Flawed Dreams and Unexpected Love

Brad Sullivan

The Epiphany, Year C

January 6, 2019

Emmanuel, Houston

Isaiah 60:1-6

Matthew 2:1-12

Flawed Dreams and Unexpected Love

Happy Epiphany y’all.  Christmas ended yesterday, and the joy of Christmas now continues on in the Epiphany, the revelation of Jesus, of the God-baby to the nations through the Magi, and if I’m being honest, I feel the joy of Christmas continued on into Epiphany, and at the same time, I’m having a hard time feeling the joy right now.  Over the first five to six days of Christmas, I really got to feel the joy of Christmas and let everything else fade into the background.  I was at Camp Allen with my family on a clergy family retreat the weekend after Christmas, and other clergy were concerned about Emmanuel after Andy’s death, and they kept asking me, “How are you?”, not just to say “hi” but actually wondering how I was, with the knowing expression in their voices, expecting a sad response. 

My answer shocked several folks because I said, “I’m doing great.”  One friend seemed a little confused by my answer and said, “I’m sorry, I thought you were working with Andy at Emmanuel.”  “No,” I told him, “I was, I am.  It’s just that for right now, I’m enjoying time with my family.  For right now, it’s a great Christmas and I get to just be with my family through New Year’s.  For right now,” I told him, “Andy hasn’t died.  When I get back, he’ll have died again, and I’ll begin mourning again.”  He got that.

So now, it’s like the regular post-Christmas blues, but magnified, and I want to acknowledge that because I’m guessing I might not be alone in that grief and struggle with joy right now.  That’s ok.  For those who are joyful, we get to be joyful.  For those struggling with joy, we get to struggle with joy.  The reality of the post-Christmas blues is, I believe, in the realization that the dream of Christmas has not fully been realized.  We celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace, the birth of Jesus, the Messiah, and then we find that as before, there isn’t yet peace on Earth. 

I heard an interview on Fresh Air with Terry Gross a few days ago with Israeli author and peace activist Amos Oz.  He had just died and they were rebroadcasting previous interviews, and in the one I heard, he was talking about one of his books, Black Box, and he said it was ultimately “a novel about great dreams, about great expectations, about bigger-than-life visions and, indeed, about the morning after and the sad realization that every dream come true is bound to be flawed by coming true.”

He went on to talk about the modern nation of Israel, about Israel itself being a flawed dream come true.  There was such hope, such Messianic hope, in the re-creation of the nation of Israel, that it would be an idyllic, egalitarian country, that nations would flock to it and they would be a light to bring peace on Earth.  With all of the good that Israel is, the reality has of course fallen short of that dream.  The same could be said of the United States, of the city on a hill and light to the nations that we strive to be, and the reality that falls short of that dream, and the same can be said of the Church and every other dream we have.  That’s life. 

“Every dream come true is bound to be flawed by coming true.”  That struck a chord with me regarding Christmas and the Epiphany.  The dream of the Messiah and of peace on Earth.  Did the Magi, after seeing Jesus, feel “the sad realization that every dream come true is bound to be flawed by coming true?”

Who were these guys and maybe galls, these Magi from the east?  Ultimately, we don’t exactly know, but from the text, we know they weren’t kings.  They were more like astrologer, pagan, mystic, tarot card-type folks who were decidedly not Jewish.  So, star guiding them or not, why were they looking for or expecting some Jewish king or messiah?  Israel had a king, and they went to Israel’s king to ask about this newborn king/messiah guy, so this obviously wasn’t a geopolitical greeting and first summit around a new world leader.  So what was going on?

Again, we don’t exactly know, but my guess is this.  These magi had heard stories from Jewish people they had lived with or encountered.  My guess is further that the stories they heard included stories from the prophets about a messianic figure, about the restoration of Israel, and about the peace on Earth of God’s kingdom fully realized that such a Messiah was thought to bring about. 

Perhaps they’d heard stories from Isaiah 2 about nations streaming to Israel and people beating “their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; [when] nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”  Maybe they had also heard stories from Isaiah 60 about the light of God coming upon Israel, of the good fortune for all through that promise, culminating with “they shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord.”  Maybe the Magi had heard that verse and therefore brought gold and frankincense to proclaim the praise of the Lord…except for poor dumb Steve who thought Myrrh would be a good idea.  Poor Steve the Magi.

