Divided Houses, A Particularly Human Stupidity, and God’s Antidote

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets
June 9, 2024
Proper 5, Year B
Genesis 8:3-15
Psalm 130
Mark 3:20-35

When Adam and Eve were in the Garden, they heard God walking toward them in the cool of the evening breeze. That should have been a wonderful sound. Birds chirping, the rustling of leaves, God’s feet on the grass, the soft shifting of soil. Rather than a beautiful sound of the beloved in a beloved place, however, the sound of God walking toward them was an unwelcome and frightening sound, because they had just betrayed God.

They had decided that they wanted to be more like God, that they wanted God’s power. They wanted to dominate creation as it’s rulers and masters, rather than be a part of creation, accepting that it was God’s, not theirs. This was a house divided against itself, Adam and Eve divided against themselves. They were one with God. So, when they decided they wanted to take God’s place and move God, a little to the side, they were also moving parts of themselves out of the way. Their war was not just with God but with themselves, and the house divided against itself fell.

So, when the scribes said Jesus had a demon and was casting out demons by the ruler of demons, Jesus pointed out that obviously that couldn’t be true because Satan wouldn’t be stupid enough to divide his house against itself. 

No, that stupidity of working against ourselves and casting down our own houses seems to be a particularly human kind of stupidity. 

Here’s a great idea, let’s betray one another. Let’s decide we want stuff and be willing to kill one another in order to get that stuff. Let’s decide that a desire for sex is worth assaulting another human and just using their body; who cares about the person? When we’re really frustrated, angry, and scared, let’s decide that it’ll be a really good idea to get a gun and shoot some people, rather than accepting the fact that things aren’t always going to go our way. 

Let’s also decide that since we want to make sure to keep the power and money we have, it’ll be a good idea to oppress others, keep wages down, lie, cheat, and steal, and pass laws to make what we do legal. 

In order to make sure the world continues to work in ways that make us comfortable, let’s make sure that people we find objectionable don’t have the same rights as we do. 

Because our religion is so messed up that we’ve taken the truth that God has redeemed us and that nothing can separate us from God, and we’ve replaced that truth with, if you don’t believe in Jesus in just the right way, God’s gonna torture you forever; since our religion is so messed up that fear of eternal torture by the God who is love has become the foundational understanding of our faith, let’s make sure to stir up enmity and strife and subjugate others to our will to make sure the angry torture-god-thing doesn’t get too torture happy with us.

Let’s blame this group for the world’s troubles and then expect someone else to fix it, and then blame that group for things not getting better. That sounds like a good idea. 

In all of these and so many other ways, we decide over and over that turning against one another sounds like a pretty neat idea. We decide over and over again that we’re going to further divide the house against itself and then rage against others when the house falls. 

Yup, as Jesus points out, that’s a particularly human kind of stupidity. Satan ain’t near dumb enough for that. Only we are. 

So again, when the scribes, heard about Jesus casting out demons, they decided to use that as an opportunity for division. Rather than join together in joy and peace because demons were being cast out and people were being healed, uniting the house of God, they decided it would be a good idea to divide the house of God, claiming that healing and love were coming from a place of evil.

They wanted not to lose their power. They wanted not to lose their understanding of how God worked within their religion. So, when they heard God walking toward them in the cool of the evening breeze, it was a threatening sound, rather than a beloved sound of the beloved coming near.

Unfortunately, that’s pretty typical of humanity, that kind of human stupidity, but fortunately, God knows about our particularly human stupidity. Jesus knows precisely about how we divide against one another, and Jesus still thought it was a pretty neat idea to join with us in every aspect of our lives so that not even our house dividing dummy-headedness can separate us from God. 

So, what did Jesus do? Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to dwell among us and within us so that as much as we may work to divide ourselves against ourselves, the Holy Spirit is striving with us and inviting us to be united and live together as one. That’s the invitation and the way of the Church.

As the church, our invitation is to stand for each other. We strive for peace among one another, and we each do everything in our power to keep that peace. Then, realizing we don’t have enough power to keep peace among ourselves, we constantly seek God’s help to unify us and restore peace when our reactions would divide us and break peace.

So, when we’re bothered by someone, we work not to react, and we ask for God’s help. When we do react, and they react back, we let others help calm the situation, and we ask for God’s help. Rather than shouting, we quiet down and allow peace to reign. 

When we’ve broken the peace, we recognize that we may have to step back and be away from a community or be away from some people for a little while, and we ask for God’s help. We choose to be ok with stepping away for a time, letting things cool down, rather than insisting on our own way and turning the house against itself. 

