Show the Way

 

We are undergoing a type of revolution here in the United States. The "Supreme" Court's decision in the Callais case out of Louisiana, stripping away the final portions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, has led to a cavalcade of Southern state legislatures hastily redrawing their Congressional districts in an effort to disenfranchise black voters. 

Blacks tend to vote for Democrats, and the Republican Party is desperate to use any means possible to stop the inevitable thrashing they're about to get in the wake of this horrid regime and its greed and grift at the expense of working people.

On Saturday, May 16th, thousands assembled in Montgomery, Alabama for All Roads Lead to the South. This was a rally to motivate all people of goodwill to stand up and fight for the rights of black and brown people to have their voices count at the ballot box this election year. I had really wanted to go, but having done so much driving lately...and the prospect of having to do seven hours round trip to Montgomery and then have the energy to drive back and forth to Valdosta the next day....nope. The spirit was willing but the flesh said, "Are you nuts?!"

But the evil being done in state legislatures, and my own grief still present at the loss of friends, was very much on my mind as I read through the scriptures assigned for this Sunday after the Ascension. Rather than isolated one pericope, I found that the Spirit was drawing on pieces and parts from three of the four.

See what you think.

Texts: Acts 1:6-14; 1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11; John 17:1-11

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I recently reconnected with an old colleague and friend from my days working in radio.

In our back-and-forth exchange…she shared with me an interview she had done with her husband for the StoryCorps program.

StoryCorps is an independent audio production company that travels the country by silver bus.

They set up shop… usually for a couple of weeks in a location… and offer to record people who want to share their stories about anything…and then StoryCorps distributes a copy of the recording to the participants.

The originals are housed at the National Archives in DC.

Some of those recordings are also played on National Public Radio on Friday mornings.

My friend had signed up with her husband to meet with StoryCorps when they came to her city.

And they reminisced about how they met.

As part of their discussion… they talked about death.

He was much older than she was…so the presumption was that he was going to die first.

He told her that when he died…he wanted her to be happy…and to do whatever things would make her happy.

“But what if I’m not going to be happy when you’re gone?” she asked.

“Well, you’re going to have to figure that out, kiddo.”

He did die…about six years ago.

And my friend is still striving to figure it out…and to find happiness in a life without her beloved.

Grief…and the sense of a profound loss…of a spouse…a lover…a job…or even fundamental rights…can plunge us into a liminal space.

The world keeps spinning on its axis…but we don’t feel as though we’re traveling at the same speed as everyone else.

It’s that odd time of knowing that something has ended…and yet we are stumbling our way toward the beginning of something new.

That’s the place where we find the disciples right now…as we move from the season of Easter…and the joyfulness of the resurrection… and head toward Pentecost…and the next act in God’s dream for the world.

This past Thursday…the fortieth day after Easter…we marked the Feast of the Ascension…which we heard about this morning in the Book of Acts.

Jesus’s time on earth has come to an end…and like the prophet Elijah…he is lifted up and away… to take his seat at the right hand of God.

Our Gospel lesson from John this morning recalls Jesus’s concluding prayer for his friends…a final appeal to God to watch over them…be with them…protect them from the storms of life that will come their way.

Jesus has done all he could do in his time on earth.

Now it’s their turn to figure it out.

It’s also our turn.

As we have listened to these words of Scripture today…and over the past many weeks…months and years of our lives…we’ve been given countless lessons in how to live into Love.

All the prayers…the hymns that we sing…and this meal that we share at this table…they’re all meant to reinforce and remind us that we already have the tools in our proverbial toolbelts to do the sometimes frustrating…and yet important and joyful work of repairing the breeches in the world around us…loving our neighbors…no matter who they are…in the way that we want to be loved…cared for…and treated.

We heard Jesus’s prayer in John’s Gospel…but Luke’s account of the ascension gives us some more color around that moment with disciples as he left them for the last time.

Luke tells us that Jesus spent his last hour opening their minds to understanding the Scriptures…connecting the dots between the prophets of the Old Testament…and everything he had shown and taught them.

