"Be the Answer to Your Prayer" A Sermon for 22B Pentecost

 Sometimes... we say things out loud to God when we're feeling crushed by the world.

We demand that God "do something" to make whatever it is we're complaining about be "right." 

And then God does it.... by basically flipping the script on us and saying, "YOU make it right." 

YOU do the thing.

YOU be my hands and feet and heart and soul in this messy, crazy world.

And YOU be prepared for it to lead you where you do not want to go...and that's OK.

Here beginneth the sermon for 22B Pentecost. See what you think.

Text: Mark 10:35-45

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Have you ever had one of those moments where you asked for something out loud…and then realized that thing you asked for was going to require you to do something that maybe was a little bit outside of your comfort zone?

I remember one time…standing at the sink in my kitchen…fuming about a panel discussion that was due to take place with a group of religious leaders in Tallahassee.

It was a monthly event…called “Faith…Food…and Fridays” hosted by this civic organization that likes to engage people of differing opinions in thoughtful dialogue.

There was a “Faith…Food…and Fridays” session coming up…and the so-called “God Squad”…which included the local Jewish rabbi…a Baptist as well as Methodist pastor…and the rector of my Episcopal Church…were going to discuss the topic of same-sex marriage.

This was long before the United States Supreme Court ruling legalizing it…so the topic was still all the rage to talk about.

Every member of the panel was a straight married person.

And they were proposing to talk about whether the likes of me should be allowed to marry.

I want to emphasize that they were going to talk “about.”

Not talk “with.”

That’s often times how things go when you’re in the minority.

People in the majority of any group feel empowered to discuss matters that directly affect a minority group without having to do the work of seeking out said minority and engaging with them… or learning anything about them.

Anyway…I was angry about this panel.

I shook my fist at the ceiling…because of course God is up in the ceiling, right?

I poured out my complaint like a modern-day Job.

“How can they do this? Why are they doing this? Why do you, God, let them speak about us and not with us?”

About an hour or so later…my phone rang.

It was my rector.

He and the head of the sponsoring organization had talked.

They were worried that there was no gay person on the panel.

They had concluded that this wasn’t fair or good or right.

So…he asked me… would I be willing to join the panel to be the representative gay person of faith?

I agreed to do it.

And when I got off the phone…I sheepishly looked back up at the ceiling again.

“Umm…OK. You win, God. You win. Again.”

God hears the cries of the poor…the angry…the frustrated… and sometimes God says, “OK. You be the answer to your prayer!”

James and John go to Jesus…seeking to be the ones chosen to sit at his right and his left “in his glory.”

“In his glory.”

We get the sense that these two…the “Sons of Thunder”… have some sort of expectation that Jesus is going to ride into Jerusalem on a white stallion.

Jesus is going to lead the charge for the greatest battle against the evil Roman Empire…defeating their oppressor once and for all.

They want to have a piece of this moment.

They want to be his First and Second Lieutenants.

The fly guys who get to be right next to Jesus as he ascends to the throne of power.

And Jesus looks at them and says, “Do you know what you’re asking for? Are you ready for this assignment.”

“Oh, yes!” they say eagerly.

But they really weren’t ready.

They haven’t been listening closely to what Jesus has been saying to them.

We talked about this when we were studying and preparing to do the staged reading of Mark’s Gospel.

Jesus tells his band of twelve followers…not once…not twice… but three times that the march into Jerusalem is not going to easy or pretty.

In fact… it’s going to be dangerous…and for him… it will be deadly.

But even though it’s bound to end in his death… Love is still going to prevail.

Because he will rise again.

He doesn’t tell them how that will happen; he only promises that it will happen.

So even though he’s said all of this… and even goes into greater detail each time to prepare the disciples for the difficulties they’re about to encounter… they don’t seem to get it.

They don’t understand that to be in Jesus’ glory means going to the cross… that instrument of Roman torture and death.

And to be on his right and his left?

Well…for those of us who know the story… who are the ones on the right and the left of Jesus as he’s dying on the cross?

Not any of his disciples: they were two criminals.

People who were stripped of everything of worldly value.

