You Aren't Taking this Seriously Enough...And Don't Forget to Smile

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
July 19, 2026
Proper 11, A
Wisdom of Solomon 12:13, 16-19
Psalm 86:11-17
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

Did you notice that in Jesus’ parable of God’s kingdom here on earth, there was no separation between the righteous and the unrighteous? The church wasn’t separated from the world. The people of the church didn’t isolate themselves from those they thought were too sinful, or not good enough, or impure. When churches do try to isolate themselves from everyone else outside the church, they miss an essential piece of God’s kingdom here on earth. God’s kingdom is lived out among all of us together, the wheat and the weeds, the good and the bad, the righteous and the unrighteous. Welcome to Jesus’ parable of the weeds among the wheat.

Of course, you’ve also got to notice that the wheat and the weeds weren’t the ones separating each other out declaring who was righteous and who was unrighteous. That was done by angels at the end of the ages, and we know from other teachings of Jesus that Jesus will be the one who judges us as righteous or unrighteous. 

So, to anyone who has ever been told you aren’t good enough to belong to a church, or anyone who has been told you are too sinful to be able to be a part of a church, I present to you Jesus’ parable of the weeds among the wheat. We aren’t meant to separate out the unrighteous from the church and leave only the righteous people in the church. 

When we do, we end up with things like the Salem Witch Trials and the Spanish Inquisition; people die when we end up declaring “only the righteous may stay and the unrighteous must leave.” 

I think in modern times of so many gay kids who have been kicked out of their churches for being gay, and then kicked out of their families for being gay, and then ended up killing themselves because everyone they loved had rejected them and told them they were weeds, good for nothing but destruction, and of course there are countless others who have been rejected by various parts of the church for not being righteous enough. Jesus said that people’s lives were on the line when they tried to pull the weeds out from among the wheat, and we know from our lived experiences in the church that Jesus was right.

In addition to the sometimes life or death decisions of telling people they don’t belong in the church, we have the little problem that if you want to uproot someone and have them gone from the church, remember, there is probably someone else who feels the same way about you. So, as the church, we are meant to be the wheat and the weeds living together, and even though we do try to help each other in living in loving ways, in not harming each other so much, even though we may say things like, “No, you can’t shout and fight with people in the church,” we don’t declare who are the weeds and who are the wheat. We do get to say things like, “You need to go away for a while because of your behavior,” but we also get to say, “You can come back.”

Monty Python - No One Expects ths Spanish Inquisition

Of course, it is certainly easier to feel safe when we get to declare who’s in and who’s out. I’m safe from God’s judgement so long as I’m in, and I know I get to be in so long as they’re out. When we start making these determinations, however, we end up turning God into ourselves. So, let’s look at what scripture says about the God who judges us as wheat and weeds.

In the Wisdom of Solomon, we’ve got this image of God who judges justly and mildly, who gives hope through repentance for sins. We’ve also got this image in Matthew of God burning all evildoers and causes of sin in a furnace of fire. How do we reconcile these images of justice and mild justice, with repentance of sins, and burning fire? How can God have justice and mercy? How can God have judgment and forgiveness?

Usually in the church, we’ve come up with very clear, easily definable answers to these questions. Some have said God’s justice is for those who aren’t Christian (or the right kind of Christian), and God’s mercy is for those who are Christian (or the right kind of Christian). That’s kinda lovely, I guess. It certainly makes the math really easy. Unfortunately, if God’s justice is only for those other people, then we aren’t taking God’s justice seriously. If God’s mercy is only for us and those who believe just like us, then we aren’t taking God’s mercy seriously. This has been our challenge for around 1,700 years. 

Around that time, around 1700 years ago, much of the church fearfully decided to follow certainty in their beliefs about who gets God’s judgment and who gets God’s mercy. Perhaps unsurprisingly, much of the church decided that people who were a part of the church got the mercy and people who weren’t a part of the church got the judgment. They used grand theological concepts to support their fearful assurance of God’s mercy towards them, concepts like election and predestination, and none of that took God’s justice or mercy seriously because all of those things gave us assurance of salvation and gave them, those outside the church, assurance of damnation. 

What we hear from Jesus is more complicated. What if instead of easy answers with bows tied around them, we took seriously both God’s justice and God’s mercy for all people?

We all have sin, and we all do evil. So that puts us on the burned up side the Jesus’ parable. We also all have righteousness and love, so that puts us on the shining in God’s kingdom side of Jesus’ parable. So, rather that fearfully deciding who gets God’s punishment and who gets God’s mercy, how about we put our trust in the one who judges? 

Jesus will be our judge, the one who welcomes sinners and guides them into a new life. Jesus will be our judge, the one who has no time for our self-righteous judgments of others. Jesus will be our judge, the one who said, let not your sin keep you from approaching God, but rather come humbly before God and be healed.

If any think that because they believe in Jesus, they are now wheat, and any who do not believe in Jesus are pure weed, people who think that need to stop fooling themselves. We’re told in the Wisdom of Solomon that, “God’s strength is the source of righteousness.” That means we all have plenty of righteousness in us, of course we do. Sorry to Augustine and Calvin, who really liked the who’s in/who’s out theological systems, but we are not totally depraved with no goodness within us. 

Of course we have goodness within us! God made us and declared us very good! Sure, we screw up, but that doesn’t destroy all goodness within us. Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden didn’t destroy all goodness within us, and passages of scripture which indicate that they did are misunderstood and read out of context. There is plenty that is good in all humans. There is lots of good in non-Christians, and as much as Augustine or Calvin may say that non-Christians’ good works are hated by God because they don’t believe in Jesus, scripture tells a different story. Heck, just not being an idiot tells a different story.

Jesus said that at the end of the age, he’ll talk to all the people throughout the earth, folks who believe in him and folks who don’t, and he’ll say to some of them, thanks y’all for being kind and loving towards others, when you did that them, you did it to me; welcome into God’s eternal kingdom. That’s in Matthew 25. The love they showed to others is greater even than whatever faith they may or may not have had. So it’s great if we believe in Jesus, but if we don’t have love of others, our faith is meaningless. That’s in 1 Corinthians 13. So, what does God really want from us? Justice. Mercy. Kindness. Caring for others. Walking humbly with God in our lives, and we all have that ability in us. That’s in pretty much all of the prophets.

So yeah, there’s a huge amount of goodness in all humans. 

There is also plenty that is pretty darn broken and harmful in all humans. Of course there is. We get hurt. We get traumatized, and our brains react in ways that harm others, who then get hurt and traumatized, and the whole cycle just keeps on going. We have goodness within us, and we have evil within us. Welcome to Jesus’ parable of the weeds among the wheat. 

So, what are we to do? We are to grow together. We are to love one another as best we can and seek to help one another heal. We are to trust in Jesus and seek strength and healing from him. 

Sometimes we do have to have someone go away for a while, but that is always meant for healing, with an invitation to return. What we don’t get to do is declare who are the weeds and who are the wheat. We don’t get to kick out those evil ones, assuming that we’re the righteous ones. The folks who did those things never had Jesus’ backing. In fact, what we find over and over in scripture is that the weeds the righteous kicked out were the one Jesus had mercy on. Welcome to Jesus’ parable of the weeds among the wheat.

"If You Want to Be Who You Want to Be, You Have to Give Up Who You Are."

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
July 12, 2026
Proper 10, A
Isaiah 55:10-13
Psalm 65: (1-8), 9-14
Matthew 13:1-9,18-23

What is the soil of your heart like? Can it receive and live the Kingdom of God here on earth? Jesus told a parable of the one who scatters seeds of the Kingdom of God. Depending on the condition of people’s hearts, they would receive and live the Kingdom of God here on earth, or they would not. 