We don’t know how the non-Jewish, pagan Magi came to know about a baby king born in Israel and spoken of in the prophets, but my guess is that they had heard these stories of Messiah and had heard the hopes Jewish people whom they had encountered that the Messiah would be born and bring peace on Earth. 

So, were the Magi then disappointed with “the morning after and the sad realization that every dream come true is bound to be flawed by coming true.”  Were the Magi the first to experience what we call the post-Christmas blues because, of course, there was not peace on earth after the birth of this Jewish Messiah.

Not even when God became human, even Messiah, the Christ, came into the world was there peace on Earth.  There was not perfect peace on Earth, because God still left the earth in our care.  Of course life is still going to be imperfect and flawed even with Messiah, even with the Christ.  Perfection was never the point of the Christ.  Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah, came; God became human to show us how to be human, and to join with us fully in our broken and flawed humanity.  There is love.

Love is the Epiphany.  Not perfection.  Love, with its life, its beauty, and its pain is the Epiphany that the Magi saw.  These pagan, astrologer, tarot card reading type folks who were the antithesis of Jewish devotion to God were the ones to whom God gave this Epiphany of love.  They were pagan, gentile, totally other than the people of Israel.  In the eyes of the religious elite, they would have been totally unworthy of any kind of blessing or love from God, and yet the Epiphany of God’s love was given to them.  Pagan, Gentile, they were loved by God. 

They may have had some disappointment after seeing Jesus that the messianic hopes and fervor of peace on Earth had not been realized, but I’m guessing the Epiphany of love stuck with them.  During the post Christmas blues, God’s Epiphany is love.  No matter who you are.  No matter your religious devotion or non-devotion.  No matter where you are from or what you have done.  You are loved.  You are so loved.  That is the Epiphany of Jesus.  That is how Christ heals us, how Christ helps us to become fully human, that we know, in our hearts, that we are loved.  That is God’s Epiphany of love.  You are loved.  You are so loved.   

“I Love You.” “I know.”

Brad Sullivan

3 Advent, Year C

December 16, 2018

Emmanuel, Houston

Isaiah 40:1-11

Luke 1:26-38

“I Love You.”  “I know.”

There’s a scene in the movie, “The Empire Strikes Back” in which one of the heroes, Han Solo, is about to be taken away by the villainous, evil Empire, and just before he’s taken away, one of the other heroes, Princess Leia, says, “I love you.”  Han replies, “I know.”  They’d had this on again off again, flirtatious angry relationship, never fully admitting how they felt for each other.  Then, as everything is going downhill fast, Princess Leia makes sure Han knows how she feels about him, and Han replies with the perfect answer.  Rather than the expected, “I love you too,” Han sees how much Leia wants him to know that she loves him, and so he replies, “I know.”  In that, “I know” is of course heard, “I love you too,” loud and clear.

Now, aside from being a Star Wars nut and having been given a couple of Christmas coffee mugs yesterday with Leia on one and Han on the other that say, “I love Yule;” “I Noel,” why in the world would I bring this up?  I bring this up because it actually seems to fit our Gospel reading for today.

Through the angel Gabriel, God tells this young woman, Mary, that she is going to conceive a son in her womb, not by her fiancée, Joseph.  No, this son is going to be conceived within her by the Holy Spirit of God, and the child will be called Son of God, and he will be holy, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever.  God says to Mary, “I’m going to give you a son, conceived by me, and your son is going to be the anointed one, the Christ, the savior of humanity.”

“I love you,” God says to all of humanity through Mary, and Mary responds, “Here I am, the servant of the Lord.  Let it be with me according to your word.”   “I know,” Mary responds on behalf of humanity, with the accompanying, “I love you as well,” heard loud and clear.

“I love you,” is a familiar refrain of God to humanity throughout scripture.  In Isaiah, we hear God saying “I love you,” by giving Isaiah words of comfort for Israel, and  Isaiah responds with “I know,” by crying out God’s words.  “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.  Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.”

Comfort, God says, but we hear God’s cry of “I love you,” not only in his words of comfort, but also in the why, the why God’s words of comfort were spoken.  She has served her term, and her penalty is paid.  Israel has been punished, and even in that punishment, humanity is being told, “I love you” by God.  In the punishment, God is saying to Israel, “y’all are supposed to be my people, living as a light to the nations, and here you’ve been so lax in following my ways, that the rich among have been hoarding your wealth and keeping wages low for the poor, you’ve been so lax in your prayer and worship that you’ve ceased to gain any of the strength and love and kindness that comes from begin with me, and you’ve show yourselves not to really love one another and therefore not to really love me.  That’s not following in my way, and you can’t call yourselves my people when you act so contrary to my way.”