James and John don’t know that the glory of Jesus comes to those willing to put their ego and selfish desires aside…and to basically die to the whole idea of “self.”

I sometimes think that gets lost on us too.

I’ve mentioned the name Dietrich Bonhoeffer before…the Lutheran pastor and theologian who was executed by the Nazis shortly before the end of World War II.

Bonhoeffer says there’s a cost to discipleship…something he came to know in a real sense himself.

But that cost doesn’t necessarily mean a literal physical death.

It does mean dying to the idea of living a comfortable… uncomplicated life.

To truly follow Jesus means that we are often led into difficult places… and dealing with tough situations.

It means going to people and sitting with those who aren’t able to give us anything in return for our kindness….and we need to be at peace with that reality.

And that’s hard.

We want to be recognized for the things we do.

We don’t want to give up our own comfort or status.

We get possessive about those things that we believe are ours… or are set up for us… things that we feel that we’ve earned through our hard work.

If we were honest about it…we’re all a little bit selfish…and insecure and little bit possessive about what we perceive as “ours.”

To follow Jesus…and to understand his mission… is to allow ourselves to let go of the need for the stuff in our lives…and to let our hearts get broken by the injustices in the world.

And then to take those broken pieces…and follow in the footsteps of the disciples.

After that mighty wind of the Holy Spirit blew open the hearts and minds and loosened the tongues of those gathered in that Upper Room… the disciples mustered up the courage to go where they needed to go.

James and John… Peter… Phillip and the others went into their communities and beyond their own comfort zones to do the work of Jesus…to free the oppressed and bind up the brokenhearted.

What does that work look like today?

Perhaps it’s the person who tutors a student struggling and having trouble in school.

Maybe that individual with the knowledge of government  who can assist someone with challenges of navigating a bureaucracy.

Or perhaps it’s the person who offers a ride to somebody who is carless.

And even more profoundly…it means we need to examine our prejudices… and to surrender those to God.

To follow Jesus… is to be willing to give up things in our lives that keep us separated from each other…so that we begin to truly love one another as fellow siblings in this big… beautiful body of Christ.

This is God’s dream…

God’s love…

God’s joy…

God’s glory…

For the world.

In the name of our One Holy and Undivided Trinity.

 

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me..." A Funeral Sermon for Jim Crochet

It is hard to lose a loved one. It is even harder when their death was apparently preventable, and had been hastened by mistakes made during a surgery. That seems to be the case with Harold James "Jim" Crochet, the husband of my friend, Craig, and a former long-term care ombudsman for the state of Florida. His death was tragic, and happened in the home. He literally passed away in Craig's arms. 

I reached out to my friend when he posted his agony on Facebook. Craig immediately asked if I would serve as the celebrant at Jim's funeral, whenever it would happen. And I said it would be my honor.

Within about 24 hours, I was getting noticed that the funeral would be happening on Sunday, September 29th at St. John's Episcopal Church in Tallahassee. My head was spinning. At that time, we were less than two weeks out from this announced date and I hadn't had a chance to sit down with Craig or Jim's brother, Glen. 

Hurricane Helene interrupted the plan. Dignitaries invited to be on hand for this man who had been a champion of LGBT+ seniors needed to get it on their calendars. And St. John's, which is a beautiful, stately cathedral looking church, had its own funerals and several weddings that had already been taken for any weekend dates. We finally settled on October 15th at 3pm.

And I finally had a chance to sit with Craig and Glen and join with them in their place of grief and mourning, anger and frustration, and I got to learn more about this man who I had only had the pleasure of meeting once at Craig's retirement party from the Florida Supreme Court. I wish I had gotten to know him better.

But I took what I had gathered...prayed...and gave back to a congregation of mostly so-called "unchurched" queers... a picture of Jim as more than just their friend and partner, but an advocate who embodied all the qualities of a good and faithful servant of God.

See what you think.

Texts: Isaiah 61: 1-3, Psalm 23, John 14:1-6

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Friends…let us pray: may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be always acceptable in your sight, O God our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

 

Many thanks to all of you for being here for Craig and for Glenn…and thank you to Jon, Rep. Tant, and Nadine for your words and offering some more context for Jim’s life…his purpose…and helping Craig tell the story of his beloved partner and the pain surrounding the circumstances of his death. There are no words to soften the hard realities.