The Kingdom of God here on earth is a life of faith and hope, trusting in God’s grace and love for us, trusting in God’s grace and love for every single person, ever. We believe that we are loved by God. We believe that we are forgiven by God. We believe that even after we die, will continue to live forever with God in God’s eternal Kingdom. 

So, with that faith and hope, Jesus teaches us to live the Kingdom of God in our lives on earth. Forgive people who wrong you, even if they don’t deserve it. Work to heal any damage you’ve done to others. Love those who love you, and love those who hate you. Rather than fight against a world that is full of problems, accept the things you cannot change, and lovingly live to help heal the things you can. Faith and hope build up the Kingdom of God, and they are built on the foundation of love.

In the parable Jesus told, he is constantly scattering the seed of that kingdom of faith and hope, built on the foundation of love, and as he scatters that seed, some people really don’t get it, just don’t understand. Their hearts don’t understand. Their hearts just can’t grasp the idea of a life of love, forgiveness, and service to others built with faith and hope. So, the idea of living God’s Kingdom of faith, hope, and love, is gone almost as soon as they hear it. 

As Jesus scatters the seed of God’s Kingdom, some love the idea, and they really want to start living a life of faith and hope. Other people they know, however think it sounds stupid and weak, and they mock them for such soft beliefs. So, they give up on the Kingdom of God because their hearts weren’t ready to live it without the total support of others around them.

Then, Jesus said there are some who receive the seed of the Kingdom of God, but they want power, wealth, and stuff instead. They put their trust in their own power; they want control over the world and the lives of the people around them. They don’t want to serve and heal the world, rather they want to force the world to be the way they want it to be. They may have a lot of money and power, or they only have a little bit of money and power, but either way, they want they everything to go their way, and so they reject the Kingdom of God to make the kingdom of themselves. They cause harm, so much harm to those around them, near and far.

Then, Jesus said there are some who receive the seeds of the Kingdom of God and they truly accept it. They choose to live a life of faith and hope, built on the foundation of love. These are the peacemakers, the merciful. These are the pure in heart, the meek, the poor in spirit. These are the ones who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the ones who mourn, the ones who may even be rejected and ridiculed for their way of faith, hope, and love.

When rejected and ridiculed, the ones who truly live the Kingdom of God don’t turn to their own power. They don’t turn to anger or rage. They offer their difficulties up to God, they accept what they cannot change, and they seek God’s strength to continue living a life of faith and hope as part of something bigger than themselves. 

When we see people shot on the Metro right beside us, we offer our fear to God, we leave rage alone, and we seek God’s strength not to be overcome by evil, but to overcome evil with good. 

When we hear of people being chased in ordinary looking cars and then shot by people claiming to be police, we offer our fear to God, we leave rage alone, and we seek God’s strength not to be overcome by evil, but to overcome evil with good. 

When we feel like we keep getting knocked down over and over again, we offer our fear to God, we leave rage alone, and we seek God’s strength not to be overcome by evil, but to overcome evil with good. 

When we have given up and decide to do whatever we can to numb and feel better, we turn back again, we offer our fear to God, we leave rage alone, and we seek God’s strength not to be overcome by evil, but to overcome evil with good. 

The seeds of God’s Kingdom are scattered over and over throughout our lives, and sometimes the conditions of our hearts aren’t able to receive them. So, we work on the condition of our hearts. We work to make the soil of our hearts ready to receive and live God’s Kingdom of faith, hope, and love. 

So, I’m going to sing a song by Guy Forsyth called, “Leave Me Alone.” It’s about a guy who wants to just be left alone, except that he actually desperately wants not to be alone. Maybe he’s been overcome by pain and hurt in his life, we don’t know, but we find in the end that he desperately desires to change so that he won’t always be alone.

Leave Me Alone - Words and Music by Guy Forsyth

https://www.guyforsyth.com/ (Sung with permission)

I’m all alone now, they’ve all gone upstairs.

I’m on my own now, except for the tables and the chairs.

Guess that’s what I wanted, you know I tried hard enough,

To make them leave me alone.

It used to scare me, now I crave it.

I keep joking about taking off to London.

Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

If I could, I would. I want to go, to go away,

To make them leave me alone. 

 

They all danced so well tonight,

Spinning cartwheels ‘round the moon.

I didn’t even have the strength to move my legs.

I didn’t even catch the tune.

If you want to be who you want to be,

You have to give up who you are.

Lie with your love, love with a laugh,

Laugh with a lie, life to your love.

Don’t let them see which one is me,

Or they will leave me alone.

Leave me alone.

When we find we want God’s kingdom and we just can’t seem to live it, we just can’t seem to receive the seeds of God’s kingdom, then we find we must give up who we are in order to be who we want to be. That’s resurrection. That’s Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 16:25, that, “those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” 

“If you want to be who you want to be, you have to give up who you are.” If you want to live God’s kingdom, but you just can’t seem to receive the seeds of God’s kingdom, then it’s time to turn around, to give up who you are and ask God to take control and guide you into who God wants you to be, and like in the song, that work is not done alone. We can’t become who we want to be, living God’s kingdom of faith, hope, and love, and be left alone. We join with our church and others in our church to live the life of God’s kingdom together, becoming merciful peacemakers, pure in heart, meek, poor in spirit, hungering and thirsting for righteousness, even as we mourn, even if we are rejected or ridiculed for our way of faith, hope, and love. We live the kingdom of God with others, dancing so well together, spinning cartwheels ‘round the moon.

Giving Up the Power of Anger and Receiving the Power of Forgiveness

The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets, Houston

January 11, 2026

1 Epiphany, Baptism of Jesus

Isaiah 42:1-9

Psalm 29

Matthew 3:13-17

I have been struggling with sadness over the last several days. A 37-year-old woman was shot and killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis while in her car, apparently trying to drive away from the agents. In response, our government has called her a terrorist and said she brought the killing on herself. There’s been the now usual clash of responses to her killing, folks on the right claiming that it was her fault and that she should have been killed, and folks on the left saying it was an ICE Agent murdering an innocent woman. Fear and anger. Fear and anger. 

Closer to home, a young woman was shot and killed on a METRO bus by a couple of teenagers here in Houston. They weren’t even trying to kill her, they’d gone on the bus to kill someone else, like that’s any better. Fear and anger. Fear and anger. 

Hearing about these things last week, along with everything else that’s…the crud of the world, I’ve had to deal with my anger quite a lot. I’ve been snapping at my family a bit, brooding, and working to keep my anger in check

What has helped me keep my anger in check is many things. Prayer. Medicine. Writing a song to get the anger out in a constructive way. Talking about how angry I am with a couple of people I know I can trust to hear me without sharing my anger, spreading my anger, or using it against me.

The reason for all that work is the knowledge that if left unchecked, my anger will take over, and I will harm others, probably just with words, but I’ll be looking for a fight, looking for any way to lash out at someone. That’s me. No work required. Scared, angry, and wanting to lash out at anyone and everyone. 

I do the work required not to lash out at everyone because I firmly believe that lashing out like that is not the right way to live. Anger feels good, feels powerful, till it overpowers us. Then, when we lash out at people in anger, people tend to get hurt, and people tend to die. When we lash out at people in anger, a young woman gets shot and killed on a METRO bus. When we lash out at people in anger, a 37-year-old woman gets shot and killed in her car. Such is the world when we lash out in anger, when we don’t do the work to be healed of our anger, and when we instead take the power of our anger out on others.

Jesus showed us a better way. Jesus showed us to use our power for justice and peace. 