And just before he ascended into heaven…he was offered them a blessing.

But rather than being in despair…Luke says Jesus’s friends “returned to Jerusalem overwhelmed with joy.”

Not moping.

Not handwringing.

They were overwhelmed with joy.

That’s such an interesting observation.

And yet it makes sense.

Because something had shifted in them.

Deep in their hearts they understood that this ending of Jesus’s earthly ministry wasn’t an end….like “Well, that’s over!”

No, his spirit…his words…his mission was with them…and in them…in the same way that it’s within us.

We are the new hands and feet and mouths of Jesus.

That’s really good news…especially as we face the challenges that are before us.

The author Anne Lamott used a phrase in a recent Substack article that resonated with me, “Life is getting so much lifeier than I was prepared for.” (“Gold” from Hallelujah Anyways, May 2, 2026 on Substack).

She was writing about all the things happening at the global level of life as we know it: wars…billionaires using and abusing people and systems…and…while she didn’t name this one… I would add to her list the breakneck speed at which Southern state legislatures are undoing all the heavy lifting of the civil rights movement.

Add to those troubles…the more personal things that affect us: the surgeries…the troubling diagnosis…the death of loved ones. And Lamott says, “that’s more lifeier than I was prepared for.”

But even with those realities that sometimes can come at us in rapid fire succession…we aren’t hopeless when we remember and return to the root of our being: the Love of God that is in us…with us…and around us always.

That’s what our Epistle reading from the First Letter of Peter is driving at.

Peter acknowledges that ordeals will test and challenge us.

We are going to face health crises…and bad days at work…and gerrymandered political maps that deepen the rifts between us…and make us turn on one another.

As Peter so aptly put it: “Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour.” (1 Peter 5:8b)

But when such trouble arises…we must resist it…and stay steadfast in our faith.

One of my favorite theologians…Howard Thurman…wrote that “the evilness of evil isn’t about destroying the body or reducing cities to rubble;

Its real target is to corrupt the spirit and give the soul the contagion of inner disintegration.” (Thurman, Essential Writings, quoting The Meditations of the Heart, 110-111).

Now.... I admit…when something big has happened that makes it seem as if the ground beneath my feet is shifting every which way…I find it hard to remember to slow down…and as Peter says “Humble myself,” meaning…enter that prayerful place… and lean on God to seek help.

Or…more accurately…I get so caught up in my own mental wrestling that I forget that God is waiting and ready to remind me of those things that I already have learned.

So when I have finally have worn myself out with my thrashing…I ask for God’s guidance…and taking some deep breaths…I make my plea to the Holy One:

To tell me again those truths…that the real nature of God is love.

And Love is stronger than hate.

Help me to hear those words… so that it fills my heart and mind with balm of God’s peace.

Ground me in the goodness that is always there…

Open my eyes to take in the wonder of God’s artistry in the rising and setting of the sun and the song of the birds in the trees.

And with my soul now calm and the noise in my head quieted down…again show me the way so that I may help lead others with strength…courage…and kindness…so that I may

not be a stumbling block to those seeking the freedom that comes from God’s love.

As Pentecost draws near may our hearts and minds be primed as we seek God’s peace…and hope…so that we’re ready to do the work of Love that’s before us.

In the name of our One Holy and Undivided Trinity.

The Transforming Power of Love

 

This has been a particularly rough patch for me personally. I have lost two friends, one a year older...the other a year younger than me... this past month to cancer.  In between mourning and funerals was the latest Mickee Faust cabaret, a celebration of new ministry in Valdosta at Christ Church, and my spring clergy conference on the Georgia coast. Following that, I traveled to last week to Fayetteville to participate in the funeral of my younger friend, the Rev. Leslie Roraback. And after our service at St. Barnabas this past Sunday, I drove through a massive traffic headache on I-75 to get to back home to Tallahassee to attend the memorial service St. John's held in honor of Leslie who had been their associate rector.

I didn't know if I would have the ability to write a sermon through exhaustion and tears. But I did. And I have a feeling that I had a couple of angels who were hovering over my shoulders to help me get it done in fits and starts. See what you think.

