American Blessing: A Failed Narrative

Brad Sullivan

3 Epiphany, Year A

Sunday, January 26, 2014

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Isaiah 9:1-4
Psalm 27:1, 5-13

1 Corinthians 1:10-18
Matthew 4:12-23

There are really two stories being told in Matthew’s Gospel story this morning.  One is the story of Jesus getting his first disciples and the story of how Matthew chose to tell this story…not simply with the action itself, but through the lens of prophecy and fulfillment.

Jesus called to these young fishermen and told them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”  I wondered, what did they use as a net?  What did they throw out there?  How did they actually go about fishing for people?  Well, we’re told at the end of the passage that, “Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.”

That’s a pretty good net, curing every disease and every sickness.  After Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension, however, what net did the disciples use?  There were some healings, but they didn’t continue to the same degree with which Jesus was healing people with his own two hands.  So what was the disciples’ net which they fished for people?  My guess is their net was teaching and the proclaiming of good news of the kingdom, which has continued ever since.

So what were they teaching?  What narrative, what story?  This is where the way in which Matthew tells this story is instructive.  Matthew tells us that when Jesus went to the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, that the words of the prophet Isaiah were fulfilled.  The scripture he’s quoting is from Isaiah 9:1-2

The names Zebulun and Naphtali are instructive; they are tribes of Israel, children of Abraham whose names mean “honor” and “wrestle”.  Israel will be honored once more.  They will wrestle with their enemies and win.  This prophecy was fulfilled during the reign of king Hezekiah, hundreds of years before the time of Jesus.  Hezekiah’s reign was a time when Israel became faithful to God again after the atrocities of his father, Ahaz’s reign.  Hezekiah restored covenant faithfulness to God, brought honor back to Israel, and when an Assyrian king tried to invade, Israel wrestled with them and won.

Isaiah 9 was fulfilled with Hezekiah as king, through covenant faithfulness to God and through military victory.  Matthew, when using the Isaiah 9 passage to talk about Jesus, however, knew that Jesus did not bring about any kind of military victory.  As far as driving out the Romans goes, Jesus lost, mightily.  Something other than military victory gave honor to Israel in Matthew’s eyes…covenant faithfulness to God and the presence of God within their midst in the person of Jesus. 

Isaiah 9 was fulfilled through Jesus in a different way than it was fulfilled centuries before.  A different narrative was being told.  In the previous narrative, one could identify blessing by God by seeing obvious outward signs of blessing:  wealth, power, prestige, etc.  Israel had these under the reign of Hezekiah.  As a counter narrative, Matthew (and Jesus before him) was telling the story that covenant faithfulness to God was its own blessing and it would not necessarily bring wealth, power, or prestige.  Rather, covenant faithfulness to God brought blessings of peace amidst suffering, contentment without great wealth, and confidence of eternal life in God even in death.

Outwardly, people may not seem blessed by the narrative Matthew (and Jesus) told.  On the inside, however, if you got to know the people, you would see their blessings…love, hope, faith, peace, confidence, contentment.

I look at the narratives in America, and look at the story of our country, and one of our dominant narratives in America is the narrative of each successive generation being better off than the generation before it.  Each successive generation would have a little more financial prosperity than the preceding generation.  It is a compelling societal narrative, which, ultimately, seeks to alleviate suffering.  The next generation will have what we didn’t so they won’t suffer in ways that we did.

We now have more stuff and more wealth than we know what to do with.  The challenge is, stuff and wealth don’t actually bring us peace and contentment.  They don’t actually alleviate our suffering because we aren’t designed to be soothed by stuff.  We’re made to be in relationship with others, to be soothed and blessed by people. 

As a nation, we have achieved immense wealth, power, and prestige.  From the outside, we look to be immensely blessed.  The immensity of our wealth and the vastness of our treasures have not seemed to bless us inwardly, however, with love, hope, faith, peace, confidence, contentment.  Our wealth, power, and prestige haven’t stamped out suffering or worry, fear or anxiety.  Instead, we have very high levels of anxiety, depression, and violence.  A narrative that brought outward blessings to a nation (wealth, power, prestige) has not seemed to bring inner blessings (peace, contentment, confidence, love, hope, faith).  The narrative of finding blessing and alleviating suffering through more money and more stuff with each generation is a well intentioned narrative, but it is a failed narrative. 

As disciples of Jesus, fishing for people, we have a different narrative to offer, a narrative counter to the narrative of American blessing.  Our narrative tells us that we are blessed not by or because of wealth, power, or prestige, but we are blessed because of covenant faithfulness to Jesus.  We are blessed by a life in which we seek first and foremost to love God and to love others.  We are blessed by a life in which we seek to partner with God in bringing about greater love, peace, justice, and hope in the world.  The signs of our blessing are not wealth, power, and prestige, nor a life without struggle.  Rather, the signs of our blessing are peace, contentment, confidence, love, hope, and faith even amidst the same struggles that all people have. 