The prophet Isaiah exclaims:

“The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,

because the Lord has anointed me,

he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,

to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim liberty to the captives

and release to the prisoners…”

For those who heard those words many centuries ago…this was some good news.

This was said to a people who were feeling crushed…and brokenhearted and lonely after being conquered and carted away by a hostile empire.

Now the prophet Isaiah was proclaiming their freedom.

They could go back to their homeland and breathe easy again.

These words are ones that Jesus read aloud in the temple in Luke’s Gospel.

This was the passage that Jesus read from the scroll as he was proclaiming his purpose and reason for being.

They expressed the meaning of his earthly ministry…a ministry of freedom for those who were oppressed…and kindness to those who desperately needed someone to show them love.

These are the words that ring true for every person who makes that bold commitment to making their life about serving others.

Those guardian angels on earth who are the friends to the friendless.

The people who have that spirit within them that sharpens their vision, so they see those who others so easily ignore.

The ones who advocate for the least…the lowest… and those getting lost by the system.

These words paint a picture of the child protection investigator…and the commitment and attention needed to be the long-term care ombudsmen in a state where the most vulnerable require an advocate grounded in loving kindness.

These are words that are befitting of Jim Crochet.

Truly the spirit of the Lord was upon Jim…to live out a life of service rooted in Love.

A love that was strengthened and sustained in a partnership with Craig…and informed from a life of growing up in a military family…coming out of the bayous of Louisiana.

It’s our life experiences that inform how we live and move and have our being.

And the spirit of God implanted in Jim from his experiences gave him a deep belief in justice.

An abiding and unwavering sense that he could do his part to bring about a more just outcome for those who have been pushed down… and beaten up by the world.  

Certainly Jim…and those of us in the LGBTQ community in Florida…know that it takes persistence and patience…and a whole lot of strength to stand up to the bullies and tyrants.

It also takes a heart that has been broken…and knows the sting of rejection… to have the compassionate care to be a loving and loyal advocate.

Standing on the side of the powerless…going to the mat for someone’s grandmother…parent…or spouse who is getting ignored and abused in a facility…isn’t the work that gains a whole lot of fame and fortune.

But for those who hear those words of Isaiah…who feel that spirit of God saying: release the captives…free the oppressed…comfort the brokenhearted….

Those Jims of the world aren’t in this work for kudos and big bucks.

They do it because it is right.

And they care to make this world a better place.

When Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life” he was talking about the peacemakers and the justice seekers such as Jim.

He was telling his disciples…and by extension…telling all of us…that the way…the truth…and the life is bound up in the commandment to love one another… and do right by each other.

The way for us to live into that spirit of Isaiah’s prophetic proclamation is to remember the lessons seen through Jim’s life.

The life of a true servant…a dedicated brother and loving partner…and a friend and advocate to those who needed someone who would fight for their rights and their dignity.

Jim left us too soon…that’s true.

His death hurts all of us who remember his warmth that radiated through his entire being.

No one feels that loss heavier than those closest to him: Craig and Glenn.

You two have been plunged into that valley of the shadow of death that psalmist so aptly describes.

Grief does that. The shadows in that valley are long.

And the tears you shed are the rains that feed the river that runs through that valley.

Your tears join with those of so many who know and have experienced a profound loss and untimely end to a loved one’s life. 

That valley walk hasn’t gotten any easier for any of us.

But I came across something recently in the prayers of our Jewish siblings.

It was in their Yizkor service as part of their prayers on Yom Kippur…the day of atonement.

And it made a very astute and important observation about the promises made and kept in Psalm 23.

The psalmist doesn’t say that evil will end…or that suffering and pain will be eradicated.

But the psalm does make one very important promise: You are not alone.

Craig and Glenn: you aren’t on an island and alone in your grief.

Those here present with you today…Jon and Nate…Tip…Allison…Nadine…all of us…everyone here are with you in that valley.