Today, we’re remembering the day when Jesus was baptized. He walked into the River Jordan to be baptized by John for the forgiveness of sins. Presumably he didn’t particularly need to be baptized. Jesus was the Son of God, God himself who had become human. So, as far as sins which separate us from God and one another, Jesus didn’t have that sinfulness. Jesus didn’t and couldn’t separate himself from himself. Jesus didn’t need baptism and he chose to be baptized anyway. Even though he was God, Jesus emptied himself of that power. Jesus didn’t raise himself up above everyone else. He chose to serve others, instead. In that service of humanity, Jesus chose to join with us even in baptism for turning our lives around, not because Jesus needed it but because we do. 

Jesus had power, and like all people with power, he could have chosen to use his power either to help or to harm others. There have always been people with power, and those with power have used their power to help promote justice and peace for others or to improve their own lives at the expense of others, forcing the world to be like they want it, hurting and killing the powerless in order to get their way. We see in Jesus which of those two ways is the way of the one who has all power, the way of God.

Jesus had all the power of the universe and more, and Jesus chose to serve humanity, rather than rule it. Jesus had all the power of the universe and more, and Jesus chose to teach and guide others. Rather than use his power to force people to follow his desires, Jesus used his power to heal, to help, and to guide.

Such is the way of God. You want to know who God is and what God’s ways are? Look at Jesus.

God chooses to be with us as a fellow human being. God chooses love and relationship over forcing us to be right all the time. God is here with us in tragedy. God forgives us and invites us to forgive others. God teaches us to let go of our anger and our fear, to give them over to him so that we may be healed. In these and so many other ways, God strengthens us for recovery and healing. God offers us that healing and love.

God doesn’t force us, and God doesn’t bribe us with wealth and riches. A little side bar here, but let no other preachers mislead you. Jesus does not promise wealth. Jesus does not promise riches. If you’re expecting Jesus or your faith in Jesus to bring you wealth and riches, then you are praying to something other than God. I mean, you can pray to God for riches, but if you expect that because you believe in Jesus, God will make you rich, that’s not God. Jesus doesn’t teach that our salvation comes from wealth. In fact, Jesus tells us the truth, that our wealth ends up consuming us. Wealth may feel powerful, but as we see in the world today, a lot of people end up using that power to further enrich themselves, rather than giving away that power to serve justice and peace.

Wealth often ends up consuming us, kind of like our anger does. If feels powerful, but then it ends up overpowering us.

Now, back to God and what Jesus shows us about God. I’m really tired of the ultra-rich harming people through their wealth, and I’m really tired of people killing other people out of their anger. What we have seen of Jesus makes me think that perhaps God is tired of those things, too. In fact, from what Jesus taught and did, it’s a good bet that God is frightfully tired of people harming others through their wealth and God is frightfully tired of people harming and killing others out of their anger. 

Frightfully tired of it. What that means is, we can trust God to deal with those people as God sees fit. If people need punishment, God’s gonna give it to them. So, we can pray all of the anger we have towards people and ask God to do all of the things we want to do to those people. 

God may or may not do it, but that’s not the point of the prayer. This prayer is to be honest with God. The prayer that God will do all of the things we want to do to the people we are angry with is a prayer of trust that God will do whatever is right and that we, then, don’t have to take our anger out on the world.

Praying all of our anger to God has another point as well. Remember that Jesus was baptized with a baptism for the forgiveness of sins. God was baptized with a baptism for the forgiveness of sins, joining with us in forgiveness of sins. God joined God’s own forgiveness with us. 

So, in praying our anger to God, we’re also praying for forgiveness. We may not pray for forgiveness right away, but that’s the goal. We pray our anger over to God to give over the power of our anger and to receive instead the power of forgiveness. 

Those who killed the young woman on the METRO bus and who killed the 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis chose to use their power of anger to force their way on the world, and death followed. 

When we pray our anger over to God to give over the power of our anger and to receive instead the power of forgiveness, life follows. In Jesus’ baptism, God showed us that forgiveness is who is how God is. Jesus taught over and over how people could turn their lives around and be healed by loving others and by loving God. On the cross, as he was being killed, Jesus prayed, “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” 

Baptism, forgiveness. Life and teaching, forgiveness. Death and resurrection, forgiveness. God would so much rather forgive than punish, and that is where we find our way when we are lost in and consumed by anger. Give that anger to God so that death will not be your way, and receive instead the power of forgiveness, so that life may follow.

Giving Thanks: Topsoil, Rain, Bread of Life

The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets, Houston

November 26, 2025

Thanksgiving

Deuteronomy 6:1-11

Psalm 100

John 6:25-35

When the people of Israel came into the promised land after they had been freed from slavery in Egypt, God commanded them to take the first fruits of the food they were growing, and bring them to the altar of God to be given as an offering of thanksgiving. This offering was a reminder that God had been with the people from the beginning and that God brought them out of slavery in Egypt so that they could be a light to the nations. The offering also reminded the people that God gave the growth to their crops, so they were to give thanks to God from whom all life flows. The people planted and tended their crops, and God gave the soil and brought the rain so the crops could grow.

Radio broadcaster Paul Harvey once noted that “despite all our many accomplishments, we owe our existence to a six-inch layer of topsoil and the fact that it rains.” If there were no plants on the earth, there would be no animals. If humans could not grow fruits, and vegetables, and grains, we would all die. So, we do indeed owe our existence to a six-inch layer of topsoil and the fact that it rains. 

Giving thanks for the simple fact of food helps ground us because when we don’t give thanks, we tend to take things for granted. We don’t notice any of the blessings around us, and when we no longer notice blessings, we tend to fall into despair. If there’s nothing for which to be grateful, well then there’s nothing good in the world, and if there’s nothing good, well then everything is bad. 

What do we do with the bad stuff in our lives? We tend not to like it that much, and we end up contemptuous and resentful of all the bad things in our lives. So, when we stop giving thanks, we tend to become contemptuous and resentful of everything in our life, even the good things. 

It seems God really knew what he was doing when he told the people of Israel to give thanks for the first fruits of the harvest each year. Remain grateful so that you can remain joyful. Remain grateful so that you notice the blessings around you and don’t fall into despair.

There is also something particularly healing about being grateful for food, and I think it is this: food comes from the ground, from the earth, which is where we come from. We are connected to our food because we are connected to the earth. 

When the people of Israel were wandering in the desert, God gave them manna to eat. It rained down from the heavens and the people gathered it every morning. It was described as the bread of angels. That’s pretty fantastic that God gave the people angelic food, and they didn’t even have to work for it. Every morning it just appeared, and the people quickly came to hate it.

Ok, on the one hand, guys, just be grateful. On the other hand, I think they grew to hate the bread of angels because it wasn’t from this world. They weren’t as connected to the manna as they were to the fruits of the ground. 

There is something about real food that connects us to the earth and to each other. Meals eaten together connect our families and communities. Those meals, that food, connects us back to the earth, that six-inch layer of topsoil and the fact that it rains. Those meals then, that food, helps remind us of our connection to God from whom all life flows and from whom all love flows.

God loves us so much that he thought becoming human sounded like a pretty neat idea, so that God is connected physically to us, just as we are connected physically to the earth. Our sustenance, our food, is not only the physical food that comes from the earth, but also the physical connection to God which comes from Jesus.

“I am the bread of life,” Jesus said. “Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” Never be hungry and never be thirsty, Jesus said, even when we mess up, even when we turn away from Jesus, because we always get to turn back. 

Jesus said that our work, the work which will bring us the bread of life, is to believe in Jesus. Well, that work that Jesus would have us do means believing in all of his life, and his teachings, and his death, and his resurrection. 