As Jesus’ church, healed and seeking to make peace among one another, we also seek to soothe the sufferings of the world around us, with one another as members of the church. When we see problems in the world, it’s easy to rage against and blame others, and sometimes we’re even right. Rather than rage against the ones we blame for the problem, however, as the church we ask what we can do to help. 

When people brought folks to Jesus who were possessed by demons, Jesus didn’t start a preaching campaign against Satan for putting demons in people. He didn’t start blaming people for allowing the demon in. Jesus cast out the demons. When confronted with things as terrible as demons, Jesus didn’t stir up hatred and strife. Jesus healed people. Rather than divide the house even further, Jesus united the house. 

We are the church, called and empowered by God to be a house united. 

There are so many problems and divisions in the world, and we’re not going to fix all of them. We can’t end that particularly human stupidity of being divided against ourselves, meaning we’re not going to end all human division. As the Talmud states, “Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly now, love mercy now, walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.”

We cannot end all human division. We can, however, seek God’s help to remain united as a church, here among each other, united in this time and in this place. We can then take that unity with us into the world, and, with God’s help, we can bring some of that unity and healing to others as we go. That is who we are as God’s church. Then, when we hear the sound of God walking towards us in the cool of the evening breeze, we can welcome it as a beloved sound of the beloved coming near.

May God Keep for Us that which We Do Not Need.

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets
June 2, 2024

Proper 4, Year B
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
Psalm 81:1-10
Mark 2:23-3:6

Creator of the planets and their courses, you created the Sabbath as one day in seven for all. Having invited us to rest, to breath, to pause; now, encourage us to rest our demands on others, listen in the place of speaking, and pause our impact upon the cosmos. You make the sabbath to universally benefit humanity and all creation. We give thanks for this benevolent provision that enables us to experience a life with you that is well lived in the shadow of your wing. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

That’s a prayer from our bishop, Andy Doyle. “God makes the sabbath to universally benefit humanity and all creation.” We are invited to rest, to give rest to others, and to give rest to creation itself. 

We need rest, and yet in today’s world, we seem to pride ourselves on how much we work and how little we rest. New York is called “the city that never sleeps.” The same could be said for Houston. In fact, you could say we live in a world that never sleeps.” Businesses are interconnected across the globe, so while some sleep, others in the same company are busy at work. The company itself, the business itself, never stops. The work never stops. 

Even in the same city, some work while other sleep. We’re grateful for this when hospitals are open in the middle of the night, and we also notice that when we are trying to sleep, there are always cars going by, planes overhead. Our society doesn’t rest. 

Nature, our nature, our bodies, the world itself needs rest. We need sabbath, a true letting go of all of our work, laying down our burdens and truly resting in God’s embrace. 

God’s commandment that we keep the sabbath is given for our healing. Isaiah 30:15 tells us, “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and confidence shall be your strength.”

In Deuteronomy 5:15 God told the people of Israel, “Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the sabbath day.” “Keep the sabbath,” God commands, because we are not meant to work constantly to amass great wealth for our overlords, like Israel did as slaves in Egypt. We are meant to work, and to rest. We are meant to work for all of our benefit, not just for some, and we are meant to rest for all of our benefit, to live together in unity and love.

Sabbath is more than a rule to be followed. Sabbath is a way of life. Rather than the way of death, the way of constant work and business, sabbath is a way of life, a way of healing. So, it makes sense that Jesus healed on the sabbath. 

When Jesus and his disciples were making their way through the grain fields, they ate some of the grain, and the religious leaders cautioned that they were breaking the sabbath. There were very specific rules about how the sabbath was to be observed, rules about what constituted work and what didn’t, rules about how far from home one could walk. Rules, to make sure people kept the sabbath appropriately. 

Jesus’ basic response to the religious leaders was, “Guys, y’all are missing the point.” See, sabbath rest can’t be lived out the exact same way for all people at all times. Situations come up in life where the sabbath must be broken in order to fulfill the purpose of the sabbath, healing and rest. The sabbath is a blessing given to humanity, not just one more rule that we have to follow.

So, when a man needing healing on the sabbath, Jesus didn’t turn him away. He healed the man, which is the point of the sabbath. Jesus broke the religious leaders’ rules of the sabbath, and yet he was keeping the sabbath. Holy rest for healing. Allowing others to rest and be healed. Allowing creation itself to rest and be healed.