Texts: Acts 7: 54-60, John 14:1-14

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Following Jesus is not for the faint of heart.

To actually walk the walk…and talk the talk…of the one who keeps pointing the way to Love takes practice…patience…and an ability to handle the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and the sea of troubles that will come.

Now I want to be clear: to follow Jesus and to live out our Christian faith in this world does not necessarily put us in mortal danger.

Despite what some might want to say and trumpet on any number of social media platforms…we Christians of the United States are not a persecuted minority.

This is not Somalia or North Korea.

Even with the declining number of people attending churches in this country…. Christians still have an out-sized statistical advantage over other religious groups.

And we are still ahead of that growing number of people who say they don’t have any religious affiliation at all.

Of course…that could change…in part because of the way those who claim to be Christian are behaving…making gods of out of other “things”…and not following Jesus.

But if we can take anything away from the stoning death of Stephen…the first deacon and martyr of the church… it’s that when we have the courage to speak from a place of faith in Jesus…not everyone is going to receive it…and we may find ourselves facing hostility because of it.

Because the way…the truth…and the life that Jesus calls us to is one that doesn’t fit with what the culture counts as strength.

Jesus was about teaching us to keep looking beyond labels…and recognize the divine spark that lives in all creation…both humans and animals and even in the plant life around us.

The more we seek connection to one another…the closer we are getting to that vision…that dream of God…where we might stop falling into the trap of wanting to dominate others in order to feel as though we have some self-worth.

Now the interesting thing about Stephen is that he apparently was very good at living into his faith…and doing the task that he was given to do: to love and care for the Hellenistic widows of Jerusalem…helping to feed them as well as the other widows in the city.

The whole reason the apostles made Stephen and a few others into deacons was because the needs of both native Jews to Jerusalem and the Greek-speaking population were so great they needed some extra help.

But by Stephen doing these acts of charity…and being faithful… he aroused the jealousy of some.

And…just like with Jesus… Stephen’s detractors trumped up charges against him…and got some people to lie about him to the council.

But unlike Jesus…this man…described as having the face of an angel…decided to launch into a lengthy…detailed lecture…tracing the history of Israel…and the way that the people turned on Moses and the prophets.

And then he capped it off with accusing the council members of being stiff-necked and killing Jesus.

While his speech was passionate…it wasn’t the best way to win friends and influence people.

Just in the same way…screaming Bible verses into a bullhorn and condemning people to hell if they don’t profess a belief in Jesus is not the best kind of evangelism.

In fact…it’s pretty repulsive to most people.

There’s a reason so many have turned away from the church since the days of the Baby Boomers.

So this diatribe of Stephen’s wasn’t his best moment…and still…it ended up serving a greater purpose.

His killing was an awful and extreme act of retribution.

And…just as it did at the crucifixion…the attack on Stephen sent the disciples scattering.

And out of those ashes came new growth.

The disciples…coming in contact with others outside of Jerusalem…began to quietly and carefully…share the story of Jesus.

Philip would encounter the Ethiopian eunuch who…upon seeing a pool of water…asked “What is to stop me from being baptized?”

The same happens with Peter who finds the Roman centurion Cornelius and his family in Caeserea.

And as we heard this morning…standing in the crowd that was attacking Stephen was Saul…who would undergo his own massive conversion on the road to Damascus…and would become the prolific New Testament writer Paul.

What others did as an act of evil…God salvages and Love transforms it for good.

I think about these moments such as this one with Stephen…and the crucifixion of Jesus.

I note that in both cases…they didn’t give in to bitterness.

Even as others are attacking them and killing them…they still kept their eyes fixed on Love.

For Jesus…he prayed Psalm 22... a psalm of lament that ultimately keeps the heart fixed on God who is merciful.

For Stephen… he had that vision of Jesus at the right hand of God… and his faith and trust in Jesus’s ways led him to pray for forgiveness for those persecuting him.

I think about how anchoring ourselves in our faith…tapping into that lifeblood of Love that is around us…is our true superpower in times of trouble and turmoil.