Even in that, God is saying, “I love you,” chastening to teach a still better way, and Isaiah, by crying out to the people, is responding on behalf of humanity, “I know.”  I understand, Isaiah says to God, that in times of judgment and in times of forgiveness, you are constantly saying, “I love you.” 

God is constantly saying, “I love you,” and not just to any one person or to any one people.  God’s “I love you” is for all of humanity.  That’s why God is our savior, why God has always been our savior. 

In Psalm 62:1 we hear, “For God alone my soul in silence waits, from him comes my salvation.”  Salvation in all its many forms comes from God, and God is the one thing alone for which our souls are longing, the one thing alone which is our salvation.  God is love, hope, truth, light.  God is the way for our lives to bring about community and healing in times of division, serenity in times of strife, love and compassion in times of loneliness, sorrow and repentance in times of harm, and friendship and celebration in times of joy.  

God is the constant, “I love you,” to humanity, and in becoming human, that constant “I love you” becomes one with humanity.  “I know,” Mary says.  “Thank you, God for the love you have for us, for all of us, and so ‘Here am I the servant of the Lord, let it be with me according to your word.’”

God’s constant, “I love you,” is all around us, in scripture and prayer, in kindness and compassion, even in chastening and calls for repentance, God is constantly crying out, “I love you.”  So how do we respond with “I know?”  With the words of the prayer of thanksgiving at the end of Morning Prayer, we respond to God, “I know,” “not only with our lips, but in our lives, by giving up our selves to your service, and by walking before you in holiness and righteousness all our days; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen

I Ain't Takin' My Christmas Tree Down

Prisoners of Hope

Brad Sullivan

1 Advent, Year C

December 2, 2018

Emmanuel, Houston

Jeremiah 33:14-16

Psalm 25:1-9

1 Thessalonians 3:9-13

Luke 21:25-36

Prisoners of Hope

“Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly.”  Happy Advent everyone.  Here at the beginning of the church year, we have Jesus talking about what almost sounds like a doomsday scenario.  Be on guard, guys, because it’s gonna get bad, then it’s gonna get worse, then the Son of Man is going to come, and you’ll really have to watch out.

That’s not what’s going on here.  “That day,” Jesus said.   “Be on guard…[lest] that day catch you unexpectedly.”  They day he was referring to was the day of the son of man, an allusion to Daniel chapter 7.  The son of man, or one like a son of man, or a regular dude, (depending on how you interpret the words of Daniel), a regular dude is going to come with the clouds of heaven, and he is going to lead the people of Israel, and from then on, the people of Israel will be honored and praised by all the world, and all nations will look to Israel for peace and justice and the way of God throughout the earth. 

This was Daniel 7:13-14, after the first twelve verses of Daniel 7 described four terrible kingdoms of the earth rising up and wreaking havoc on Israel.  So, four kingdoms of the earth, followed by a kingdom whose origin is from God, a divinely ordained and ordered kingdom for God’s people, Israel.

That hasn’t happened yet.  If we’re looking for historical cognates to the four kingdoms mentioned in Daniel, there are plenty of contenders like Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, but the point of Daniel’s vision is less about particular historical cognates, and more about God’s restoration of Israel after and even through destruction. 

“Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life,” Jesus said.  Remember Daniel’s vision?  Yes, dark days are coming, and God will be with us in and through those dark days, and afterwards, we will be restored.  “When I am killed,” Jesus was saying, “when Rome sacks Israel, when the temple is destroyed, do not become prisoners of despair, weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life.”

Don’t become prisoners of despair during the dark times.  Whether it’s Rome sacking Israel, Harvey sacking Houston, the Camp Fire sacking northern California, we have no lack of dark times.  We’ve got distress among the nations, roaring of the seas, fires, floods, we’ve definitely got fear and foreboding.  We’ve got plenty of reasons to numb ourselves.  That’ really what Jesus is talking about, being weighed down by dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life.  Numbing.  Numbing out so the worries of this life seem muted, or at least for a little while, we don’t have to care as much.  Jesus is warning against responding to the worries of this life with dissipation and drunkenness. 