In our world today, many of us simply can’t take one whole day as a sabbath rest, much less can we all take the same sabbath day. Our society simply doesn’t work that way anymore. We give thanks for those who work while others sleep, and we pray that they may find sabbath rest as well.

See, Jesus didn’t make his church so that we each follow all the right rules all the time. Founding the perfect community with the perfect system of rules has never worked in the history of the world. Jesus wasn’t silly enough to think it was going to work just because he said so. No, the church isn’t a bunch of people meant to follow all the right rules to constantly stay on God’s and each other’s good sides. 

The church is a people trusting in Jesus, following in his way as best and imperfectly as we can. The church is a people trusting in Jesus’ grace and forgiveness for all the times when we don’t. The church is a people who offer that same grace and forgiveness to one another. The church is a people of healing, a people who seek and offer sabbath rest.

The church is a people who have decided to lay our burdens down weekly, daily, so that our bodies, our minds, our souls can receive the rest we need. In our sabbath rest, we lay our burdens down, not just anywhere. We lay our burdens down into God’s hands so that God can carry our burdens for us while we rest in God’s healing love. 

Then, when we take our burdens back up, some we might just leave with God entirely, because some burdens aren’t truly ours to bear. There’s a prayer I pray some nights in which I thank God for the day that is past and then offer to God all of the day that is past. The good and the bad, my successes and failures, I offer to God that I may rest that night in peace. Then, I pray that when morning comes, God will give back to me that which I need and hold on for me that which I do not. 

For our strength and salvation is not given through our own might and power, nor for ourselves alone. We are granted sabbath rest as a gift both to receive and as a gift to grant to others. We are granted sabbath rest as a gift for creation itself for we are all united together, and as each of us rests, so does creation rest as well. “In returning and rest we shall be saved; in quietness and confidence shall be our strength.”

So, I offer to us all the sabbath prayer that I pray some nights as a prayer that can be prayed not only at night, but at any time. Any time we need to rest from our burdens, we can offer all of our lives to God, for God to hold them for a time, and then when that time of sabbath rest has ended, we can ask God to give back to us that which we need and hold on for us that which we do not. 

Being born of water, we become like water.

 The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets
May 26, 2024
Trinity Sunday, Year B
Romans 8:12-17
Psalm 29
John 3:1-17

 

The writer of the Tao Te Ching, Lao Tsu, is quoted as saying, “water is fluid, soft, and yielding. But water will wear away rock, which is rigid and cannot yield.” As best I can tell, that quote is actually a couple ideas from the Tao put together, and the teaching holds simple truth. Water yields if you try to push it, moves around you if you jump into it, and yet, given time, water can wear away enough rock to form the Grand Canyon.

So, the teaching that “water is fluid, soft, and yielding. But water will wear away rock which is rigid and cannot yield,” is meant to tell us to be like water. Water moves around obstacles in its way and still gets to where it’s going. Water flows into the deep places of life where other things cannot go, and water gives life.

If we can yield like water, then we can move around the obstacles in our lives without constantly fighting them. Flowing like water, without constantly trying to force our own way in the world, we find peace in the deep places of our lives, and if we can yield and flow, finding peace in God, then we will give life and love to the world.

Now, I am almost certain that Jesus did not have Lao Tsu’s teaching in mind when he said, “no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.” Jesus was talking about baptism when he talked about being born of water.

In baptism, there is a cleansing, a putting away of life lived according to one’s own way, trusting in oneself. There is instead, in Baptism, a trusting in God, living life according to that trust in God. There is a giving up of one’s own way and one’s own will, and there is a submission to God’s way and God’s will. That means we interact with the world differently.

Being born of water, we become like water. Accepting that the world is God’s and now ours, and putting our faith and trust in God, rather than in ourselves, we flow like water, without constantly trying to force our own way in the world. We find peace with God’s presence in the deep places of our lives. We yield to the flow of God’s love and give life and love to the world. Being born of water, we become “fluid, soft, and yielding, able to wear away that which is rigid and cannot yield.”

Being born of water and yielding to God, accepting life as it is, rather than we would force it to be, we are born of the Spirit, born of God’s Spirit. Now, this is not just some generic spirit thing. We believe in God’s Holy Spirit, who, along with the Father and the Son, is one God. We believe in this God who is a relationship of persons, three persons bound together so perfectly in love that they are one.

The Spirit of this three-person one-God is the Spirit of God that moved over the water of the Earth in creation, the Spirit of God that carried the Word of God through the prophets, the Spirit of God which the Word of God sent forth upon the Church at Pentecost. The same Spirit of God which blows and moves throughout all creation is the Spirit in which we are born.

