“In returning and rest we shall be saved. In quietness and confidence shall be our strength.”

 The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets Episcopal Church
May 14, 2023
6 Easter, Year A
Acts 17:22-31
1 Peter 3:13-22
John 14:15-21
Psalm 66:7-18

“In returning and rest we shall be saved. In quietness and confidence shall be our strength.”

Has anyone else ever found themselves worshipping an idol, or is it just me? Interesting Sunday when the priest tells you he’s been worshipping idols, but I figure I should be honest about that when the sermon topic includes idol worship. Now, in our reading from Acts, Paul was talking about what we often think of as idols, little statues of gold or wood, and no, I’ve not bowed down and prayed to a little statue made of gold or wood. 

It was bronze…kidding. 

When Paul saw all of the things the Athenians had for their various religions, he saw idols, little statues, and he saw an altar to “an unknown God.” Paul let them know that God was not actually unknown, and pointed out that God is not anything like a little statue. God is not something that we make. 

God is, in fact, beyond all of creation. As vast as the universe is, all of the universe is contained within God. Anything that we could make or do is contained within God, for as Paul said, “In God we live and move and have our being.” Rather, than something we make, God made us and all of creation so that we would search for God and perhaps grope for God and find God.

Union with God is the deepest desire of our souls, and God is always united to us. The trick of the devil is not to separate us from God; that’s impossible. The trick of the devil is to have us think that we’re separated from God and then to think that something else will fill that void. 

In the Garden of Eden in the second story of creation, we find desire for knowledge as the first idol. Remember, God told the humans not to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but the serpent told them that they actually should eat it, told them that God had lied to them. The serpent tricked them into thinking that their union with God was broken and gone. Then the serpent let them think that the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, would somehow replace their union with God, would satisfy their longing for union with God. Their union with God wasn’t actually broken, but the serpent convinced them it was and then lied to them about how they could fix their longing. 

Classic marketing strategy on the serpent’s part. Here’s a problem you didn’t know you had; now you can fix it by purchasing this.

Our souls want union with God. We actually have union with God, but our hurts and fears, our anxieties and traumas often keep us from realizing the unity we have. We feel a deep longing for peace. We feel great disquiet within ourselves, and we long comfort, for soothing, for some way to know that we are ok or to stop caring that we are not. In our hurts and fears, our anxieties and traumas, we seek all sorts of things which we think will fix us or fill us. 

Some seek money and power, never having enough, even when they’ve got more than they could need in multiple lifetimes. Others simply have enough, and yet they still fret constantly, worried about the future and if there will be enough. In either case, money can become an idol when it becomes our focus in soothing all our fears and anxieties. That’s one of the kinds of idols I was talking about earlier. If only I had enough not to worry about money, well then, I’d be ok. 

We have countless idols, not statues of gold and wood, things that we think will help soothe our souls. Being right and making sure we can prove others wrong can be an idol. Hanging on to anger and resentment can be an idol. Finding fault in others to make ourselves feel better can be an idol. The what ifs of the past or the if onlys of the future can be idols. Numbing and escaping reality can be an idol. 

So, now when I ask, “has anyone else ever found themselves worshipping an idol,” maybe you get my meaning a bit more? The kinds of idols I’m talking about: money, more, being right, resentment, anger, escape, what if, if only, numbing out…these kinds of things are idols I’m guessing all of us find ourselves turning to. 

My point is not, “Oh, we’re terrible idolaters, how awful of us.” My point is that we are hurting, and we tend to seek help in ways that don’t actually help us all that much. We unwittingly believe the serpent’s lie that our union with God is broken and any number of these other things will fix it. 

The truth is, “In God we live and move and have our being.” God is with us, among us, around us, in us, and through us all the time. So, when we set our minds on other things to fix us, we ignore the life all around us. When we turn to the idols of money and more; the idols of being right, resentment, anger; the idols of escape, what if, if only, and numbing out, when we turn to those idols, we block out God in whom we live and move and have our being. When we turn to these idols, we block out the peace we can have by turning to God in whom we live and move and have our being. 

I was talking with a gentleman a while back, seeking some peace, and we talked about prayer and meditation as ways to be with God, rather than disassociate from our fears and anxieties. 

We talked about having a rhythm of prayer. Rhythm has been found to help heal trauma. Our bodies are wired for rhythm. Our breath, our heartbeats, the steps we take, all in rhythm. There are the rhythms of the sun and the moon, night and day, the rhythms of the seasons. We’ve separated ourselves from a lot of these natural rhythms in modern society, and I believe that adds to our stress. So, adding in some rhythm of prayer can help heal our bodies, spending time with God in whom we live and move and have our being. 