Last Sunday, we heard about Jesus’ death in his crucifixion, calling out “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Forgive them for killing the bread of life. That’s love, right there, God’s great love for us. Not only did God give us six inches of topsoil and rain so that we can eat the physical food of this earth, God gave us the bread of life, the physical connection between us and God. In Jesus, God gave us a physical connection with God’s own eternal life, and when humanity tried to kill that physical connection between us and God, Jesus said, “Father forgive them.”

We can’t do enough bad to sever God’s connection with us in Jesus, and we know this because of Jesus’ resurrection. The resurrection tells us that God doesn’t give up on us, even when we give up on God. As a friend of mine, the Reverend Pete Nunnally said, “Even though we tried to kill God, God came back to us.”

That is the bread of everlasting life which we eat by believing, and we let that belief be real enough to change our lives. 

“Do not work for the food that perishes,” Jesus said. Do not work, and strive, and fight just for things that’ll help you feel better for a moment or two. The next bit of cush will make you feel better for a short while, but it will also drain you of life. The next drunk will help you not care for a time, but it will also drive people away from you and make them push you away. 

The police are making the rounds more and more on the streets of midtown, moving people off the sidewalks, removing people’s belongings, and forcing people to leave the area. On the one hand, it kinda sucks to take someone who has no place to live and force them to go away to somewhere else. On the other hand, when folks are using drugs, getting drunk and high, threatening men and harassing women so they no longer feel safe coming to church here, who could blame the police for making people move on?

I don’t say this to condemn, because as a recovering alcoholic myself, I truly do understand the pull and the chains of addiction. I understand using something to feel better and feeling like that thing will fill the hunger. I also understand how addiction harms one’s behavior, and I understand how addiction leads to anger, resentment, fear, and hopelessness. 

I understand trying to fill a hunger with food that doesn’t satisfy, “food that perishes,” Jesus said, and I understand how dark life can be. I also believe that the true hunger we feel is not just to feel better. The true hunger we feel is for eternal life. The true hunger we feel is for connection with God and one another. The true hunger we feel is for love and belonging. 

So, today I offer again what God has given us to fill our hunger, the bread of life which is Jesus. God became human to connect us physically with God’s own eternal life, and not even death Jesus’ death on the cross could sever that connection. “Even though we tried to kill God, God came back to us.” 

No matter how often we turn away, God always invites us back. So for us, the antidote to our anger, resentment, fear, and hopelessness is not numbing out with food that perishes. The healing for our anger, resentment, fear, and hopelessness comes from the bread of life, and working for that bread, believing in Jesus. Our healing comes from believing in Jesus’ teaching and ways. Our healing comes from believing that Jesus is the eternal life of God joined physically, and our healing comes from letting that belief be real enough to change our lives. 

So, on this day of giving thanks, we remember God’s gifts, and we remember the gift of gratitude itself, because without gratitude, we stop noticing the blessings around us, and we fall into despair. We give thanks today for the food of the earth, for that six inches of top soil and the fact that it rains, connecting our lives physically to creation. We give thanks for the bread of life. We give thanks for that physical connection to God’s eternal life, Jesus, whom we tried to kill and who came back to let us know that nothing can separate us from God’s great love for us and God’s eternal life.

Living Into Our True Humanity

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
August 31, 2025
Proper 17, C
Sirach 10:12-18
Psalm 103:1-8
Luke 14:1,7-14

Pride, to feel that I matter above anyone else. Pride, to be so angry when someone hurts me, insults me, or looks at me wrong, that I hurt or insult them back, because after all, I’m more important than they are. Pride, to turn inward, putting walls up around me, letting no one in because it’s safer that way and I don’t need anyone else anyway. In all of these ways, pride is to forsake God.

We heard in our reading from Sirach that the beginning of pride is to turn away from God, to pull our hearts away from God. 

When we pull our hearts from God, then we assume that we are all-sufficient, that we have no need for others, that we trust no one and nothing. When we pull our hears from God, we have pride leaving us alone, hurting, often with violent anger which lashes out at others. As we heard in Sirach, however, neither violent anger nor pride were made for human beings. We’re not made to be prideful and violently angry. We’re made to be loving and supportive towards one another. We find our full humanity in being loving and supportive towards one another. When we withdraw and isolate in pride and violent anger, we pull further and further away from our own humanity.

Sometimes when I’ve seen folks get violently angry, or gotten terribly angry myself, I’ve heard folks say things like, “but he insulted me,” as though being insulted is a good reason for beating someone, punching and hurting them. Talk about pride leading to violent anger. He insulted me; he wounded my pride, so I am going to get violently angry now. 

Ok, so on the one hand, that’s all too human. We strive, we struggle, we get hurt, we make mistakes. We lash out. We isolate. We’re human; we mess up. On the other hand, pride and violent anger take away from our true humanity.

Our true humanity dwells in love. Our true humanity dwells in forgiveness. Our true humanity dwells in kindness and in caring about others. 

I preached several weeks ago about Mr. Rogers. He was someone whom we tend to put on a pedestal. He was like a saint, so wonderful and kind. Ok, but Jesus was telling us not to put people up on pedestals in the teaching we heard today. When we put some people up on pedestals, we tend to devalue others. These great ones are so wonderful, and these others are, eh, not as good. 

When we put folks on pedestals, we also tend to elevate them even above ourselves. They are someone great, not someone like me. They can be kind, and caring, and wonderful because they are special, somehow, not like me. We tend to do that with people like Mr. Rogers, and his widow was adamant that people not put him on a pedestal. After all, Mr. Rogers believed all of us can be people of kindness, forgiveness, love, and caring. If we assume that we can’t, that people like Mr. Rogers are saints and we can’t achieve that, well that’s just another kind of pride. 

I’m different. Someone else can do that, but not I. I’m not special enough to be able to be as kind and caring as that person is. The reality is that for Mr. Rogers and anyone who is kind and caring, it’s a choice and it takes work. 

For any who think that Mr. Rogers was a saint, and I can’t do that, the truth is that it may just take more effort than we’re willing to put in. We’ll, if we’re unwilling to put in the effort, that’s the same kind of pride that says, “I matter above anyone else. I matter too much to waste my time working to be kind, forgiving, loving, and caring to others.”  

When we put people like Mr. Rogers up on a pedestal as some kind of special saintly person and we tell ourselves we can’t be that good, we are forsaking God and others, because it is safer and easier not to have to work so hard. Overcoming our pride takes work. Not lashing out in violent anger takes work. Living into our true humanity takes work.

For Jesus, it took the work of the cross. “Father, forgive them,” he prayed, as he allowed himself to be crucified, rather than calling on hosts of angels to rescue him and kill his killers. That was Jesus’ work for our sake, to free us and to help us live into our true humanity. 

“Take up your own cross and follow me,” he said. We don’t have to be crucified, but living into our true humanity takes work. 

Sometimes that work looks like daily, hourly, or minute by minute prayer for God’s help so that we might live in kindness, rather than lashing out at others. Sometimes that work looks like sharing our difficulties with others and asking for their help so that we might live in love and caring, rather than pride. Sometimes that work looks like taking medicine because our brains need extra help to live into our true humanity, to overcome depression, violent anger, and other mental illnesses that we face. All of that work is what we can do to live into our true humanity.

Jesus taught us not to take places of honor, assuming we’re better than everyone else. Sometimes that means not putting others up on pedestals, as we refuse to do the work it takes to live into our own true humanity.

I had a friend, years ago; we were talking about the saints, and she said, “I don’t want to be a saint.” She was thinking of being a saint as being kinda miserable, giving up everything that makes you happy so that you can be good enough for God. That’s not what being a saint is; that’s just being miserable. No, being a saint looks like doing the work you need to do to care for others. Being a saint looks like recognizing that we are all in this life together.