Our presence today is the reminder that you have many who will help you as you navigate this path…and offer a helping hand when you trip over the rocks along this journey.
This is the way…and the truth…and the life of how God works in our realm…through the love we show and share with one another.

Jim is there with you too.

In every memory weaved into that tapestry of your lives together.

From the way his whole face lit up with his smile… to his discerning tastes about what does and does not belong in gumbo.

He may not be here in body…but Jim lives on in your heart…and he’s with you in spirit.

The spirit of the Lord is upon you…and me…and all of us…to remember Jim’s dedication and love…and to be with you…and help you to carry on.

In the name of the one Holy and Undivided Trinity.

 

 

 

 

"Life's A Journey" A Sermon for 21B Pentecost Proper 23

Well...hello again!

Hurricane Helene was supposed to smash Tallahassee with Category 4 or at least high Cat 3 winds and rain on September 26th. Instead...it clobbered Florida's Big Bend Coast...and followed Idalia's path through Valdosta...up to Augusta and Savannah...and finally causing the predicted landslides in the southern Apalachian mountains. Asheville, North Carolina's downtown became a river. And towns such as Chimney Rock were completely destroyed. 

It's been hard and awful. And it hasn't helped to have people peddling lies and conspiracy theories about FEMA trying to take people's homes...and others putting out weather maps depicting mythical storms forming in the Gulf of Mexico.

Back in Valdosta, power lines and substations were down...utility poles snapped like toothpicks...and roofs and homes damaged by the winds. St. Barnabas was without power to the church for a little over a week; although our parish hall came back online after about four days...allowing us to offer a place for folks to go to charge their phones and sit in the AC.

All of that to say: last week's sermon was mostly a time to talk about what had happened. The week before we couldn't meet and even if we had wanted to...some folks literally would not be able to get to church because there was a tree blocking their driveway or their street.

So here's this week sermon...largely based on Mark 10:17-31...and the rich young man who wants to know what he has to do to have eternal life. Enjoy!

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“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”

We’ve probably all heard that phrase at one time or another.

The band Aerosmith used it a song in the 1990s called “Amazing.” Steven Tyler…the lead singer… wrote:

“Life’s a journey, not a destination and I can’t tell what tomorrow brings.”

There’s lots of theories on where that phrase came from originally.

The most likely source seems to be that a pastor named Lynn Hough used it when he was doing a Sunday school teaching back in the 1920s about the apostle Peter.

 

Regardless of who came up with that phrase and when…it’s the one that kept coming back to me as I looked over our readings this week.

We’ve been slowly recovering from a major hurricane…and praying for others as yet-another one slammed Florida this past week.

Lights are on again.

Off again.

And then back on again.

Our nerves have been given a jolt every time some bad actor or conspiracy theorist decides to go on the internet and peddle lies about new storms…and raise doubts about the helpers sent to assist us with the real ones.

As linemen and women work to untangle power lines from downed trees…and broken power poles snapped like toothpicks…thousands…even millions of people…are sweaty…hot…tired…and bothered.

We humans are not always the best at being patient…especially when we’re uncomfortable.

The journey lately has certainly been rocky and fraught with difficulty.

Like Job…and our psalmist…we lament.

We want a quick fix…and we want it now.

“My God, my God: where is our air-conditioning?”

“Haven’t we been good people?

What else must we do to get our power back on and to stay on?”

What else must we do.

That’s where we find our rich man coming to Jesus in the Gospel of Mark.

He wants to know, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Isn’t there something that I can do?

We can almost picture Jesus raising an eyebrow at this question.

What must he do?

Jesus takes this in and goes ahead and tells the man to basically keep the commandments that he presumably already knows.

But that’s not what the rich man is after.

He wants to know…”What’s the quickest way to get to the destination…to get and possess eternal life?”

He’s impatient. He already knows all about the journey…the whole don’t murder, don’t bear false witness, honor your father and mother, yadda yadda yadda.

He wants to know: What else must he do?

Again….I’m thinking that Jesus’ eyebrows must be permanently up at his forehead.

The rich man has completely misunderstood the mission.

Because none of this is about doing; it’s about being.