As disciples of Jesus, we don’t believe we make our children’s lives better than ours by providing them with more money or things than we had growing up.  As disciples of Jesus, we believe we make our children’s lives better than ours (or possibly just as good as ours) by providing them with love and faith, with rhythm and relationship, with deep roots in God and each other.

In a society and culture continually speeding up, we slow down.  In a society and culture that is increasingly loud and full of distractions, we grow quiet and centered.  We slow down and grow quiet and centered because so little of the speed, noise, and distraction lead us to live lives in which we bring about greater love, peace, justice, and hope in the world.  So little of the speed, noise, and distraction help us to live intentional lives in which we love God and love people. 

That’s our net, or at least a large part of our net.  As disciples of Jesus, we have and live lives of love, hope, faith, peace, confidence, contentment.  We live the story that covenant faithfulness to God is its own blessing and it does not necessarily bring wealth, power, or prestige.  Rather, covenant faithfulness to God brings blessings of peace amidst suffering, contentment without great wealth, and confidence of eternal life in God even in death.  That’s our teaching and preaching that we, as disciples of Jesus, get to go out and give to others and live.  Amen.

"I Can Work With That." - God

Brad Sullivan

1 Epiphany, Year A (Baptism of Our Lord)

Sunday, January 12, 2014

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Isaiah 42:1-9

Psalm 29

Acts 10:34-43

Matthew 3:13-17 

Today we’re celebrating the baptism of Jesus, hearing Matthew’s version of Jesus’ baptism by John in the River Jordan.  Years ago, I had a conversation about this very passage with a group of pastors, and while we started talking about why Jesus was baptized and what happens when we are baptized, the conversation quickly digressed into a talk about river baptism vs. font baptism vs. baptistery (the big immersion pool) baptism.  They even went into saying, “it never said Jesus was submerged, it said he emerged from the water.”  Do you sprinkle some water or do you poor?  This was a serious conversation, not about Jesus or what God does for us in baptism, just how do you get the ritual right, and each pastor more or less declaring themselves to be right.

One of the pastors actually said it doesn’t really matter how you baptize, what is important is what God does.  There was the tiniest little pause after his comment, and then the group went back to talking about immersion vs. pouring vs. sprinkling.  I was going nuts, and while on the one hand all I could really thing throughout the conversation was, “oh God, who cares?”, the conversation did speak of our need for ritual.  We need some way of marking our desire and goal of becoming a new person.  When we repent and turn our lives around (which can just about happen daily), we tend to need some way to mark that.  As physical people, we need physical action. 

So we take this ritual bath in baptism.  Now, baptism in the church only happens once.  We don’t get baptized over and over because we believe God is true to his word.  In baptism, we are welcomed into the Body of Christ, and we believe we need never be baptized again because God has already welcomed us and God will keep his promise to us.

Now some folks may want to take another ritual bath.  Maybe they don’t remember their baptism, or maybe they simply want to repent again since their baptism and want again a physical way of cleansing.  Well, while we won’t rebaptize in the church (thereby declaring God’s original promise broken), I say if you want another ritual bath, take one.  After some repentance and some soul searching, take a bath.  Renew your baptismal promises and vows when you take a bath, or when you take a shower, or jump in a pool or a lake or the ocean.  You can renew your baptismal promises and take some kind of ritual bath anytime you want, not because God needs you to, but because sometimes we need some ritual in our lives to remind and to renew.  We’re going to be renewing our baptism covenant once I’m done speaking so that we as a people can be reminded of and renew the promises we made and be reformed again as God’s people. 

So that’s a bit about what we do in baptism, but what does God do?  God sees a heart that is longing for connection with him.  God sees a heart that is longing to live a life of love, faith, and hope, and then God sees a wonderfully messed up person, fully of imperfections emerging from the waters of Baptism, and God says, “I can work with that.”  God says, “you are flawed and scared, and deeply messed up, and I am going to grant you my Holy Spirit, make you one with me and walk with you, and use who you are and what you have to partner with me as a people to live out my love in the world.  I will make you part of the Body of Christ,” God says, “and I will walk with you always.”

So why was Jesus baptized?  Jesus was already one with God, already living out God’s love in the world.  He didn’t become part of the Body of Christ; he was the Body of Christ.  So what was going on?  Partly I believe this was revelation as God’s Holy Spirit came down and lighted on Jesus, and the voice from heaven declared Jesus to be God’s beloved son.  Partly I believe Jesus was baptized in order to be in this with us.  He was calling us to be God’s faithful people, and part of being God’s faithful people in the first century was to take the ritual cleansing bath of Baptism.  This ritual bath was a way that Jews repented in order to be reformed as God’s people.  Without baptism, Jesus would have been declaring himself other than that people.  Jesus did not declare himself other than us.  Jesus was a part of Israel, standing squarely with those who knew they needed repentance, knew they were not perfect, and sought help from God to live as God’s faithful servant.