At the beginning of our service this morning, we sang, “Satan, we’re gonna tear your kingdom down.” Satan, the Adversary, keeps us divided. Satan keeps us saying, “We’re not in this together.” “You don’t belong.” “I’m more important than you.” “We’re against one another,” or at the very least, “You’re against me, so I must be against you.” 

In all of those ways that we remain against one another, we’re helping to build up Satan’s kingdom. When we exclude the undesirables, put others on pedestals, and determine that being kind and caring to others is too much work, we’re helping to build up Satan’s kingdom.

Now, long-term, big picture? Jesus has torn Satan’s kingdom down. While we get to live out Satan’s kingdom if we choose to, Satan’s kingdom has ultimately been torn down, by Jesus on the cross. So, we get to live Jesus’ kingdom. 

We get to live the kingdom of kindness, mercy, love, and caring, and even if we have been building up Satan’s failed and doomed kingdom, we always get to come back. Jesus welcomes us with open arms, saying, “Come on, let’s start building together.” Living and building Jesus’ kingdom is work, but think about how much more work it is to live against one another. Think about how much more work it is to live with pride and violent anger? 

Following Jesus’ way, doing the work, and building up Jesus’ kingdom, we get to let go of our pride and violent anger. We get to live and work for kindness, forgiveness, love and caring for all.

"How long, O Lord, will there be such strife in the world?" We Ask. "How long, indeed?" God replies. "How long, humanity? How long?"

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
July 27, 2025
Proper 12, C
Colossians 2:6-15, (16-19)
Psalm 138
Luke 11:1-13

There’s something terribly wrong with the world*, isn’t there? Terrorists kill thousands, and so others respond by killing hundreds of thousands. Folks want as big a return on investment as we can get, and if that is done by paying people poverty wages or worse, well…it’s not really my fault, that’s just how the market works.

Those poor people on the streets are unsightly, let’s put them in jail or drive them far from here, and what happens to them after, that’s their problem. I’m hurt and angry. It feels like that’s all I’ve ever been, and I’m just going to keep taking it out on everyone around me because I really don’t know a what else to do. Most of what the church has ever done is just threaten me with Hell, so to Hell with them too.

We care about people in the abstract (in general), but when it comes to sacrificing our own comfort and security, taking on suffering ourselves for the sake of others, our caring often becomes even more abstract (less). That goes for churchy disciples of Jesus, too. 

How often when I (or others) talk about Jesus’ teachings on economic justice do folks blast it as woke socialist teaching? It’s not. It’s just what Jesus said. “Sure,” folks will counter, “but you can’t apply Jesus’ teachings to our economy, or how we invest money, or how we pay people.” Ok, but that’s just like what the people of Israel kept saying when the prophets kept telling them, “Y’all are sunk because of you exploit the poor and seem to love economic injustice.” Saying you can’t apply Jesus’ teachings to the economy is to place love of wealth above love of people and to place economic might as an idol above God. 

How often do I then hear people agree with the very same teachings of Jesus, the teachings about economic justice, so long as they can pretend that those teachings are only about what happens when we die, and not about economic and social justice in this world and in this life? A lot, very often, that happens.

Yes, there is something terribly wrong with this world, and recognizing that fact, we find a deep longing for people actually to care about one another.

I was saddened last week over the death of Ozzy Osbourne, and I bring him up, one because I love his music, and two because he was one who shared this deep longing for people actually to care about one another. Despite what lots of right-wing fundamentalist preachers have shouted over the years, Ozzy was a Christian. He was a flawed dude, but he was also a dude who despaired at the horrible things we humans do to one another. He wrote songs calling out our human atrocities and longing for hope, longing for people actually to care about one another.

In an interview with The Guardian in 2014, they asked about his faith, and in part of his answer, he said,

My idea of heaven is feeling good. A place where people are alright to each other. This world scares the shit out of me. We’re all living on the tinderbox. It’s like there’s some maniac somewhere trying to devise a new means of destruction. It always amazes me that mankind always goes to find the biggest, powerfullest means of destruction before they find anything good. It’s always the negative things they find first. Since I’ve had kids I’ve thought, ‘What are we leaving these people? Nothing.’ What a future we’ve got for mankind.

He was torn down by how terribly wrong this world is, and he wrote about that in his music, which was aggressive and violent sounding, but like most angry music, it wasn’t meant to harm others but to heal them. “I’d rather have people get rid of their aggression at an Ozzy concert,” he said, “than by beating some old lady over the head and running off with her purse. [The concerts, the music are] a release of aggression.”

  

“How long, must we keep on waiting?”** He wrote in one of his later songs, Diggin' Me Down. That song in particular makes me think of the lament Psalms, like Psalm 13. How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will I have grief in my heart day after day? Look at me. Answer me. How long will the enemy triumph?

The Psalms is a lament and a question, challenging God to answer because there is something terribly wrong with the world, and it doesn’t seem to be getting any better.

“How long, O Lord,” and I think there are times when God’s answer may well be, “How long, indeed?” How long will you people continue to hurt one another. How long will you continue to seek all the best for yourself pretending like it’s not hurting anyone else? How long will you continue to go it alone, taking your violence and anger out on everyone around you. How long, humanity? How long?

Knowing all that is terribly wrong with the world, when Jesus’ disciples asked him to pray, he taught them “The Lord’s Prayer,” as we call it, and there are two things I’d like to point out from his teaching. One, knowing all that is terribly wrong with the world, Jesus taught us to pray for God’s Kingdom to come and for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in Heaven. 

If we’re praying for God’s kingdom to come, that also means that we’re gonna be working towards it. Remember that Pope Francis said, “You pray for the hungry, then you feed them. That’s how prayer works.” Well, regarding the Lord’s Prayer, you pray for God’s kingdom to be lived out here on earth as in Heaven, and then you live out God’s kingdom here on earth. That’s how the Lord’s Prayer works. 

You pray for people to care about one another and be loving towards one another, and then you actually start doing that. You pray for economic justice, and then you actually start living it. You pray for an end to hatred and vengeance, and then you actually start loving and forgiving people.

Jesus taught that our actions are meant to match our prayer. Jesus also taught that we don’t try to live out God’s kingdom all by ourselves. We are to ask the Holy Spirit constantly to help us. He told the story of the guy who kept beating on his friend’s door asking for some bread because another friend had just showed up at midnight. Weird story, please don’t do that to people. Wait six hours till the morning, your hungry friend ain’t gonna die. 

What Jesus said was that this persistence in prayer was for the Holy Spirit. The guy in the story eventually gave some bread to his jerky friend just to shut him up. “How much more,” Jesus said, “will God give the Holy Spirit to those who ask.”

God gives the Holy Spirit for the church to live out God’s mission of reconciliation and love. God gives the Holy Spirit for the church to bring some kindness and caring into this world, rather than the anger and aggression we so often face.

There is something terribly wrong with this world, and that terribly wrong this is the spirit of the Adversary: us vs. them, me vs. you, fear and anger, get all I can regardless of who it hurts or how it hurts them. The spirit of the Adversary is rife in this world, and we don’t even recognize it. We see the spirit of the Adversary, and we say, “I need a good return on investment, and that’s just how free markets are supposed to work. We’re supposed to get vengeance on our enemies. I’m hurting and in need, and to hell with anyone who gets in my way.”

That spirit of the Adversary is what is terribly wrong with this world, and God has given us a different Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, so that we might no longer be against one another but for one another. God has given us the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, so that we might live out God’s kingdom of economic justice, mercy, forgiveness, and love here on earth, right now, as it is in heaven. 

How long, O Lord? How long will we continue not to ask for the Holy Spirit or to ask selfishly? How long will we keep God waiting? Ask for the Holy Spirit, Jesus taught us, all day, every day, so that we might follow the Advocate, rather than the Adversary, and live out God’s kingdom here on earth, as in Heaven. 