Being born of the Spirit, we then become like Spirit, as Jesus said, “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” When we are born of the Spirit, we live according to God’s will, rather than our own, which means we don’t force our will on others. We also don’t force what we believe to be God’s will on others. We live according to God’s will like water, or wind, fluid, soft, and yielding. We live God’s will and allow that to influence others over time, as water to a rock.

Living as water or wind, what gradual influence do we have in the lives of those around us? Well, if we are born of the Spirit and live according to the Spirit, then our influence would be by the Gifts of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. That is what we would bring to the world.

Have you ever seen someone remain in control and even at peace in a situation that was awful and kinda nuts. Rather than making things worse and adding even more anger to a situation, they have brought peace, patience, and kindness to that situation, you’ve been left wondering how in world they did that. I’d say it was the gifts of the Spirit and the Spirit of God leading to God’s will in the world.

So, what is God’s will in the world? God’s will for us is to “do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God,” from Micah 6:8. God’s will for us is that we would “love one another,” from John 13:34. God’s will for us is that we would “put away…bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, and be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven [us],” from Ephesians 4:31-32.

Justice, mercy, love. When we see injustice, vengeance, and hatred, God’s Spirit leads us to bring justice, mercy, and love into those places. We cannot and do not, however, do this on our own. On our own steam, we tend to want to force the justice, mercy, and love, and when we try to force justice, mercy, and love violence and control of others, we end up bringing wrath, anger, and malice instead.

We bring justice, mercy, and love like water to a rock, changing it over time, doing only the part that God has for us to do. We do this work together with God’s Spirit, trusting not in earthly powers or authorities, or do we really think any political party through our government is going to bring about justice, mercy, and love? Do we really think any business or human institution is going to bring about justice, mercy, and love?

Governments, businesses, institutions, they can all do some good, sure, but that is not where our faith lies. In bringing justice, mercy, and love into the world, our faith lies in God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In bringing justice, mercy, and love into the world, our faith lies in God’s Spirit to guide us together into living justice, living mercy and living love. We strive, each of us in our own ways, guided and strengthened by God’s Spirit to bringing justice, mercy, and love into the world through how we live. Then, we influence others as we go to live according to same justice, mercy, and love of the Spirit of God.

Slowly, over time, trusting in God’s Spirt, God’s will, and God’s ways, we are called to be born of water and the Spirit, trusting not in our own flesh to force our way in the world. Born of water and the Spirit we are called to become like water which is “fluid, soft, and yielding, and yet will wear away rock.”

Jesus Isn't Anyone's Personal Savior

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets

May 19, 2024
Pentecost, Year B
Acts 2:1-21
Psalm 104:25-35, 37
John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

“When the day of Pentecost had come, the disciples were all together…All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit.”

They were all sorts of different people, a large, disparate group of people from all different backgrounds, different cultures, different norms and ways of life. They were gathered together already, and the Holy Spirit united them even further.

That was Jesus’ prayer for his disciples fulfilled, that they would be one, as Jesus and the Father are one. Remember, that God, by God’s very nature, is a community of relationship, three persons bound together so perfectly in love that they are one. When Jesus prayed that we would be one as God is one, Jesus was praying that we would live into the image of God in which we were made. 

We are made for community, for loving and supportive relationships. So, when Jesus formed the Church, Jesus formed us as a community of people, a bunch of different and odd collection of people who were made one with one another through the Holy Spirit. 

What that means, among other things, is there is no such thing as a solitary Christian. 

We hear a lot about personal salvation, but that’s not really a thing. Jesus isn’t anyone’s personal savior. Jesus is our savior, all of our savior. We have a challenge in understanding this partly because the people who translate the Bible into English mostly seem not to be from Texas. What I mean by that is, they don’t use the word “y’all.” 

Most of the time, when Jesus said, “you,” he was actually saying y’all. It’s a plural form of you that he used. In our passage today, Jesus said, “[The Advocate will come], whom I will send to y’all…” In the sermon on the mount, Jesus said, “Blessed are y’all when people revile y’all and persecute y’all and utter all kinds of evil against y’all falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for y’all’s reward is great in heaven.”

Jesus does talk about God repaying each one of us according to our individual deeds. What each person does, really does matter. At the same time, salvation is not a solitary affair because the kingdom of God dwells in community.