When we are baptized, Jesus is standing squarely with us to, not because we are perfect, but because we are beloved and because we said yes to God’s call to repent and be reformed as God’s people.  In baptism God forms us as part of the Body of Christ.  We become part of the servant described in Isaiah 42.  In Isaiah 42, God was talking about the people of Israel as his servant.  In the Isaiah passage, we hear God referring to his people Israel:

He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street; a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice.  He will not grow faint or be crushed until he has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his teaching.

That is who and what we are baptized into when we are baptized into the Body of Christ.  Jesus is Faithful Israel lived out in one man.  When we are baptized into Jesus’ body, we are formed as faithful Israel, called to partner with God to bring peace and justice to the world.  We’re called to do, to be, to live as love incarnate in the world.

We are not called to be perfect.  While we do repent and try to turn our lives around, we don’t rid ourselves of all our imperfections.  Obviously, none of us have been made perfect in baptism.  God doesn’t need us to be.  God just wants us to say yes.  God then takes us, scars and all and says, “I can work with that,” and then God asks us to become love.  We still have our imperfections.  God doesn’t eradicate them.  God redeems them.  God uses the mess of our lives to help heal others and reach out to folks who couldn’t be reached by someone without some imperfections.  We often relate to each other in our messiness and our brokenness.  So God takes what we’ve got and works with it, redeems it, and uses us, partners with us in loving and healing the world he created.

When we baptize, we tell God we want to be a part of his people.  We say, God, I’m a mess, see what you can do with it, and Jesus stands squarely with us, being baptized with us, standing squarely on the side of broken messed up people, and decaring them his.  “Y’all want to be my servant, God says, part of my son’s body.  Y’all are broken and messed up, but I can work with that.”   Amen.

Yeah, I've Heard That Story Before...

Brad Sullivan

2 Christmas, Year A

Sunday, January 5, 2014

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Jeremiah 31:7-14
Psalm 84
Ephesians 1:3-6,15-19a
Matthew 2:13-15,19-23

Last week, I watched two movies, a horror/thriller named “The Purge” and a sci-fi/action movie called Elysium.  They were basically the same movie.  A rather dystopian future, the haves vs. the have-nots, things going pretty well for the haves until the struggles of the have-nots spilled over into the lives of the haves.  In one of the movies, this story was told as a horror story.  In the other movie, this story was told as a sci-fi movie.  The plots were different, but the story was the same.

Now, as a horror movie, “The Purge” was like a lot of movies I’ve seen before, and I turned to Kristin at one point and said, “yeah, kinda bored now because I really like the premise, but at this point, I’ve seen this movie before; it’s like several other horror movies and thrillers that I’ve seen.”  We kept watching, though, and by the end, I realized that this other story, the story of the haves vs. the have-nots was really the story that was being told.  So, I enjoyed it and it was nice to see the story told in a different way.  Same with the Sci-fi movie, “Elysium”, as a sci-fi movie, I had seen it before, but it was a different way of seeing the overarching story of the struggle between the haves and the have-nots.

There are stories that are told and re-told over and over again, and it the stories are well told, we seem not to tire of them.  Most of the movies we see, we’ve seen before with different actors, a different plot, different script, and a different name, but the basic stories, we’ve seen and heard over and over again.  How many romantic comedies do we have to see to know the story?  A couple meets, they fall in love, they fight, and then they get back together in the end. 

Exposition, conflict, climax, resolution…creation, fall, judgment, redemption, re-creation:  this is the very basic story we see and hear in almost every story we see and hear, and we pretty much don’t tire of it.  That’s because God wrote this story into the very fabric of the world:  creation, fall, judgment, redemption, re-creation.  I guess we pretty well authored the “fall” part of the story, but then God took what we wrote and used it to end the story with redemption and re-creation.  This is the story of our lives, the story of the Gospel, God taking our stories and redeeming them into his Gospel story. 

In Matthew’s telling of the story of Jesus’ life, we see Jesus’ life mirroring somewhat the story of the creation of Israel.  Jesus started in Israel, the land of promise, then went to Egypt, and then made his way back to Israel.  This was the story of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and his sons who fled to Egypt during the famine, became a numerous people, and then journeyed back to Canaan, the land of promise, to become the nation of Israel.  Israel went through the waters of the Red Sea and then spent 40 years in the wilderness becoming faithful servants of God.  Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River and then spent 40 days in the wilderness being tempted by Satan, being strengthened to remain and fully become (in his humanity) the faithful servant of God that he was.

Matthew told the story of Jesus’ life through the lens of scripture, constantly quoting scripture and showing how Jesus’ life fulfilled scripture.  Have you known folks who can quote scripture?  Often people do this to teach or tell others how life is or how they should be.  There’s no Bible to thump, so they thump other people with their knowledge of scripture.  Sometimes folks quote scripture, however, because scripture has become the lens through which they view their lives.  The stories of scripture are our stories and they make sense of our lives.  Like Matthew telling the story of Jesus, our lives tend to make sense when we narrate them through the stories of scripture.  You don’t have to be able to quote scripture in order to do this.  Even if you can’t quote it, the story, the Gospel story over and over again, is your story, woven into your very being. 