It’s about how one is living right now to make things better in the world right now.

It’s about the journey…being in communion with all of creation….the expansion of friends and family.

It’s about that sense of belonging that manifest both when life is going great…and learning how to make lemonade when life delivers us a bushel of lemons.

I think we all get caught up in this same misconception that we must “do” something to receive what is already available to us in the form of God’s grace.

We tend to think that grace is some sort of commodity that we can only have if we do something more…something extra…beyond simply being and living a life based on Love.

But the thing is we can’t do anything to earn the gift that is freely given.

And there’s no short cut or “get grace quick” fix.

What Jesus offers to this man…and what is offered to us…is the invitation to stay on the journey and not worry so much about the destination.

And that requires us to change our perspective of what it means to inherit eternal life.

Eternal life is in the present…not some future “when I get to heaven” sort of thing.

How are we moving…living and having our being right now as people of God?

Like the disciples and this rich man…we can so easily get deluded into thinking that “grace” equals “material rewards.”

That’s the terrible theology of the prosperity gospel… that somehow having lots of money and “things” is proof of God’s love.

But the reward that Jesus is promising has nothing to do with money or more stuff.

And that’s the rub for the rich man.

Jesus has burst his belief bubble…and challenged a whole system of believing that equated wealth and status with living in God’s favor.

It’s what Job has gotten wrong in his ranting and raving at God in our First Lesson.

Job…like the rich man…like Peter…and like us mistake that having material things signals God’s favor.

But a life of faith is not a guarantee of only good things in life.

In fact… to follow Jesus is to join with him…

At the bedside of a sick relative…

In the grief of a spouse…

With the person who has lost a home…or their job

 To cry out in those words we remember Jesus said on the cross:

 “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?”

It’s too bad we didn’t hear all of Psalm 22…because the psalmist knows…that even in this moment of agony… that God is still there…

Later in Psalm 22 at the 23^rd verse we hear:

“for he does not despise nor abhor the poor in their poverty; neither does he hide his face from them; but when they cry out to him he hears them.”

Because God shows up for us…and in us.

God becomes known and seen and experienced when we help each other.

When we come alongside a person…whether it’s a family member…friend…or stranger…and lend an ear or place our hand on their shoulder…that is the way…the truth… and the life… of being Jesus.

That sort of loving kindness is a manifestation of God’s Love in the here and now.

Companionship…compassion…are the riches we get on this journey.

Journeying together through the valley of the shadow of death makes that trek a lot less lonely and frightening.

Be willing to let someone be the embodiment of Jesus for us makes us a whole lot more human.

In the name of our one holy and undivided Trinity.

 

Jesus and the Comfortable Words: A Sermon for the Feast of St. Anna Alexander

 

September 24th is the Feast of St. Anna Alexander; however as a patron saint of the diocese of Georgia, churches are encouraged to celebrate her feast day in place of the normal Sunday liturgy. I'd like to believe I had a small hand in that...having asked the bishop last year in front of my congregation on his visit if it would be OK for us to make that switch. Our diocesan convention accepted the resolution put forward by Racial Justice Georgia to make it a diocesan-wide practice. Anyway...here's what I had to say about this remarkable woman and her witness in southeastern Georgia in the first part of the 20th century.

Text: Matthew 11:25-30

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We just heard in Matthew’s Gospel:

‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. ²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’

This beautiful statement is one that I remember from my childhood…although phrased a little differently.

This passage is among what we Episcopalians know as “the comfortable words of Jesus.”

I have vivid memories as kid hearing these words…and the other short “comfortable word” snippets of Scripture…read right before the priest would lead us in the Eucharist.

This particular one from Matthew has been one of those touchstones in my life.

I have returned to it often…whether I was feeling particularly burdened or not.

Even at times when I wasn’t attending church…I could still hear the voice of one of our priests reciting this passage.

These truly are comforting words when we think of Jesus offering us respite from the burdens of the world…shouldering the load…stepping alongside us when we need him most.

And they were necessary words…given what Jesus had been offering up to his disciples in the verses before.

This was a way of giving them this blessed assurance for their souls.