It has helped me and so many others when things in the world seem so bleak…or unjust and out of whack with that vision that God has of us living in harmony with each other and the rest of creation.

I’m wondering who else might have had that experience?

Have any of you experienced something that felt like a set back of some kind…and through some form of prayer or even pleading to God… that you found your way through that time of trouble?

(Leave a moment for this. If nothing comes…move on.)

The thing is that we are always going to face challenges and difficulties. And Jesus knew that would happen big time for the disciples.

That’s why John records his extended goodbye speech to them…starting with this famous portion with “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”

Those who have learned from Jesus…and listened to Jesus…and absorbed all that…have all that they need to survive life’s tempests as they come.

When we partake of the bread and the wine at this table…we’re not only receiving into our bodies the elements that bring us solace….but this meal is about giving us the strength and renewal to face the challenges put in our path.

Love is the feast served at this table.

Keep that in mind this morning as you receive the bread and the wine…and may it feed us so we are ready to feed 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.

 

 

 

 

"The Word Became Flesh for Love's Sake"

 

I wasn't entirely sure how I was going to handle preaching on the opening to John's Gospel. It has such an otherwordly quality that I find it hard to grasp the best way into it. But with prayer and lots of wandering around...I finally got to a place of "a-ha." And it seemed to really strike a chord with a number of people in the congregation. 

See what you think.

Text: John 1: 1-18

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“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

Whenever I hear this prologue from John’s Gospel….I feel myself getting plunged into an otherworldly sea of poetry.

Unlike our other evangelists…who either give us a timeline of Jesus’ bona fides as the promised Messiah from the House of David…or a Jesus who’s already starting his adult ministry and preaching a one sentence sermon right off the bat…John traces Jesus back to the very beginning.

The beginning that sounds like the Book of Genesis:

“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth….the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the deep…”

John wants us to know that Jesus was present with God and the Holy Spirit even in that very beginning.

The Word was there.

And the Word was with God…and the Word is God.

And this Word became more than just a Word.

This Word became flesh and lived among us.

This Word that was at the beginning when God was creating the heavens and the earth…has now come into the realm of the earth…bringing heaven together with the earth into a human form.

This Word was born through the same way most everyone is born.

The Word was made flesh and blood…bones and ligaments…and coming to life thanks to the strength and courage of a young woman who said, “Here am I. I will be this mother of the Savior.”

As one commentator put it…this incarnation of the Word made flesh is a moment where humanity and divinity has a group hug.

Because the Word becoming flesh is the ultimate testament about a God whose entire being and language is one of Love.

Why else would God have become human?

I mean…God could’ve manifested as great ball of fire…or some magnificent creature.

But rather than coming to us in some terrifying way…God came to us as a vulnerable baby.

That’s true Love.

I remember the time when I felt that Love so profoundly.

My father had died and we had had his funeral and burial in New Hampshire.

But because my parents had briefly relocated to Tallahassee…and my father had been one of the favorites at his assisted living facility…and so many of my friends wanted to have “something” to remember my dad and support me and my mom…we held another memorial service at St. John’s in Tallahassee.

My mother had been attending church there…and thought the woman associate rector was the bomb…and that I needed to meet this priest.

But I could’ve cared less about the church…or women priests…or St. John’s.

After all…St. John’s for much of the 1990s had been the home of the most virulent homophobia I’d ever heard coming out of an Episcopal Church.

Reluctantly…I agreed to having a memorial service for my father on All Saints’ Day…which was a Thursday.

That following Sunday…St. John’s had a tradition of processing banners with the names of the departed.

My mom asked me to come back to church and carry my dad’s banner.

So…again…reluctantly…I went back to St. John’s to process this banner…which they then gave to my mom to take home.

Now…I had been in church three times in about a month and a half….the most I had been to an Episcopal church in more than 15 years.

I figured… I was done.

I’d completed all my obligatory good daughter deeds and I could go back to doing crosswords and drinking coffee on Sunday mornings.