Jesus is the story of all creation told in one human’s life.  Jesus is the Gospel story.  Most of us have heard this story over and over again, and we tend not to tire of it because Jesus is God’s story, woven into the fabric of creation, told and re-told over and over again throughout our history.  Jesus’ story is the story of our lives, woven into us even as we were being formed in the womb. 

Now, have you ever heard a story that ends prematurely?  Creation, and no fall.  Fall and no judgment.  Judgment without restoration and re-creation.  We tend not to like these stories as much.  Stories that end early leave part of the narrative of creation out of them.  They aren’t full stories.  We hate hearing or telling these partial, incomplete stories, and yet often, sadly, people live out these incomplete narratives. 

Imagine the prodigal son choosing not to go back to his father, too proud to turn around and admit he was wrong, or imagine that once he did go back, he simply told his dad he wanted more money, skipping redemption and re-creation and going straight back to fall.  That would make a lousy story, and yet it is the kind of story many people choose to live.  

Sometimes we don’t let this incomplete narrative be the story of our entire lives, but just the story of some relationships in our lives or just the story of some poor decisions in our lives.  Our pride, our arrogance, our fear, our hurt, etc. keeps us holding on to the one part of the narrative we can pretty well author for ourselves…the fall.  Now the fall may be terrible, we may be miserable and hate it, but it’s ours.  We wrote it.  We can keep writing it, and no one, by God, can take it away from us. 

Well, Jesus didn’t come here to take our hurts away from us.  Jesus didn’t come here to take our broken relationships and poor decisions away from us.  Jesus came here to redeem our hurts, to redeem our broken relationships and poor decisions.  Jesus came here to finish the story woven into the fabric of creation and to help us to finish our stories. 

Sometimes that means we’re going to have to take a journey.  If we’re going to allow God to finish our stories with the story of the Gospel, with redemption and re-creation, then we might first have to go to Egypt and make the long slow journey back.  Imagine if Israel had not spent 40 years in the wilderness becoming faithful and obedient to God, if God had said, “yeah, y’all are not really faithful to me at all, but go on in, have the promised land.”  That would have been a terrible story because they would not have been the light to the nations that God formed them to be.  The story would not have been complete.  Imagine if Joseph had not trusted in God to journey to Egypt with an infant / toddler.  That was likely no simple journey and relocation, and Joseph could have decided that he had just about had it with God’s interference in his life and that he was going to stay right where he was.  That probably wouldn’t have made for a very good story once Herod showed up. 

Living out the Gospel story in our lives and allowing God to redeem our stories means we may have to travel far out of our comfort in what we do.  Reconciling past hurts with people is no easy task, but then again, staying angry or hurt makes for a terrible story because it’s not the story of the Gospel.  Having a desire to serve other people, noticing the needs around us, is no easy task, like Joseph fleeing to Egypt, but then again, having a desire and an ability to help others and choosing not to makes for a terrible story because it’s not the story of the Gospel. 

Whatever is on your heart right now, service, or forgiveness, or a need for healing or to be healed, allow God to finish your story.  You know the basics of the narrative, you know where your story is leading…redemption and re-creation.  Now, you may have a long slog before you get there.  You may have to go to Egypt before coming back to the promised land, but trust in God on that journey.  Trust that Jesus has already made that journey, that he has lived and told your story, your basic story, because it is the story of the Gospel, woven into the fabric of creation.  Amen.

Peace, Goodwill Toward Men.

Brad Sullivan

Christmas Eve, Year A

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Isaiah 7:10-16
Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18

Romans 1:1-7
Luke 2:1-14(15-20)

This passage from Luke’s Gospel, verses 8-14, is one of the best known passages to me (although for this passage, the King James Version is the one I usually remember).  The reason I know and remember this passage so well is not because I’ve heard it in church a lot, although I have.  The reason I know and remember this passage so well is because I have seen “A Charlie Brown Christmas” many times, and this is the passage which Linus recites to tell Charlie Brown what Christmas is all about. 

This was not a big church event or some religious leader or elite proclaiming the story of Jesus’ birth.  In this secular story, “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” a little boy told his friend about the Christmas story.  I rather doubt you remember every Christmas sermon you’ve ever heard…or even any Christmas sermon you’ve ever heard, but if a friend of yours were to tell you the Christmas story, and tell you what Christmas is all about, I bet you’d remember that.

God has a way of breaking through and working with the ordinary stuff in our lives.  …of course God could have come in power and great might.  God is powerful and mighty, and yet, God so often identifies with the lowly.  God has power and doesn’t need us to brandish our power in order to impress him.  God is powerful, but even more so, in his very nature, God is relationship and love. 

