring wheat harvest.  This feast has also been associated with the remembrance of the giving of the Law to Moses.  As the law was written on tablets of stone, the Spirit would write God's law upon the hearts of believers.  When Moses came down from the mountain, he found God's people worshipping an idol and 3,000 of them died.  When the Spirit was given, the disciples were obediently waiting in Jerusalem.  3,000 people were saved!  The New People of the New Covenant were empowered by the Life-giving Spirit to be Christ's Body in the world, proclaiming to all the Easter message that Christ is alive.

    Easter is a lifestyle.  We are Easter People!  As those early disciples in Emmaus and Jerusalem and in Galilee experienced the living presence of the Risen Christ, so we recognize that he stands among us today.  To paraphrase Jesus, "believing is seeing."   When we gather to hear the Word and share in the Holy Meal, it is usually easy to experience his presence "enthroned upon the praises of his people."  The challenging part comes when we disperse.  When Christ's Body touches the world through you and me when we are apart from one another, do you suppose the Living Presence is felt?

    Easter is our only hope.  St. Peter writes, "By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…"  There is a lot of help out there for people with all kinds of needs.  But Christians believe that beyond help, people need hope.  So what if you are physically or emotionally well.  Life is just not complete without hope.  The Easter faith gives the world hope.

    So, don't let Easter fade like the blooms on your Easter Lily!  Easter is more than a day; it is a season, a lifestyle, and a faith that fills our lives with hope.

    Ron

  • Sermon at Church of the Good Shepherd ~ April 18, 2011

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    Listen to the Sermon for Monday in Holy Week, April 18, 2011

     

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  • Sermon at Church of the Good Shepherd ~ April 17, 2011

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    Listen to the Sermon for April 17, 2011

     

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  • Two Kinds of Crosses

    Pocket Cross J Collins Some time ago, when I was engaged in a period of intense discernment, a dear friend of mine, Bill Cherry, presented me with a small silver cross I can carry in my pocket.  He told me, that God had led him to give me the cross and that when the reason becomes clear to me God will let me know to whom I should pass the cross along.  He's given out hundreds of these crosses through the years and each one has its own special story.

    The story of this pocket cross is not complete because the time to pass it along to someone else has not yet come.  So it is in my pocket every single day, reminding me of several things.  For example, whenever I reach into my pocket and touch this cross, it reminds me of my friend and the faith we share.  My pocket cross is also a constant reminder that a lot of people around me are carrying crosses.  Some of these crosses are visible.  However, there are crosses that people carry in their hearts. The crosses of the heart are usually carried quietly, sometimes secretly, and on occasion they seem almost too heavy to bear.

    During Holy Week, we will walk with Jesus in the Way of the Cross.  As we do, we should remember that Jesus carried two kinds of crosses.  One was visible, made of wood.  It was ugly and heavy as he dragged it down the streets of Jerusalem toward Golgotha.  The other cross he carried was even heavier.  It was the cross of estrangement between God and humanity.  It was a cross weighed with the sin of the world and the evil of a fallen cosmos.  But Jesus carried both of these crosses with such courage and grace that today the cross is a symbol of hope and a testimony about life’s meaning and purpose.

    I think my friend gave me the pocket cross because he recognized that I seemed to be struggling under the weight of a cross I was trying to bear.  He wanted me to know the strength that comes from the Savior who carried a cross to Golgotha and transformed an instrument of death into a means of redemption.  When I am thinking that I have a cross of the heart to bear, he wanted me to remember how to carry it as Jesus carried his, trusting in the divine power that is at work in me, which can accomplish more than I can ask or imagine.  After all, God can do more with us than we can do with ourselves.  That's what St. Paul is getting at when he writes, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:19-20).

    Ron

    P.S.  Here's an inspirational poem entitled The Cross in My Pocket written by Verna Mae Thomas. The photo is of the actual cross I carry in my pocket, created by artist Jeep Collins.

  • Is there life after birth?

