Fifth Sunday of Easter
Acts 11:1-18
Psalm 148
Revelation 21:1-6
John 13:31-35

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
 grace and peace to you from the one who defines who we are and whose we are. Amen
 
So Peter has a crazy thing happen to him,
 he’s out and about spreading the good news
 that Jesus is the Messiah,
 
he’s doing it among his fellow Jews
 because they’re the ones waiting for the messiah
the one sent from God to the chosen people of Israel.
 
Now remember these are the people who God chose
 and set apart a long time ago
and to mark their apartness
God gave the chosen people all these laws to follow as a gift,
 
you know the main ten,
 no other Gods,
don’t use the name of God in vain,
 keep the Sabbath,
don’t kill, don’t covet etc.
 
and then after the main ten there came a whole lot more,
some six hundred more laws
and the arrangement was
that as long as the people followed the law
life with God would be good
 
 but if they broke the law
God could do everything from hide
to downright punish the people
 usually through occupying armies
taking over the promised land.
 
Now this is over simplifying the relationship
because God is also gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love,
 
 but the essence is that the mark of the chosen people
 is the following of the law, however imperfectly,
  
 it’s how the Israelites show they are chosen
 both to God and the world around them.
Following it is a big deal.
 
Which brings us back to Peter and his crazy experience.
Peter is in Joppa sharing the message of the messiah
He takes some time to pray
and while he’s praying he has a vision,
 
in the vision he sees a buffet of animals
 that are prohibited for food by the law,
 and a voice tells him to “Get up, kill and eat”
 
Peter protests saying
 “by no means Lord; for nothing profane or unclean has ever entered my mouth”
 he’s a faithful follower of the law
 it’s the right response,
 
but instead of congratulating Peter for his faithfulness
 the voice says “what God has made clean, you must not call profane.”
 
as the vision ends
 some gentiles arrive,
gentile is the blanket name for everyone else
those who are not chosen by God
 
and they invite Peter to come with them
and nudged by the Spirit Peter does
and as he shares the news of Jesus
 the Holy Spirit comes on these outsiders
 in the same way that it had on all the disciples
 
and faced with the actions of the spirit
Peter goes ahead and baptizes the people
and stays with them
and by doing so breaks the law.
 
Which is why when word of this gets back to Jerusalem
the people there are pretty upset with Peter,
 in spending time with the gentiles
he has betrayed his identity as an Israelite
  
in our first lesson we hear Peter’s explanation
 to his fellow apostles and believers,
and at the end of his story he concludes:
 
“And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them just as it had upon us at the beginning. And I remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ If then God gave them the same gift that he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could hinder God?”
 
With this the complaints are silenced
and the apostles praise God
 for giving even the gentiles the good news.
 
Faced with a huge shift in identity
 Peter and the apostles hesitate,
 push back even
it’s a natural reaction to changing identity
 
but despite their misgivings as they pay attention to the work of the spirit
 and as they remember the teachings of Jesus
 they are able to praise God at the new thing God is doing in their midst.
 
 After all, on their last night together
Jesus did give them a new commandment,
 a new identity marker for the community
when he told them “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
 
Love is the new law
The new marker for the community
and honestly we struggle with that,
 even after all of these thousands of years,
 
 like the Israelites we go through periods of struggle
where the communal identity shifts
toward a more inclusive understanding of community
 and then we settle in
until it seems like we’ve always done it this way
 
And that’s when God shakes things up
Reminds us of the law of love
 
and breaks out the phrase
 “What God has made clean you must not call profane”
 
And once again we struggle with our identity
 because things are changing,
 those we thought were out are now in,
 
these are the moments where we must follow the lead of Peter
and pay attention to where the Holy Spirit is moving and working around us
and remember the teachings of Jesus
and perhaps then we will conclude with Peter
 “who was I that I could hinder God?”
 