God identifies with love even more than with power. So, God comes to us in the loving act of the birth of a child.  There are few more loving moments than when a child is born.  I remember when my kids were born, and each time, I looked at them, and I felt this new love just happen, this new space in my heart suddenly be created as I looked at my sons for the first time. 

God came to us in a way that would bring out the very best in us.

Once a year, for twelve days, we get to look on that baby Jesus and love God as a newborn baby.  Once a year, for twelve days, we can have the best brought out in us again.  After that, we’re into Epiphany, and we hear stories about Jesus as a grown man, and he starts getting into our business and messing with our lives, but for now, we just get to give our love to Jesus and receive God’s love for us in his gift of himself to us. 

What is the point, though?  What is the true meaning of Christmas?  Well, I don’t think that question has one answer, but many.  Part of the true meaning of Christmas is that God brings out the best in us, giving us a gift of love so that we might love him more.  Part of the true meaning of Christmas is that God has become one with us in Jesus and this shows us that God has never and will never give up on us.  God joined himself to us in Jesus, so if God gives up on humanity, then God will have to give up on himself.

Part of the true meaning of Christmas is that along with never giving up on us, God will continue to strive with us, to dwell with us, to love us, and that one day, Jesus will return and will put all things right.  Jesus, the savior, the messiah, will come again to restore all of creation.  In the mean time, we get to love God as a little newborn baby.  We get to share that love with others.  We get to be with others in the ordinary parts of their lives and strive with them, just as God strives with and never gives up on us.  We get to tell others the story of our faith, the story of Christmas and why we believe in this little baby whose birth we remember today. 

We get to share this story and the meaning of this night.  I doubt you’ll remember much of what I’ve said tonight in a year.  Any of your friends could hear this sermon and likely not remember much of us either.  If you tell your friends what Christmas is all about, however, I bet they’d remember that, just as I remember the words from Luke’s Gospel.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.  And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.  And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.  And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.  And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. (Luke 2:8-14)  Amen.

Put God to the Test

Brad Sullivan

4 Advent, Year A

Sunday, December 22, 2013

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Isaiah 7:10-16
Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18

Romans 1:1-7
Matthew 1:18-25

Put God to the test.  That was my advice to a parishioner earlier this week who had been given some gift cards in order to give them to hungry people.  This person came to the church and offered the gift cards to me so that I could give them to folks who came to St. Mark’s asking for food.  I thought that was a pretty good idea, but then, in a surprise move, I refused the gift cards, insisting instead that this person give them to hungry people he found or ran into in his life.

A conversation ensued.  This person wasn’t against giving these gift cards to hungry people, he said he just didn’t really know any, and didn’t know how to get them to people who would need them.  He also thought it would be insulting to ask random strangers if they were impoverished and needed some food.  I agreed, and then I said “put God to the test.”  We talked about this Sunday’s passage from Isaiah with Ahaz refusing to put God to the test and the story of Joseph believing in God, and I told the person in my office to pray for God to send folks his way.  Hungry folks are all around us, I said, and if you pray to God multiple times a day for God to send those folks your way, I bet they’ll find you.  Put God to the test.

In our Isaiah reading, King Ahaz, one of the not overly good kings of Judah (seemed to have no faith in God at all, an idolater, offered up his sons as burn sacrifices…lovely guy), King Ahaz said he would not put God to the test.  You may remember Jesus telling Satan, when Satan was tempting Jesus in the wilderness, that it is written in scripture, “do not put the Lord your God to the test.”  Jesus was quoting from Deuteronomy 6:16, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test as you tested him at Massah.”  This was referring to a day, shortly after God brought the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, across the Red Sea, and the people were thirsty.  They quarreled with Moses, saying, “why did you bring us out of Egypt to kill us…with thirst?” (Exodus 17:3). 

They didn’t believe in God or trust in God that God could or would save them.  After God had freed them from slavery with many miracles, they hit a road bump, and decided they no longer trusted in God.  They put God to the test meaning they stopped believing and demanded a sign so that they would believe again.

When Jesus quoted to Satan, “do not put the Lord your God to the test,” Satan was trying to get Jesus to attempt suicide, forcing God to save him, to prove that God truly loved him.  Jesus was saying, “I trust God, and I don’t need to come up with some crazy scheme to test whether or not my faith in God is justified.  I trust in God, and I won’t put him to the test.”

Now, back to Ahaz in our Isaiah reading from today, God offered Ahaz a sign, and Ahaz decided to quote Deuteronomy back at God, using scripture as a tool against God to refuse God’s offer.  This was not a man of faith, trusting in God saying, “I believe in you, and I will not demand a sign or put you to the test in order to believe in you.”  This was a man who flat out didn’t trust in God, and was misusing scripture to further his lack of trust and confidence in God.  It’s like he was trying to trick God by using scripture, but God wasn’t buying it.