    From the musical Show Boat we have the song, “Old Man River.”  The words and music of this song combine to depict the sad plight of the black slave along the banks of the Mississippi.  The depths of despondency and grief are vocalized in the lyrics: “Ah gits weary an’ sick of tryin’, ah’m tired of livin’ an’ skeered of dyin’.”

    These words strike a familiar chord in all of us. The fear of death is a major psychological problem for humankind.  As Sigmund Freud once observed, “In dealing with death, most of us are living psychologically beyond our means.”  And, at the same time, the weariness of living presents people with problems.  St. Augustine suggested that the fear of dying and the lack of zest for living are related.  After the death of a very close friend, he became despondent and wrote: “Some incomprehensible feeling arose in me: both a loathing of living and a fear of dying weighed heavily within me.”

    I am reminded of something someone said, “In this age, the important question seems not to be is there life after death, but, rather, is there life after birth?”  There is an answer to both questions.  In fact, the main theme running through the Bible is God’s concern that we be given every possible chance to enjoy life to its fullest – now, and in the hereafter.  If we are to face death, we first have to learn to face life.  And life – on the river of life – is best faced in communion with God.

    During this Lenten season, we have seen this concern repeatedly in our Sunday readings. In no place is this more evident than in Sunday’s gospel in which Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1-45).  Here we see Jesus’ humanity and divinity revealed in a magnificent way.  By the power of the God of life, Jesus calls forth the dead man from the grave.  If God can and will do this, can it be any more difficult or any less God’s desire to pour new life into us?

    This message is central to the witness of the Church.  After Jesus raised Lazarus, he turned to those standing nearby and said, “Unbind him.”  The Church today continues to carry on the new-life-giving, liberating work of Jesus, loosening all sorts of bonds that cause weariness in living and fear of dying.

    Ron

  • Sermon at Church of the Good Shepherd ~ April 3, 2011

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    Listen to the Sermon for April 3, 2011

     

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  • Be the light

    At the Great Vigil of Easter, the Paschal candle will lead us with our candles in procession into the dark nave. The pews, altar, pulpit, and font are there in the darkness but we cannot see them until they are illuminated by the lights we bear.  The darkness must surrender to the Light.

    In an encounter with a man who was blind from birth (John 9:1-41), Jesus’ disciples saw someone whose blindness they assumed was punishment either for his sins or the sins of his parents.  Jesus enlightened them by saying they were wrong on both counts.  When Jesus healed the man they understood.

    The blind man was accustomed to a world of darkness.  When Jesus healed him, he could see for the first time.  There was also an inner illumination; He understood that Jesus was the Messiah. 

    Other people didn’t believe it was the same person but someone who looked like him.  Their point of view and frame of reference obscured their vision.

    The criteria of established religion prevented the Pharisees from seeing and believing what was before their eyes. They suffered spiritual blindness. They were supposed to be enlightened, but this incident revealed them as “the blind leading the blind.”  The man born blind had more vision than the Pharisees.

    I remember watching The Christophers television broadcast as a child and a line from their theme song, recorded by Perry Como in 1952,  "If everyone lit just one little candle, what a bright world this would be".  The mission of The Christophers is to encourage people to use their God-given talents to make a positive difference in the world.

    Paschal Candle When our lives are illumined by the Light of Christ, we become lights.  The Light of Christ shining in us disperses the darkness – as a parent saying bedtime prayers with a child, as a host providing Room in the Inn for a person with no home, as an ethical business person, as a friend giving encouragement.

    In the words of St. Paul to the Ephesians, “Once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light– for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true” (Ephesians 5:8-9).

    Ron

  • Water From a Rock

    I was fortunate as a child to spend my summers in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado where our family owned a beautiful piece of property.  One summer, my dad bought a building, which he intended to move onto the property where he would convert it into a guesthouse.

    There was a problem.  There was no water.  The intended solution was to find a mountain spring that could be tapped but none was evident.  Finally, my mother said to my uncle, who was there with us, “Do you remember when you found water with a dowsing rod on the farm where we grew up?  Why don’t you try that here?”