*And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there? 

Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression.

― Alan Moore, V for Vendetta

** Digging Me Down, Ozzy Osbourne

https://youtu.be/nqAmREzj6nA?si=Tgjt1yWllbcX9KO2

Apostles of Forgiveness

 The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets, Houston
April 27, 2025
2 Easter, C
Acts 5:27-32
Psalm 118:14-29
John 20:19-31

Jesus talked a lot about forgiveness. He gave us parables about the forgiveness of God, like in Matthew 18:15-20 with a parable about guy who owed 2000 lifetimes’ worth of wages and was forgiven all of his debt. Jesus taught his disciples that as far and as long as there is vengeance in the world, that is how far and how long you are to forgive. Then, Jesus showed that he actually meant what he said when he forgave his murderers in the act of killing him. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.”

Sure, they didn’t know that they were killing God incarnate, but I think he meant that they didn’t know that their killing him, even just as a regular human being, their killing him was wrong. I know that because “Jesus didn’t count equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied himself,” and Jesus taught that whatever we do to the least among us, we do to him. 

Father, forgive them, because they just don’t get that killing other people is wrong. Forgive them, even though they’re incurring over 2000 lifetimes’ worth of debt. Forgive them because they just don’t get it; they just don’t understand the horror of what they’re doing.

Then, when Jesus was raised from the dead and met with his disciples, he said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit,” just as he had received the Holy Spirit in his baptism, and he told them that he was sending them just as he had been sent by God the Father. “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them,” he said. “If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

If you forgive sins, they are forgiven. If you retain sins, they are retained.

This has become a bit of a power play in parts of the Church, hasn’t it? Some folks believe that priests, standing in for Jesus, proclaim people as being forgiven or not forgiven. Jesus did say, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” So, there you have it; if you don’t forgive, they’re not forgiven.

Is that really what Jesus meant, though? If you select few proclaim my forgiveness, then I have forgiven someone, and if you don’t proclaim my forgiveness, it is because I have not forgiven someone? Is that really what Jesus meant? Maybe. Then again, maybe not.

Remember just how darn much Jesus forgave and how seriously Jesus took forgiveness. He taught his disciples to forgive for as far and as long as there is forgiveness in the world. I don’t know that he’s then going to say, “Oh, by the way guys, I’m often not going to forgive, and you’ll know when, so you can retain the sins of some people.” Nah. Not so much.

“If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven.” If you, or I, or anyone forgives the sins of any, they are forgiven. When you forgive someone, that person is freed and so are you. So, don’t worry about whether or not Jesus will forgive; I’m pretty sure we’ve seen that he already has. Instead, focus on your forgiveness, the forgiveness you give others. Your forgiveness is real. Your forgiveness is true. Your forgiveness is healing and life-giving.

At the same time, realize that your lack of forgiveness is just as real and just as true. Your lack of forgiveness is harmful and deadly. “If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” You get to keep that poison, if you choose, slowly killing you and those around you. Even though Jesus has forgiven, our lack of forgiveness can still harm us and kill us.

So, forgive, Jesus told us. As the Father sent Jesus to forgive, so does Jesus send us to forgive, at least that’s what the story says.

How do we know that Jesus really did send us to forgive? How do we know that Jesus was even right in his commands for us to forgive? We often don’t want to forgive. We often feel like people don’t deserve forgiveness, and we’re probably right. They probably don’t. When it doesn’t feel like people deserve forgiveness, or even ask for forgiveness, how do we know that it really is ok to forgive? How do we know that it really is the right thing to forgive?

Well, the short answer is, we don’t. We don’t know that forgiveness is the right thing. We’re asked to believe.

Thomas didn’t know if it was Jesus he was seeing. His fellow disciples had seen Jesus, and Jesus showed them his scars. Then, when they told Thomas about it, he didn’t believe, and said he wouldn’t believe until Jesus showed him his scars. Then, when Jesus offered to show Thomas his scars, Thomas said, “No, that’s not necessary. You are my Lord and my God.” Thomas didn’t see what his fellow disciples saw, and yet he believed. His fellow disciples saw even more, and they believed. Mary Magdalene, the first apostle, saw Jesus outside the tomb, and she believed. 

We have their stories, and we are asked to believe, and we are also asked to believe Jesus’ teaching on forgiveness. We are asked to believe that we are Jesus’ apostles of forgiveness, sent by Jesus to forgive.

So, how’s that work? Does being sent as apostles of forgiveness mean that if someone kills someone we love, we should just say, “I forgive them, so just let them go kill again?” Of course not. We can forgive and still have people in prison. Safety and keeping others from harm is still a thing, but what about forgiveness and even release when someone is sorrowful for what they’ve done and has repented? Might forgiveness involve advocating for their release from prison? Might that be part of the life-giving healing Jesus had in mind? 

I read a story published in People magazine about a man who did advocate for the release from prison of his brother’s murderer. Kimyon Marshall was 15 years old back in 1998, when he killed Ruben Cotton over a pair of tennis shoes. Ruben’s older brother, Darryl Green, was torn apart by grief and anger at his brother’s killing, for which the murderer, Kimyon, received a life sentence. Over the next decade and a half, Darryl struggled with his anger and struggled for purpose, even though successful in his career. “Although Kimyon was the one behind bars,” he said, “I was in my own prison, a prison of hatred.” After 15 years, Darryl and his father agreed that it was time to forgive Kimyon. So, they went to his resentencing hearing, and they heard his remorse, and they advocated for his release.

At the hearing, Darryl shook Kimyon’s hand. They both cried, and Darryl said to him, “You’ve been known for taking a life, now let’s go save some lives together.” From there, they started an organization called, “Deep Forgiveness” which works with young people, helping them break free from cycles of violence. 

They have been doing this work together for years now, and forgiveness is still work for Darryl, but he said that “Once you forgive, you’re now able to unlock the key to your own prison cell.” As for Kimyon, he says that when he received the gift of freedom from Darryl’s family, he was able to give back to the community and work to save lives.

That’s the power of forgiveness. Darryl and his family retained Kimyon’s sins for 15 years, and those sins were retained. Then, they were ready to forgive him his sins, and his sins were forgiven. What came next was healing and life-giving. A man and his brother’s murderer, reconciled, working together to bring forgiveness and life to the world. That’s resurrection. That’s the gospel of Jesus lived out among us. That’s two men believing in the forgiveness of Jesus and then living as Jesus sent them to live, as apostles of forgiveness.

So we are asked to believe and live as well. Jesus said when we retain people’s sins, they are retained, and indeed they are. We keep that poison and remain imprisoned ourselves until we’re able to forgive, and that takes time. Then, when we forgive people’s sins, as Jesus sent us to do, they are indeed forgiven. We are apostles of forgiveness, sent by Jesus to forgive, just as Jesus was sent by God the Father to forgive, and when we do, we are freed, and there is healing and new life.

https://people.com/darryl-green-deep-forgiveness-man-forgave-brothers-killer-exclusive-7506937

God forgives those who need it.

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
March 30, 2025
4 Lent, C
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Psalm 32
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32

Context matters. With Scripture, as with anything context matters for determining the meaning of something. Taking bits of scripture out of context, we can get scripture to say all sorts of things. For example:

“God loves nothing,” rather, “God hates.” If I had a hankering to make up an angry, frightening story with scripture, taking words out of context, I might just say that. “God loves nothing. God hates.” See, context really does matter, because those words really are in scripture. Deuteronomy 16:22 really has the words, “God hates” right there together, but the verse is actually at the end of descriptions of idolatry and injustice, “things that the Lord your God hates.” That’s what scripture says; God hates things like idolatry and injustice. Context matters. 