When I say “put God to the test,” I don’t mean drive some bargain with God whereby you can prove God’s existence or prove God’s goodness.  When I say, “put God to the test,” I mean tell God, “I will trust and believe in you, God.  I will ask for your help and guidance, and trust in you.”  This is not, however, a bargain, telling God, “If you deliver, then I will have faith in you.”  Rather, I will have faith in you, God.  I will follow your commandments.  I will live according to your way of life, and I will trust in you, even if the thing for which I pray doesn’t happen. 

See, I would say that when Joseph decided to stay with Mary after the angel told him that the Holy Spirit had conceived the baby in her, that Joseph put God to the test, meaning, Joseph trusted in God.  Joseph could have left. 

His wife was pregnant, not by him, and that’s all he really knew.  He was probably fairly heartbroken, maybe a little bit angry, hurt, humiliated, and yet he decided to dismiss her quietly, not to shame her publically.  She could have gone on and been with the father of her child, so Joseph thought.  It might have been a scandal, but they’d have probably been ok, and Joseph would have been heartsick. 

Then, an angel came to him in a dream and told him to stay, that Mary was still a virgin, that it was the Holy Spirit who had conceived God’s son inside of her.  He could have thought it was just a dream.  He could have let someone else raise the child that was not his.  He chose instead to believe.  Joseph chose instead to make Jesus his own child, to be his son and family, and to raise him as his own.  He never knew for certain if Jesus was truly conceived of the Holy Spirit or of some other guy.  An angel appeared to him in a dream…hell, I’ve had some pretty fantastical dreams.  Joseph chose to believe, to put God to the test, not as a bargain, not saying, “if you do this, then I will believe.”  

Joseph simply chose to believe, and things seem to have worked out pretty well.  We don’t know too much more about Joseph.  We know that he and Mary had other kids together after Jesus was born.  We know that he raised Jesus and taught him his trade as a carpenter.  It seems that Joseph died before Jesus began his ministry, because Joseph was never mentioned along with Mary and Jesus’ brothers and sisters during Jesus’ ministry. 

What that means is, Joseph may never have seen the miraculous signs and wonders that Jesus did.  Joseph may never have had any confirmation, any proof or tangible evidence that Jesus was the Son of God, as the angel told him in his dream.  Joseph chose to believe the story and let that belief be real enough to bless his life.

When it really comes down to it, none of us know that Jesus is God’s son or if there even is a God.  We don’t.  We don’t know.  We believe.  We have faith.  We have varying levels of conviction in our faith, and we choose let that belief be real enough to bless your life.

Regarding my advice to this St. Mark’s parishioner to put God to the test, to ask God to send hungry people his way so that he can give them these gift cards, people may come or people may not come.  This was not a test to prove God’s existence.  This was a chance to trust in God without fear.  This was a chance actually to believe that God will help us fulfill whatever ministry he has for us. 

In Joseph’s case, this meant raising Jesus as his own, and loving him completely.  Putting God to the test, simply meant trusting and believing in God without agenda, without any examination day.  So, put God to the test.  Trust in God.  Believe in God, and allow that belief to be real enough to bless your life.  Amen.

Affluenza, John the Baptist, and Jesus' Stubborn Refusal to Kill the Romans

Brad Sullivan

3 Advent, Year A

Sunday, December 15, 2013

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Isaiah 35:1-10
Canticle 3 / 15

James 5:7-10
Matthew 11:2-11           

So there’s been a lot of outrage on the interwebs and the facebooks this week over a teenager in Texas who stole booze from Wal-Mart, drove drunk, crashed his car, and killed four people.  The outrage has been that this young man avoided prison by claiming “affluenza” as his defense. Instead of prison, this young man is going to a posh drug treatment center and is on probation for 10 years.  The idea was this.  His parents had spoiled him so thoroughly, and they had bought his way out of trouble so much, that he had no real concept of right and wrong or of there being consequences for his actions.  So, because he was rich, he had learned that there are no consequences for his actions, and therefore he should be given special treatment by the courts and act without consequences. 

I’ll warrant that perhaps rehabilitation and treatment are what’s in order for this young man.  The outrage is that the only reason he’s able to get that treatment is because he’s rich.  A poor young man, doing the same thing as this kid, would have gone to prison.

The unfortunate lesson people are learning is, if you have enough money, you can kill other people with near impunity.  “Yeah, I killed some folks, but it’s not my fault, I have affluenza.”  If you’re rich and powerful, you can get away with murder.  That’s a bit of an overstatement, but that’s how people are feeling, hearing this story.  That’s the lesson learned. If you’re great and mighty, and powerful, then you can pretty well do whatever you want, and if you hurt other people on the way, well too bad for them.  That may be greatness in our kingdoms of earth, but that’s not greatness in the kingdom of heaven.  The kind of power and might that kills with impunity due to wealth has no place in the kingdom of heaven. 