Don’t be prisoners of despair.  Be on guard lest you numb out and spend your life in frivolous amusement, wasteful expenditures, dissolute living…basically a lot of excess and pleasure seeking in order to numb out and avoid the darkness and worries of life. 

Almost everyone numbs in one way or another to avoid or to get a temporary reprieve from the darkness and despair and worry of so much going on around us.  We all numb out in one way or another, but don’t become prisoners of despair, Jesus taught.

Instead, Jesus taught, be prisoners of hope.  This idea of prisoners of hope comes from Zechariah 9:12, and I am completely stealing this idea from Rabbi Annie’s sermon last month during the Shabbat for Solidarity.  Become prisoners of hope.

Jesus knew he was going to die.  He knew the Temple would be destroyed and his people would be scattered to the ends of the earth.  He was acutely aware of the darkness and hardships around him, and he knew things were going to get worse, and yet he remained a prisoner of hope. 

Remember Daniel’s vision, guys.  Remember that one day, God’s kingdom will be fully lived out with Israel at the helm.  Remember the brightness of the future which casts out all the darkness of the present.  Remember, and be prisoners of hope. 

Love deeply.  Party with your friends, and enjoy life, that’s what Jesus did.  Honor and respect yourself and those around you.  Be faithful and true to who you are and who you want to be.    Serve others when they are in need, and let others serve you when you are in need.  Spend lots of time in prayer.

Jesus was constantly reconnecting himself to God through prayer.  He got overcome by the darkness of the world, just like we do, and so he spent a huge amount of time reconnecting to the light of God through prayer. 

As a people, we’re re-learning how to reconnect to the light of God through prayer with ancient practices like centering prayer and meditation.  A group meets here at Temple Sinai on Thursdays at 5:00 for Centering Prayer.  Bible Prayer groups are beginning to meet to pray though passages of scripture and to let the Spirit of God speak through the scriptures.  Groups of people are meeting for prayer in online communities when work and travel and distance won’t allow them to meet together in person. 

Praying the hours is becoming cool again.  Early in the life of the church, folks were becoming overwhelmed by the fast pace of life and the constant demands of their time and attention by second and third century society.  So, monastic communities began forming as folks left the cities to devote themselves to quieter lives of prayer, and far from drudgery, lives of service and prayer gave light, life, and joy to those who had been weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life.  Nowadays, we find a new interest in monasticism in which people don’t have to become monks and nuns but continue to live their regular lives and also join with monastics in lives of service and prayer.  More and more folks are choosing to become prisoners of hope.  Morning, noon, evening, and night, we Episcopalians pray as prisoners of hope.  Even those four hours of prayer come from monastic roots, from people no longer wanting to be weighed down by numbing the worries of this life away through dissipation and drunkenness. 

Continual prayer and reconnecting to the light of God.  Serving others in need and allowing others to serve us when we’re in need.  Partying with friends and enjoying life while honoring and respecting ourselves and those around us.  Love deeply.  These are the ways Jesus lived as a prisoner of hope, and how Jesus taught us to be prisoners of hope. 

Restoration is coming from God.  That is our hope.  In little ways every day, God is restoring creation in and through us.  One day, God will restore all of creation with Israel at the helm.  So do not numb out.  Do not be weighed down by dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life as prisoners of despair.  Instead, love deeply as prisoners of hope. 

...Then Were We Like Those Who Dream...

Brad Sullivan

Proper 28, Year B

November 18, 2018

Emmanuel, Houston

Mark 13:1-8

…Then Were We Like Those Who Dream…

“When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.” (Psalm 126:1-2)  That’ Psalm 126 verses 1-2, and whether in those words or in other words, that idea is a recurring theme through the history of Israel.  “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.”  God restores Israel.  God restores his people.  God restores creation and covenant.

Before God restored the fortune of Zion, well obviously Zion’s fortunes weren’t doing so well.  Babylonian captivity and the near total destruction of the nation of Israel.  The capturing of the Ark of the Covenant by the Philistines, God’s very presence seemingly taken from Israel.  40 years of wandering in the desert after the Israelites lost faith in God that he could bring them into the land that he had promised them.  God’s anger and rejection of the people of Israel after they formed a Golden Calf to replace God almost immediately after God saved Israel from slavery in Egypt.  In each of these cases, after Israel’s fortunes weren’t doing all that great, God restored the fortunes of Zion, and then were the people of Israel like those who dream, then was their mouth filled with laughter and their tongue with shouts of joy.