How are we doing as a community? How do we each act towards others? Last week, there was a man sitting on the sidewalk as cars were driving quickly by. Another man was worried about him and wanted him to be safe. “Get up! Get up!” He shouted. “Stop sitting there! What are you doing? Get up!” Well, the guy got up, but he thought he was being attacked. I asked what was going on and found out that the guy who was shouting was just concerned for him, so I suggested that next time, he kneel down and gently ask the guy to get up for his safety. He realized how his shouting seemed like an attack, rather than a help, and he apologized. The two went away good with each other instead of at odds. The kingdom of God was the result, rather than two people angry at each other. Our individual actions help bring about or break apart community.

What each one of us does matters, not for our individual salvation, but for all of our salvation. Jesus formed the Church not to make a bunch of individuals personally saved, but to save a bunch of individuals by making us one.

This is the church, and I don’t mean a location. I don’t mean a building. This is Jesus’ gathering of his disciples. Not all who are here may be disciples of Jesus, and all are welcome here, even if not a disciple of Jesus, and this gathering of people is Jesus’ church.

That means we have some ways of life we follow so that we may be one. When we’re here gathered for worship, we follow the way of love and respect. This time and gathering for prayer and worship is meant to be a time of peace and unity. We’re not here as a bunch of individuals out for ourselves. We’re here as the church, made one by the Holy Spirit. 

Then, we carry that unity with us as we go. We continue to pray for the Holy Spirit to make us one. Unity and community is what we are made for and a big part of how we are healed through Jesus. 

A big challenge we find with our brothers and sisters experiencing homelessness is the lack of supportive community. Life on the streets is tough, and even once someone gets an apartment through The Way Home housing programs, life can be tough due to isolation. Imagine living on the streets with a group of people who have become your friends, and then you have an apartment, which is great, but it’s also over an hour bus ride from everyone and everything you know. You no longer have any community, a difficult time getting a job due to transportation issues, and so you have a roof over your head, but you are an island, isolated and alone. 

We see this with some, not all, but some of our parishioners who get housed. Saved from the streets, but saved in isolation, and that isolation simply doesn’t work. Like with Jesus, personal salvation isn’t really a thing. 

Being saved from God who is angry at us for breaking rules isn’t really what Christianity is about. When we sin, we do things that isolate ourselves. We hurt others and push them away. We care about ourselves to the exclusion of others, climbing ladders and leaving others beneath us. We isolate in addiction, desperately trying to cope with the problems in our lives and in our world, and we are left, once again, alone, even if surrounded by people. 

Loneliness and isolation are hells from which Jesus saves us. His prayer for us was that we would be one, just as he and the Father are one. Then, Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to continue to form us as one. As disparate people from all over with different cultures and backgrounds were formed into one body at the birth of the church, so are we continually being formed as one body through the same Holy Spirit. Such is our salvation, no longer individuals tossed to and fro by the changes and chances of this life. We are made one body to live together in unity, raising each other up when we fall, and living not only for our sakes alone but for Jesus who died for us and rose again, whose body we have become. 

Following God as Healing and Love (not a less scary alternative to torture)

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets
April 14, 2024
3 Easter, Year B
Acts 3:12-19

Psalm 4
Luke 24:36b-48

Peter was pretty forthright with the folks to whom he was preaching, wasn’t he? This was a group of Israelites in Jerusalem, the folks who had condemned Jesus to death. He told them what they had done in condemning Jesus to death, admitted that they’d acted out of ignorance, and then he called on them to repent. Peter was doing exactly what Jesus had told him to do, proclaiming repentance and forgiveness of sins. 

With Peter and this group of fellow Israelites, Peter’s preaching made sense. It was appropriate. They had a shared religion, shared experiences, they knew something of one another’s stories. They had also just seen God heal a man through Peter’s ministry, and they were curious about how he was able to do that. Peter was saying that it wasn’t he who had healed the man, but Jesus working through him. From there, Peter was able to preach to them about Jesus.

There was shared experience between Peter and the people, and there was a question the folks had asked Peter; his talking to them about Jesus and calling them to repentance was in response to that question. He was also kind when he preached to them, not condemning them.

Nowadays, when I hear of folks telling others they need to repent, I often hear of it being done randomly, with contempt and anger. Someone sees another person, a stranger, doing something and they call them out, telling them they need to repent, or Hell is waiting for them. Not exactly our practice here, but I see it and hear about it. Randomly telling someone you don’t know that they are messing up and need to repent or else, that they need to believe in Jesus or else, is not proclaiming the Gospel. It’s an attack.