In the Episcopal Church, we have a rhythm of prayer. Eucharist every Sunday. We also have daily prayer: morning, noon, evening, and night. Following this rhythm of prayer helps bring rhythm back into our lives and helps bring us into constant awareness of God’s presence with, and around, and within us. 

Another way to spend time in awareness of God meditation, specifically a meditation prayer called Centering Prayer. In Centering Prayer, you spend time in silence, focusing on your breathing, simply being in the present moment, aware of God’s presence around and within you. 

The way it works is you sit in silence for a few minutes, or up to twenty minutes, and you simply breathe. Before you begin, you choose a “sacred word,” generally something related to faith: God, Jesus, Love. Mine is Peace. The sacred word is used to draw us back to the center and back to the breath. As we sit in silence, thoughts will come, as thoughts tend to do, and when thoughts come, we say our sacred word in our minds to let go of the thoughts and draw us back to the present, to the breath.  

Centering Prayer is a way of letting go of our thoughts, simply experiencing the quiet (or the noise) of the present. Simply experiencing the quiet of breathing, of life around us. Simply experiencing God in whom we live and move and have our being.

The result is peace. 

Dwelling not in the past or the future, but simply dwelling in the present, focusing on the breath, breathing God in and out, we find peace. 

Rather than disassociate because of hurt and trauma, rather than use various idols, we can seek rhythm of prayer and meditation. We can seek to know and live unity with God, for it is God in whom we live and move and have our being. Union with God is the deepest desire of our souls, and despite the devil’s lie, we are still united with God. We always have been. When we let go our idols, when we turn to rhythm of prayer and meditation, we help our bodies realize the union with God that is always there. The union with God that is always with us. The union of God that brings us peace.

A Woman Made Bread, and Jesus Said, "This Is My Body"

Brad Sullivan

Proper 12, Year A

July 30, 2017

Emmanuel, Houston

Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

A Woman Made Bread, and Jesus Said, “This Is My Body”

Jesus said the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to “yeast that a woman took and mixed in with tree measures of flower until all of it was leavened.”   Bread.  The kingdom of heaven is like bread, the yeast mixing with the flour, helping it all grow together, the hands of God working to knead the dough and bake it, transforming it from something gooey and inedible, to something delicious and life-giving.  God gives life and forms people in the Kingdom of Heaven, transforming us from one thing into another.  Like God took clay and formed it into Adam’s body and transformed it into a living being, so did a woman knead and shape dough to make bread, which Jesus took, and broke, and gave to his friends and said, “this is my body.”

We are called the Body of Christ live here on earth, as we believe in Jesus, recognize him moving in our lives, and as we seek to live out his Kingdom here on earth.  We’re called to be bread, our separate lives transformed into something greater and life-giving, yeast mixed with flower and water, kneaded, shaped, and leavened into a large loaf of fresh baked bread.   Think for a second about the smell of fresh baked bread; it smells so good, makes you hungry, even if you’re not, you smell that bread, and you want some.  That’s what the Kingdom of God is like.  When we see or hear about the Kingdom of God really being lived out here on earth, we want to go there, we want to be a part of it.

Really living out the kingdom of God here on earth takes time and effort, just like it takes time to and effort to make bread.  It takes time and effort to mix the ingredients together, to knead the dough, and then it takes God’s transformation, the ingredients literally becoming something else as they are baked together.  That’s life in God’s Kingdom:  time, effort, mixing, and God’s transformation.

Life in God’s kingdom, truly living our God’s kingdom takes time.  It takes time for people to form relationships with others, time to get to know our neighbors.  Life in God’s kingdom takes effort.  It takes effort for people to join with others in their communities to serve others, to pray together, to strive together for justice and peace: seeking and serving Christ in all people, respecting the dignity of every human being, and loving our neighbors as ourselves. 

Life in God’s kingdom also takes mixing.  For the kingdom of Heaven to work, the yeast doesn’t just sit on the counter and watch the woman make the bread.   The yeast moves in and  around and interacts with the flour, the yeast and flour joining together with each other, changing each other, becoming something different than the two were separately.  In the kingdom of God, we take time and effort mixing our lives with the lives of others.  We work.  We strive.  We meet people, and we see where Jesus is moving in their lives.  We join with them:  the movement of Jesus in our lives joined with the movement of Jesus in their lives.  When we take this time and effort to mix our lives together, Jesus works to knead the dough, like a woman who kneaded and shaped dough to make bread, which Jesus took, and broke, and gave to his friends and said, “this is my body.”

I read an article last week which was about this kind of Kingdom work, people mixing together and forming bread.  The article from gravityleadership.com, was titled “How to Shift Small Groups to Missional Communities”  For those unfamiliar with the term, mission communities are groups of people within a larger body of the church who “are committed to growing closer to Jesus, doing life together, and joining God’s work in the world.  In other words, missional communities embrace worship, community, and mission as a holistic life of discipleship.” 