Ironically enough, however, that’s the kind of greatness people were expecting out of Jesus, perhaps the greatness even John the Baptist was expecting out of Jesus…great, mighty, powerful, ready to kill a bunch of Romans and get them out of Israel.  John was in prison at this point for upsetting king Herod, and I can imagine even John thinking Jesus was going to be the messiah they were expecting, a mighty king who would raise an army and kill all of Israel’s enemies, ushering in this reign of peace for Israel.  John sent his messengers to Jesus from prison, and I think he was basically saying, “ok Jesus, I did my part, got all of Israel to repent, and yet here I am stuck in prison.  It’s time for you do your messiah thing, spring me out of here and kill all the bad guys.

Jesus responded to John’s messiah question by affirming nothing at all of what John and everyone else was expecting.  “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”  ‘That’s great, Jesus,’ John and the people are thinking, ‘you’re a super nice guy, friend to the needy, but what about becoming powerful and mighty and killing our enemies?’ 

Jesus then tells the people that John the Baptist, crazy John with his camel’s hair and wilderness repentance kind of ways, jailbird John the Baptist is the greatest of all men, and yet, Jesus says, the least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he.  That sounds rather insulting to John, doesn’t it?  I think Jesus was not insulting John, but illustrating the extent to which violence and vengeance and power and might have no place in God’s kingdom. 

God the Father showed us just how much vengeance and violence have no place in his kingdom by allowing us to kill his Son, Jesus with impunity.  God did not take vengeance on humanity for killing his Son.  Rather, God allowed us to kill him to show us his radical love for us, and God demonstrated his power not by killing us in vengeance, but by raising his son from the dead, forgiving us, and inviting us to share in the Resurrection life with.  In Jesus, God showed us the power and might of love and forgiveness.

God showed us the power of his kingdom in which the great and powerful are not those who use their wealth and power to kill with impunity, but those who use whatever they have to serve others.  God’s kingdom is great not because God can destroy the Romans, or any other group that people don’t like.  God’s kingdom is great because in God’s kingdom, “the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at [Jesus].”     

Love, forgiveness, service, and humility are hallmarks of God’s kingdom, and there is a lot of what we hold onto now that must be left behind to live in God’s kingdom.  Vengeance and violence, they have no place in God’s kingdom.  Resentment and anger have no place in God’s kingdom.  Absolute lack of caring for other human beings has no place in God’s kingdom.

Jesus said, “how hard it will be for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.”  We see in this tragic killing why it is so hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.  If one’s wealth allows a person to buy his way out of trouble so much that he comes to care so little for human life that he feels he can even buy his way out of trouble for ending human life, then we the truth of Jesus’ words.  “How hard it will be for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven,” and yet, Jesus says, “with God all things are possible.” 

God can change our hearts.  God can make us new.  In Jesus, we can become new creations and be a part of God’s new creation.  The Kingdom of Heaven is not just some place that good people go when they die.  Rather the kingdom of heaven is lived out in this world, in fits and starts right now, then eventually, when our waiting is over and Jesus returns, the kingdom of heaven will be lived out fully, as God renews, remakes, and restores all of creation, including, if he wants to be a part of this new creation, the young man with affluenza who stole, drove drunk, and killed four people. 

He probably couldn’t live there right now, but with God all things are possible, and if he wants to, that young man can be remade and be part of God’s new creation.  That may be a tough pill to swallow, the thought that that spoiled kid can have a place in God’s kingdom, but “blessed [are those] who take no offence at me,” Jesus said.  Blessed are those who don’t shun that kid and desire vengeance upon him.  Blessed are those who pray for and seek his restoration, that he will have a new heart and be remade through Jesus in God’s kingdom. Blessed are those who pray the same thing for the poor people as well who do stupid things, who steal, drive drunk, and kill. 

In God’s kingdom, blessed are those who forego their anger and desires for vengeance at the evils of the world.  In God’s kingdom, blessed are those who seek not to become great and change the world not by adding violence upon violence, killing those deemed to be enemy (as people wanted Jesus to do to the Romans).  In God’s kingdom, blessed are those who seek to change the world by serving others, by being humble, by living as the kind of humble messiah Jesus proclaimed to John.  Amen.

Burn Away the Chaff: Love God. Love People. Do Stuff.

Brad Sullivan

2 Advent, Year A

Sunday, December 8, 2013

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Isaiah 11:1-10
Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19

Romans 15:4-13
Matthew 3:1-12

So folks tend to think of repentance as a rather less than joyous affair.  “Repent” we hear John the Baptist cry, and, nowadays quite honestly, “repent” we tend to hear fairly angry sounding preachers cry.  It seems like repentance is supposed to be this miserable activity where we say, “yeah, your right, I’m terrible,” and then are left just feeling kinda terrible.   

Advent is a season of repentance so in the secular world, we skip Advent all together and go straight for Christmas, and my biggest problem with that is not that the secular world ignores the need to repent and largely forgets about Jesus.  My biggest problem with secular pre-Christmas is not the commercialization and rampant consumerism.

No, my biggest problem with overdone secular pre-Christmas is that unlike most of the year when, if you don’t want to hear a particular song or any music at all, you basically just don’t turn on your radio and problem solved. During secular pre-Christmas, however, the Christmas music, both good and bad is unavoidable, and two weeks after going to HEB one morning, the Beach Boys’ Little Saint Nick is still running through your head.  You’re welcome.  I’ll take a little Advent repentance over that any day plus, I think Advent is a joyful time.

I spent the weekend with youth from St. Mark’s and around the diocese at a youth conference at St. Martin’s in Houston, called Conspire.  The name of the conference is every bit as provocative as it sounds.  The point is for the youth to conspire together about how they can change the world, in Jesus’ name for Jesus’ sake.  In the words of our keynote speaker for the weekend, Bob Goff, how can they and we “Love God, love people, and do stuff.”  That’s the conspiracy:  love God; love people; do stuff. 

The keynote speaker, Bob Goff is a lawyer and author of the book, Love Does, and he’s one of the most joyful souls I’ve met.  He was a trip, and he talked about our need to stop agreeing with Jesus.  What he meant was our propensity for reading the Bible, agreeing with what Jesus says and then not really living that out. 

Sometimes our fears keep us from living as love, living as Jesus said.  Sometimes feeling totally in adequate or overwhelmed by the enormity of the task Jesus has for us, keeps us form living as love.  Jesus has a task for all of us, something which each of us is particularly suited to do. 

For Bob Goff, it turns out that his task is to help children in Uganda who have been victims of child slavery, among other things.  He goes over there every sixty days to help get kids out of slavery, to prosecute the bad guys, and to help the bad guys repent.  He loved his enemies.  He started a school for some of these bad guys who were hurting children, and when they graduated, he was there, giving them their diplomas, proud of them, and loving them…and telling them that if they ever harmed a child again, that they would die in the deepest darkest hole of a prison that Uganda had, which from the sounds of it is a very deep dark hole.  That’s loving your enemy, and keeping the children safe. 

Mr. Goff didn’t plan to do all of these things.  He had the knowhow, as a lawyer, to prosecute.  He had the resources to go over there and help, and he had a heart full of love to say yes without fear whenever he was met with the next challenge.  So, stop agreeing with Jesus, Mr. Goff said.  Go and do what Jesus says.  Become Love itself.  Love God; love people, and then do stuff. 

This is really what John the Baptist was talking about when he told people to repent, adding that “[Jesus] will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” (Matthew 3:12)  Love God; Love your neighbor, and do stuff.

Ok, it may sound kinda dissimilar, but here’s the deal.  All wheat has chaff.  That’s the outer covering of the wheat.  The wheat grows inside it until it is mature and then the chaff is removed when the wheat emerges.  The chaff is thrown out and the wheat is used.

We have both wheat and chaff within us.  Our fears and insecurities are part of our chaff with which we try to protect ourselves.  Whatever we use to protect ourselves in such a way that we are unable to love God and love people:  fears, insecurities, anger, holding on to past hurts, these are all our chaff.  Now, we can grow somewhat even inside of our chaff, but we can also become those fears, become those insecurities, become that anger, become those past hurts.  We can, if we choose to, turn our wheat into chaff.  Then, in then end, will there be anything left other than chaff? 

Our true selves are the wheat.  The chaff is just our protective covering which can help of for a time, but eventually keeps us from becoming love.  Jesus loves us that we may become love and be truly and fully human ourselves, to get rid of our chaff.  Once we are love, once we are truly human, we don’t need to worry about what Jesus means or what all the answers are to all of our questions.  We don’t need to know how it’s all going to end.  Once we get rid of our chaff, become love, become truly human, then we just need to do stuff.

Repent, John the Baptist said.  Start removing your chaff.  Turn around, John said, and begin the process of undoing the harm you’ve done, healing the wounds you’ve made, and then walk in the path you see Jesus leading.  Follow Jesus step by step, one step at a time.

We’ll mess up and fail, and we won’t know where exactly the end is, and that’s ok.  We just keep following, offering up to God the chaff of our lives as our burnt offering to him, praying for Jesus to burn away the chaff we hold onto, and praying for the Holy Spirit to grow the wheat inside of us.  Repent.  Follow Jesus, and become love.

Advent is a joyful time.  Repentance is a joyful occasion with or without Little Saint Nick.  Repentance is part of the process whereby we ask God to help rid ourselves of our chaff and become more fully the wheat we were made to be.  Repentance is part of the process whereby we follow Jesus and become more fully the beloved and loving human beings God made us to be.  What could be more joyful?

At the Conspire conference, the youth were told that they could become love, that they could conspire together to change the world in Jesus’ name…and they believed it, and so it will happen.  When John proclaimed a baptism of repentance that folks could turn their lives around, wash and be made clean, they believed him, and so it happened.  If we believe Jesus can burn up the chaff in our lives, that we can repent, and that God’s Holy Spirit will grow the wheat in our lives and turn us into love, then it will happen as well.  Repent, for the kingdom of God has come near.  Love God.  Love people.  Do stuff, and be not afraid.  Amen.