Because when we think about it,
what God is doing for them,
whoever that happens to be,
it’s the same thing God has done for us,
 
In love God claimed us
and gave us an identity that will never change,
 child of God
 
 that identity is ours
no matter what anyone else says,
 or how the community changes
 
we are God’s beloved,
and when we think of it in this way,
who are we to hinder God? Amen
 

Festival of Pentecost
Ezekiel 37:1-14
Psalm 104:24-35
Acts 2:1-21
John 15:26-27, 16:4-15

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
grace and peace to you from the one who sets loose the spirit. Amen
 
The spirit is on the loose.
 That’s what Pentecost is about,
 the unleashing of the spirit in the world
 
we have three readings today
that help us understand what this means
 who the spirit is,
 
and in each of these readings
we find that the spirit is the gift of God,
 it is unleashed by testimony
 and brings life where it is heard and received.
 
In Ezekiel we have the story of the dry bones,
 because we hear it in English
we miss some of the nuances of the story,
 
 Hebrew is a language
where a lot of words have double meanings
 and authors often play with those double meanings,
 in this story that word is ruach
which means both breath and spirit
pointing to the intimate connection between the two
 there cannot be life without breath
and when we think about it can there really be life without spirit?
 
God takes the prophet Ezekiel
and sets him in a valley of dry bones,
then asks the prophet if the bones can live?
 
 all indicators say
that these bones are dead with a capital D
but the prophet defers to the power of God saying
 “O Lord God, you know”
 
and God instructs the prophet to speak to the bones,
 to tell them of the promise of God,
that God will bring them back together into bodies
 and will cause breath to enter them so that they will live.
Instead of speaking to these bones directly
God gives the words to Ezekiel to tell to the bones,
and Ezekiel using his own breath prophesies to the bones
 
 and they come together and form bodies
but they are not alive
until the prophet speaks to the breath, to the spirit
to come into these bodies
that they come to life.
 
Then God explains the object lesson to the prophet,
the people of Israel feel like these dry bones,
dead with a capital D,
 but through the words and breath of the prophet
God promises to breathe life back into the people
 who thought there was no life left.
That is the power of the spirit
 
Perhaps you’ve experienced something like this,
you were in a dry valley of faith or life
and it seemed like there was no climbing out of it
and then someone spoke a few words to you
 and things didn’t seem so hopeless anymore.
That is the work of the spirit set loose in the world,
 the spirit that is as close to us as our own breath.
 
In our Gospel
we hear Jesus promise to send the disciples an advocate,
 the spirit of truth
and this advocate will testify,
will speak on behalf of Jesus
 so that the disciples may also testify,
tell others of Jesus and his love.
 
As he is saying good bye to his disciples
Jesus acknowledges that there’s a lot that’s been left unsaid
“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.”
 
the spirit is truth,
 that comes to advocate when the time is right.
 
We are abundantly aware of the things left unsaid,
there are a multitude of issues in life
that Jesus in the Bible does not directly address
 that we struggle with,
 
we have trouble bearing them
we disagree about what to do
when we are faced with them,
they divide communities,
 
and yet in the midst of it all
 is the spirit of truth
showing us the way,
speaking through a prophet or two or three the words of Jesus,
 “love one another as I have loved you”
 
the message spreads,
 slowly sometimes
and as it spreads Jesus is glorified
in the love of the community
that is growing and expanding
through those who tell what they have heard from the spirit of truth
 
The spirit is on the loose spreading the truth.
 
Finally we have our reading from Acts,
the account of the first Pentecost.
 
The risen Jesus has appeared to the disciples
and they have witnessed Jesus’ ascension into heaven.
They know they are on their own so to speak
and they are preparing to continue on as a community,
 
on the morning of Pentecost,
a festival observed fifty days after the Passover
 the community is gathered
 
they hear a sound like the rush of a violent wind,
 this sound fills the house where they are
 and the holy spirit appears
 like tongues of fire above their heads
and fills the disciples who begin to speak in different languages,
 
all of this causes such a racket
 that people are drawn to the house
and as a crowd forms and the disciples spill out of the house
still speaking in their given languages
the crowd is amazed
 because they can understand the disciples,
 they are hearing the message of Jesus in their own languages,
 
 of course there are some naysayers
who think the disciples are drunk,
but Peter interprets what is happening
 through the prophesy of the prophet Joel,
the prophesy that says in the last days
 the spirit will be poured out on all people
young, old, slave, free, male, female, everyone
 
all the distinctions that normally divide will fall
as the spirit is given out equally
 and all shall share the words of the spirit with the world
 and these words will spread like wild fire.
 