Such attacks are not following the preaching of Peter. Such attacks are not following Jesus’ command to proclaim repentance and forgiveness of sins. 

For one, Jesus very specifically told us not to make our own little determinations of who would be going to Heaven and who would be going to Hell. Every time someone does that, they’re placing themselves in the position of God, basically proclaiming themselves as God. 

Additionally, the Gospel of Jesus and the proclamation of repentance and forgiveness of sins is far from determining who goes to Heaven and who goes to Hell. Such a simple who’s in and who’s out is not the faith of Jesus, not the point of the Gospel. A gospel of sin management determining where we go when we die is a fearful corruption of the Gospel of Jesus. 

How many people have been turned away from Jesus, have been turned away from the light and love of God because they haven’t been offered the love of Jesus. They haven’t been offered repentance and forgiveness of sins. All they’ve been offered is condemnation, threats of Hell, and a way out. 

The thing about Hell is, it may be eternal, but it also may be empty at the end of time, because Jesus is there as well, offering repentance and forgiveness of sins. Nothing can separate us from the love of God, not even Hell itself. So, any preaching or condemnatory attacks on people that focus on threats of Hell are putting Hell in the place of God. 

We are called to follow God not as a less scary alternative to torture. We are called to follow God because God is love and the way of love is the way we were created to live.

So, in calling people to repentance and proclaiming forgiveness of sins, we only start with that if we have a shared understanding, shared history, and actually know the folks we’re talking to. In calling people to repentance and proclaiming forgiveness of sins, we are not threatening punishment and then offering a way out. That’s coercion, not love. In calling people to repentance and proclaiming forgiveness of sins, we’re offering out of love, the way of Jesus because of the healing we’ve found in following the way of Jesus.

The people Peter talked to first saw healing. Desiring that healing, they then listened to Peter tell them about Jesus and the healing he brought. 

So, Peter’s first proclamation to the people was not given through his words, but through his actions. He healed a man, or rather Jesus healed a man through Peter’s ministry. Our first and best proclamation of Jesus is usually our own healing, how we live. We proclaim through out actions. 

We repent of our wrongs. We recognize the healing we need. We forgive others and forgive ourselves. When others see and become curious, then we can tell about how Jesus is the one who brought us healing. 

Then, we don’t need to convince anyone to follow Jesus. We don’t need to make the sale with them. We offer the healing we have found, the healing we have been given. We also need to be aware in making that offer, that the Gospel of Jesus has been corrupted by centuries of fear so when many people who don’t believe hear about Jesus, what they first hear is, you’re going to go to Hell if you don’t believe. Even if we don’t say that, people are going to hear it. 

If we don’t believe in that, if we don’t follow the “believe in Jesus or go to Hell” branch of Christianity, we can let folks know that we don’t believe that. If our faith is based not in fear of punishment but in the lived experience of healing and love, we can let folks know of the healing and love we have experienced. 

Healing and love is what we are offering when we tell people about Jesus. Healing and love is what we seek, the balm for our weary souls. Healing and love is what we proclaim when we proclaim repentance and forgiveness, first by living that healing and love, by living our own repentance and forgiveness. Then we can tell others about the healing and love we’ve found in Jesus, the healing and love of repentance and forgiveness when they see the healing in us, become curious, and ask how we have been healed.

Sharing the Music that Is in Us

The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Lord of the Streets
March 17, 2024
5 Lent, Year B
Jeremiah 31:31-34
Psalm 51:1-13
John 12:20-33

Sharing the Music that Is in Us

Jesus’ response to the news that some Greeks were looking for him seems odd. Really, most of Jesus’ responses to people in John’s Gospel seem odd. In this case, his disciples tell him some Greeks are looking for him, and he says, “The hour has come for the son of man to be glorified.” 

Just before this, Jesus had come into Jerusalem, and huge crowds had been cheering for him. While he was riding into town, the Pharisees looked to one another and said, “You see, you can do nothing. Look, the whole world has gone after him.” The fact that some Greeks had come to speak to Jesus seems to confirm what the Pharisees said. “The whole world has gone after [Jesus].” As much as they’d wanted to keep the whole Jesus movement from spreading, the cat was officially out of the bag and there was no stopping it now.

They were right. Early church had no buildings or organized support. They could not worship in the synagogues, nor in the Roman temples, and yet the church, spread like wildfire. People believed in Jesus. They trusted him. They found healing in Jesus. They found love. So, they ministered to others out of that same love, offering that same healing. 