But the Word which became flesh became a DJ…spinning all the greatest hits from the 1982 Hymnal in my head.

No matter where I was or what I was doing…I was hearing all the hymns from my childhood growing up in the church.

I bind unto myself today that God is working his purpose out as we crown him with many crowns the Lamb upon his throne…(incidentally the second line of that last hymn ironically says: Hark! how the heavenly anthem drowns all music but its own!)

I could not hear anything but the Episcopal hymnal.

When the following Sunday came around…I woke up with a booming voice in my head that commanded me to “Show Up!”

I showered.

I got dressed.

And I went back to St. John’s.

And for the first time in 39 years of being an Episcopalian… I heard every word of every prayer and every hymn and every line of Scripture and it all said one…unmistakable…and overwhelming message:

“You are loved. You always have been loved. And I will always love you.”

There was no asterisk.

There was no “I love you if you do x-y-z.”

This love was deep…and broad and wide.

The Word became flesh…so that the Word could use that opportunity to infuse all flesh with this Love.

To wrap all of us up in this cosmic hug that says, “You are so loved that I want to be with you…live with you…live within you. Experience your joys….and endure your sorrows…and bring you through the foggy darkness of a world that rejects and belittles people to show you the light that leads you to better days.”

The Word…The Love…came to us for this purpose.

As we hear in John’s Gospel: “…to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.”

We who gather here and come to this table every Sunday are God’s adopted children.

Through faith and grace we have become part of God’s loving inclusive family.

Now is the time for us to take what has been given freely and lovingly to us…this Word…and make it tangible for others.

I see that happening all the time here at St. Barnabas.

We bring the experience of Christ to others through such loving gestures as preparing our bags of loving kindness to those who are without a permanent home.

I see it in the way we take time to bake cookies for service members living away from their families during the holidays.

I see it in visiting with those who are homebound.

And there are so many other ways in which we manifest the light of Christ for others and remind those who are seeking to know this Love that they do matter…they are valued…and they are so loved that God sent God’s Word into the world not to condemn it…or call it rotten.

But to rejuvenate it…and remind us that the One who we call our Creator…who we say made all things…declared them…us and all of creation… good.

This One…this Word…wants us to live…and become agents of Love through grace upon grace.

 May that Love that put on human flesh at that First Christmas grow and spread like wildfire through us.

In the name of God…F/S/HS.

 

 

These Bones CAN Live: A Sermon for 5A Lent

Well, I'm running way behind the proverbial eight ball in getting my sermons posted! My apologies if you are someone who is visiting this blog and reading the mashed up musings that come from how the Holy Spirit lives, moves, and breathes through the Scriptures and into my brain.

There was so much richness in the Fifth Sunday of Lent lectionary. Ultimately, I found myself drawn to a comparison between Ezekiel's dry bones and the dry bones of Lazarus resurrected in John's Gospel. And I love the text of Psalm 130. 

Texts: Ezekiel 37:1-14; Ps.130; Rom.8:6-11; John 11:1-45

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Another long, complex, detailed lesson from John.

Another opportunity to contemplate the power of change.

And this time it is the ultimate change: moving from death to life.

In the Gospel…the raising of Lazarus serves as a pre-cursor to what we’re approaching… the death and resurrection of Jesus. And our lectionary diviners have made an interesting pairing of this story of Lazarus with the reading about the valley of dry bones in Ezekiel.

Both speak to the presence and power of God as the source of life.

Both show that even in the moments of our greatest despair… God can bring us out of the depths of our darkest places—as our psalmist says—and into a new and changed life.

The dry bones of Ezekiel represent the trauma of Israel. Foreign armies from Assyria and Babylon have swept in at various times…dispersing the people… taking the best minds and the strongest backs to far away lands and leaving behind a broken and despairing few.

They are devastated.

They are depressed.

They feel dead inside.

And so God asks the prophet: Mortal, can these bones live?

Can this people…this down and out…defeated… people… be brought back to life?

What a question!

Imagine standing in a place that is utterly destroyed.

Think of the folks in Rolling Fork, Mississippi.