    My uncle admitted that he remembered not only that occasion but also a couple of other ones when he lived in the Texas Panhandle during the Dust Bowl days of the Great Depression.  As a ranch hand, he found water for livestock that were dying of thirst.  They dug wells, put in windmills, and saved the herd.  He’d been reluctant to suggest this method of finding water because he didn’t want to provoke laughter about what was to him a very special gift.

    He went into the aspen grove, found an appropriate tree branch, and fashioned it into a “Y” shaped dowsing rod.  He then went to a damp area near the site where they wanted to position the building and proceeded to do what dowsers do.  I tagged along because I had to see this!

    The place where he stopped seemed as unlikely as anywhere else and was, in fact, a large boulder.  He said, “There’s a spring under this rock.  Dig here.”

    In a few hours, the hole we were digging began to fill up with water and after a bit more digging the spring was opened up and water flowed.  All the necessary paraphernalia was put in place and water was pumped to the house where a pump and tank were installed to provide pressure.

    My uncle believed he could find water; so did we; and our problem was solved.

    In the wilderness, God’s people found themselves in a similar situation – in a place where there was no water in sight (Exodus 17:1-7).  They became thirsty and started complaining to Moses.  They demanded water as proof that God was in fact with them.  Remember, this is the same God who parted the sea, gave them quails and manna to eat, and provided smoke by day and fire by night to guide them.  Yet they still weren’t sure their God was with them.

    Moses took their case to God.  God told Moses to take some of the leaders of the people and go on ahead of them.  He was to take his staff with him and when he came to a certain rock he was to strike it with his rod and water would flow out for the people to drink. He did as he was instructed and God came through once again for his people. Water gushed from a rock to quench their thirst!

    Moses renamed the place “proof” and “contention.”  The way in which the experience has been remembered among God’s people is primarily through the name Moses gave it.  It has always been associated with fault-finding and harness of heart.  But it should also be remembered, perhaps even more, as an illustration of God’s abundance and grace.  For God did not berate the people.  He gave life-sustaining water.  And, it is a lesson to remember when we are faced with problems of our own.  It illustrates in a wonderful way how God wants his children to solve their problems.  In every area of life, we are indeed saved by grace through faith.

    Ron

  • Sermon at Church of the Good Shepherd ~ March 20, 2011

     

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    Listen to the Sermon for March 20, 2011

     

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  • New life requires risk, trust

    Sunday's readings are filled with images of renewal – new birth, new life, new creation.  These images imply that God’s promise for new life entails God’s gift of a fresh start, freed from the restrictions of our past lives in order to enter a new relationship with God through the power of the Holy Spirit.

    Lent is a time for engaging our new life in Christ more deeply, risking new levels of trust.  The purpose of Lent is not to dwell on suffering, or to spend forty days bewailing our manifold sins and wickedness for the sake of feeling our pain.  Lent is about engaging in the ongoing process of renewal, regeneration, and new birth; it is about encouraging us to trust and to risk going forth and being sent out with the promise of new life.

    Lent may require us to “think outside the box” of piety and religiosity, just as Abram and Sarai had to break with their past, and Saul and Nicodemus the Pharisees with theirs.  The promises of God bear not only upon the future of our individual lives in relationship to God, but also upon the future of our parish, our diocese, and our Church as a whole

    To respond to the promise for new life means we have to be ready to redraw and rename the places on the journey.  When the ancient ones told the story of Abram and Sarai, they were also inscribing new place names and creating a new social geography on the territories of their migrations in company with God.

    God may be inviting us to rethink how we do Church in light of the socio-geographies of the times we live in.  When Saul the Pharisee became Paul the Apostle as we know him, he brought new words, images, and new community structures into being, “calling into existence things which do not exist,” by trustfully following Jesus into new life.

    Lent is for listening to that call in our own lives.  In the words of James Russell Lowell, “New occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth.”  Lent is for careful thinking about how to step into the as-yet-unmapped future, to deepen our relationship to God, to trust the picture of new life in Christ, and for identifying the breaks with the past that we need to make in order to respond to the promises of God.

    Ron Short Signature