As God had said through the prophet Jeremiah, “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God. I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.” People were loved, forgiven, and healed, and God’s law, God’s love, was written on their hearts. 

See, there’s hearing and learning about the way of God’s love, and then there’s living the way of God’s love. As a musician, I think about the practice that goes into playing songs, getting them fully under your fingers and into your voice. You practice, and practice, and practice, and eventually, you leave the practice room, and you play the songs for others. There’s risk in that, risk in offering that music to be received by others, but it’s also a beautiful offering. When you’ve worked at it so the music is written in your heart, then it’s a beautiful offering and sharing of song and story. 

I saw Guy Forsyth play a show last week, and boy does he play. He practices a lot, and then he risks the stage. He plays those songs written in his heart, and his risk is worth it. His connection to the audience is beautiful. The stories he tells through his music, the human connection he brings, receiving his offering of music is healing.

When the music is written in your heart, then you can play, you can risk, and that brings healing and love to the world.

That healing and love is what happens when the Gospel of Jesus is written in our hearts. We leave the practice room, we risk, we play, and that brings healing and love to the world. 

Jesus talked about the risk of playing the Gospel. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies,” he said, “it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.”

Early followers of Jesus risked for the sake of the healing and love of the Gospel. They risked being kicked out of their synagogues, and they were kicked out of their synagogues. Gentiles risked being ostracized, and they were. 

The Gospel of Jesus demands risk. It demands being booed off stage, and if we are, ok. We practice some more, we allow the love and healing of Jesus to be written even more fully in our hearts, and we risk again. We risk not only for our sake, but for the sake of others.

We risk being peacemakers. We risk connection with one another. We risk offering the faith that is in us. We risk trusting in Jesus and following in his ways, rather than holding on so tightly to our lives out of fear of loss, that we end up hurting others and ourselves in the process. 

Our futures are uncertain. Jesus told us they would be. Following Jesus means risking that uncertainty. Jesus risked everything for our sake, for the sake of all people. “’Now is the judgment of this world;” Jesus said, “now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.” (John 12:33)

How did Jesus know that he would be raised and lifted up from the earth after he was crucified? My guess is he didn’t know it. He believed it. How did Jesus know that he would draw all people to himself? My guess is he didn’t know it. He believed it. How did he know that people wouldn’t simply forget, not believe, or ignore his life, message, and resurrection? My guess is he didn’t know it. He believed it. Jesus believed that people would receive his offering, receive his way of love and forgiveness. Jesus believed that people would receive the healing he offered and that they would then risk as he did to offer that same healing of forgiveness and love to others. 

Jesus believed in God, in forgiveness and love, and because of that belief, he risked everything for the sake of all humanity. He invites us, then to risk as well, for the sake of his Gospel and for the sake of humanity. Jesus invites us to risk for the sake of people who may hear, receive, and live the forgiveness and love of Jesus through the risks we take. Jesus invites us to risk forgiveness and love of others.

If we just talk about Jesus’ forgiveness and love to others, just tell people about it, then we’re really still in the practice room. If we mostly talk about Jesus’ Gospel, then I’m not sure it’s truly written on our hearts yet. When we live Jesus’ forgiveness and love, that’s when Jesus is written on our hearts. When we truly forgive and love others, that’s when we’re risking. Living Jesus’ forgiveness and love is when we’re out of the practice room and on stage, offering our music to others, making that connection, sharing the beauty and healing of the music that is in us.

But God, I Wanted You to Hurt Them, Not Care for Them!

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets
September 24, 2023
Proper 20, Year A
Jonah 3:10-4:11
Psalm 145:1-8
Matthew 20:1-16

But God, I Wanted You to Hurt Them, Not Care for Them!

“But God, I wanted you to hurt them, not care for them!” That’s Jonah’s complaint against God over the people of Nineveh. Jonah was a prophet sent by God to tell the people of Nineveh to turn from their harmful ways and follow God’s ways instead. Jonah didn’t want to go there because he wanted God to kill all the people of Nineveh, and he knew if he went there, they would repent and God would show mercy.

So, when God took him to Nineveh on the Whale Express, he preached to the people, and they repented, and then Jonah began to sulk. “I wanted you to hurt them, God, not care for them.” Jonah was displeased because God’s love for humanity was too much for Jonah’s taste. “It’s great that you love me, God, but you’re not supposed to love those other ones. I don’t love them. I don’t care about them, so you shouldn’t either, God.”