Here's another one. “God loves nothing.” Ooh, way harsh, “God loves nothing,” and yes, you can pluck those words right out of scripture, from Wisdom 7:28, but here’s what it actually says, “God loves nothing so much as the person who lives with wisdom.” Again, context matters.

I bring this up because today we have a passage about God’s forgiveness. In the story Jesus tells, a young man basically tells his dad, “I wish you were dead, now give me my inheritance.” When the young man spends all of his money and ends up penniless, he goes home, begging his father’s forgiveness, and his father runs out to him, embracing him, and throwing a party because he came back. From that story, God’s forgiveness seems pretty vast and unending. 

Last week, however, I heard in a Bible study someone say that if you are a Christian and you turn away from Jesus, you can’t be forgiven of that. There’s no way to come back to Jesus if you have ever turned away. 

That is not our belief in the church. If you turn away from Jesus, yes, you can come back. That’s the whole idea of repentance. That’s what Jesus was showing us in the story he told. So, where have we gotten this idea that you can’t come back to Jesus if you are a Christian who has rejected Jesus? Well, this idea comes from scripture, but it comes from scripture without context.

See, in Hebrews 6:4-6, the writer says, “it is impossible to restore again to repentance those who have once been enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, since on their own they are crucifying again the Son of God and are holding him up to contempt.” Well, that seems pretty clear. If you believe in Jesus, and then you stop believing in Jesus, you cannot return to a belief in Jesus, and you cannot be forgiven. 

What about the context, though? 

The writer of Hebrews is writing to a whole church, a large group of Jewish Christians, and it seems as though this church is beginning to lose their faith in Jesus, wanting to continue in their Jewish faith apart from Jesus. The writer is trying to convince them that Jesus really is the way to go, and he writes about Jesus in a very Jewish way. He compares Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross to the Jewish animal sacrifices on the altar. He talks about Jesus’ priesthood in the context of the Jewish priesthood. Additionally, he writes about turning away from Jesus in the context of the people of Israel turning away from God throughout the scriptures. 

Remember, he writes, how Israel would forsake God and God would forsake them until the next generation would return to God? So, he’s writing to them about Jesus in the same way, and yeah, he’s threatening them a little, but that threat is written to them for the purpose of keeping them from turning away from Jesus. The writer of Hebrews’ words aren’t a forever truth to Christians that if you believe in Jesus and then stop believing in Jesus, you can never be forgiven. 

Such a belief, that God can’t or won’t forgive you for turning away from Jesus, is in conflict with other parts of scripture, like James 5:19-20. “My brothers and sisters, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and is brought back by another, you should know that whoever brings back a sinner from wandering will save the sinner’s soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.” James states very clearly that if you turn away from Jesus, you can turn back. 

The thought that you can’t be forgiven if you turn away from Jesus is also in conflict with the overall narrative of Scripture. The story of scripture is of God creating us, loving us, and constantly reaching out to us to heal us and guide us back to him. Grace, and love, repentance, and forgiveness are the themes of Scripture. 

Maybe that’s why Jesus taught about God’s forgiveness, over and over again. Jesus taught about God’s forgiveness in the story he told of the young man wanted his father dead, took and wasted his inheritance, and then came back penniless and filthy, begging for his father’s forgiveness. His father forgave him instantly, and then his older brother complained.

“He doesn’t deserve it,” the brother complained. “He turned away from you, while I’ve been here with you the whole time; he should never be forgiven.” When we start saying that folks can’t repent if they turn away from Jesus, we start sounding like the older brother in the story, complaining how unfair it is, that forgiveness should only be for those who deserve it.

Well, that definitely sounds like people claiming forgiveness for themselves, while also saying others are beyond God’s forgiveness. The religious leaders in Jesus’ day seemed to be claiming the same thing when they got upset with Jesus for hanging out with sinners. “Those are the wrong sorts of people. God doesn’t like them!” They seemed to think. So, Jesus told the story of forgiveness. 

God forgives, whether we want others to be forgiven or not. God forgives not just those who deserve it. God forgives those who need it. We all need the healing of forgiveness. So, God calls us to repent, because we need that too. 

How often do we hear repentance expressed as a threat, as if the point of repentance is to appease God’s anger. “Yeah, it’s time to repent. I gotta get God off my back again.” Such thoughts forget that the purpose of repentance is our healing and wholeness. We repent because we need it for our healing. Turn away from things that are causing harm. After all, we only repent of things that are harmful to ourselves and others. 

So, whatever else you’ve heard about repentance, whatever rules you’ve heard about God’s forgiveness, try setting aside those rules made by bits of scripture taken out of context, and remember instead the story Jesus told. A young man said, “Dad, I wish you were dead, because I want my inheritance now. Gimme my money. The dad did, and the kid left, only to return filthy and penniless, begging forgiveness, and his father ran to him, blessing him and forgiving him. 

God forgives. Over and over again. God forgives us. Whatever it is, however, many times it is, God keeps inviting us to repent, to turn away from ways that are causing harm and return to God’s will and God’s ways. Jesus invites all to return and receive God’s forgiveness, not just those who deserve it, but those who need it. 

When God Became Human, He Didn’t Find Things to be Beneath His Dignity to Do.

The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets, Houston

January 12, 2025

1 Epiphany, C

Isaiah 43:1-7

Psalm 29

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Today, after the service, I have to leave to get to another church where I’ll be talking with them about Lord of the Streets, recruiting volunteers, and continuing to grow our connections with our supporting congregations. So, unfortunately, I won’t be here for breakfast, which I love, not just the food, but being with everybody. Usually, after breakfast, I join with our parishioners to help clean up, put tables and chairs away.

One morning about a year ago, I was cleaning up after breakfast with several parishioners, and someone else said, “You shouldn’t be doing this. You’ve got more important things to do.” I said, “Not really, cause for one, I like getting to be with our parishioners doing this work, and two, if I’m too good for cleaning tables and sweeping floors, then I’m not good enough to be preaching and serving at the altar.”

I bring that up because I think it has something to do with why Jesus got baptized. In seminary, this was a popular question.  Why did Jesus get baptized? He was without sin, right, so he had no need for baptism. We’re told in Matthew’s version that Jesus chose to be baptized to “fulfill all righteousness.” So then, of course, there were debates about what exactly that means. Jesus was already righteous. He was God. Nothing he did separated him from God, and he needed no reconciliation to be reunited with God. He was righteous. He had no need for forgiveness of sin. You could say he was too good for baptism, and you’d be right.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Baptism-of-Christ.jpg

So, what righteousness was Jesus fulfilling? Perhaps the righteousness of being human. The righteousness Jesus fulfilled was the righteousness of joining with humanity in every way. Jesus got baptized because we get baptized. While he was too good to need baptism, he wasn’t too good to be baptized. Jesus didn’t “regard equality with God as something to be exploited.” (Philippians 2:6) Baptism marks our repentance and our desire to be washed clean of everything that separates us from God and one another. Baptism is a physical and spiritual way that we choose to accept and live into our unity with God through Jesus.

We are baptized to embody our unity with God and the love, forgiveness, and grace God has for us, so when God became human, rather than claim to be above all of that, God joined with humanity even in humanity’s ways of joining with God. Even if he didn’t need baptism, Jesus wasn’t too good to be baptized. He wasn’t above that.

Perhaps, as followers of Jesus, there is a lesson there for us. When God became human, he didn’t find things to be beneath his dignity to do. Rather, God joined with us in all of our lives. Perhaps then, nothing is beneath any of our dignity to do as well.