Prior to this passage… Jesus has given a very detailed description of the dangers of discipleship…

To follow him will be a hard…and arduous path…a perpetual struggle.

He’s warned the disciples that he’s sending them out like sheep among wolves.

He’s announced that families will be divided on account of his name.

He’s even announced that there are cities that face a massive downfall…worse than what happened in the story of Sodom’s destruction in the Book of Genesis.

With all that as the set up for today’s Gospel reading….we get the idea that Jesus is not only wanting to offer comfortable words….he’s also saying to those who are feeling especially worn out by the world…those who have been among the disinherited and the pushed aside:

I see you.

I am with you.

And I’m promising the heavenly gifts will come to the tired and weary who turn to the Source of Light and Love for help.

Realizing all of that…there couldn’t be a more perfect Gospel lesson to have on the day when we remember St. Anna Ellison Butler Alexander and all that she did living at time and place where there were many obstacles set up in her path.

Y’all have the biography of Anna Alexander in your bulletin insert with the readings.

So you know that she is the daughter of former slaves on the Butler Plantation, which was a huge tract of land along the Georgia coastline.

You know that she became the first and only African American to be set aside as a deaconess in the church…and it would only be later that deaconesses would gain recognition as deacons.

We know that she and her siblings built churches and schools in Darien and Pennick and that she taught school in and around Brunswick for more than 50 years.

But what makes this Gospel lesson…and these comfortable words of Jesus… such a perfect reading for her saint day is that they reflect her reality when we remember the times in which she lived and did her work of Christian witness in the world.

It was the turn of the 20^th century.

The Civil War was still a relatively fresh memory for people who were still alive.

Jim Crow laws were well-established throughout the southern United States. And there lynching and attacks on Black communities happening across the South and Midwest. The area known as Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma, had been destroyed by white violence.

The whole town of Rosewood, Florida, which was a predominantly Black town was wiped out by vigilantes when a white woman claimed she had been assaulted by a black man in  January, 1921.

Here in Valdosta, we remember the horrific killing of Mary Turner and her unborn child in 1918.

Our own Georgia diocese had split in 1907…and the new bishop of Georgia excluded Anna Alexander and all Black churchmen and women from participating in the diocesan conventions…a wrong that would take more than forty years to correct.

Knowing that this was the reality in which St. Anna was placed to live out her calling as a teacher and moral guide to children in Pennick…we can imagine that she might have earmarked her own Bible to return to these comfortable words of Jesus.

We can appreciate that for St. Anna Alexander… having to persevere and find ways to fund her church and school under such circumstances… she needed a Jesus who both forewarns his disciples that discipleship comes with a cost…but not to lose hope… and to remember that Jesus would be there to comfort and sustain them through their trials and tribulations.

These words…penned for Matthew’s community reeling from the Roman Empire’s destruction of the Temple in 70 CE… were likely just as important for St. Anna Alexander to ponder and consider as she helped lift up the hearts and minds of black children in Pennick in the early 1900s…while living in a world full of violence and danger.  

Even today… in September 2024…I can believe there are many people both here in this church and outside our red doors who the need to hear Jesus say, “Yes, child, it is tough to be my disciple. The world makes it hard. But don’t give up. I’m with you… my teachings…my yoke…will keep you afloat amidst these storms of life. The time is now. Believe…and spread the love.”

We are fortunate to have this mediator and advocate that we have in Jesus.

We have his example of living in Love…even as people walked away from following in his footsteps grumbling that the demands to love were too great.

Jesus demonstrates what it means to stick close to that source of love…speak truth to power… and even when rejected… even to the point of death.

And yet…he still was able to rise again.

In these times when we are seeing people turn against each other… even within families… we have these comfortable words of Jesus to keep reminding us that we are not alone.

If we will accept his teaching… a teaching grounded in love for each other… no obstacle… no rhetoric… will grind us down.

Go to Jesus…go to that source of Love…all you who are weary and heavy laden. Close your door… or shut your eyes… and ask for that rest your soul needs.

Seek that solace and receive the strength you need to keep going.

In the name of the one holy and undivided trinity.