If we’re really honest, Jonah’s contempt for humanity tends to show up in all of us, even if in less obvious ways. The people we won’t forgive. Our “my way or the highway” mentality. The irredeemable people we know are on the outs with God. Sometimes our contempt for humanity is even less obvious than that. Jesus illustrated this in his teaching about the Kingdom of God with his parable of the laborers in the vineyard.

In Jesus’ parable of the Kingdom of God, people who only worked an hour got paid the same as people who worked all day. That’s not fair, we may cry, and we’d be right. It’s not fair. God doesn’t seem all that concerned with our notions of fairness. God seems concerned about people, the healing and well-being of all of us and of all people.

All of the people in Jesus’ parable needed enough to live on, and so they each received the usual daily wage. That wasn’t making anyone rich. The daily wage was enough to live on. So, when folks who worked only an hour received the usual daily wage, they were receiving just enough to live on.

Well, it’s still not fair, we may say, so let’s look at where our notions of fairness get us. If the folks who only worked for an hour only got paid for an hour’s worth of work, they’d have had about an eighth of what they needed to live. If they kept on with only an eighth of what they needed, they’d soon enough be starving and dead.

The landowner had enough for that not to happen. He was able to pay all of his workers enough to live on, even those who were only able to work for an hour. Is it fair? No, but the other option for the people who could only work an hour is eventually just to let them die.

That’s where our notions of fairness get us. You can’t live off only an eighth of a day’s worth of wages. So we see, our notions of fairness actually hold people in contempt just as much as Jonah did with the people of Nineveh. “I wanted you to hurt them, God, not care for them” Jonah was thinking. Then the laborers in the vineyard were thinking, “It’s not fair that those who only worked an hour got paid for a full day’s worth of work.” The possibly unconscious reality was then, “I don’t care about them, and neither should you, God. If they die, they die.”

We may not actually think that last part, but our notions of fairness leave us with the contemptuous mentality of “If they die, they die.” That’s the economic reality of those upset about fairness.

Jesus’ parable of the kingdom of God is about economic justice, because economic justice seeks to care for people and heal people. Remember, that’s the whole point of the gospel, for God to heal us and for us to heal each other. So, in God’s kingdom, we use what we have for the well being of others.

The wealthy landowner needed workers, and the workers needed enough to live on. The landowner could have only paid an eighth of a day’s wage for those who only worked an hour, and that’s probably what would happen most often in our economy. The landowner got to save some money by only paying them for the hours they worked. They weren’t owed anything else, and anyone who complained could easily be replaced by someone else the next day.

That’s often how our economy works, but that’s not how the kingdom of God works. If all who call themselves Christian were really serious about living the kingdom of God, people would be paid what they really need, not just what employers can get away with paying them. Of course, not all employers do that. Many employers do pay what people need, but a great many do not, and a great many people get extremely wealthy while their lowest paid workers are in poverty.

That’s not the kingdom of God, and for those who think Jesus’ parable is all about getting into heaven when we die, don’t kid yourselves. Saying this parable is all about life after death is definitely a convenient way of ignoring the economic justice that is taught in this parable, but getting to heaven when you die is not what Jesus was teaching. The parable wasn’t a metaphor for life after death. Jesus was talking about life here on Earth and God’s continued desire for us to treat one another with love and to create a society in which we care and use our riches generously.

If you look at the acts of Jesus and his other teachings, he was continually healing the poor and sick, those who had been left with only an eighth day’s wage, and he was continually telling those with great wealth to give what they had to the poor.

Pretending that this parable is not about economic justice is just one more way to ignore the fact that our apathy towards others and our desires for “fairness” would leave many people dead, and in fact, our apathy and unthinking ways do leave many people dead.

“But God, it’s not fair that those who only worked an hour got paid for a full day’s worth of work.” Well, if we paid people what the really needed, not just for the amount they were able to work, wouldn’t that lead to apathy? Many would argue that, saying, “God’s economy wouldn’t work. I’ll bet the next day, in Jesus’ parable, no one showed up to work until the last hour.” Well, I’ll bet the landowner had a fix for that.

Notice the people who only worked an hour wanted to work, and the landowner was happy to hire them. If folks had showed up at the last hour, unwilling to work until then, I have a feeling he wouldn’t have hired them. God’s economy works. We just have to be willing to care about one another as much as God does. We have to be willing to let go of our ideas of fairness. We have to be willing to let go of our apathy towards one another and our contempt towards one another. Then, we will see “justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 5:24) Then, “all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God” (Isaiah 52:10). Then, we will see God’s kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven.