Gospel text for Sunday 8 June 2014

John 20:19-23        When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you." After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you." When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

Reflection        And Jesus came and stood among them, stands among all of us who are locked in the upper room, locked in our fear, suffering or self-loathing and says, “Peace be with you.”

Peace be with us?  What is that about? How can we be peaceful? This situation is dreadful. The world outside hates us – persecutes us – it’s exploding in violence and every dis-ease. And inside, we feel awful, guilty and broken-hearted.  We don’t follow You Jesus. We follow our selves.

And Jesus breathed on them (Huuuhhhhhh ) ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’ 

Ohhh – what’s happening?  You are not going to condemn us? Rebuke us and cast us out? What is this strange calm, friendship we feel? How can there be ease in the midst of all our guilt and fear and tears? How can there be peace in the midst of all the hatred and violence in the world?

 And Jesus breathed on them (Huuuhhhhhh ) ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.

For three years Jesus ate with the disciples, talked with the disciples, walked with the disciples and when they arrived at locked doors, he knocked. But on the evening of the first day of the week, Jesus did not knock. He did not enter as the others had, through the doorway.

Jesus arrived as a spiritual presence rising within the hearts of the disciples, as close as their breath. And how did they know Jesus’ presence you ask? By the peace they experienced in spite of the fact that they had locked themselves into a room for fear of being persecuted. They knew Jesus’ presence by the peace they experienced in spite of the regret and guilt and pain in their broken hearts. 

I wonder if when Mary Magdalene saw how upset the disciples were, I wonder if she reminded them of the promise Jesus made while he was still with them? “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.” (John 14.26-27)

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Gospel text for Sunday 1 June 2014

John 17:1-11       Jesus looked up to heaven and said, "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.

"I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. “

Reflection       Hears, believes, has… this is all present tense. According to John’s gospel eternal life is not about delayed gratification. It is not about post mortem reward. Right here, right now, hearing the Word of God, believing the Word of God, and acting in accord with the Word of God, we have already “passed from death to life.” This new life is eternal life. 

The way it has generally been understood we might envision eternal life as an enormous circle (which of course it is not because it could not possibly have edges). In any case, at some location far below the circle of eternal life is the tiniest of circles. That would be me. Or you. In our relationship to the enormous circle our understanding of eternal life is as something far above and beyond us, and, given my track record, probably inaccessible to me. 

Imagine again the enormous circle of eternal life but this time put our tiny circles inside the circle of eternal life. Our relationship with eternal life is utterly transformed. We are not outside eternal life, bouncing up and down trying to break in. We are always and everywhere intimately part of eternal life. Any sense of separation we may experience is because we are not hearing the Word of God, believing the Word of God or acting in accord with the Word of God. 

When we hear, believe and choose to act in accord with the Word of God we realize that the work of our life is to disentangle ourselves from any concerns that block the flow of Divine Presence. Actions driven to accumulate power, comfort, wealth or any other selfish motive create a false sense of separation between us and God and one another (our little distinguishing circle). But, we can choose to “sell everything,” which is to say,  we can choose to surrender our natural inclination toward selfishness. When we “sell everything” that interferes with the flow of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, generosity and self-control, the insubstantial membrane that seems to separate us from one another dissolves and we experience our lives as the unified whole that they are.  This is the answer to Jesus’ prayer.

“I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through (the disciples’) word, that they may all be one…  as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one…” (John 17.20,23)

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Image by Alex Grey

Gospel text for Sunday 1 June 2014

John 17:1-11        Jesus looked up to heaven and said, "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.

"I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. “

Reflection         Eternal life is now. That is what Jesus tells us in the Gospel according to John; “Very truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgement, but has passed from death to life.” (John 5.24)

Hears, believes, has… this is all present tense. According to John’s gospel eternal life is not about delayed gratification. It is not about post mortem reward. Right here, right now, hearing the Word of God, believing the Word of God, and acting in accord with the Word of God, we have already “passed from death to life.” This new life is understood as eternal life. 

In the customary interpretation of Mark, Matthew and Luke’s gospels we might envision eternal life as an enormous circle (which of course it is not because it could not possibly have edges). In any case, at some location far below the circle of eternal life is the tiniest of circles. That would be me. Or you. In our relationship to the enormous circle our understanding of eternal life is as something far above and beyond us, and, given my track record, probably inaccessible to me. 

Imagine again the enormous circle of eternal life but this time put our tiny circles inside the circle of eternal life. Our relationship with eternal life is utterly transformed. We are not outside eternal life, bouncing up and down trying to break in. We are always and everywhere intimately part of eternal life. Any sense of separation we may experience is because we are not hearing the Word of God, believing the Word of God or acting in accord with the Word of God. 

When we do hear, believe and act in accord with the Word of God it is as if the thin membrane that seems to distinguish our individual tiny circles from the enormous circle of eternal life dissolves. For an instant we experience the unborn, undying, always and everywhere Presence of Divinity. We know that we know that we know we are not free-lancing bubbles of being vying for a ticket to paradise. 

When we act in accord with the Word of God we realize that the work of our life is to unentangle ourselves from worldly concerns that block the flows of Divine Presence. Actions driven to accumulate power, comfort, wealth or any other selfish motive create a false sense of separation between us and God and one another. When we choose to “sell everything” that contributes to the oppression of another and choose to surrender our natural inclination toward selfishness and acquisition, the insubstantial membrane that seems to separate us from one another dissolves and we experience our lives as the unified whole that they are.  This is the answer to Jesus’ prayer, “….as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one…” (John 17.23)

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Gospel text for Sunday 25 May 2014

John 14:15-21        Jesus said to his disciples, "If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.

"I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.”

Reflection        When I was a child I understood God to be up, up and away,  far above me; out of sight and unreachable. Even if I could climb a few steps of the ladder toward God’s supreme place of excellence the gap between my bumbling humanity and God’s unwavering divinity was too great for me to navigate. My early experience of life with God was rather like walking on a gangplank. With boldness of heart and firmness of spirit I would mount that plank and head toward God - until the inevitable plunge. I’d fall from grace into the ocean of shame, wallow there for a time then drag myself out to try again. 

There is every chance I would still be running and rerunning the gangplank scenario; crashing, treading water and dragging myself out, if I had not really ‘heard’ Jesus’ words to his disciples, “On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” From then on the gangplank and unmountable ladder were replaced by an image of God as a boundless circle with Jesus in the circle and me in it too! The best thing about it was that there was no way to be out of the circle. God is in me and I am in God just as Jesus is in the Father and the Father is in Jesus. 

Some of the time the edge of my slight circle seems to dissolve into God’s infinite circle and I experience the joy and the love, the grace and the peace, the wisdom and the blessing that I know belong to God - not me. Those moments come unbidden and last but for a breathe.  Pure gift they arise like God’s oceanic love to inhale the droplet of my being then breath me out again. It’s a gentle breathe, a coming in and a going out, always within God’s circle. Always a gift. And then, there is the slight circle again. The merest me engulfed in God’s endless sea. 

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Gospel Text for Sunday, 18 May 2014

John 14:1-14        Jesus said, "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going." Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him."

Philip said to him, "Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied." Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, `Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it."

Reflection     “I am the way and the truth and the life…” With his I am statements Jesus is saying to the disoriented community of  late first century religious Jews -  Believing me does not require that you dissociate yourselves from God of our ancestors. Believing me does not require that you turn away from the Great I Am as revealed to Moses and the prophets.  Believing me is contiguous with believing the God of our Fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Don’t you see, in God the Father’s house of creation there are many places in which to live.  There are many ways to be in relationship with I Am, God, first person present here and now.

Jesus’ I am statements were given to people who were steeped in the Jewish religious tradition, who understood the Torah, and who hopefully would make the connection between the God whom Moses encountered on Mt. Horeb from where he was sent to “say to the Israelites, “I am has sent me to you.’” (Ex 3.14) and God as revealed more fully in the person of Jesus.

Jesus is the way of inclusive participation in the mystery of God, I Am, first person present. Jesus is the way first century Jewish Jesus followers could continue to connect with the mystery of the God of Israel. Their experience of Jesus as the way they could encounter God of their ancestors was never intended to be an exclusionary claim that Jesus is the only way for anyone to experience the God of Abraham, Isaac or Jacob. In the Gospel according to John, Jesus is speaking to a particular people in a particular time about being in relationship with God who is always first person present.

I believe Jesus’ words to the late first century Jews, “I am the way, the truth and the life,” were intended to bridge the chasm between God of history and God first person present. Never were they meant to be an exclusionary claim to an exclusionary God.  I believe we would do well to recall Peter’s counsel  in the Acts of the Apostles, ”Truly I perceive that God shows no partiality, but in every nation any one who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” (Acts 10.34) 

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Gospel text for Sunday 11 May 2014

John 10:1-10        Jesus said, "Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers." Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.

So again Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly."

Reflection        What is life? That was the first question that came to mind when I read Jesus’ words to the disciples and us, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”  I typed my question, “What is life”  into google search and guess what popped up? You are not connected! Oops? So I waited twenty-seven seconds and then received 9 billion, 600 million hits.  Now that’s connection! 

In the 1960s Lynn Margulis, the biologist who is credited with one of the great achievements of twentieth-century evolutionary biology, explained how eukaryotic cells - cells that have a nucleus and a cellular membrane and are the basis of all life - Margulis explained how these cells evolved over millions of years as a result of interdependent and cooperative relationships between once-distinct bacteria. (Which of course means our true ancestors are bacterium.) Margulis also suggested that rather than evolution being driven by competition it is determined by symbiotic or cooperative relationships between organisms of different phyla and kingdoms. In other words, at the cellular level, life is relationships between things that are not the same and that change over time.

What does that have to do with our gospel text? Well, sheep and shepherds are of different orders. Much as Margulis’ distinctively different bacterium interact and cooperate to impel evolution,  so too do the shepherd and the sheep collaborate for the common good. I believe that is Jesus’ point when he says, “I came that they may have life and have it in abundance.” I believe Jesus is saying, "I came to be in relationship with them. I came to be in interdependent and cooperative relationship with each and every one of them, like a shepherd with his sheep. See, I even know them by name and they recognize my voice. I came to pour myself out to them (and to us) so that they could pour themselves out to me. Like the ancient bacterium that engulfed one another such that both survived and evolved over millions of years and became the basic cells of life, I, Jesus came to be in intimate, deeply personal relationship with you; loving, leading and caring for you. I came like a shepherd to the sheep; reaching across the chasm of order, genus, family and species. " Jesus came to show us the way of reaching across whatever divides us, the way of bridging our differences and cooperating for the common good. 

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Gospel text for Sunday 4 May 2014

Luke 24:13-35        On the first day of the week, two of Jesus' followers were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. And he said to them, "What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?" They stood still, looking sad. Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, "Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?" He asked them, "What things?" They replied, "The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him." Then he said to them, "Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?" Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures. As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. But they urged him strongly, saying, "Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over." So he went in to stay with them. When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, "Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?" That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. They were saying, "The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!" Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.  m

Reflection         Have you ever been so distressed, disturbed or dismayed that you could not stop the tape from playing over and over and over in your mind? Have you ever heard yourself telling your story over and over again and leaving no room for anything new?   I certainly have. Surely this must have been Cleopas and the other disciple’s experience. Their minds must have been so filled with flashbacks and their emotions so stunned with the sights and sounds and smells of the past three days that there was no room for Jesus to arise in their consciousness. 

Indeed, all the words in the world, even ‘the stranger’s” full account of God’s story, “beginning with Moses and all the prophets…” and interpreting for the disciples, “the things about himself in all the scriptures,” all the words were not sufficient to break into Cleopas and the other disciples’ bristling state of consciousness. 

However, “When the stranger was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him (Jesus); and he vanished from their sight.” The veil between ordinary and an altered state of extraordinary consciousness was torn. The two disciples experienced a dimension of reality in which Jesus was present in spirit. That experience opened their hearts and their minds. They remembered, "Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?" And their lives were forever changed.

Cleopas and the other disciple turned in their tracks. They returned to Jerusalem, found their friends and they told them, “what had happened on the road, and how (Jesus) had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.” Ordinary bread; taken, blessed, broken and given away, a sacred symbol pointing beyond itself to an “inward and spiritual” dimension of reality. An ordinary loaf of bread given to gladden the disciples’ hunger for divine relationship.

We do this on the first day of every week; come together with our friends, listen to the words of Holy Scripture interpreted and then share an ordinary meal of bread and wine. This ordinary meal opens the eyes of our hearts and unclogs the furrows of our minds to experience the extraordinary presence of the One who instructs us to remember, “This is my body, given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”   Amen

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