The spirit is fire,
by nature it spreads often unpredictably,
 and even we humans who have harnessed the power of fire
appreciate that it is a wild thing
 that we manage and contain but really have no control over
and we get into trouble when we forget that fact.
 
The spirit set loose in the world,
through the gift of God
 and the testimony of the disciples
is out of the disciples’ control
 
just like that the people who come from all corners of the earth
who hear the spirit filled message of the disciples
will take it home with them,
 and they will tell others
and Jesus’ word will have spread to the far corners of the earth
far away from the original disciples.
 
It’s quite a contrast
to the first part of Acts,
the measured preparation that the disciples take,
casting lots to choose the most worthy follower of Jesus
to join the in crowd
 
the spirit busts that all open
because it’s not about worthiness
it’s a gift of God to all people
regardless of how they are defined and divided by the world
 
 the spirit, breath, truth, fire
shows up especially when people are defined and divided
 and interrupts those divisions,
 that attempt at controlling who is in and who is out,
 who claims to have the truth
 
there the spirit interrupts
breathing new life into places we have caused death,
spreading the love of Jesus like a fire that cannot be contained
showing the truth found in love
all while working through us,
the words we speak
the love we share.
 
Life, truth, fire
Watch out,
the spirit is on the loose.
 
And I say,
come Holy Spirit. Amen
 

Second Sunday of Easter
Acts 4:32-35
Psalm 133
1 John 1:1-2:2
John 20:19-31

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
 grace and peace to you
from the one who comes to us in community. Amen
 
Today we hear reinforced in our readings
that for better or worse,
 the way Jesus has decided to come to us,
 to continue the relationship post resurrection
 is through community,
 
 namely the community of disciples
that gathers in Jesus’ name,
or as we sometimes call it ‘the Church’ with a capital ‘C’
 
Thomas was absent
the first time Jesus appeared to the community of the disciples,
 and while his demands
 have been played up as doubt vs the disciples’ belief,
 all Thomas wanted
is what the other disciples first received,
 to see Jesus,
 
and when he is with the community the next week
Jesus comes again
and Thomas has his chance
and exclaims “My Lord and my God.’
 
 Out of Thomas’ questioning
comes deep faith,
 facilitated by the community gathered.
 
Then the gospel writer
takes the opportunity to offer a blessing
for all of us who have believed
without placing our hands on the resurrected Jesus
 as Thomas had opportunity to.
 
We may not have placed our finger
 in the spot on Jesus’ hands
where the nails when in,
 nor have we place our hand in his side
 where the soldier’s sword pierced him
 but we have all encountered the body of Christ on earth,
 
we would not be here today
had we not come into contact at some point with that body
 and members who make up that body,
who brought Jesus to us and into our lives,
 
 because that is how the gospel message is spread,
 through the community.
 
We heard in Acts,
the history book of the early church,
how the church formed and spread
 after the ascension of Jesus,
 
 how the believers were of one heart and soul,
how they gathered together to hear the testimony of the apostles
and how each member of the community was as valued as the next,
as lived out in the distribution of communal property
such that poverty in the community was wiped out.
 
 Other places in Acts
tell how this community attracted more and more believers every day.
 
Now I don’t know about you,
but to me that sounds like a pretty good community to be a part of.
 
In confirmation this week our lesson,
serendipitously
was on The Church,
 
each lesson starts out with a Bible passage
 and questions to get us into the lesson
and this week the passage was a very similar passage in Acts
as our first reading,
 
 and the writers of the curriculum remarked
that the description of the early church
sounded like a party that anyone would want to join,
then asked the confirmands to consider
how the actions of the church members
 helped or hindered how Christ’s message first spread.
 
In talking about it
we agreed that the character of the community
had a lot to do with the success of the early church,
 and then we agreed that it is still the case,
 
 how church members and communities act
make or break how the message of Christ is spread,
whether or not people want to take part in the community,
the primary place in which God chooses to be revealed in the world.
 