Even forgiving others, which is part of what baptism is all about, the forgiveness of the harm we do. For us to forgive, we have to swallow our pride, to set aside the fact that forgiveness may not be deserved, and then choose to forgive anyway. That’s what God does, forgiving us, not necessarily because we deserve it, but because we need it. We need healing, and forgiveness brings healing, both for the one being forgiven and for the one doing the forgiving.

If God can forgive us and even be baptized with a baptism for forgiveness of sins, then, as hard as it may be, forgiving others is certainly not beneath our dignity. If being God didn’t put Jesus above forgiving others, then being human certainly doesn’t put any of us above forgiving others.

Now, in Luke’s version of Jesus’ baptism which we heard today, John talked about Jesus gathering the wheat of humanity into his granary and burning the chaff of humanity with unquenchable fire. That’s God’s job to do, not ours, and it is a job that we don’t fully understand. How exactly does God’s judgement work? Who or what is the chaff? Who or what is the wheat? We’ve got lots of answers, but if we’re being honest, we don’t fully know or understand. That’s because it’s God’s job to do, not ours.

What we do know is, God is unmistakably for us, and so we are meant to be for one another as well. When we judge one another, and we do judge one another, our judgments should be meant for healing, for reconciliation, for helping one another in this life. We can judge our behaviors as harmful or helpful, as loving or hateful.

Our judgments are not meant for determining who is the wheat and who is the chaff to be burned with unquenchable fire. When we make those determinations, we’re making ourselves equal with God, and not even God made himself equal to God when God became human.

So, when we judge, for example, we can judge that violence and settling our conflicts with our fists and weapons is harmful and terrible for us. Last week at breakfast a man felt disrespected when another asked him to quiet down during the prayer. Feeling disrespected, he became angry and attacked the other man, physically, rather than just taking a breath or using his words. That unquestionably the wrong thing to do. His violence at feeling disrespected didn’t help him. It just hurt everyone, and he had to leave over it.

At the same time, that man may have been doing the best he could do at that point. He seems to have been under far too much stress to condemn him simply as bad. He’d obviously been hurt in his life and dealing with so much that when he felt disrespected, he couldn’t do much of anything other than attack. He still had to go, but that doesn’t mean we condemn him. Hopefully he can come back.

Now, some might say that man is like the chaff which will be burned with unquenchable fire. Maybe, but again, if we make that determination, we make ourselves equal with God. Perhaps, instead of the man being the chaff to be burned, the brokenness and hurt within the man is the chaff to be burned with unquenchable fire, and the healed, beloved, forgiven man is the wheat that will be gathered into God’s granary.

We don’t know, but that certainly seems possible, considering how even God chose to be baptized for forgiveness of sins, not because he needed the baptism, but because we do, and God didn’t find joining with us in our baptism to be beneath him. Rather, God chose to be with us and for us, showing us that we can be with and for one another as well. Even if being for one another means we walk into water that is dirty as sin, we can be for one another, knowing Jesus is there with us to gather us together with God.

When We Know Forgiveness, We Know Salvation

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston

December 8, 2024
2 Advent, C
Philippians 1:3-11
Canticle 16
Luke 3:1-6

Have you ever felt guilty about something you did? Ever felt bad about hurting someone, even if they didn’t know it, you lied or cheated, and betrayed someone’s trust or love? Have you then ever been forgiven by the one you’ve harmed for the things you’ve done?

If so, then you know the immense release that comes with forgiveness. The healing that goes on inside of us when we are forgiven, and our guilt recedes, and a weight is lifted because the one we have harmed has restored us to being ok. We’re no longer wracked with guilt. We’re no longer separated from one another. We’ve been restored to the possibility of love between one another. That is salvation.

The problem we see that needs fixing, from the Eden onward, is our disconnection from God and disconnection from one another. As we hurt one another, we pull away from one another, we put up barriers and shields to keep us safe. We walk around with anger in our hearts, showing others that we’re tougher than are so they won’t hurt us. We walk around with fear in our hearts pulling away from others before they have a chance to hurt us.

We see one another as threats, knowing that we’re often right, that others are threats, but mostly because they see us as threats.

We compete with one another out of scarcity for money, jobs, food, shelter. Since we feel we can’t trust others, we tend to go for winner take all, the American Dream of being billionaires while others work for them without enough to pay rent. Even further disconnection.

In our disconnection and mistrust, we turn to drugs, sex, alcohol, and anything else we can in order to feel better or not to feel at all. Those things don’t help, but they disconnect us even further. Angry, afraid, disconnected lives, seeing others as enemies to be feared or conquered…does that sound to anyone like Hell on Earth? That's because it is.

Disconnection is the Hell on Earth we know all too well. Salvation, then, is reconnection, reconnection with God and reconnection with one another.

John the Baptist went out into the wilderness proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, and we are told that John did this so that people would know salvation through forgiveness of their sins.

Forgiveness brings us reconnection, and reconnection is salvation from the Hell on Earth that we so often live. When we are restored to one another through repentance and forgiveness, we’re no longer separated from one another, and we are restored to the possibility of love between one another. That is salvation.

When we know forgiveness, we know salvation. 

So, as followers of Jesus, our way of life is the way of forgiveness. Ideally, we follow the way of forgiveness because we actually know the healing and salvation that forgiveness bring. Some folks maybe don’t.

Some folks might say, “no,” to the question, have they ever felt guilty about something they did. Some may be too afraid to face it or admit it. Some are so self-absorbed that they fail to recognize the harm they’ve caused, and some may even be so self-important that they wouldn’t even care much about the harm they’ve done to others even if they did recognize it.

In any case, for folks who refuse to feel guilt or who won’t or are just too unaware to feel guilt, it may be hard to really understand the salvation given by God. Perhaps that’s why John’s baptism wasn’t just a baptism of forgiveness, but a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

With repentance, we first have to understand the harm we’ve done, actually care about those we’ve harmed. Then, we repent. We change our ways. We seek to make amends and bring healing where we can to those we’ve hurt. Repentance and then forgiveness of sins. That brings about healing and restoration. Repentance and forgiveness together are our way of life, the way of healing and love.

Unfortunately, it often feels like we’ve largely divorced repentance and God’s forgiveness from this life and made it all about avoiding punishment after this life. Then we’ve further made rules out of Jesus forgiveness. Don’t feel guilty about anything you’ve done in this life? No problem. Just believe in Jesus, and he’ll forgive you. Don’t believe in Jesus, but you seek to bring about healing through repentance and forgiveness? Well, too bad, since you don’t believe in Jesus, God is going to punish you anyway.

Here's the deal with Jesus and God’s forgiveness. Yes, God forgives us. Yes, we are given forgiveness through Jesus. Yes, we are assured of punishment for the wicked, and at the same time, yes, we get to rest secure in God’s love for us and God’s forgiveness of us. How do we fit God’s punishment of the wicked together with God’s forgiveness and love? We fit God’s punishment and God’s forgiveness and love together with trust and faith.

We trust in God’s punishment, because sometimes, when we don’t realize or don’t care about the people we’ve harmed, we need God’s punishment to give us a kick in the tail, and we need God’s forgiveness and love because that is where healing and reconnection happens. When we truly feel the weight of how we’ve harmed others, and we repent and seek amendment, we feel the release and healing of forgiveness, we have salvation here on earth.

God will one day restore all things, restoring this world so that there will be no more Hell on Earth; there will be no more of us harming one another and disconnecting from one another. One day we will all be restored, God will wipe away every tear from every eye, and we will live fully in the peace and love of restoration with God and one another.

In the mean time, God’s forgiveness and love gets to be lived. We get to live the gift of forgiveness choosing and working to release anger and hurt, to release the debt that is owed, and let forgiveness rule in our hearts. As we do, we know salvation.