A tornado has ripped up and trashed everything… from their lumber yard that they depend on…to the Dollar Store.

In this case of Ezekiel…the landscape is littered with bones instead of bricks and wood and broken glass.  

Can these bones live?

Ezekiel sees this sea of death before him…and gives the only answer he knows to give to such a question.

Demurly… he says… “O Lord God, you know.”

Ezekiel knows that if anything is going to revive Israel… bring back those who have been scattered in the diaspora… resurrect the people from their death of community… it’s the power of God.

Likewise… the same thing happens in the Gospel lesson with Lazarus.

Just as in Ezekiel… what stands before Jesus is a tomb… and a people broken by grief at the loss of a brother and a friend.

And in this case…Jesus enters into the grief.

For those who might have grown up in a tradition with sword drills (a term I only learned about a few years ago…good Episcopalian as I am… we don’t demand people know how to quote chapter and verse from the Bible)…the line in this Gospel passage “Jesus began to weep” is famously quoted as “the shortest line of the Bible.”

It’s even shorter in the King James Version when it says, “Jesus wept.”

Jesus joins with the mourners… the Jews who have come to Martha and Mary to sit shiva with them… a Jewish custom at times of mourning where a minyan, meaning ten Jews, sit with those in mourning for a week to be around them for comfort.

The tradition is that if the mourner wants to talk or cry… the minyan is there to bear witness but not to interfere with outpouring of emotion. It is a kind and gentle way of offering support to people in grief.

Sitting shiva is compassionate witness.

Compassion meaning that one enters the suffering of another.

When Jesus sees the emotion of the sisters… when they express their woe that Jesus didn’t arrive sooner…when he considers the loss of his dear friend Lazarus… Jesus begins to cry too.

This is a powerful image of our Lord and Savior.

Even the “Word made flesh” has so deeply entered into the flesh that this Word weeps.

There have been many times when I have counseled people in distress to remember that God really does meet them in their hurt and broken places.

I believe this because “Jesus wept.”

Jesus knows the ache of grief and loss.

 Jesus understands the pain in our hearts… and the trials and tribulations of our lives.

Here…Jesus weeps because this is a time for weeping.

And Jesus points the way to God by praying before everyone…thanking God for having heard his prayer… a prayer expressed by his tears and those of so many others.

And when Lazarus responds to the call of Jesus to “come out”…Jesus has shown the power of God… the same God who connected bone to bone in the valley and laid sinews on those dried bones. 

 In this act…  Jesus has affirmed that God has dominion over both the living and the dead and in this way…“God’s kingdom has no end.” (Nicene Creed).

The Gospel also gives us an equally powerful moment in this scene… and that is Martha’s confession about the identity of Jesus.

This declaration by “Martha”… that she knows that Jesus is the Messiah… the Son of God… is no less important than when Peter makes the same declaration about Jesus.

She expresses belief in Jesus… she hears him say “I am the Resurrection, and I am the Life” and she takes that in.

 This demonstrates her faith in God.

 Even as she is wagging her finger at Jesus for not coming sooner… even as she is wiping the tears from her own eyes…she still believes.

That’s a powerful moment in this story for us.

One can be hurt and angry and in sorrow…rage against the Almighty… and still have faith and belief.

Grief can look like that.

Grief is that peculiar world where we seem to be moving in another world

Time and space is going at a different speed than everyone else.

Death… whether it is the actual physical death of someone we love… or the other deaths we experience in our lives… relationships ending… a job loss… even loss of one of our senses or a body part… drops us into that place of grief.

What this Gospel… and what Ezekiel… demonstrate to us is that God meets us in that strange world…and moves with us through it.

When we’re wailing and wondering “God where are you? What took you so long?’ God is there.

When we’re looking at the broken bits of our lives as we feel ourselves sitting in the valley… God is there to breathe us back to life.

When we weep, when we sigh, and when we come around to finally saying, “Yes, I believe,”…God is ready with resurrection and restoration to life.

With God…these bones can live. Trust and believe.

In the name of God…F/S/HS.