And if the community is like the one described in Acts,
 that’s great,
 
but we don’t have to think very hard
to find an example of when a community
did not live in a way that made people want to take part in the community
 
in fact I think it might almost be easier
 to think of negative examples,
 the times of exclusion, hate,
petty bickering and power dynamics
 
 and all of a sudden
what sounded like gospel
the proclamation that Jesus comes to us in community,
starts to sound like law,
 
 because we are intimately aware of the fact
that the church is not perfect,
nor are the people that make up the church perfect
 
 and yet we’re the primary way
 that Jesus uses to build relationships with people?
 That’s a lot of pressure,
there is a lot riding on our imperfect selves
and the imperfect community we make up.
 
But lest our despair at our imperfections
cause us to give up on the community
, as so many have done,
there is a word of grace,
forgiveness,
that when we sin we have an advocate in Jesus Christ.
John, in our second reading
 addresses the reality of the Christian community,
both the good and the bad,
 
his description of how the community works is beautiful,
 how the older community members share their experiences
 and build relationships with new community members
so that in these relationships,
relationship with God is built,
 
 and then John acknowledges the reality
 that communities don’t always practice what they preach,
 just saying we have fellowship with God is not enough,
 we must also live out that fellowship.
 
oddly enough
John doesn’t seem too concerned
about the particulars of the sin
 present in the community,
 
 he acknowledges that it’s better not to sin
but if anyone does
there is forgiveness in Christ Jesus,
 
what John seems more concerned about
is the failure to acknowledge our sin,
our imperfections,
 
from this passage
we get the line that is used in confession and forgiveness
“If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, if we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
 
The key then to the Christian community
 is authenticity rather than perfection,
 
I mean which community would you rather belong to?
 one that pretends it’s perfect
 and points out others’ imperfections
 
or one that acknowledges its faults,
 asks for forgiveness
and moves forward with the intent of not repeating those past mistakes or harmful actions.
 I know which one I choose,
and strive to create.
 
 and perhaps that’s the genius
 of God working through an imperfect community
 and imperfect people,
 
 it’s the way to connect with others
 who are not perfect
and to share with them the grace
 that has transformed our lives.
 
One person who has lived this out in a very public way
that comes to mind
 is Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber,
she’s a Lutheran pastor and public theologian and author
and has been quite open about her struggles in life with addiction,
 
and through her openness about her imperfections
and her experience of grace
 God has used her to gather a community of people,
many of whom who have felt excluded by other Christian communities in the past
because of their imperfections.
 
 I’ve heard her speak several times
and a couple times she’s mentioned
that some people at her church  
have told her they feel less intimidated coming and confessing to her
 because they know that she’s done way worse things
 and that God has forgiven her.
 
When we’re in a less than ideal situation,
 it’s comforting to know
 that there is someone else who has been through it
and survived and thrived,
 
 and that is the essence of Jesus,
 Immanuel, God with us,
 who has experienced everything we do,
 even death
and who live and loves us still,
 
  in fact on Maundy Thursday we heard Jesus command the disciples
 “to love one another as I have loved you, by this everyone will know that you are my followers, if you have love for one another.”
 
The mark of the community gathered around Jesus
 is love,
 Jesus love,
that he first shared in a community,
 that he continues to share in community.
 
Jesus comes to us in community,
 Jesus comes to us in community
 so that as a community
we can live and share the gospel message of Jesus’ love.
 
That is why we are all here,
imperfections and all,
to experience the love of God
through one another,
and to share that experience with the whole world
 so that like Thomas
 all may exclaim “My Lord and my God.” Amen
 

7th Sunday After Easter
Acts 1:6-14
Psalm 68:1-10
1 Peter 4:12-14, 5:6-11
John 17:1-11

​Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
grace and peace to you from the one who prays for us. Amen
 
Here’s the scene:
you know you’re going to die soon.
What do you say to the loved ones you’re leaving behind?
What do you want them to know? To feel?
To carry with them the rest of their lives?
 And how do you tell them this once you’ve got it all figured out?
 
Or you’re on the other end of the good bye,
wondering how you will move forward in life,
who you will be in the absence of your loved one,
wondering what you are supposed to do without them.
 