That portion of Psalm 126 seems to me the unspoken promise within Jesus’ prophecy of the destruction of the temple.  His warning / prophecy sounds pretty ominous, doesn’t it.  Not only will the temple be destroyed, there will be wars, rumors of wars, nation against nation, earthquakes, famines, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria.  “This is but the beginning of the birthpangs,” Jesus said. 

All that stuff I just described, it’s gonna get worse after that.  The birthpangs, they begin, and then there’s full blown labor, and it’s gonna hurt, cause labor tends to do that, and sorry guys, there’s no epidural for this one, no nerve block.  The best you can do is that breathing thing.  Labor is coming, guys, and it’s gonna hurt, Jesus was saying, but let’s put a different emphasis on what he said.  Rather than, “This is but the beginning of the birthpangs,” let’s say, “This is but the beginning of the birthpangs.” 

Well, after birthpangs and labor comes a baby.  So, what you’re saying, Jesus, is that after the destruction of the temple and all that other bad stuff happens, something fantastically wonderful is coming?  Oh!  Well that’s great!  “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream.”  That’s what’s coming.

Now, what came was not the rebuilding of the temple, nor even the restoration of the nation of Israel, at least not for about 1900 years.  What happened was the people of Israel were dispersed and scattered without a nation, and the people of Israel survived, and even thrived.  Rather than ceasing to be a people, they became even more fully a people, God’s chosen people spread throughout the world.   The Temple was not restored in Jerusalem, and the religion changed at that point, but synagogues spread throughout the land.  A people with one temple became a people with countless temples where folks could come and dwell and become God’s people. 

I would say Emmanuel had a fairly decent dose of birthpangs back in August of 2017.  I could say that Harvey and Emmanuel’s flooding, and all that has happened since “is but the beginning of the birthpangs.” To be faith think we’re still in labor, but guys, all that has happened, the flooding, the work, the fear, the discord, the coming together and the work to be done is but the beginning of the birthpangs. 

A baby is coming.  New life is coming.  What’s that gonna look like?  What does it mean for us to be a post-Harvey Emmanuel, a new creation by water and the word?  I think we’re starting to find that out as we go, as we receive hospitality, as we continue to be Emmanuel even without our home, as we learn to be adaptive, gracious and flexible, practicing gratitude as life comes our way. 

Ultimately, I think a post-Harvey Emmanuel, a new creation by water and the word, looks like a spiritual oasis in West Houston in which we are a spiritual oasis because you are a spiritual oasis, and you are a spiritual oasis, and you, and you, and all of y’all, and I are all spiritual oases.  The Emmanuel being born is an Emmanuel in which the community is a spiritual oasis as we are all spiritual oases.

That’s the disperse nation of Israel after the destruction of the temple, bringing the light of God not in one place, but in countless places throughout the world.  Emmanuel as each of us being a spiritual oasis in which God’s presence, peace, and nurture is present wherever any one of us is present, deeply rooted in prayer and scripture, deeply rooted in Jesus, always acting in love for others, with compassion, mercy, and peace. 

That’s what I see in a post-Harvey Emmanuel.  We gather as a spiritual oasis, and we leave as spiritual oases where the weary, the sin-sick, and the burdened come to be refreshed by the love and peace of Jesus present in each one of us.  As spiritual oases, we each continually refresh ourselves through daily prayer, almost monastic in our practice of the four daily prayers of the Episcopal church.  We continually refresh ourselves with daily reading of scripture, dwelling in God’s presence throughout history in the sacred stories of our faith.  We continually refresh ourselves through other practices through which we remember and become aware of God’s presence, and love, and peace all around us. 

No ain’t none of us gonna get it right all the time, and sometimes the best we’re gonna do is to reach out to someone else when our well has run dry and we need refreshment from them as a spiritual oasis.  That too is what Emmanuel is becoming, this new baby being born, the new creation by water and the word.  All the turmoil and strife has been but the beginning of the birthpangs.  Emmanuel is becoming what we have been striving to be, a spiritual oasis in west Houston, by each one of us continually refreshing ourselves in God’s presence, and love, and peace.  Emmanuel is becoming a spiritual oasis in west Houston by each one of us becoming a spiritual oasis.  Emmanuel is becoming a spiritual oasis as our hearts are filled with God’s promise of restoration.  “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.”