The thrust of the article was that missional communities are different from small groups and that in order to live God’s kingdom, we need to shift some of our small groups into missional communities.  The article points out that many churches have done pretty well at gathering their large worshipping communities into smaller groups which pray together, and study scripture, and get to know each other more deeply through their faith.  The small groups take a large community in which some people know hardly anyone, and they give places where people can grow together in deep relationships with one another.  The article went on to say, however, that often these small groups grow stale, continually looking for the next book or next study, and the mission and work of Jesus gets left undone.  Even with a good focus on formation and sharing faith together, reaching out to others beyond themselves is often left out of these small groups.  The yeast remains on the counter, watching the flour from a distance, not mixing and allowing the woman’s hands to form them into bread.

To be fair, the yeast is always ready for the flour to come to it.  We, the church, want people to come here.  We have become a largely attractional community, waiting for folks to come through the doors of the church building and join us in worship.  While we do outreach here and have mission trips which are all good things, those efforts are not usually part of our daily lives and the communities in which we live.  Rather, much of our life in the church is a part of this attractional model:  come to church to be a part of these outreach efforts here. 

With the attractional model of church, we’ve also done Sunday school pretty well for those who are here.  If you come to church on Sunday, you can be formed in the stories of scripture and the faith of Jesus.  If you can’t come to church on Sunday, you’re kinda left on your own.  Folks can watch Joel Osteen on TV, but there’s not actual interaction, actually community with real people, watching something on TV.  We have not been really faithful to Jesus’ calling for us to go out into our communities and form disciples of Jesus there.

Now, that sounds like evangelism, which the Episcopal church has not historically been overly well known for.  We can share our faith within communities within the church, but going out?  That sounds like less than happy street corner people.  Let me be very clear:  a faithful, yet less than happy person on a street corner, threatening strangers to believe in Jesus isn’t yeast mixing with flour; it’s rat poison.  Truly being yeast that gets up off the counter to mix with the flour means mixing with others in our communities, living life together, and thereby allowing Jesus to transform us into bread.  Evangelism is not generally done with strangers.  Evangelism is done with people we know and people we have gotten to know.  Evangelism is done in community, not by ourselves.  Becoming bread, becoming the kingdom of God means we live out our faith in community with others, going out together in our communities to serve others and likely to be served by them as well.  That is what missional communities are, what the church was always intended to be.

The article, “How to Shift Small Groups to Missional Communities”,  gave three steps toward transforming a small group into a missional community which has an outward mission:

• Start a conversation with your existing small group about joining God’s work in your community. If you are not currently part of a small group, prayerfully make a list of people you can invite in on the conversation.
• Discern mission as a group by making a list of areas in the community that God might be inviting you to step into. This could be a place like your neighborhood, [joining with others to regularly and consistently help at a non-profit or community home], or a people group that you feel especially called to serve and love.
• Develop some rhythms to support your life together that includes regularly seeking God, connecting in community with one another, and engaging your shared mission together.

Prayer, Worship, Service.

[Finally], as you step into mission as a community, think presence more than projects. How can you be intentional and consistent in being present among a group of people as a community? Then simply keep noticing where God is at work and join him there!

Now, I’d love to give an exact, step by step process for becoming a missional community with a simple beginning, middle, and end, but the Kingdom of God doesn’t work like that.  What exactly a community is going to look like, what exactly the community mission work will be depends on what needs there are in each of our communities.  What are our passions, and were do the needs of our communities meet the passions of our hearts?  A missional community could join together to serve together, regularly, at a non-profit or a community home/shelter.  A missional community could join together and get to know their neighbors and serve them when in need.  Then that person might join the missional community and serve with them when someone else is in need. 

A missional community, like the Body of Christ, like the Kingdom of God, is not a project that can be easily drawn up, pre-formed, modeled, and packaged for easy assembly.  Missional communities, the way of the kingdom of God, requires work, effort, mixing together, dreaming and praying together with guidance from Jesus.  Missional communities are going to be different everywhere because the needs and the people are different in each community. 

Our part is to be formed as bread, to be yeast, to mix with our communities, to really get to know the communities in which we live, to notice what the needs are, to notice where Jesus is already at work, and then to be willing to be changed by mixing our lives and the work of Jesus with the lives and work of Jesus within others in our communities.  Then we become the Kingdoms of God. 

When we take this time and effort to mix our lives together, Jesus works to knead the dough, like a woman who kneaded and shaped dough to make bread, which Jesus took, and broke, and gave to his friends and said, “this is my body.”

https://gravityleadership.com/small-groups-missional-communities/