This is the scene we find in our gospel for today,
Jesus knows he’s going to die soon
and this is his farewell address to the disciples,
 
it reveals what is most important to him,
 what he wants the disciples to carry with them
even as he answers their as yet unspoken questions
of identity and purpose.
 
Jesus starts by saying once and for all
the purpose of his life,
 what he wants the disciples to remember
- that God sent him, his son-
 to bring eternal life to all-
 
that is why Jesus has been among them,
 and in the event that they are unclear on it
 he defines eternal life:
 
being in relationship with the true God
who is revealed in his Son Jesus Christ.
 
Jesus’ purpose has been fulfilled
in his relationships with the disciples,
relationships where he has communicated who God is,
 through his presence among them
 
 and this has not been a general presence
but a personal intimate presence,
one built on relationships,
 
it is a presence that participated in the whole range
of the human experience from life to death,
 
a presence who felt the pain of the mourning
and raised the dead,
 
a presence who felt the hunger of the crowds
and provided bread and hope,
 
a presence who became the life of the party
when the wine ran out,
who got to know the people he encountered
and who loved them faults and all,
 
Peter the blockhead,
 Thomas the questioner,
 Martha the overworker
and yes even Judas the betrayer,
 
 Jesus loved them all
 and saw them as a gift from God,
 was honored by the relationships,
the people that God had placed in his care
 
 and in the end,
 in his farewell address
 he gives thanks to God for them
 
And it is in this thanksgiving
for the gift of his disciples
that Jesus begins to lay the foundation
 for the disciples’ future life,
 
a life without his physical presence
 yet where they are still in relationship with God
because they are God’s,
 
he paints the picture a future
where they will be the presence of Christ in the world,
where their purpose will be to live the eternal life
given them by Jesus
 
and to share that eternal life with others
by being the presence of Jesus in the world,
in the same way Jesus shared it with them,
by building personal relationships
 that reveal God as one who is intimately concerned
 with the lives of God’s children.
 
Jesus knows that this will not be an easy identity and purpose to live out,
 especially in the sadness and confusion,
the joy and wonder
 at his death and resurrection
so he closes his prayer for the disciples
with a prayer for protection and unity.
 
 He closes his prayer,
 that’s how Jesus has chosen to give his parting message to the disciples,
through a prayer for them that they overhear.
 
It is a beautiful and intimate thing to be prayed for
and it is reflective of the intimacy Jesus has with both God and his disciples,
 
it also creates new life in the people who pray and hear the prayer.
 Prayer is not just communication with God,
 a checklist of requested items
but a time of relationship building
 where hopes and dream are exchanged
and those involved are empowered to live into the new life
envisioned in the prayer.
 
Even as Jesus says good bye to his disciples
 he creates new life for them,
just as he creates new life for us
 for we are overhearers of the prayer too,
 we are disciples,
Jesus prays for us
knowing what we need in his seeming absence.
 
Today we mark the ascension of Jesus to heaven
 as we heard in our reading from Acts,
 and we remember the promise that Jesus will return,
 it has been many generations of waiting
 for Jesus to return
 and though Jesus has left us with our identity and purpose,
comes to us in the bread and wine at the table
 and is present in the spirit
sometimes we can’t help but feel his physical absence,
 and we wonder why,
 
 just as when we lose a loved one,
 we still miss them
and wonder what the future will bring
even as we live out that future.
 
These are the moments when we go back to the farewell,
we take time to remember and be renewed
in the memories of our loved ones who have gone before us,
who we are because of them
 and our purpose in life after them,
and we are renewed in our convictions.
 
In the same way
we take time to remember Jesus,
 to hear his prayer for us,
to be renewed in our identity as children of God
 and Christ’s presence in the world
 and our purpose of living and sharing the eternal life
of relationship with God
that has been given to us.
 
It has been many generations
 since the first disciples
witnessed Jesus’ ascension to heaven
and yet here we are,
 children of God,
living the gift of eternal life in relationship with the God
who Jesus revealed to us by the community of disciples,
 Jesus’ presence on earth.
 
We remember with thanksgiving
 those who passed the faith along to us
 and the prayer that Jesus prays for us,
 
 
 and so renewed in our identity as beloved children of God
 and our purpose of sharing that relationship with others
 we live into our eternal life in Christ. Amen